User talk:Jimbo Wales/Archive 242

Institutional racism

Of course there is racism on Wikipedia. On Wikipedia it is called Institutional racism. Institutional racism was defined by Sir William Macpherson in the 1999 Lawrence report (UK) as: "The collective failure of an organization to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people."^[1][2] Please don't be thoughtless and deny that racism exists on Wikipedia. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 21:10, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

I haven't yet seen an example of Wikipedia (ie, the WMF or groups of longstanding Wikipedia editors) engaging in "discrimination through prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people." As Masem says above, Wikipedia is already taking action to address issues with systemic bias, which is the closest thing you'll see to (but distinct from) institutionalized racism. Such actions are the antithesis of "ignorance" and "thoughtlessness." 71.234.210.113 (talk) 21:21, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

That some people who are Wikimedians are working to eliminating institutional racism, structural racism, or systematic bias seems to make the point that there is a problem and not that doesn't exist. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 21:39, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

As I stated, systemic bias is not the same as institutional racism. Conflating the two does not help your case, and misapplying the term "racism," here or anywhere, does a disservice to those who have fought against actual racial injustice. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 21:45, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

@FloNight: Once again, do you have any examples of institutional racism through "prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping" by the WMF or a consensus of longstanding en.Wikipedia editors? 71.234.210.113 (talk) 22:45, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

From your comment and question, I believe that we have a different understanding of how structural racism, institutional racism, and systemic bias are related and the manner that they contribute to racial injustice. I don't have my textbooks available to me but an internet search show many books, articles, and websites that explain the way that an institution's policies, procedures and practices enforce racial injustice. One important point is that systemic racism may not be as readily obvious to those privileged by the system. It can be entirely unintentional. That does not stop it from being institutional and structural racism and systemic racism that causes harm through racial injustice. I have a few examples in mind that I can write up and share. It will be tomorrow my time. Thanks for engaging. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 00:04, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@FloNight: Well, even without examples, I think I'm starting to understand where you're coming from. Systemic bias leads to disparities in our coverage of certain topics, such as those relevant to racial minorities. You consider this disparity to be "institutional racism," as it disadvantages those with interest in these topics, right?

While this is a reasonable stance, I take issue with the use of the term "racism" for this phenomenon. Systemic bias does not target just racial minorities, it affects all groups which lack coverage in reliable sources. Systemic bias also doesn't target racial minorities on the basis of race, again, it's a matter of topics that concern any minority groups only receiving a minority of the coverage in reliable sources. It may seem like a convenient shorthand to call this "racism," "sexism," or "[whatever]-ism," but such terms are misleading. To say there's a problem with "racism on Wikipedia" is to say that addressing "racism on Wikipedia" will address the problem. But of course, neither the WMF nor the vast majority of Wikipedia editors are racist, and many will take corrective action against any perceived acts of "racism." The claimed "racism" is merely a symptom of the overall systemic bias. Unfortunately, there is (to my knowledge) no widely-accepted term for the systemic disadvantages felt by underrepresented groups in general. But using the term "racism" necessarily draws focus when it's only one part of the larger issue of systemic bias. It distracts from the relevant aspects of the problem almost like a red herring, and inhibits discussion of the broader issues. It also leads to unnecessary confusion, as we had here. If FloridaArmy had instead said that systemic bias was preventing him from writing articles on certain topics, he would certainly have had less objections and more support. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 16:28, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

+1. It is always explained clearly when WP:GNG was the reason for declining a new article for submission. It isn't helpful to throw around allegations of racism or sexism in this situation. This doesn't, however, solve the problem that some people (including important living academics) do not have a great deal of coverage in reliable secondary sources. There has been a long discussion about this at WP:ACADEMIC.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 16:38, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

This is the first time I'm commenting on Jimmy's talk page, but I have very strong reservations with people insisting that systemic bias shouldn't be equated with institutional racism. Unfortunately, and I speak at this coming from a minority community on the English Wikipedia, it is emblematic of institutional racism, and I'll be very blunt here: many English Wikipedia editors from the Anglosphere — and especially some who've participated in this conversation so far — have absolutely no idea what we go through just to get our articles to stick, especially in the last 5-10 years.

The English Wikipedia's insistence on "perfection", whether at AfC, AfD or elsewhere, is particularly detrimental for us from minority communities. How many Wikipedians from the Philippines or India or Nigeria or elsewhere have been driven out of our community because some editor from the U.S. or the UK nominated the articles they put a lot of effort into making for deletion, all because they didn't have enough sourcing to meet WP:GNG? I myself have had to deal with this, and at least I've survived long enough not only to be here today, but to also give a presentation on it. But because we're a minority community, we have to navigate through structures that the majority of our community — who just so happen to be composed of highly-educated white males from the Anglosphere — have built, and have built without any consideration for how it can affect those of us who aren't from that community and have to deal with all the handicaps that come with it. We used to allow stubs to stand and have others jump in to improve our work, but now we insist on having a perfect article the first time around or it will be nominated for deletion or declined at AfC? What on Earth happened to us?

Yes, Wikipedia isn't outwardly racist, and casual racism is something that doesn't prosper here. But we cannot deny that systemic bias exists, and that as a result there is a structural racism that we must continue to challenge and destroy so that we can have a more equitable, more equal and more open project that is accessible to all. But we are nowhere near there yet, and we have a lot of work to do. If I, with all my privilege, can recognize that systemic disadvantages exist on the English Wikipedia that happen to benefit a group of people at others' expense, I hope those who happen to be the most privileged (who also happen to be the very people having this discussion to begin with!) can recognize that too. --Sky Harbor ^(talk) 22:12, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

If you've read my comment above, you haven't understood it. I have other issues with your comment, such as your claims about stubs and your repeated assumptions of the demographic makeup of this discussion, but I see no point in engaging if you haven't digested this section yet. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 22:37, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Explaining to a person of color that he doesn't understand institutional racism is a new low point even for this page. Gamaliel (talk) 22:55, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I know I said above that the racism claims are like a red herring, but that actually is a red herring. Good show. It seems that "inhibits discussion of the broader issues" was prophetic. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 22:59, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I've read through your slides and that's not anything like institutional racism. You're identifying the fact that we have too many people that coming to Wikipedia without spending anytime to learn policy and guidelines and quickly grow frustrated and leave when their edits and contributes aren't kept. That's a systematic disadvantage but no specific group except for new users who have no patients to learn. We try to welcome new users but far too many run off to the worst possible places to make their first contributions, often driven by personal interest - such as running to pages about Trump or COVID - which creates major problems that we (experienced editors) can't afford the time to explain why there's problems with that. Or they come and try to write articles on people or topics they think are interesting but spend no time to read on WP:V and WP:N and we are forced to delete their contributions. Or a number of zillion reasons Ive seen. I come from the pre-Endless September days were "listen and lurk" was the recommended practice before contributing to a community but that's loooong gone today. People want instant gratification, but we require their contributions to meet very specific requirements. So yes, we are systematically acting against these types of people, but by necessity to keep the quality of the work, not because we don't want their contributions. This is blind to race, gender/etc.

Now you do raise a good point on topics outside the Anglosphere, but I do stress that our sourcing policies do not require English language sources except in the case of exceptional claims where we need at least some clear English translation. But we do have the issue that most of us in the Western countries NA and EU don't have good familiarity of what are reliable sources outside the Anglosphere so I can see a valid point that an AFC may be rejected because the reviewer can't make that distinction while they'd keep an AFC of similar sourcing quality based on clear English sources. That is something we wish we could do better on and that's not so much "racism" but "language-ism". All we'd can really do is hope that AFC creators are more helpful to explain non-English sources to AFC reviewers and AFC reviewers are more open to what are RSes from nonWestern countries. --Masem (t) 22:50, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

First off, as someone who's been on Wikipedia since 2005, I can see on its face that the creeping bureaucratization of Wikipedia over the last decade or so has had a visibly detrimental impact on those who are less able to keep up. I have difficulty as it is keeping up with the volumes of policy and guidelines we have on the English Wikipedia, and that's despite me being very privileged for someone who happens to be a person of color. What about someone who doesn't have the capacity to keep up? As it is, we have difficulty retaining editors as it is in the Philippines owing to the many social, economic and political factors that coalesce to deter people from effectively participating. What more if they have volumes of policy that they need to comprehend on top of that? (Not to say that having policy is a bad thing, but in this case, perfect is the enemy of the good, and it clearly shows.)

We cannot deny the fact that there are people who are disadvantaged by the way Wikipedia is structured, and the ones who are often disadvantaged are people of color. For those who happen to identify with the majority community, they don't realize that there are clear injustices that can be perpetuated in the name of policy. No one questions the reliability of U.S. or UK sources, yet major sources in the Philippines — despite being in English! — have had their reliability questioned (which was my point re: sourcing). No one questions the notability of a U.S. or UK celebrity, yet African musicians need to have a Grammy to be considered notable. You can insist 'til kingdom come that our policies are "blind" to gender, race and language, but while that may be the case on paper, it is rarely the case in practice. I know, because I've lived it. Many of our editors of color have lived it. You're likely extremely fortunate to not have to go through what we face, so please, don't you dare tell me that I don't know what the institutional racism on Wikipedia perpetuated by systemic bias looks like.

The fact that I'm probably the only person of color actively involved in this discussion (a cursory glance at user pages tells me most of the participants here are either from the U.S. or the UK, with one person from Romania) says volumes about the immense privilege many English Wikipedia editors have. We're too busy with real life to edit Wikipedia, and yet when we're privileged enough to be able to edit Wikipedia, we fight the uphill battle to ensure our nations, our histories, our cultures and our languages are adequately represented to begin with — something that you are privileged enough to not have to experience. While you get to enjoy having meta-discussions on policy and culture, we have to contend with fighting for the reliability of sources, advocating for oral citations just to get our stories adequately represented, and, heck, just ensuring that we can even continue to exist on Wikipedia, given what we face to even get to the door. --Sky Harbor ^(talk) 00:23, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

I see a single editor questioning that source at that AfD, and the AfD (on a topic most relevant to the rural Philippines) ultimately received nothing but Keep !votes. This is an example of institutional racism? 71.234.210.113 (talk) 00:30, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

"No one questions the reliability of U.S. or UK sources," yes, they do, all the time. Look at WP:RSN, or any of a number of AfDs. "No one questions the notability of a U.S. or UK celebrity," yes, they do, all the time. Articles for thousands of minor and aspiring celebrities have been deleted, including many from the US and UK. I hate to be insensitive, but please consider that your bias may be holding you back, just as you claim "most of the participants here" are blinded by their "privilege."

The only evidence provided in support of the idea that "racism" is the underlying problem here are appeals to emotion and claims that those participating 'just don't get it.' (FloNight left us high and dry) It's true, we don't get it, and that's because the arguments aren't very convincing. I can only imagine the emotions these discussions must bring out, but we need to have high-quality discussions if we want to resolve these problems. These comments based on passionate appeals and personal grievances are devoid of substance and do no one any good. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 00:48, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

I want to stress to @Sky Harbor: that none of Wikipedia's policies and, only speaking as a volunteer, as best as I understand the Foundation's policies/principles, support any position that would allow racism or any form of discrimination towards an editor as a person. We actively fight that when we see it happen or are notified when it happens. This is something that the WMF appears to also be establishing to roll out across all its projects in terms of handling civility, harassment, and discrimination towards persons. This is where when people call "wikipedia is racist!" its a very iffy charge because we absolutely do fight that when the discrimination is directed towards editors as persons.

What most of your presentation was about - and what most of this discussion has been about - is the racism/discrimination of the contributions of editors, which we do not give any bearing onto the person itself, outside of behavioral issues that tie the contributions to disruptive behavior that has to be dealt with (eg someone going around adding a negative slur to all African-American articles and clearly non-apologetic for it when asked about it- which we'd likely quickly ban per my first paragraph). Someone going around editing in good faith African-Americans is fine, that implies nothing to us about the editor outside their interest in that topic area. It is just that now, we're talking an area that we know systematic bias can occur: that this is an underrepresented group and sourcing difficult if not impossible to find to justify full articles, and there's not many volunteers that share that interest to help in that area. That we may not allow many drafts of articles on African-Americans to stay in mainspace, or even have these deleted is not a reflection on the editor supplying these articles at all -- which is where some your argument seem to be directed at - only the fact your contributions to date may have problems with the systematic bias that Wikipedia has a hard time overcoming.

There are things Wikipedia can try to do better like getting more volunteers involved in various underrepresented areas (like the Women in Red project does) or other similar article drive attempts, but there's only so much we can do about the lack of sourcing issue that comes from how history has treated these underrepresented groups and that is something that an encyclopedia we simply cannot overcome. (Hence, why I suggested maybe whos' who type project within the WMF bounds that would serve this better?)

