Talk:Ariane Sherine

Countdown

Was she really Countdown champion? The UTube link seems to show her in Countdown, but doesn't prove she was champion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yaris678 (talk • contribs) 21:23, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Race

I don't know why the entry on race has been removed. Is it because there was no citation. How about this article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article5488849.ece

About 2/3 of the wasy down she says "As a mixed-race kid..." Or is her own self-definition insufficient? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yaris678 (talk • contribs) 21:45, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

She is Human; using the term "race" to speaking of ethnicity is shocking. Furthermore, "ethnicity" is too ill-defined to be of any help, so it is better to say nothing than to sound racialist or worse. Rama (talk) 22:00, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Yeah. I thought you might say something like that, which is why I didn't change it back. I agree this topic can move between the offensive and the meaningless quite easily. Sounds like your issue isn't specific to this person though. Is there some kind of Wikipedia policy on this? Maybe there should be.

I don't really know why you think the word race is so shocking in itself. However, I agree that race is something hard to define and that trying to do so can cause offense without actually illuminating anything, so I can see that it might be a good policy to avoid the whole area unless there is a good reason not to.Yaris678 (talk) 23:17, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, good idea! Let's just abolish the word "race" and there won't be any racism any more, right? And while we're at it, let's abolish "ethnicity", too. Let's just pretend everybody in England, or the world, for that matter, has exactly the same colour of hair, skin, eyes, speaks exactly the same language, etc. - and we're all going to be friends. Simple as that! Jimmy Fleischer (talk) 12:38, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

I certainly wasn't suggesting that. But maybe Rama was. But I do think you are getting yourself into a minefield. How specific should you be? How do you agree on terms? I might use the word Semitic to describe both an Israeli Jew and a Palestinian Arab but either could be offended by the term.

I could be described as white, Caucasian (though I’ve never been near the Caucasus), White-British or maybe even mixed-race since the British survey currently allows you define your ethnicity as White-Scottish, White-Welsh etc. Personally I would consider Scottish and Welsh to be nationalities rather than ethnicities, but obviously someone disagrees.

I notice the Manual of Style Biography Section doesn’t have anything to say on the subject. Presumably nobody has thought of anything sensible to say.

Yaris678 (talk) 13:27, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

@Yaris678: I know you weren't suggesting that, my comment was in reference to Rama's. With all due respect, I see no problem with the term "race" at all. To quote the lead of Race (classification of human beings): The term race or racial group usually refers to the concept of categorizing humans into populations or groups on the basis of various sets of heritable characteristics.[1] The most widely used human racial categories are based on visible traits (especially skin color, cranial or facial features and hair texture), and self-identification. "Race" is also a category of the US census, see Race and ethnicity in the United States Census. Ariane referred to herself as "a mixed-race kid", as referenced above. Of course, Rama is entitled to feel "shocked" by all this, of course. Just like the rest of us is entitled to think this is ridiculous. I hope she reads this discussion and will write something funny about it some time... ;) Jimmy Fleischer (talk) 18:12, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

"Thought for the Day"

I wonder if we need (or are even allowed) to quote the "Thought for the Day" in its entirety? I would say let's quote just a few key statements instead, but then I'm finding it hard to single out any. After all it's pretty generic stuff - the sensation, if any, is not in what she's saying, but in the fact that they're letting her say it at all on this sort of programme ... :| Jimmy Fleischer (talk) 20:37, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. We certainly don't need to quote it in full, and WP:QUOTE backs that up. I'll work to summarise it - if editors are finding it hard to single out useful quotes, then the current article is even less use to a reader. --McGeddon (talk) 22:00, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Was this actually the Thought for the Day - was there no religious speaker that day? Richard Dawkins did an atheist TFTD a few years but it wasn't at the usual time and there was a "normal" TFTD as well. If it didn't replace the regular TFTD, then it wasn't the first. Apepper (talk) 14:59, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you in two ways.

1. Yes, it wasn't actually Thought for the Day. It was on Saturday afternoon not a weekday morning.

2. I have a vague recolection of Dawkins doing something too.

That is why I changed the text on 11/01/09 from "Sherine was asked to give the first ever non-religious Thought For The Day" to "Sherine has given a non-religious equivalent of Thought for the Day". However, on 13/01/09, this was changed to "Sherine gave the first non-religious equivalent of Thought for the Day"

I think this later version still addresses point 1 by stating that it was an equivalent - i.e. not the actual thought for the day. Or do you think it should be made clearer?

Do you think we should remove references to it being the first? It would be handy if we could find a reference to the Dawkins Thought.

Yaris678 (talk) 21:42, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Further to the above, Dawkins gave a "Thought for the Day" back in 2002 (as this BBC article describes). He wasn't in the usual TftD slot and, as I recall, it was billed as TftD-like rather than TfdD (despite what the BBC article says). Either way, insofar as it was part of the Today programme, it was more TftD-like than Sherine's slot. Anyway, I'll see about rewording the article to reflect this. --PLUMBAGO 13:26, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Nice one. Yaris678 (talk) 21:41, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The Atheist's Guide to Christmas

Is is worth adding this tome to her biography? Ariane has conceived the first Atheist Charity book which did make it to the Amazon best sellers list. Skeptic sid (talk) 19:16, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Does she describes herself Atheist today?

If not, than that the categorization should be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.67.131.95 (talk) 15:19, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

https://mobile.twitter.com/ArianeSherine/status/1214635830125498370

--Traiano91 (talk) 20:56, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Request for Comments

There is an RfC on the question of using "Religion: None" vs. "Religion: None (atheist)" in the infobox on this and other similar pages.

The RfC is at Template talk:Infobox person#RfC: Religion infobox entries for individuals that have no religion.

Please help us determine consensus on this issue. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:15, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

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