And I would emphasis that why WP is not being racist or discriminary to you as an editor, only your contributions, is that if you also edited in articles that were outside underrepresented topics, where there was plenty of sourcing, in addition to your attempts to bring underrepresented topics to mainspace (assuming all contributions made in good faith), we'd still readily accept the other contributions, as your contributions int he underrepresented topic area against have no impact on you as an editor or affect your other contributions. This might be a point to try to get across to new editors better: that working in an article area that is better covered in sources as your first experience rather than something obscure is likely going to make your initial editing experience better, or that if you opt to spend all your time in underrepresented topics that you're likely to see a lot of difficulty getting your topics into mainspace because of the known systematic bias and provide resources to groups that might be able to help. But to the point: none of this is reflecting on any racism or discrimination on the editor as a person themselves, only their contribution.

This is probably where a lot of new editors do leave WP early because they don't understand that WP makes this distinction between the editor and their contribution. They seem their edits reverted, and feel that we've slighted them as a person and run off. Again, maybe we can set up our newbie documentation better to make is clear that just because they were reverted, or their article wasn't accepted, that they would feel bad about themselves. This might help make it seem less like we have any racism/discrimination occurring from that point of view. But there's only so much we can force a new editor to read before they hit "publish" for the first time, and there will always be some that don't see a word of that , and then come running calling a reversion of their edit as "censorship" or "racism" or whatever to an ANI board, which is obviously no the case. --Masem (t) 16:15, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Note: I've started a discussion of the "Who's Who" idea here, as this section is getting unwieldy. 2601:194:300:130:F405:9C39:A641:A0B2 (talk) 17:13, 1 June 2020 (UTC) <- Same anon, different IP

(Apologies for not responding yet. I had several unexpected visitors yesterday.)

First off, I want to say that I’m engaging on Jimmy’s talk page to have a dialog about a topic that I believe to be of utmost importance to the success of Wikipedia. I understand that racism is an ugly word and something that people want to distance themselves from. But in my view, organization and people who now pause and reflect about the ways that they perpetuate racism will be viewed in a positive way. Here and now, I encourage others to look deeper into the way that words and practices result in racism in our movement orgs and to provide a safe space for reflection about how change could happen.

Next, I want to make clear that I’m not an expert on institutional racism, structural racism, and systemic racism, but I did deliberately study the topic of racism over the course of a decade as an adult at a university to gain a better understanding of why racial inequity is persisting in major organizations (in particular health care orgs) in the United States. After I began editing Wikipedia in 2005, I expanded my studies and reading in order to gain a better understanding why Wikipedia and the Wikimedia movement is failing to meet the mission of providing free access to the sum of all human knowledge. Why does Wikipedia continue to attract a narrow demographic of people making it impossible to create unbiased content? How do the sociotechnical structures create barriers to participation?

I can see that recognizing and correcting the flaws that allow for systemic racism in Wikipedia will improve the lives of millions of people and change the course of human history. I’m not here to argue point by point for a win, or have anyone’s ideas dismissed as irrelevant because they are based on emotion, or someone's views declared invalid by the majority on this page. This approach is not going to move us toward having a community that is more welcoming of people who are underrepresented in the Wikimedia movement and on English Wikipedia.

I believe the vast majority people in the movement are not racist or sexist at heart and are capable of meeting the challenge. We need to make it a priority to look deeper into all of our processes and policies to see how they are impediments towards diversity and inclusion.

I also request that we show empathy for people who express concern about racism and other types of injustice especially as they share their stories.

I understand that some of these items I identify below are challenging to change based on the traditions of the movement. But it is essential that we look to the future instead of the past if we want to achieve our mission.

• The success of Wikipedia is largely based on volunteerism where well educated men from North America and Western Europe are spending their leisure time creating article content and enforcing policies. Niche paying jobs like Wikipedians in Residence and ED, Event Coordinators, and Trainers are limited to a tiny segment of the community. Programs that allow for compensation by way of stipends or jobs to create content are regularly quickly dismissed by the majority of the community as undermining volunteerism. There are many cultures or subcultures that do not allow for leisure time to spend engaging with Wikipedia. People of color are significantly more affected by this. Because this is a known fact, I believe that this is an example of systemic/institutional/structural racism because our community has devalued the significance of lack of leisure in people of color from creating Wikipedia content and kept it as a barrier to creating content.
• The moriturum/slow movement toward growing larger new affiliate Chapters is resulting in the more people of color being in smaller affiliates known as User groups. These smaller groups have smaller budgets resulting in a disporpatate amount of funds and resources continuing to go to the existing Chapters affiliates.. I have concerns that this overly cautious approach to funding affiliates who are in parts of the world that are underrepresented in the Wikimedia movement is rooted in systemic racism. This affects the ability of these groups to do the amount of training and recruitment needed to bring in a more diverse group of users.
• The nobility policy needs to be reevaluated because it is not working. Far too many articles about people of color that have encyclopedia type content are deleted because of lack of understanding of their relevance to their culture. We own this problem and need to find the solution instead of placing the blame with the outside world.

I'm sure that some of these are hard to accept, especially on first reflection. But I hope that we can open a dialog about them in the coming months. Sydney Poore/FloNightUser talk:FloNight 00:58, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

@FloNight: Thank you for your continued engagement. I too hope something productive can come from these discussions.

racism is an ugly word and something that people want to distance themselves from True, but not relevant to this discussion. As I stated above, referring to systemic bias as "racism" is simply incorrect and leads to confusion. You insist that we not dismiss concerns rooted in emotion, yet this seems just like an attempt to dismiss an argument because (you claim, despite evidence to the contrary) it's based on emotion.

I agree with you, in spirit, on many points. Systemic bias is one of the most serious and widespread issues affecting the content of the encyclopedia. Finding effective methods to further reduce the effects of systemic bias would greatly improve Wikipedia, and thus the experience of millions of people who use it.

As to your first bullet point, it is true, and unsurprising, that the editors of the English Wikipedia are mostly from English-majority countries, and that this contributes to systemic bias. Increasing editor participation from other parts of the world would help reduce the effects of systemic bias. I do not, however, understand how this would be considered "racism." People may not be able to contribute due to a lack of time or resources, but their ethnicity is not what prevents them from contributing. The same applies to people in the ethnic majorities who happen to be poor, busy, or uneducated. Nobody is barred from the English Wikipedia on the basis of race.

I can't speak to your second bullet point, although like many in the community, I think there needs to be greater transparency and accountability with how the WMF applies their ever-increasing budgets.

I disagree strongly with your last bullet point. The notability policy is one the most fundamental aspects of Wikipedia. Notability is not a measure of importance. Articles are not deleted because someone thinks they lack "relevance." Notability is purely a matter of sourcing, and whether sources are available. This does put many cultures at a disadvantage, because they may lack the well-documented and widely available sources as had in the western world. But Wikipedia, by design, can only contain information available in reliable sources. To change that would mean that Wikipedia is no longer a tertiary source, and thus, no longer an encyclopedia. There are no easy solutions to this. All we can do is make the effort to locate, access, and promote reliable sources that cover the topics areas in which we're lacking. Perhaps the Wikimedia Foundation could fund and promote projects to improve access to reliable sources in developing countries, or even to create new reliable sources of information (ie, help to publish books and promote local media). But these solutions are tangential to Wikipedia itself.

And therein lies the crux of my contention. Changing Wikipedia won't solve problems that aren't actually Wikipedia problems. The WMF and the Wikipedia community can exert their influence on the outside world in ways that benefit Wikipedia, but Wikipedia, by design, shouldn't be exerting it's influence on anything. It's very tempting to think that the solution to these problems might be as simple as changing a few lines of code, or a couple of guidelines, or reallocating some budget, but the issues driving the problems are far larger than Wikipedia. It is absolutely worth the effort to improve access to information and increase representation online for marginalized groups, and I applaud those who do so. But changing Wikipedia, in an attempt to change the world, will not only have minimal effect on the world, but would also result in massive collateral damage to Wikipedia. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 02:53, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

^^^ IP here has captured what I was going to reply with. Particularly with #1, we really need to not call this racism or discrimination. That's systematic bias we work as hard as possible as a volunteer project to convince editors and whatever outside forces (like school projects and editing drives) to help correct but it is not going to be a correction that happens naturally. But it is not racism and calling it that hurts this discussion. And the point on notability is spot out (outside that it is a guideline and not policy and we have some wiggle room at times) - it all starts with sourcing and that goes back to the systematic bias of where volunteers live and where the necessary sources actually are.

A good reminder to keep in mind; WP is always considered an unfinished project. Hopefully as technology catches up, we can get more local sources digitized, making them easier to source from anywhere in the world, and then searching becomes easier, and then we can add them. We've got the framework ready for when that can happen. It is not possible now because of the systematic disparity in the world, which is nothing WP can do to fix. --Masem (t) 03:11, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

This was a very interesting read, even though I disagree with much of it. The point about bias resulting from well-educated Westerners' greater leisure time is interesting. I went and checked the stats for two countries, India and Nigeria (both large enough to have clear numbers, and free enough that the WMF doesn't need to hide editor stats to protect the people there), to see how far we still have to go, and to what extent we are failing to convert readers to editors outside wealthy countries. The stats were quite far from what I was expecting: India makes up 8% of ENWP's readers and 8% of ENWP's editors, and Nigeria makes up 0.4% of ENWP's readers and 0.4% of ENWP's editors.

I am surprised by these numbers. I don't know quite what to make of them, especially since even if lack of leisure time somehow didn't affect editing, there are plenty of other things that I would expect to affect it in the same direction. --Yair rand (talk) 04:10, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Examples

User:Bob K31416 to answer your question, almost every article subject we have on politicians, judges, and athletes is less notable. Every pro athlete is automatically notable. Every run of the mill state rep, often real estate agents and small business owners, is considered notable. But these extraordinary men and women who achieved firsts and major exploits, some as former slaves, the Wikipedia community has deemed unworthy. You can come up with all the excuses you want. All of the above articles clearly meet inclusion criteria but they face an uphill battle. So yes, it's racism and if you want a scientific example here are my first three hits on a random article Jerome B. Friedman, Koala emblems and popular culture and Mali, Nepal. Yes, it's bigotry. And it's disgusting. FloridaArmy (talk) 21:17, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, Re "You can come up with all the excuses you want." — Don't look at me for excuses. I'm just pondering all this stuff. There's another thread on this page, Larry Sanger: Wikipedia "scrapped neutrality, favors lefty politics". Bob K31416 (talk) 21:51, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

When the left and the right are both accusing us of bias, you can be sure we're pretty close to neutral. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 21:53, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

For the rest of the world, both Republicans and Democrats are right wing. Tgeorgescu (talk) 21:56, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Tgeorgescu, true dat. Joe Biden's platform is closely aligned with Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union of Germany. Guy (help!) 23:45, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, Could you give examples of articles that you created about African Americans that have been accepted? Bob K31416 (talk) 22:59, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

There are lots and lots listed at User talk:FloridaArmy.--Salix alba (talk): 06:05, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Actions, not words

I feel, as several above have pointed out, that our lack of coverage of minorities reflects the bias of our sources and society more than it does our editors. However, us sitting and talking about whether or not we have racism is not as useful as asking: if so, then what? For argument's sake, lets assume Wikipedia is racist. How do we fix that? What would we change? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 22:03, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

The appropriate action to take is to accept and improve article subjects on African Americans and other unrepresented article subject groups that meet our inclusion criteria as those listed above clearly do. If someone disagrees and wants to take them to a deletion discussion all the better, as they will close strong keep and be further improved along the way. Enough with the excuses: the wrong action to take. We shouldn't need balkanization and an "African Americans in Black group" or any other special interest group to advocate for inclusion in order for these very notable subjects to be included.FloridaArmy (talk) 22:23, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

They do not meet our notability guidelines based on the sources provided, that's the point of why they have been rejected at AFC. They haven't been outright deleted because there is a slim chance that there may be more sourcing there for them but they fail notability to be put into mainspace at this time. To get them into mainspace, someone needs to do the legwork to look for more sources to show that either they meet one of the subject-specific notability guidelines, or more sourcing actually exists. You cannot just handwave and claim them notable because of your person importance standard. And this is where we have to be careful, we're not calling this out as being a matter of this being African-American subjects and thus require an apparent strong goalpost for inclusion. This is being impartial to what our policy and guidelines are for sourcing. If these were about white people in the exact same positions in life with the exact same type of sourcing, we'd be also not promoting them into mainspace and asking for more sources as well. Trying to twist this back to being about WP being racist doesn't help, we know what our limitations our with the systematic bias and do our best to fight it without losing our purpose as an encyclopedia. --Masem (t) 23:38, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Masem, so if someone is notable in, let's say the Philippines, but there aren't enough sources that would satisfy WP:GNG despite being notable, they aren't notable? The English Wikipedia as it is has editors who question the reliability of sources from outside the Anglosphere, so even if the policy on its face doesn't intend to perpetuate systemic racism in nature, practice suggests otherwise. Not to say that white subjects don't fail AfC, but the way the world is structured gives them advantages that allow those subjects to more easily pass AfC than, let's say, a non-white subject. --Sky Harbor ^(talk) 22:30, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

First, we're talking en.wiki's definition of notable, not the real-world definition. If you have reliable sources from Philippine papers that would meet the GNG (independent, in-depth secondary coverage - just not necessary in English) then we'd still be able to use those for GNG notability and sourcing; we don't discriminate against foreign-language sources. One key factor though is that en.wiki's definition of notability is not the same as the other sister wikipedias. Those other wikipedia may help point point to sourcing but just because an article exists in those doesn't mean we'd have an article. --Masem (t) 22:53, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Agreed that this is systemic racism, not institutional, though for some that’s a matter of little distinction given the democratic nature of this project. Symmachus Auxiliarus (talk) 22:59, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

• We would first need to know in what ways Wikipedia is racist. For example, if there's a group of racist editors causing disruption or pushing their POV, then we should have policies that allow us to block them for disruption and develop a neutral point of view. But we already have that. If editors are insisting on using low-quality sources with overt racial bias, then we should develop and enforce guidelines on reliable sources. But we already have that. If we can get some better examples of this supposed racism, we might be able to devise targeted solutions to the problems. But changing Wikipedia won't solve problems that aren't actually Wikipedia problems. The evidence thus far suggests that the issue lies outside Wikipedia, with the available reliable sources. Wikipedia, by its very nature as a tertiary source, is a victim, not a perpetrator. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 23:34, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

CaptainEek, I don't think Wikipedia is racist (though we occasionally turn over a stone and find a racist here). We do have systemic bias, and always have had. Guy (help!) 23:46, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

• Editor group projects. Do edit-thons, etc. with people who have access to libraries and research skills (students/teachers/librarians/academics/NAACP members/ACLU members/HBCU's etc. etc.) and want to write on the topics (see, eg Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red). -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:15, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

There's a lot to digest here, and I'm still digesting...for the moment I wanted to zero in on CaptainEek's comment, above, about how to fix racism/bias.

One thing I do, when I consider what subjects I want to edit: I look for scholarly dictionaries or encyclopedias on undercovered topics that will at least help me establish a foundation of notability for my articles. See Fati Mariko for an example (a couple of other Nigerien topics as well). They may not help me overcome the sourcing issue raised by Sky Harbor, but I hope they will at least keep such articles away from AfD. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 03:03, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Article reviews on FloridaArmy's Talk Page

I looked at FloridaArmy's Talk Page and found reviews of the account's many submissions, including 30 archives! And the FloridaArmy account is only a year and a half old. This account is an extremely prolific article creator.

I certainly couldn't look through all of the reviews, but as I started to look at the reviews on the current FloridaArmy Talk Page I didn't see a pattern of racism. There are so many articles in the 30 archives that I'm not surprised that someone could pick and choose the relatively small list that we were shown for the claim that Wikipedia is racist, which may be a misrepresentation. I'll wait to hear from FloridaArmy before deciding what to think of this. Bob K31416 (talk) 02:23, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Subjects related to African Americans and the African diaspora are far and away the hardest to get accepted. Even after they have been accepted they are the ONLY ones I've had dragged to deletion discussions. As the lengthy list of excuses above makes clear, subjects about Black people are largely unwelcome on Wikipedia. FloridaArmy (talk) 03:00, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I don't see it. Good luck with your articles. Bob K31416 (talk) 04:22, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

You need to demonstrate they are being rejected because of the subject matter. And to do that, you need to find articles of near equivalent "quality" in terms of the sourcing, the person of the topic of the article in terms of their status in life, and other similarities except race, and show that we routinely keep those at AFDs (or at AFC, do not challenge them and let them go to mainspace), as to show we are implemented a bias that is beyond the systematic bias related to sourcing. We've already established there's a sourcing bias against minorities, you need to normalize that out to proof that WP has its own bias beyond that. --Masem (t) 04:24, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, you've done nothing to establish your assertion. If you feel that you can do that, Masem has provided a framework. North8000 (talk) 18:38, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I think that AFC inherently will have a slightly higher "bar" for notability. Probably the biggest reason is that a reviewer has to put themselves on the line to say "this is wp:notable" for it to pass, and that other people may be looking at their decision later and so are probably more likely to "play it safe" and make sure it is not borderline. Whereas, later on it needs somebody to decide "this is not notable" to AFD it. So the borderline ones are less likely to make it through AFC. Also because AFC might be a bit of a teaching / mentoring area for new editors, where holding one up for improvement or finding more sources for wp:notability could be seen as a part of the teaching / mentoring process. North8000 (talk) 16:19, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

A new WikiProject?

After stating "We shouldn't need... an "African Americans in Black group," FloridArmy has created Wikipedia:WikiProject People in Black, seemingly by copying Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red (without attribution, oof). I note that a less ambiguous name might be "WikiProject:Black People in Red," and that we already have Wikipedia:WikiProject African diaspora, who should probably be involved with anything like this. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 19:14, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Good point about attribution. My mistake. Hopefully anyone who thinks Wikipedia should cover notable subjects related to African Americans and the African Diaspora will sign on. Sad that it's needed. But as the discussion above shows, it clearly is needed. FloridaArmy (talk) 19:25, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Assuming that you mean wp:notable, that is already the norm, and you've done nothing to support your claim otherwise. Repeating the accusation (as you again did implicitly again in the above post ) does nothing to support the accusation. North8000 (talk) 20:18, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

• Related? I've created WikiProject Black Lives Matter. Interested editors are invited to join. Thanks, ---Another Believer _(Talk) 19:09, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Update of article draft list in OP

Six articles in FloridaArmy's original list have been accepted. Here's the updated list with the accepted articles indicated without a bullet.

Vince Proby
Lucius Brooks

• Draft:John Clein

Hamilton High School (Memphis, Tennessee)

• Draft:Henry Hayes (musician)

Thomas Cardozo
Lawrence Lindell

• Draft:Storm Saulter
• Draft:Woodsworth, North Carolina
• Draft:Henderson Middle School (DeKalb County, Georgia)

Ferdinand Gaynair

I did a little editing on the Thomas Cardozo article. Bob K31416 (talk) 23:47, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

More evidence of racism

I've now been hauled before ANI, as I was after creating stubs on the African American Reconstruction Era politicians of Georgia. The hearing resulted in my being severely restricted.

Here we go again. The articles used as examples of my horrible editing include entries on African American politicians who were elected in North Carolina. Many were murdered soon after. But User:Guy doesn't want them included unless they are DYk length.

But No No No. No racism on Wikipedia. We can't have an editor adding entries on these subjects but it's absolutely not racism. No racism here folks. Absolutely no racism. FloridaArmy (talk) 16:38, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, bullshit. The problem is the creation of large numbers of undersourced stubs. You did that in mainspace, it overwhelmed AfD, so you were told to send them through AfC. Rather than banning you form creating articles (we have done that before), I advocate that you are reminded to at least put enough effort in to meet the standard of ...And?

If you are smart you will realise that this way you get more articles to mainspace and less drama. Which, it seems to me, is what everyone in that ANI wants. Guy (help!) 16:48, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Right, undersourced stubs on African American politicians, Cameroonian cuisine, and the military school where the Netherlands trains leaders of its former colonies. YOU ARE RACISTS. FloridaArmy (talk) 16:57, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

This is name calling. Most Wikipedians are not racists, if this is defined as prejudice or discrimination based upon race or ethnicity. Various people have pointed out that trying to interpret WP:GNG and making good faith decisions based on it is not racist.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 17:10, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

@FloridaArmy: Calm down. There is no excuse for personal attacks. You're just giving them a reason to block you. 71.234.210.113 (talk) 17:14, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

It is an established problem that African Americans or notable academics may not have enough secondary sourcing for a decent length article. We have been through this many times before. Once again, systemic bias is not the same thing as racism.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 17:20, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Let the racists block me.

Here we are on Blackout Day when we're supposed to be honoring George Floyd, an African American father killed with a knee on his neck as he begged for air and his life for 8 1/2 minutes. And a large group of editors is working stop me from creating articles on subjects about African Americans. The examples THEY targeted are Draft:James Martin (South Carolina), Draft:Solomon Dill, Draft:Joseph Crews and Draft:Lucius Wimbush. Guess what these people all have in common?

Let the racists block me. I'm not going to calm down or be quiet. I was attacked for asserting Wikipedia is racist. Not enough evidence. Honestly what more evidence do you need??? So let these Racists block me. It will be fitting. Especially going down after this discussion on Jimbo's page. FloridaArmy (talk) 17:26, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

@FloridaArmy: And how will playing the martyr help your cause? 71.234.210.113 (talk) 17:30, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm upset and angry over the Killing of George Floyd but it isn't helpful to throw around accusations of racism when an article for creation request is turned down.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 17:32, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

What do they have in common: they were Republicans. FWIW: I see the two black men's entries are now in mainspace, while the two white guys' stubs are still drafts. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 17:52, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

SashiRolls, the determination to ascribe motives is rather depressing. I hope that no experienced Wikipedian would be unaware of the fact that Republicans were historically progressive, and that the link between the Republican party and racism was a deliberate policy to hoover up disaffected racist Dixiecrats after the Civil Rights Act. Guy (help!) 10:45, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

If you don't mind, I'm going to steer clear of the mudslinging, but I'm not clear what the purpose of your "history lesson" is. I mentioned that the four pages were about Republicans because the tacit assumption was that they were about African-Americans. The pages above are related to the Reconstruction Era, which ended in the late 1870s. By the 1880s, the bank & railroad party (i.e. the Democrats) had consolidated power in the South with the aid of allied paramilitary groups (White League, Red Shirts, KKK, etc.). The Southern Strategy was several generations later (more than 20 years after Strom Thurmond's 1948 run as a Dixiecrat).

Also, Hoover, as you may know, was not one of our better presidents. His association with the Lily-white movement helped him break the Southern block in 1928. I suppose, being British, you may have been talking about "Boss" Hoover rather than HH? :) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 20:11, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

SashiRolls, the only point was that nobody's going to reject these articles because the people were GOP, because we all know that the GOP was different back then. That's all. Guy (help!) 20:36, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, it is rare to find any human who is entirely free of racial bias, but calling me and others racists is not going to win you a lot of friends around here. Asking for at least a minimal level of sourcing is not racist, it's Wikipedia 101. Guy (help!) 10:42, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, I looked over there at ANI and so far you haven't been restricted more than your current restriction of requiring AFC for new articles. So far it stands at 3 admins for further restriction, 5 opposed, and 1 neutral. Also, they don't seem inclined to block you because they think you're a net positive for Wikipedia.

Apparently the issue is the high rate of new article submissions by you that is difficult for AFC to keep up with. How would you feel about reducing your rate of new article submissions? You could use the extra time to expand your existing articles or expand articles before submitting them. Bob K31416 (talk) 19:18, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

I suggested the solution which is to remove the requirement I go through AfC. The community made clear that it doesn't want one or two sentence stubs so I don't by and large create those any more. Occasionally I do make exceptions. But I aim to please and always try to respect community consensus as best I am able. FloridaArmy (talk) 19:24, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

First off, I'm not familiar with the workings of AFC. I went over there to try to see how articles are chosen for review. As far as I could tell, the review of articles was voluntary. So it seems that if FloridaArmy was submitting articles at too fast a rate, editors at AFC would have the freedom not to review them. I'm probably missing something and maybe someone can help clarify. Bob K31416 (talk) 10:30, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, that's not going to happen for the exact reason that the AfC drama is happening. If you can't be arsed to write enough of an article to establish why we should care, then don't write the article. I'm astounded that you are so extraordinarily passionate about having these people on Wikipedia, and yet this passion stops short of being prepared to write a proper article. Stubs were fine when we had ten thousand articles and no Draft space. Now we have millions and the expectation is that a new article will be more than a directory entry. Guy (help!) 10:49, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

I can't control whether racists care about African American politicians or article subjects from Africa and Jamaica, but if the subjects meet notability criteria they should be included. I understand that not caring and not liking these subjects is widespread. Racism is a BIG problem especially here on Wikipedia. FloridaArmy (talk) 10:54, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Bob K31416 , I can at least reply to this, not barring Guy’s response, given my familiarity with AfC. There are a multitude of factors behind the acceptance of an article, though notability as guided by the GNG is paramount. With caveats for different subject areas, and POV forks. Perhaps you could provide us links to these AfC submissions so we can comment on specifics? Symmachus Auxiliarus (talk) 11:37, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

FloridaArmy, here's a clue: if you write more than a single sentence, the notability question becomes obvious. Wikipedia is not a directory, and writing what look like directory entries is a recipe for drama - as you already know. A lot of us support what you do, but your militant refusal to accept the validity of any concerns does you no favours at all. Guy (help!) 11:02, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

(Personal attack removed)

Pardon the interruption, but Guy, you seem to be familiar with the workings of AFC. Could you respond to the request for clarification in my last message? Bob K31416 (talk) 11:20, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Bob K31416, I don't think it's a problem creating large numbers of articles.For under-represented communities that can be a real boon. The problem is that FA has been restricted to creating articles via AfC, due to past issues with sourcing as far as I can tell; he resents this and it's becoming increasingly difficult to conclude anything other than that he sees this as some kind of challenge, to force reviewers to either accept his word on trust (i.e. abrogate the AfC process) or pick fights with them.

Saying, as FA does, that everybody who fails to appreciate the innate worth of every article he creates is a bigot or a racist, is profoundly unhelpful. It comes across - really rather strongly - as playing the race card. And I think if he continues to call individual editors bigots based on his own personal interpretation of their motives, rather than any objective evidence of bigotry, then I think he will end up blocked, which is a shame.

So to answer your question: I don't think anyone cares how many articles he creates, but they need to unambiguously establish notability before he clicks Submit. The most I saw created in a day was about six. That's not so many. But it's too many to have to go and look up the subject in your library every time. Guy (help!) 11:46, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy, Re your comment, "But it's too many to have to go and look up the subject in your library every time."

If any reviewer feels that way, doesn't the reviewer have the freedom not to review FloridaArmy's articles? Bob K31416 (talk) 12:20, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Bob K31416, not that easy. There's a backlog, and the backlog doesn't identify the author. So you keep opening articles and finding one short paragraph with a couple of passing mentions as sources, and no real indication of actual substantive notability. And as you see here, you get unbridled hostility if you don't accept the article.

Reading between the lines, FA resents having to go through AfC and resents even more any submission that is not immediately accepted because he resents having to go through AfC in the first place. And being frustrated, the then calls people bigots, liars, racists and what-have-you, which makes matters worse. Guy (help!) 20:34, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Guy, regarding your comment, "There's a backlog, and the backlog doesn't identify the author. So you keep opening articles and finding one short paragraph with a couple of passing mentions as sources, and no real indication of actual substantive notability."

After a reviewer opens an article, can the reviewer decline to proceed and return the article to the backlog? If a reviewer can do that, the reviewer can note the article title to avoid it the next time. Seems like this would significantly cut down the time involved. Bob K31416 (talk) 20:54, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• Liars and bigots do not belong on Wikipedia. If my article creations on African American, Jamaican, and African related subjects are upsetting to some that is their problem. FloridaArmy (talk) 11:27, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

  FloridaArmy, no, the problem is your refusal to write enough of an article that AfC reviewers c an easily see that the subject is notable.

  You know this. You know this is why you have to send articles via AfC. At this point you are doing a stunningly accurate impression of someone who wants to make it as hard as possible for AfC reviewers, because they resent having to go via AfC. And the irony is that both issues would be fixed if you just took the time to write a couple of decent paragraphs on the subject before hitting submit.

  AfC reviewers would stop bitching, and the AfC restriction would probably be lifted.

  Please meet people halfway and at least establish, in the article, why they should care. Guy (help!) 11:50, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

I do agree that it's a bit of a shambles to post an article with an erroneous birthdate to Jimbotalk... given the prevailing attitude about "completeness". Personally, (and yes I know this goes against current policy) I would prefer to run across sparse but interesting entries that need "correction" because I know it can be fun to "fix" their wiki-surfaces without changing the quality of what counts (the references)... someone being "wrong" on the internet can indeed be a motivating force some mauvaises langues might even say that's part of a "movement" strategy. Just look how solid that article has become in the last day... it's not just the birthdate that's been repaired for Mr. Q95967914!

I would submit to FA that JzG's statement the AfC restriction would probably be lifted might be worth pushing on at ANI (if that's still open) before piling up the briars & ligots for a self-immolation on Jimbotalk. It's lame to have to go through AfC when you like to work on edge cases. But your detractors are not all racists, some of them probably just like standardized punctuation and accurate birthdates (when they're in the refs)... -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 20:53, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Issues in Systematic Racism and Wikipedia and Notability

Contributors:

• Wikipedia makes systematically certain that no one has to know the race of any contributor, and for (almost all?) contributors their race is unknown. Question: Why is that not enough to ensure that racism is not systematic? Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:58, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• • One comment here: there are some editors that based solely on their editing patterns one can make a guestimate of their gender and/or race and/or geolocation. An editor that focuses on biographies of women? Good chance that editor is a woman. That said calling this out at any point if the editor hasn't already offered that information, short of behavioral issues, is an absolutely no-no under OUTING, but I know over time we've had cases involving editors mistreating other editors based on such implied behavior from editing patterns. When we know this is happening, we call it out as disruptive and put a stop to it. This may play a tiny bit into the systematic bias aspect - the ones that tend to raise this issue - even if they don't mention their gender/race/etc. - may reveal some insight, and other editors might call them out on this, which is not a good thing. In these types of discussions, we have to be very aware of not trying to make this a personal issue to the editor raising the question. --Masem (t) 23:54, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Alanscottwalker, I am thinking the same as your question presupposes. I don't see a racism issue here. Nocturnalnow (talk) 15:27, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

• @FloNight: speaks of a developed world demographic. Questions: How is that not classism, instead of racism? If race did not exist, would not unequal distribution of wealth/resources ensure skewed demographic, anyway? Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:58, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

African American topics:

• From both personal experience writing and just looking around Wikipedia, Wikipedia does cover African American topics. Question: Does that not prove there is no systematic bias in this area? Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:58, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

• There are multiple books/encyclopedias/journals/archives on African Americans in multiple fields. Question: As a systematic access problem to those resources, how can access be systematically remedied? Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:58, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Notability:

• "Notable" may be one of the worse concept-names there is -- it causes confusion, anger, and sometimes, it seems, even pain (as in, 'Obviously exceptional African American person is not notable!' Response: 'What the hell is wrong with you?'). Question: Why does not Wikipedia stop leading with its ass, and get closer to what it wants to discuss, something like, "Topic sourcing requisites", short name "WP:TOPIC-ABILITY"? Followed by, "General Topic-source Guideline" (GTG)? -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:58, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes it absolutely is classism. Race is a standby for class in a fair number of instances. My experience is that bourgeois snobbery is rampant here. (Most editors are not actually rich or even have a rich-person education, but you know: they identify with the ruling class.) But... I mean the Wikipedia is rampant with young, white, first-world, college people. That makes sense, so I'd expect bourgeois snobbery here. But... I mean, a person can transcend that, you know. But most people won't, either here or in real life. It's like water to a fish: you might as well convince a fish that they're wet as convince most Wikipedia editors that their mindset is blinded by class bias. And most of the rest are proud of it.

As to the subject a hand... a normal person would think "Here is an entity that is clearly notable (a band, let's say). We have evidence that huge crowds attend their concerts, their sales figures are thru the roof, they started a whole new genre of music, plus they're preternaturally skilled. However, nobody writes about them. They're from Franistan where the government absolutely forbids writing about pop music, and anyway the country is small, poor, and mostly illiterate, and anyway there's not even a decent machine translator for the Franistanian language. BUT, they're very well known and important anyway, in Franistan. Since that's so, our job here is dig up whatever references we can to support at least a small article about them. And to that end we should bend our standards some if needed... after all, we're not rule-bound here. We're here to serve the public."

But, like "reliable source" or "consensus" or many other terms, "notable" has a somewhat fuzzy relationship to the term as used by normal people in real life. To a Wikipedian, "Notable" means "has refs (to our standards)". That sorta kinda mostly works out -- genuinely notable entities often do have sufficient refs, but not always, so the paradigm breaks down sometimes, especially at the margins.

A functional response to that is "well then let's refine our rules to match reality" rather than "let's ignore reality when it doesn't fit our rules", but... it is what it is. People, you know? Herostratus (talk) 22:44, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

@Herostratus: This young white college stereotype is old and ridiculous. Have you ever been to a Wikimedia Meetup? How many young white college kids you see Wikipedia:Meetup/Gallery? And it looks like some Franistani revolutionaries need to make work of their oppressive government. TryKid ^{[dubious – discuss]} 23:21, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Ah, yer all wet. Herostratus (talk) 06:22, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks TryKid ^{[dubious – discuss]}

these photos are wonderful....the happiest most engaging bunches of people I've seen in at least 50 years....truly a beautiful gallery of groups of happy people from all over the place. These photos say it all about Wikipedia's fantastic influence and accomplishments. Nocturnalnow (talk) 01:58, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

People sometimes ask why Wikipedia has copious articles about characters in The Simpsons but not an African American activist or a female academic. The sad fact is that it may be easier to write and source an article about Mr. Burns than it is to write an article about these people. So it is time to accept that WP:GNG is not perfect, and can produce systemic bias. This is not the same thing as racism or sexism, although it can appear like that to some people.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:45, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

A point I've made time & again, based on my own experience. Why are there so few articles about Federal government ministers of Ethiopia, some of the most notable people in that country? Because despite a lot of effort, I could not find enough information to write more than a two-sentence stub on them. (And at the time I felt Wikipedia had far too many stubs, so I was loath to add more.) The easiest articles to write on Ethiopia was 19th & early 20th century history -- the time of European Exploration & Colonization -- & perhaps the least useful for defining the unique character of that country. (Even sources for history of the last 30 years were inadequate; one of the reasons I finally gave up writing articles on those topics.) -- llywrch (talk) 20:27, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

That said - certainly some of the top level posts in the government of Ethiopia are notable as government positions, and it would not be unreasonable in a standalone article on such a position to list all those who have held the post, which would give use redirect targets for any individual otherwise not notable otherwise. We'd not be able to include full bio details but this is where additional references for that person can be included. --Masem (t) 20:32, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I tried to do that. Online resources about details of the Ethiopian government (which is what I was depending on at the time) are sketchy, to put it mildly. For example, there was one government website that appeared to be the product of an afternoon's experimentation with IIS. Print sources, on the other hand, can be often be critically out of date. In short, in some subject areas of Wikipedia one must devote a great deal of time & effort to find the needed content. And the Foundation could offer some form of help in these efforts. (There are ways to help editors besides money, but finding the right person who is willing to help is often a discouraging challenge.) -- llywrch (talk) 22:12, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Ianmacm, if we relax GNG based on subjective "under coverage", I am reasonably confident we will have 50 articles on obscure Christian worship bands for every one on Nigerian scientists. Guy (help!) 11:03, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting relaxing the GNG rules, but have pointed out that the reliance on the sourcing that exists will sometimes lead to systemic bias.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 12:50, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

If you both agree that GNG is correct, then you may both agree that Wikipedia is not at fault for any bias that is caused by limited sources for some subjects. I mention this because when systemic bias is mentioned, there seems to be an implication that Wikipedia is at fault for something it has no control over, i.e the available sources. Bob K31416 (talk) 15:52, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Concrete examples

I think that anyone who questions the prevalence of racism on Wikipedia should probably spend 5 minutes reading the talkpages of our articles on, well, pretty much any unarmed African-American shot by the police. Or the archives of Talk:Barack Obama. Or how about the time when we had an editor who was quite literally a member of the KKK—he uploaded his self-produced pictures of cross burnings, which he insisted we call cross lightings, in the interest of neutrality—and the Wikipedia community was like, "you can't ban him just because his views are unpopular!" We actually had an admin say that it was a good thing to have him editing our articles on the KKK, because of his subject-matter expertise ("OrangeMarlin called for a Klan member to recuse himself from editing the Klan article. But really, who better?") Think, for a moment, about the way a non-white editor might feel about our embrace of outright KKK members into our community under the guise of "neutrality" and "objectivity".

But back to the present day. Take a look at Talk:Ronald Reagan. Reagan was recorded on the Nixon tapes mocking African diplomats as "monkeys". (His exact words to Nixon were: "To see those, those monkeys from those African countries—damn them, they’re still uncomfortable wearing shoes!") This portion of the Nixon tapes was suppressed during Reagan's lifetime, to protect his image, but was released a year or two ago, attracting substantial coverage in reliable sources (e.g. The Atlantic, New Yorker, TIME, BBC, etc), and some scholarly work has incorporated it into an understanding of Reagan's racial views. However, there is an ongoing, and likely successful, effort to suppress any mention of this material in our article on Reagan. The excuses range from the desperately silly ("This was a private conversation and there is no evidence Reagan knew it was being recorded", "this was a decade before he became President") to the outright shameful (minimizing it as "an unguarded and foolish remark in a private setting"). The article is full of fulsome trivia about Reagan, so concerns about notability are implausible. Anyhow, maybe we could start by committing to reject active KKK members from our ranks, and to basic honesty about notable, well-documented racist utterances from our political idols. It would be a modest start. MastCell ^Talk 23:01, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

(The hits keep coming: we shouldn't include the commentary because it "was not reflective of anything (other than the man he was trying to make nice with)". Nixon made him say those racist things! I mean, who could possibly be in Nixon's company and not say racist shit? Definitely not notable and not a reflection of anything! Jimbo, you have a problem. MastCell ^Talk 23:12, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Your criticism of editors who downplay racism and your connecting it to the broader problem of racial bias on Wikipedia makes editors "uncomfortable" and they feel you should be sanctioned for it per this discussion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Masem#Uncomfortable. That, if anything, just strengthens concerns of racial bias on Wikipedia. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 17:33, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

No, the issue is near direct calling out a specific editor as a member of the KKK based on the discussion here and the Reagan page, which is near a NPA and absolutely not allowed. --Masem (t) 17:49, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Where does Mastcell all out the specific editor who downplayed racism as a KKK member? I've read his comment above and all of the comments on the Reagan talk page. In his comment above, he's addressing two manifestations of racial bias on Wikipedia: allowing racists to edit (a long-standing issue that has been addressed in the broader literature about Wikipedia) and downplaying racism (an issue that reared its ugly head in the currently active RfC on the Reagan article). Snooganssnoogans (talk) 17:59, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes. The KKK-member editor was awhile ago, and he's long-since banned, but he was welcomed and valued by a substantial portion of the Wikipedia community despite his very open affiliation. He even had other editors affiliated with the KKK come to his page and leave supportive messages. His presence was defended in the interest of inclusivity of "unpopular" viewpoints, while people who objected were derided as "politically correct", irrational, or biased against unpopular viewpoints. I brought it up because it demonstrates how we as a community approach racial issues. I don't see any reason to think much has changed.

Separately, there is an obviously bad-faith effort to suppress well-documented racial issues right now, at the Reagan talkpage, and so far the major concern seems to be tone-policing me for bringing it up. Seriously, go check it out; editors are arguing that mocking African people as "monkeys" is somehow not racist (). MastCell ^Talk 18:12, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

It's the clear implication of the second half (I am ignoring the first part that deals with the long-past editors). Mastcell points out the past cases (which I will assume were true), and then goes on about their current problems at the Reagan page, and then says that "maybe we could start by committing to reject active KKK members from our ranks". No, they are not calling out any specific editor, but it is very clear between the lines which specific editor they are having problems with (since we know this is from the Reagan talk page) and why they are commenting here on this. It is clear as day who that editor is. I'm not saying there's anything wrong about the downplaying of racial issues, and I agree we need to be careful about suppressing information where appropriate, but you do not go around calling any other editor racist or the like , even indirectly, like this. WP:NPA is an absolutely policy, and if you cannot see the issue with your comment and implication, that's not good. --Masem (t) 18:19, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

The fact that you've spent a lot of time and effort tone-policing me, and made zero effort to confront the guy who sees no problem with referring to African people as "monkeys", makes my case more eloquently than anything else I could possibly say. MastCell ^Talk 18:26, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Masem is always very concerned that we never refer to harassers and other deplorables as exactly what they are but only seems to care when his blp concerns affect deplorable folk but not their victims.--Jorm (talk) 19:42, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

This has crossed the line into incivility. --Yair rand (talk) 19:46, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, but I agree with both Jorm and MastCell here. Masem was only brought here by someone who is on the other side of the argument at the Reagan talk page, and only seems to be concerned about BLPs when its someone on the opposite political spectrum of what most would consider the left. I think he should recuse himself from policing the politics area of Wikipedia as he lets his obvious bias cloud his judgement. This is just from an outsider looking in, so please feel free to ignore. Valeince (talk) 22:22, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

No, I will look for any case where we're not being neutral in how we use labels, and not only to BLP but bios and entities. The problem is, the problems arise nearly exclusively on the right, there is rarely a case of left-leaning labels that even come up for discussion, let alone exist. BUT this situation has zero to do with BLP or anything like that. It is an editor nearly calling out another editor on NPA for being a KKK member, and I dropped a caution on their talk page about getting close. If it was calling out the editor for being Antifa, all other factors the same, I'd do it again. --Masem (t) 00:20, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Why do you think that there are more labels for the right than for the left exactly? Could it be that they are accurate descriptors of behavior that is typically championed by the right than the left? There are more pseudoscience positions held by people in power on the right, examples being climate change and the fact the earth wasn't created in 6 days. There are more people engaging in the hate filled, racist rhetoric and ridiculous conspiracy theories peddled by the right then the left, examples including "pizzagate", the 75 year old protester that was recently abused by the cops being an "antifa provocateur", calls for journalists to be hunted due to reporting on false statements made by the President. There are more reports on the right engaging blatant falsehoods, emboldened by Trump who has such a documented detachment from the truth that he is fact checked on nearly every remark. Now, this isn't to say that the left hasn't had its issues as well, and when they come up they are documented based on what's been reported, but to say that they should be treated equal when they are clearly not is why I think you are not neutral in this matter. Valeince (talk) 00:43, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

And of course, I've never said we can't use labels, but they should be used in a neutral, impartial manner, as BLP, LABEL and several other policies say. It is really really easy in the climate today to stack up label atop label on certain people easily supported by the media (the scarlet letter effect I've talked of). That's fine, but we still are an encyclopedia writing for the long term, and we have to working from a much more neutral stance to be impartial. Doesn't mean you can't use labels, but they shouldn't in Wikivoice (eg they need attribution or some clear statement that it's a common label and that need to be backed up by consensus on talk pages), and shouldn't be the first thing said about a person or group until we've had a chance to actually state who or what they objectively are. That's it, 90% of the time. So yes, most of the time, this is only coming up with persons and groups with right-leaning labels, but point me to where left-leaning labels are misused in the same way, I'll be there. A lot of editors are angered (rightly so) by whats happening externally and the inability do anything about it - except on WP - but we are still committed to being an encyclopedia and we can't let feelings like that cloud judgement which happens far far too often nowadays. --Masem (t) 00:59, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

As I've stated at an ANI thread and at MastCell's talk page, I have been shown I was overzealous on the warning related to a possible NPA, so I'm being clear as well to publicly apologize to MastCell for that as well as to consider that matter closed from my side. (There's a separate ANI issue related to the Reagan talk page that i'm not inolved with). --Masem (t) 04:40, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

What matters is that editors here don't engage in racism or other problematic behavior toward each other. It is wrong to ban editors who stick to all the rules w.r.t. editing here including proper conduct on talk pages, just because their views on certain subject matters is considered to be racist, homophobic, misogynist, antisemitic, etc. Count Iblis (talk) 21:35, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Count Iblis, I think you are missing a point here: advocating for content supportive of bigotry, however politely, is offensive and distressing to editors who are victims of bigotry. A civil POV-pusher advocating, say, the Lost Cause narrative, is more of a problem than one advocating free energy conspiracy theories. Guy (help!) 06:41, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

The Monsters are due on Wikipedia. So gather your bricks and rocks for later, grab a bag of popcorn for now, and sit back and enjoy this clip. Bob K31416 (talk) 02:24, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

MastCell, what can you do once racism has been mainstreamed? We still have the endless circular arguments at white privilege and race and intelligence, to name but two, based on fringe sources that are given spurious legitimacy, occasionally in sources that are nominally reliable. Guy (help!) 06:38, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

JzG, I think there's plenty we can do in our roles as Wikipedians, and in line with site policy. When we observe people making obviously bad-faith arguments, we can call them out and stop lending them credibility. We can examine our sympathies, and wonder why we immediately jump to the defense of people who make or excuse racist comments without considering the impact on people affected by those comments. Perhaps most importantly, we can resist cynical efforts to rebrand basic human decency as "political correctness", and we can push back against half-witted invocations of totalitarianism and "witch hunts" from people who are not used to being held accountable for the shit they say. MastCell ^Talk 19:40, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

However, on the opposite site of the problem, and this is related to the matter above, is that not every editor action that is made that works "against calling out racism" (for lack of a better way to describe it) can be considered racist, because there are many other valid reasons that action may/may not be appropriate depending on the situation. Totally separate case, but this is what I experienced when I was trying to argue for a neutral approach to the Gamergate controversy (where at that point, one angle of the story was the instigators of the controversy were pushing an angle about rape and the like against named BLP, and the talk page was being bombarded with IP/new accounts trying to push for inclusion of this story), I was called out as a "rape apologist" on the argument that I must support the rape angle to make the article neutral, which, of course f'ing not. Policies like NPOV are there for a reason and at the time, weren't being followed.

In the case above, one of the editors stated that the material related to the new sound bites on the tapes didn't have due weight on the main Reagan page, a point I'd agree with given how little Reagan and racism had been discussed anywhere on the main bio page, but did have a clear section on his presidency and issues page. (This is compatible to the a previous section here on Jimbo's page about what Obama "conspiracy theories" we don't cover on Obama's main page and where they really are more appropriate) Where the new tape material should be incorporated is a fully appropriate question to ask, and not including it on the main Reagan page but elsewhere shouldn't be taken as a racist editor action (though the stance ... "utterly inappropriate" I think was the wording OTTOMH, was definitely a bit strong and came off dismissive, though in context of further discussion, it was clear what the intent was). End of the day, around that entire situation, trouts for several including myself, as there was a better way to approach it.

But my point relative to this discussion is that identifying things like racism, bigotry, misogamy , or anything similar cannot easily be seen through a single or a handful of edits, and it usually takes a pattern to identify It does not help WP or any other editors to jump to the conclusion that because an editor disagrees about the singular inclusion of what appears to be a significant racial issue, that that editor is racist or perpetuating to keep any claims of racism out of the target article. There are fair encyclopedic questions that are asked that might be difficult discussion points that one might not like the answer to but that's why we have talk pages that we ask for civil behavior and understanding this is open debate from a global community. We absolutely do want to be vigilant against any form of editor-derived racism/etc. but not so hyperfocused to mistake every possible slight as a racist action. Over long-term or multiple actions, we absolutely do want to be careful. I do hope that more editors out of the protests from the last few months have a keener awareness of the issues around racism and other similar matters as to be aware to be more careful with their words in such discussions as to not appear so readily dismissive of issues of high racial importance, but that still doesn't change other encyclopedia policies like UNDUE as well that can come into play. --Masem (t) 20:09, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

"usually takes a pattern to identify It" And yet despite well documented acts of outright racism, racist speech, racist political policies, reliable sourcing going back decades, we still dont call Donald Trump what he is. Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:37, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

As a label for a BLP, even with something that disliked by the global community, we can't say it in Wikivoice, but the first sentence of Racial views of Donald Trump calls it out as closely and plainly as we can say it factually. (And I was speaking obviously of editors on WP, and here calling any editor directly as a racist or having racism intents, you'd better be ready to back that up with evidence.) --Masem (t) 14:45, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

I could make a perfectly plausible argument for a redirect pointing at Trump for the phrase 'Racist-in-chief' given the amount of sources that refer to him as that. It even brings up articles about trump in search engines that make no actual mention of the phrase. RE Editors: It would actually be fairly trivial to source evidence of racist editors. Its already been done repeatedly on other websites as you well know. The barrier to doing it here is that large sections of the community clutch the fiction that everyone is entitled to their opinions and shouldnt be shunned because of them. I could pick an editor, show years worth of edits deliberately anti-(insert colour, ethnicity, country here) and it would be waved off as 'thats politics' or 'we cant ban people for their beliefs'. Well lets see how that pans out going forward. Its not going to be people like Mastcell or myself who get the sharp end of the pitchforks in the long run. Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:59, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

The sole reason why the Reagan page says nothing about Reagan and race (except to laud him as being uniquely non-racist – I'm not kidding, that's basically what his page says) is that editors with patterns of dismissing race issues and racism (across Wikipedia) gatekeep the article and have reverted any and all attempts to add content on that topic. You then basically point to this successful gatekeeping and censorship as evidence that "Reagan and race" isn't an important topic. And that's partly how racial bias on Wikipedia is maintained and how issues related to racial minorities and racism are systematically omitted from Wikipedia. The demand that editors who want to add high-quality content (sourced to extensive academic scholarship) on race have to build sandboxes or add the content to forks that no one reads is just an example of the egregious hurdles that you want to erect for editors who are actively seeking to fix the well-documented racial bias on Wikipedia. None of the content on the Reagan page has undergone the kinds of hurdles that have been imposed on editors who want to add content related to race. Here, for example, you are calling on editors to add the race-related content to a fork that no one reads. These same burdens have not been imposed on any other content on the page. You don't see it as problematic and a clear-cut example of racial bias that race-related content has to cross hurdles that other content[Insert_correlation] does not face? As someone who is very capable of adding extremely well-sourced content (with dozens of academic citations if you need it) about Reagan and race, I'm certainly not going to bother spending hours doing so only to add it to a fork that no one reads, with no realistic hope that gatekeepers on the main article can be convinced to add it to the main page, and even with the very real risk that the editors will immediately revert it from the fork. That's how Wikipedia ends up omitting content related to racism and the historical experiences of racial minorities. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 19:18, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

It is one thing that you can pull lots of sources that establish a stance that some considered Reagan racist (and I can see by a quick scholar and news search before 2019 these sources exist), but there is still the aspect of UNDUE that enters into this. Even with the new tapes (from July 2019), today's works are not really discussing Reagan as a racist moreso that the GOP is a party since Nixon that generally has pushing policies that propagate racial discrimination and other factors, even if the sitting President says they're not racist. I'm not trying to dismiss the concern to minimize this racial issue around Reagan but like all other articles we have to balance viewpoints with UNDUE, and a 5-minute browse (which is not thorough or the like so I can't say my conclusive is final) show the stance "Reagan was a racist" to be minor. It's not insignificant nor fringe, and with the tapes from last year, it's more than enough that somewhere there needs to be a decent section within the summary style of Reagan's articles to cover it, but it would not be the type of information that carries the same weight as something like Reagan's legacy of the War on Drugs, simply based on source counting. The main page on Reagan can't cover every single aspect of his life and his Presidency and can only hit the points that have the greatest weight in sources, which unfortunately at this point, his views on racism seem to be very minor. This type of evaluation should not be taken as being gatekeeping or racist on its face, though obviously if done across numerous different bios its the pattern I'm talking about; this is the standard application of UNDUE. Yes, racism is an important issue, but at the end of day, WP can't right great wrongs, unless sources are there to do that. For example, the recent situation with the protests bringing to light the history of Edward Colston and why his wealth, acceptable in the past, is troublesome today). I haven't really seen the sources "turn" on Reagan in a similar manner beyond July 2019, outside of asserting that his behavior matches the long-term GOP platform to disenfranchise minorities. (Separately, I wholly agree that the issue on sourcing for the war on drugs quote is approaching nonsense BS and should be supported by a more academic source.). --Masem (t) 19:55, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm not arguing for content that says "Reagan is a racist". I'm talking about inclusion of anything related to race, such as discourse widely characterized as racially incendiary (e.g. dog-whistle politics, Reagan's role in making discourse around "anti-white racism" a prominent thing) and policies with racially disparate effects (intentional and unintentional), among other things. A person who intends to learn about Reagan will find no content whatsoever about Reagan and race, despite extensive academic treatment of the subject. The reason why is that editors who systematically scrub content related to race are gatekeeping the Reagan article. And that's how racial bias on Wikipedia is maintained. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 20:10, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

But again, a fair argument to that is that given the extensive multifaceted career of Reagan, and those topics being about his presidential/political side, and for which many career politicians including most presidents we have separate articles to identify their stance and approaches to a variety of topics (including how they handled race), typically either at "Political positions of X" or at "Presidency of X", this is where I would expect to find that information in detail, not at their bio page, unless, as in the case of Trump, it becomes a dominating factor of their presidency, in which I would still expect only brief mention and pointed to a more detailed coverage in summary style elsewhere. Again, its a matter of UNDUE, not trying to keep the information out, to place the information at the more appropriate level that makes sense. --Masem (t) 20:37, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

That sounds superficially reasonable, but doesn't stand up to even a brief reading of our Ronald Reagan article, which has been stuffed to the brim with homespun, mythopoeic fluff while fundamental—but uncomfortable—themes of Reagan's life are excluded entirely or shunted to subarticles. Reagan's relationship to race was complex and evolved over his entire life, so a serious discussion of it clearly exceeds the bounds of the usual "political positions of..." or "Presidency of..." content ghettos.

Let's get specific. We learn, from Ronald Reagan#Religion, that Reagan invited two Black teammates to his house after they were excluded from a local hotel. (Let's leave aside the fact that this incident has no discernible connection to Reagan's religious beliefs). The source is a scholarly work entitled Deconstructing Reagan, from a chapter entitled Reagan and race. So right away we know that race is a major focus of scholarly historiography and reliable sources on Reagan's life—something which is being actively denied right now on the article's talkpage. Secondly, the source clearly contrasts Reagan's early views on racial equality with his subsequent rightward evolution and embrace of racially discriminatory or outright racist views and policies. He famously rejected the landmark 1964 civil rights act as a "mistake", and as a gubernatorial candidate, his public position was: "If an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house, it is his right to do so."

So editors of the Reagan biography are clearly aware of sources dealing with Reagan and race—in fact, they use them as citations. But they carefully cherry-pick these sources for details that reflect positively on Reagan, while actively suppressing the actual content and focus of the sources they cite. This is incredibly poor editing—in fact, it's shameful. It could be chalked up to ignorance rather than intentional deception and tendentiousness, except that people are still actively claiming that there is no room for discussion of race in Reagan's biography. Shameful. MastCell ^Talk 19:32, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Obviously, a source that is reliably used to show one aspect of Reagan's actions of beliefs regarding race can and should be used to show other aspects; so you are certainly correct there. That being said, Reagan's actions in bringing his excluded black teammates to his parents' home for the night don't necessarily contradict his stand on the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Quite a few white politicians outside the Deep South (Goldwater would be a more prominent example at that time) opposed the law on the narrow (I would say too narrow) grounds that it was a violation of private property rights. In fact I can imagine young Reagan saying something like this to the hotel manager: Well ... that's your prerogative sir, so I'm going to take these gentlemen to my home to spend the night. 70.181.40.210 (talk) 20:37, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Comment: Excellent point. People forget that today. In fact, Everett Dirksen (of all people) began to question some of the civil rights legislation of the era based on property rights.Rja13ww33 (talk) 23:47, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

MastCell, this is of course not uniquely our problem, and in some ways we handle it better than, say, Facebook or Google, because we have more transparent processes, but in the end there are two themse we need to be aware of IMO.

First, the idea that banning racism and other hate speech discriminates against "conservative voices". Here we do much better than the social media platforms, because while they wring their hands and worry about mean editorials in Breitbart, we know that the problem is not that most conservatives are racist (they aren't) but that most prominent racist voices are identified with the conservative movement. Of course we also get mean editorials from Breitbart, but we don't care.

Second, the "I know it when I see it" problem. This is actually two problems in one: the use of coded language by racists, and the tendency to interpret marginal statements as racist when they may merely be tone deaf. Here we do less well. Polite dog whistling can be ignored, like any other form of civil POV-pushing, and tone deaf comments can attract a heavy-handed reaction. Guy (help!) 09:44, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

No racism that true men.Tbiw (talk) 10:20, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm not denying that's an appropriate source, nor that we need to address his racism. But we're still dealing with the UNDUE issue. I'm looking at the archives of the talk page, and also trying to judge by searching, and I'm not seeing a multi-sourced based approach to supporting the including of a section on his bio page to address this (even briefly to use as a link to the more detailed coverage in his "political position" page) - it's been argued but but not from a source base, and just addressing the tape issue isn't sufficient. Yet, and in support of why there should be more effort to find that, I hit this article from the BBC which states "Critics accused Reagan of racism throughout his career." Now, whether that means that in the long-term he will be considered a racist, or that politically his opposition sought to criticize his racial views while the GOP/conservatives tend to defend him, I don't know, but it does suggest there should be a decent body of sources that should be out there to better raise the issue if racism should be mentioned on a higher page than a presidental policy page. Peacemealing the arguments one source at a time is not effect for UNDUE-based arguments, which feels like what you've been fighting against, and why those trying to keep it off the main bio page are succeeding. A good UNDUE arguing will present an inrefutable bulk of sources at one time that's make it denied (And here, more than just the burst of coverage around July 2019). --Masem (t) 21:25, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Pretty much all the charges of racism around Reagan center on his campaigns. (For which we have separate pages....including the so-called "Southern Strategy" page.) In his private life there is virtually no recollection from those around him of this sort of thing. (And needless to say this includes people that have been critical of him both before and after his death. (Including his son Ron.)) There are some pretty good reasons why we don't go that much into that within his own bio. First off, these charges are pretty flimsy and fairly meaningless. Despite one editor's claims of all the good "academic scholarship" on this.....it amounts to anecdotes and opinion. (Ian Lopez's book on "Dog Whistle" politics is a(n) prime example.) Anybody who thinks Reagan won 44 & 49 state landslides based on some sort of "southern" strategy (for example) simply doesn't know what they are talking about. This became prominent folklore in the Democratic party decades after the fact. And furthermore, the Democrats didn't use to buy this themselves. (Remember Bill Clinton running as a "new" Democrat in 1992?) This simply wasn't central to his campaigns and the fact of the matter is: Reagan's rhetoric was fairly consistent no matter where/who he was talking to. Now, if the Reagan bio page was long enough (and it has already been criticized for being too long).....this would warrant discussion. But since it isn't.....and since virtually no credible historian I can think of believes Reagan's ascendance was due to race (read 'Restless Giant....' by: James T. Patterson for starters), I really don't see the need for inclusion of this sort of thing. I have to admit though: that's been one of the more frustrating aspects of this article over the years: how long should it be? The answer hasn't materialized yet. Even admins have made this comment in the past....without guidance.Rja13ww33 (talk) 23:42, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

(i) The book Restless Giant by James Patterson is a historical overview of several presidential administrations (covering 26 years, of which Reagan served 8). I accessed the book just now, and even at just a glance, the book clearly goes over how race was an important issue related to the Reagan presidency ("African American leaders in the 1980s denounced Reagan’s general approach to race relations... [several examples of why they did so]") and for Reagan's legacy ("The Reagan administration’s major legacy in race relations...") in the few chapters that cover him (and there's more than just those two quotes). If I were to add content from this book that you praise so highly, there is no doubt in my mind that you'd scrub the content from the page. Because extensive academic treatment is not something that is going to convince a person who thinks it's not racist to call blacks "monkeys" and who seeks to scrub blatantly DUE race-related content across the encyclopedia. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 01:31, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

(ii) I also find it interesting that you choose to describe an Oxford University Press book (the same press that published Patterson's book) by a Hispanic law professor at UC Berkeley as "anecdotes" and "opinion", as well as "academic scholarship" in scare quotes. Not only is the book peer-reviewed but it's written by a renowned expert with 12,000+ citations. The book in question has more than twice as many citations as Patterson's book in less than half the time. This is not to dismiss Patterson's book – it's just to point out how absurd and ill-founded your critique is. It highlights the kinds of hurdles that editors of this type impose on other editors who seek to rectify racial bias on Wikipedia: peer-reviewed extensively cited content by recognized experts related to race can just be hand-waved away as "opinion" and "anecdotes". Snooganssnoogans (talk) 01:31, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I'll ignore your usual personal attacks....There is (of course) no question that Reagan had a rocky relationship with the African-American leaders of the time and he is viewed negatively within the African-american community. There are a lot of reasons for that (including his anti-Big Gov views)...however that proves nothing with regard to the question I raised: was Reagan's ascendancy due to race? No heavyweight historian buys that. (Including Patterson.) Speaking of that.....your laughable comparison of a law professor to a award winning historian I think says it all about your ability to weigh sources and content. Despite your claim that Lopez's book is "peer reviewed", it is obviously deeply flawed. For starters, he claims that Reagan's "welfare queen" was "mythical". Do you know what the problem with that is? (In this "peer reviewed", "academic" resource?)Rja13ww33 (talk) 03:59, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

REGARDLESS of the quality of the sources or issue with authority, all of this is adding to the pile of what I was asking/driving towards earlier: that the BBC statement "Critics accused Reagan of racism throughout his career." seems to suggest there is a wealth of sources out there to better drive a discussion of Reagan and race from the long-term view, even if this remains a matter of debate in the sources, and subsequently, how much UNDUE/WEIGHT that carries to put to his bio and/or Presidency page. There's clearly two different schools here, and what should be done is collect sources in both schools, and figure out how to present a detailed discussion that works in both schools without necessarily calling either right (if that is the case), and then judging the WEIGHT to talk in context of his Presidency or his larger career. --Masem (t) 02:37, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. But I wish someone could set a (target) length for that article. That was one of my main reasons for posting here once i noticed this conversation.Rja13ww33 (talk) 02:44, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

No one has sought to add content on the topic of "was Reagan's ascendancy due to race?" but thanks for trying to play along with a strawman to defend your own efforts to block all race-related content from the Reagan page. Also thank you for demonstrating to the broader audience what kind of caliber of editor is actively fighting all efforts to introduce race-related content to Wikipedia. A reason why no race-related content can be added to the Reagan page is because this editor (who sees nothing wrong in calling blacks "monkeys") and others like him gatekeep the article and admins such as Masem aid those editors by adding additional hurdles such as requesting that editors who want to contribute race-related content need to add countless academic publications to sandboxes that no one reads before they'll consider whether it's DUE or not (which will of course never happen because no one is going to waste hours putting up text that no one will read and which will be rejected by the gatekeepers). This is how Wikipedia ends up omitting history and scholarship as it relates to race, racism and minorities. It's not only because of the kinds of editors who think there's nothing wrong with calling blacks "monkeys" but editors who turn a blind eye or are even willing to aid the first kind of editor in blocking race-related content. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 04:04, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Let me spell it out for you: the reason I was discussing the "ascendancy" issue (talking to someone more reasonable) is because at the article's current length (or especially if it is trimmed down as one editor recently commented there that it is 5 times as long as it should be, and I've heard similar comments over and over through the years) it is an issue (with WEIGHT) to start pumping it full of this stuff. ("Stuff" certainly being the monkey deal....and possibly a lot of the other racial issues as well.) With a trim article, only issues central to Reagan's life/character should go in. (So obviously his rise to power and some about the man himself should be in.) IF (however) the article should be deemed to be even longer.....there is no question we can go into these issues and take on WEIGHT and DUE. But I saw a comment by a admin and I wanted to make this point to (perhaps) settle the question. If we want to make it as long as a Lou Cannon bio....we can have all kinds of stuff (heck, we can start talking about his love of jelly beans)....but there has to be a cut off point here. (Even if we do include some of it.) I don't like working with nebulous criteria. Clear enough? Or do you have some more racial paranoia you'd like to share?Rja13ww33 (talk) 04:36, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Also, just in general in considering writing such a section, remember that we generally we avoid WP:PRESENTISM. I don't know enough about what the situation was in the 1980s, but if it is only recently (eg since 2010-ish) that Reagan and racism has been an issue and never was a question while he was in office, we have to be careful to make sure it is presented that it is a newer consideration. But from what arguments are here, it does sound like there were critics of him during his time in office so this probably is not a major point of concern. I just wanted to bring this up, in considering the Edward Colston matter (that in his time, no one batted an eye that slave trade was wrong so his wealth and philanthropy was fine, but since the 1980s, that became a key issue, so our article on him makes sure to present this change in social factors appropriately in discussing him, only placing his judgement by modern standards as a separate discussion after introducing his history contributions for that time). --Masem (t) 17:35, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't know that I (i.e. someone who was there) would call it 100% "newer". Certainly Reagan's "cutting" of social programs and (seeming) indifference to the poor opened him up to this sort of thing. As far as the whole "southern" strategy deal goes.....that (IMHO) is definitely very much in retrospect. Virtually all of that materialized in the decades that followed. Yes, the southern strategy had been ID'd and connected to Nixon during his campaign.....but you would be hard pressed to find a national media figure of the time who would say this was a big part of the Reagan campaign. I could give a million examples.....but I'll stick with 2 now: Dan Rather (someone I am going to assume nobody will accuse of being some sort of lap dog for the right) said on election night [1980] that Reagan ran a "smart, classy, high-road campaign....". In the debates, no journalist posed this question, and although the topic of race relations came up....nobody went in this direction. I (also) can't think of any book written on the campaign in the years that immediately followed that made the point this was central to the campaign. One of the best measures of this though (I think) is: what did the President's opponents do? In response to two landslide losses, the Democrats formed the DLC (to bring the party to the center). One-time DLC Chairman Bill Clinton, ran as a "new" Democrat in '92. Unless someone wants to say there is a racial angle in that.....they are stuck with the fact that the Democratic party (at least in the eyes of the public) changed on a whole host of issues outside of race.....and were losing elections because of it.Rja13ww33 (talk) 18:42, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I am sure there are plenty of other factors involved. I can't speak to that (and I did live through the Reagan years and can't bring to mind much of these issues), but what I Can say: 1) there does need to be a valid talk page debate that brings together sources on all sides speaking to claims of Reagan and racism (whether it was his own policy or something from the GOP or other aspects, etc.) and to develop the section on the Political positions better, and then 2) a secondary consideration of how much of that balances all other factors of his political positions to see if should filter up to be mentioned in the Presidency page and even possibly his bio page. I don't think the arguments that have been presented that there's been a wholesale effort to keep any of this off the pages equates to "editors being racist or perpetuating a whitewashing stance against racism", I just don't think that a proper discussion under UNDUE has been had. I expect the discussion will not be easy but I think everyone can agree there's more to be written to establish that there's various schools of thought on Reagan and race and that leads to how much we'd cover that to a larger view. --Masem (t) 18:54, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I, for am glad that racism opposition has taken over discourse; sure it's a "religious" belief or axiom, not anything having a bit to do with silly and oft-misquoted notions such as "science, empirical" evidence and whatnot, but in the end, it's a good belief, and hopefully one which will pave the way for the dissolution of the rampant yet archaic 19th century "scientistic" nonsense, and its documented history of use and abuse in racist ways and ends. Much as how Jesus of Nazareth was promoting peace between Jews, Africans, and Samaritans as far back as the days of ancient Rome, while "science" was and is still being used to create eugenical progroms, nuclear threats, and concentration camps as far up until the present day. IT's nice to see that a simple opposition to racism cutting through the archaism and institutionalized racism of said quaint little "scientific" establishment like a hot knife through butter, perhaps, along with the internet, the information age, and social media, eventually leading to its undoing and its 16th-19th century irrelevancy in the modern and contemporary world and era of information.

As far as "charges" go, that's a bit dramatic and pretentious, as if it were comparing the impotent and irrelevant shriekings of some barely-literate freak of nothing approaching legal "authority" whatsoever, over imagined "racism" on some dank corner of the internet, something which would easily be laughed out of any actual American or European court of law, in which thinking men or thinking women are present to begin with (as per the distorted notions of the imagined institutional racism themselves, given that most men and women judges, lawyers, and other legal professionals in America and Europe are decidedly "white", at least on the surface).

So no, I see nothing akin to any "charges", it's not as if some irrelevant and potentially racist nobody whose only "legal" knowledge comes from Divorce Court is capable of articulating one to begin with, not even considering what laws, civil or criminal they'd be likely breaking in even peddling such an idea or notion to begin with, as if most would be bored enough to charge such an irrelevant little freak or troll to begin with, as easily as they could if they were in any way inclined to, mhmm.--Inquiz13 (talk) 15:27, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

BLP policy whitewashes BLPS from racism and other problematic behaviors

Compare e.g. Luboš_Motl's biography on RationalWiki to his biography here on Wikipedia. A world of difference! While we have our policies for good reasons, we have to note that our Wiki article gives you no clue at all about what you can expect if you have a meeting with Motl. The Rational Wiki article describes the real Motl and gives you a good account of what you can expect should you ever meet him. Count Iblis (talk) 17:19, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

"World of difference" indeed. That's about as unencyclopedic as it gets. Rationalwiki's article on Reagan says (I'm not making this up) in the introductory sentences: Saint Ronald(6) Wilson(6) Reagan(6), aka "Ronnie Raygun" and "Teflon Ron" (February 6, 1911–June 5, 2004), was the GOP's messiah Sith overlord of the Galactic Empire, a B-movie actor and racist,[2] with a long career in "freeing the world from the evil grip of Communism". Originally a dead-dog Hollywood Democrat, old Ronnie got his start in politics by giving The Speech at Goldwater's Presidential nomination in 1964..... I mean come on, I have a sense of humor as good as anyone else.....but that is just preposterous. And furthermore, when racism is central to someone's life/work, we don't "whitewash" it.Rja13ww33 (talk) 17:42, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

This looks like the beginning of a tour of some kind of Circles of Hell. Bob K31416 (talk) 18:20, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

This part is spot on: "Reagan would, by twenty-first century standards, be considered an ideal caricature of an agreeable liberal centrist keen on maintaining America's integrity and ensuring that productive policy be achieved via positive bipartisan solutions despite Teapublicans forever claiming he was a stalwart defender of strong, right-wing, conservative values, and "would never-ever dream of cooperating with brain-dead snowflake leftists on any issue, and even claiming that he even so much as resembles anyone left of Ted Cruz would be a clear indication that the individual making such a claim is a godless commie and socialistic anti-American supporter of the deep state" as they would say.[citation NOT needed]". Count Iblis (talk) 20:30, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Right, as far as childish rhetoric and trash sites like RationalWiki goes. If one intentionally sought out some far-left Communist like Bob Avakian, or those kids who were comparing the Daily Show to the Daily Stormer, they'd make Obama or Bernie look like some far-right wingnut in comparison, so who cares about that (anymore than they do about silly, irrelevant, and nonsensical job titles)?

There's a reason Wikipedia is the world's tenth most popular website and RationalWiki isn't. Our use of neutral encyclopedic language and reliable sources might have something to do with it... Now that's not to say that we couldn't cover controversy a bit better. But unless there's a reliable source talking about Motl being an arsehole, we can't cover that, and for good reason. Unlike rationalWiki, people trust and rely on Wikipedia, and thus we are held to a higher standard. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 16:19, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

We are certainly more reliable that RationalWiki. But we've got some serious (structural) issues here. The fact anyone can edit is a big one because (once you get beyond the vandals) we've got way too many people here editing with a agenda. What i have thought for years (as a remedy) is to have a knowledgeable, objective person in charge of each article (or maybe article types).....and change requests get submitted on the talk page.Rja13ww33 (talk) 18:55, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

If we would forego our COI policy and allow him to write his own biography (he is active as an editor here), it would have been more critical than the present article. A friend of Luboš had this to say about him in an interview. The general opinion of him is considerably less favorable. Count Iblis (talk) 06:13, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Language is more significant than statues, and these times make us forget the finer details

Dear Jimbo, I know people are fighting and hating and hurting and that is significant... but do you know what is the worst rising (internationally) cultural phenomenon I can see in recent years that indirectly aggravates Afro-European disharmony, no matter what side we prefer..? Jimbo, let's change the name of the page Black Friday (shopping) to Peachy Friday (shopping), and thereafter, black anything as a disaster colour. I'm not going to explain it. We all know it is true.

Richer language has been shown to improve the depth of colour perception, and we humans almost did not discover that fact. The proof almost went extinct. ~ R.T.G 07:18, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

I fail to see how paring down the number of meanings a word has could make the language richer. That would seem to make it duller and more like a programming language. Pelirojopajaro (talk) 09:03, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

If we are trying to avoid instituting negativity? ~ R.T.G 09:30, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles employ the most commonly used name. Changing the name of the Wikipedia article in the hopes the change will catch on is a bit like the tail wagging the dog. Black Friday (shopping)#Origin of the term says the current meaning of the term actually has positive connotations. Do you have any reliable sources that dispute this? Has there been significant backlash against this specific term? 71.234.210.113 (talk) 18:47, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, to stop using the word "black" to represent disaster, would not be as simple as changing the name of an article. You'd have to change the world around it.

List of Black Fridays summarises the "positivity" of the phrase like this: imprisonment, financial downturn, financial crisis, disaster, anarchists hanged without evidence, the Conciliation Bill failed, a riot, announcement not to call for strike action against wage reductions, the crash of Wall Street, a day of devastating bushfires, an air raid, a disastrous attack, an air battle, a riot, flooding, massive layoffs, protest against the House Un-American Activities Committee, the assassination of US President John F Kennedy... a massacre, economic turmoil, tornado outbreak, a tornado touching down, a stock market crash, a... (something to do with a movie about Aladdin?), a series of bomb explosions, production nearly shut down, singer killed, Cinema fire, a crackdown, protesters killed, terrorist attacks, poker sites seized, terrorist attacks and terrorist attacks.

A veritable joy-joy phrase which makes us all remember happier times. If "black" is going to be so deeply racial a term, let us embrace that, and make Black Friday a day of African heritage, and start renaming "black" disaster days "bad", as intended. Oh but, that would be difficult, and there hasn't been a social war against it yet to force us... It's just some good psychology. Yeah I know, it will never happen, and yet there it is. ~ R.T.G 20:25, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Your first post requested a change to single article, but now you've moved the goalposts in order to make your point, and thus haven't addressed my response. Have you thought this through, or was this section just an off the cuff emotional knee-jerk with a simpler, more superficial goal? 71.234.210.113 (talk) 20:41, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

In fact, I stated it pretty clearly. You're right though, sensitivity doesn't have to be an issue. Or does it? ~ R.T.G 21:08, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

I think you're on to something. It is a big task. We've got a problem right off the bat with the fact there are no really white people, maybe some albinos. It's a paradox because to really get past racism there should be zero awareness or acknowledgement of race, especially not in censuses or anything official. Yet, I'm not getting the impression that destination is where many of any race want to head. Nocturnalnow (talk) 23:36, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Well there are some almost white, very rarely, and some almost black, very rarely, mostly in Scandanavia and Africa, but yes, mostly we are varying stages of brown, yellow and red with some bluish and greenish highlights... However, for the moment, the colour black has a special status in social constructs, so should not be used lightly. It's psychological, and psychology is what you do when you don't need psychiatry. Though we are not socially aware of that, the alternative is often... psychiatry... For every mistake psychology might have, psychiatry has a punishment which helps you with the issues that arise from just reacting normally to the world around us... like the old aspects of religions which we are all so keen to avoid... ~ R.T.G 08:10, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Edit: (Okay... the best psychiatry is psychological, it's not actually about punishing you, but prevention is usually much better than cure, and choosing psychiatry over psychology would be punishing indeed) ~ R.T.G 08:25, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

In order to progress in this area, We may have to deal with something that has become endemic in much of the world, which is an ever decreasing % of the population who "think for him/her self". It's readily apparent on a daily basis when you see chunks of the population adopting the positions of their political leaders on things that are so personally important like whether or not to wear a mask re: Covid.

"Sheep" is really the best word I can think of, and it's an ingrained habit apparently first developed in childhood.

And, maybe Jimbo will agree, maybe not, a few generations ago there were many more people who did "think for themselves" and, thus, although usually aligned with a political cohort, like conservative, might have strong and opposite opinions from conservative leadership on many issues. There used to be very few people who you knew what their opinion was on things like "abortion" or American "exceptionalism" without even asking them. Nowadays, the like minded stick together is social bubbles and there are not nearly as many 1 on 1 healthy and heated political arguments as there used to be.

Fortunately there has been more attention, imo, at least within the upper classes, to "critical" thinking and the term has even manifested itself in some ads for STEM schools and even JPMorgan. BUT, I dare say most Americans have no idea what the term means. Now if that is a problem that needs to be dealt with in order to move the collective mentality forward, that is a huge hurdle, because of inertia ( which the last I read is the most powerful force in the universe ). The ultimate solution to this issue (teaching individual critical thinking abilities) may be a focus upon it in public education, starting very, very early. Nocturnalnow (talk) 13:41, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Alternate Mississippi state flag nominations

Jimbo, due to recent events we are able to nominate alternate state flags for Mississippi. You know how much the military history buffs love their pagentry, right? Here is your chance to promote a fun contest. I've started the bidding at Wiki-pe-tan promoting physical fitness in her track suit. EllenCT (talk) 02:39, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

@EllenCT: I can already hear CGP Grey preparing a podcast rant about it. Not because of Wiki-pe-tan, mind you, but because of the mismatched background color and the usage of text. Otherwise he's totally cool with it. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 02:45, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

@Nathan2055: It wouldn't be a wiki if I wasn't hoping someone else to do better! <3 EllenCT (talk) 02:50, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

@Nathan2055: what is it called in heraldry when a motto is written on a ribbon? Ticker tape? Draped over shoulders? Is the heraldic term for a ribbon with writing draped over a bird's shoulders the same as for ticker tape draped over a person's shoulders? It's not clear to me that any state flags depict falconry yet, do they? EllenCT (talk) 06:20, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Back to the Reagan article

For reference regarding the Reagan article,

Text currently in article:

Reagan had a particularly strong faith in the goodness of people; this faith stemmed from the optimistic faith of his mother[19] and the Disciples of Christ faith,[19]into which he was baptized in 1922.[20] For that period, which was long before the civil rights movement, Reagan's opposition to racial discrimination was unusual. He recalled the time when his college football team was staying at a local hotel which would not allow two black teammates to stay there, and he invited them to his parents' home 15 miles (24 kilometers) away in Dixon. His mother invited them to stay overnight and have breakfast the next morning.[21] [22] His father was strongly opposed to the Ku Klux Klan due to his Catholic heritage, but also due to the Klan's anti-semitism and anti-black racism.[16] After becoming a prominent actor, Reagan gave speeches in favor of racial equality following World War II.[23]

Proposed addition to article:

In July of 2019 a previously undisclosed tape recorded in the Nixon White House was released. In the audio recording, made in 1971 and documenting a phone conversation between then-President Nixon and then-Governor Reagan, Mr. Reagan can be heard saying, “To see those, those monkeys from those African countries—damn them, they’re still uncomfortable wearing shoes!“ [1] This statement was made in reference to a United Nations delegation from Tanzania, which opposed the United States in a vote to officially recognize the People’s Republic of China. When the tape was initially released in 2000, the racist portion had been edited out. Subsequent to Reagan’s passing, the original recording was restored and released to the public.

Bob K31416 (talk) 17:16, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Instead of the proposed addition above, I would add the following as a Note:

In 2019, a recording was released of a private conversation between Governor Reagan and President Nixon in 1971, with Reagan referring to U.N. delegates from Tanzania as "monkeys".

Bob K31416 (talk) 17:55, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

So our discussion of Reagan and race expansively covers a college-football memory, and focuses heavily on the progressive views of Reagan's early career, before his rightward shift. But we confine blatantly racist political conversations to a footnote, and completely ignore the role of race in the War on Drugs, the Neshoba speech, the creation of the "welfare queen" trope, and the central role of white resentment in Reagan's political career—all of which are well-sourced subjects of scholarly historiography. The most charitable explanation would be that we have a colossal blind spot, although it's hard not to view this as actively dishonest writing. MastCell ^Talk 18:15, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Actively dishonest, indeed.

If you're ever in Simi Valley, you should go to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum. I make it a point to go to every presidential library that exists if I ever get near it in my travels. When I visited the Reagan Library I noticed that it stood alone among presidential libraries as a wholly partisan and positive representation of the president in question, obviously having been founded by or perhaps taken over by those who wish to sanctify the myth of the man. Did you know Reagan alone was responsible for breaking up the USSR? Other libraries show at least some of the controversy, some of the ugly side, some of the opposition to programs. Simi Valley will have none of that.

Is there a parallel here on Wikipedia? Absolutely. Reagan fans have written and are defending a hagiography. Truly neutral scholarship is diminished in power or completely absent. Binksternet (talk) 18:32, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Wow! I didn't realize that our Reagan Bio contained such hagiographic copy . . . "Reagan had a particularly strong faith in the goodness of people . . . [which] stemmed from the optimistic faith of his mother . . . " Jeez!! No wonder MastCell and other liberals want to add the bad stuff to it. I would suggest that the subsection on Reagan's religious background be rewritten with a few objective statements rather than with flattering speculation and that the rest of the article be combed for fluff. As for Reagan's deeply insulting references to African diplomats when he thought he was having a private phone conversation with Nixon, no, it should not go in; not unless were're also going to mention the (apparently far more frequent) racist language of Presidents such as Truman, Lyndon Johnson, and Nixon; but I wouldn't advise that either. 70.181.40.210 (talk) 18:13, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Well, a lot of the incidents/items you list are very much open to interpretation. (As to how much race played a role in them.) A lot of Presidents (for example) have played a role in the War on Drugs. And I just have a hard time picturing Bill Clinton or President Obama (for example) plotting the downfall of black America. Furthermore, a lot of Presidential bios in Encyclopedias are like this. Please point out one bio that dwells on stuff like this. I just looked at Harry Truman's bio in my old set of Britannica(s) (and World Book).....you don't see this stuff. (Same for Reagan's bio.) In fact look at Britannica's (current) article on the 1980 election. You see any of that neshoba crap mentioned? Yeah, me neither. I guess it boils down to what anyone wants: something encyclopedic.....or the dingy [under]world of partisan politics with editors grinding axes. I do what I can.Rja13ww33 (talk) 22:25, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Too bad that we're in a situation where some (most?) editors opt for the adversarial approach to editing instead of the collaborative. Bob K31416 (talk) 19:07, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

I started a section for this proposal at Talk:Ronald_Reagan#Alternate_proposal_of_a_briefer_version_as_a_Note. Bob K31416 (talk) 19:43, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Update: I withdrew the alternate proposal. Bob K31416 (talk) 14:39, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

It's time to stop paying so much attention to what happens in the U.S.A.

I get it. I wasted an hour or so last night watching another Jim Jones type USA leader preach to his sardine packed cult with lots of wide gold armbands flashing under the lights and heard about a brand new garden of monuments to be built for the Cultsters to go and worship. So I totally get how its a normal human condition to feel a need to respond to advertising and "news" and gossip, even when its about the most stupid and predictable people and circumstances. But, maybe, for the purpose of having a higher quality product, we should put "everything USA" in the same boat as "everything North Korea", and give the former about the same attention as the latter? Just an idea. Nocturnalnow (talk) 19:38, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Nocturnalnow, I am curious though. That was 100% a political rally, but it appears to have been funded by the taxpayer as a presidential event. Leeaving aside the grossly inappropriate tone, I wonder when he will be reimbursing the costs? Guy (help!) 22:10, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

You & several dozen million other US citizens. -- llywrch (talk) 18:07, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

I'd like to agree, but, paraphrasing John Connally's succinctness: He's their President, but our problem. That will probably change in the future, when other nations/leader/currencies become 'our problem', but meanwhile, we're dealing with a superpower headed by something unprecedented. ---Sluzzelin talk 22:04, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

To your point, Sluzzelin, a news reporter recently made a very good argument that something has no strategy or strategies so it's a waste of time trying to figure out what it's strategy is. She argued that something simply watches T.V. and reacts to what it sees in whatever way it feels like is best for it at that moment in time...that it said it never read a book ( or any national security papers ) and describes itself as being "visual".

So, yeah, I agree it's a superpower headed by something unprecedented that we're all dealing with. Now, there were likely similar leaders/controllers many years ago, e.g. in the Roman Empire, Caligula springs to mind, and now that I'm looking at his bio for the first time I see quite a few creepy similarities like "Caligula worked to increase the unconstrained personal power of the emperor, as opposed to countervailing powers within the principate."

and this: "wanting a statue of himself in the Temple of Jerusalem for his worship" seems not so far beyond the pale with something.

But what makes our problem uniquely/existentially worrisome is its access to nuclear weapons; especially if it gets 4 more years. Nocturnalnow (talk) 14:18, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

What do you see as a possible scenario with nuclear weapons if President Trump is reelected? Bob K31416 (talk) 01:23, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Bob K31416, to answer that, even with a vague opinion, I want to mention that his niece says he's dangerous and I'm starting to wonder, for the 1st. time because of a recent tweet, whether he is not only a psychopath but also as stupid as a pile of bricks. I'm talking about his mistaken usage of "1/100th." (instead of "100th." or "hundredth" or "one hundredth"). There are some mistakes that a not stupid person could not make....I mean, you'd actually have to add a 1 and a / to do this. Maybe he really did cheat on all his tests; and it was really stupid for him to keep believing the Central Park 5 were guilty after DNA exoneration.

It would not be the first time that a really stupid and mentally messed up person obtained a lot of monetary success just by following in his father's footsteps, pushing people around, and cheating like hell....all the way through life.

So, to my vague opinion, I'd say such a scenario is completely unpredictable in its details. His niece claims Donald's dad was a “high-functioning sociopath”; and I've come to the opinion that is exactly what he has become, except perhaps with even higher functionality.

What's scary, to me, is that since COVID hit he appears to be sliding into something akin to a psychotic episode in very slow motion. Even though the details of a nightmare scenario are not predictable, I would guess it would be something impulsive. The good news is that his inner circle and spokespeople appear to becoming more concerned themselves about his state of mind, I think/hope. Nocturnalnow (talk) 22:03, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I can see that you are very concerned about many issues regarding President Trump and that for the use of nuclear weapons "such a scenario is completely unpredictable in its details". All I can say with regard to nuclear weapons is that in his 3 1/2 years as president it looks like he has tended to avoid military conflict. Bob K31416 (talk) 01:31, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

That's true. Nocturnalnow (talk) 14:09, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

However, I'm thinking about "the nature of the beast"; in the context of something inside of something that can come out when least expected. e.g., with Caligula he was just fine for his early days as emperor, and there is a man who seemed harmless up until he was 30 years old when he decapitated and ate a young guy sitting in front of him on a bus.

There are tons of credible people who now believe that keeping him in power is like playing with fire. And there are many who see him as someone useful for philosophical purposes, like appointing conservative judges, and feel as if, even if he is a basket case, that he can be kept under control.

From an optimistic standpoint, maybe it's close enough to November where the Pentagon and Congress will step in to stop any type of reckless moves he might make, and since many Independents and even many Republicans are now of the opinion he is too dangerous to continue in power....perhaps all of us having to be subject to his behaviour will be over as of election day. Nocturnalnow (talk) 16:17, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Reply tool

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