Talk:Felicia Sonmez

Feedback from New Page Review process

I left the following feedback for the creator/future reviewers while reviewing this article: Thanks for the article!.

✠ SunDawn ✠ (contact) 10:56, 10 June 2022 (UTC)

Tenure

The following article says she worked for the Post twice:

• "in the early 2010s, left and rejoined,"
• "whose second stint at the Post began in 2018"

Washington Post fires reporter in center of online battle -- Pemilligan (talk) 13:31, 11 June 2022 (UTC)

Sexist language

The article, as it currently stands, states, “The matter began when fellow Post reporter Dave Weigel retweeted a sexist joke, which Sonmez criticized in a tweet of her own.” I can’t access the NYT article, so I’m wondering if it’s WP voice starting Weigel’s joke is “sexist”, or if the source states the joke is sexist. Can anyone help if this language is used in the source? —-Kbabej (talk) 05:25, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Yes, the word "sexist" is used in the source. Added quote to the citation in the hope the issue is now resolved. Philip Cross (talk) 06:28, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

@Philip Cross Thanks! --Kbabej (talk) 15:01, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

As per MOS:RACIST: "Value-laden labels – such as calling an organization a cult, an individual a racist or sexist, terrorist, or freedom fighter, or a sexual practice a perversion – may express contentious opinion and are best avoided unless widely used by reliable sources to describe the subject, in which case use in-text attribution." So it's not just that a source states it but that it's widely used by sources, and even then it would need in text citation. Let's not forget that this is about a living person. Alcibiades979 (talk) 00:09, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

It's not just the NYT; see CNN ("sexist retweet"), The Guardian ("offensive joke"), WaPo ("sexist joke"), etc. If a plethora of RSP-greenlit outlets are willing to directly characterize it as sexist in their own voice, we should follow that lead. Re MOS:WTW, it's the tweet, not the person, being labeled, so the threshold is not quite the same. It's still high, but that's what all the citations are for. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 18:40, 25 June 2022 (UTC)

Notability

Fails Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Subjects notable only for one event (WP:BLP1E ) Alcibiades979 (talk) 10:42, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

No, per several references dated prior to June. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 14:22, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

Actually if you look at WP:NOTNEWS it states: "Wikipedia considers the enduring notability of persons and events. While news coverage can be useful source material for encyclopedic topics, most newsworthy events do not qualify for inclusion and Wikipedia is not written in news style." Also WP:EVENT gives a clear description of what qualifies as a notability. I'm not saying she wasn't in the news, but she was in the news for: getting in trouble with her employer for tweeting about the rape accusations against Kobe immediately after he died, suing her employer for barring her from reporting on sexual assault cases and getting fired by her employer for harassing colleagues and management on twitter. None of this is notable. Furthermore as per WP:DEPTH: "An event must receive significant or in-depth coverage to be notable." Essentially what we have is some tabloid journalism about an writer's battles with the WaPo. I mean forget the WP:10YT will anyone remember this is 10 days? Why not just redirect the page to the WaPo criticism section? Alcibiades979 (talk) 00:11, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

I concur. I am still to see any arguments why this is notable. Elmenhorster (talk) 15:50, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Just in case it was me who was not getting it, I've just checked 10 random articles in the "American journalists" category at the bottom of this article. Sonmez stands out. How do I put it, to paraphrase Christoph Waltz, the difference in notability is like between a battleship and a waltz (not making any quality judgements here - difference in quantity of notability is quite enough). Elmenhorster (talk) 15:56, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

How come this article is still on?

Bearing in mind Wikipedia's advice to be editing in good faith, I went through the article's edit history looking for clues as to why this has not been deleted yet (something suggested within 2 weeks of it going live for clearly not being notable enough) and found it has attracted interest of two notorious mass-editors, namely Philip Cross and Ser Amantio di Nicolao (so notable you can Google them). I suspect there are reasons why this is on and will not be removed anytime soon that will become apparent with time... 211.244.121.120 (talk) 13:12, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Connected party?

Editor “Sdkb” on their profile page say they are a journalist and specialize in Wash DC. Sonmez meets those same characteristics. I’m just wondering where one draws the line considering someone, or not, a “connected party”? Just my two pinches of salt. 121.131.38.1 (talk) 17:25, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

D.C. is fortunate to have more than one journalist for the entire city. I am not Sonmez and have no affiliation with her. Please be mindful of the WP:OUTING policy. Regards, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 20:16, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi all! Felicia here. I'm writing to request a few corrections to the page.

1) The page currently states:

"Felicia Sonmez was an American journalist."

Not sure why the past tense is being used here, but I'm still alive and I'm still a journalist!

2) The page currently states:

"She began her career as a foreign correspondent in Beijing. In 2010, she joined The Washington Post as a political reporter."

Actually, the order here should be reversed. I began my journalism career in Washington and later became a foreign correspondent in Beijing.

3) The page currently states:

"Sonmez was teaching English in Beijing when she began writing for Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun.[2]"

It would be more accurate to say I "began working for" the Yomiuri Shimbun. I worked for the paper (assisting its journalists) but did not write for them.

4) The page currently states:

"She later was a foreign correspondent in Beijing for Agence France-Presse and an editor for The Wall Street Journal.[1][3] She joined The Washington Post as a political reporter in 2010.[1]"

The chronology here should be reversed as well. I first joined the Washington Post in 2010 and later worked in Beijing as a foreign correspondent for AFP and then as an editor for WSJ. I rejoined the Post in Washington in 2018.

Many thanks! Felicia

Fsonmez (talk) 14:08, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi @Fsonmez; thanks for looking over the page. Going in order:

1. This is borderline-vandalism, which I've reverted. Luckily, it's only been on the article for a few hours. I also changed retweeted a joke she considered to be sexist back to retweeted a sexist joke, which was also changed a few hours ago, per prior discussion above.
2. Your profile at The Washington Post currently states She began her career teaching English in Beijing. Could you provide a source for your earlier career in D.C.?
3. Changed.
4. Changed.

Best, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 16:47, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

@Fsonmez: Per Sdkb's request I have semi-protected the page for a month, so it cannot be edited by unregistered users (i.e., IP addresses) or newly-created accounts during that time (a step taken back in June as well, for less time). We'll see how this works ... there are additional measures that can be taken if this does not prevent people from making these edits. Daniel Case (talk) 18:04, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

The Washington Post article which is already cited here indicates you moved to Beijing after failing to qualify for employment in the Foreign Service. I have to believe this is a relevant aspect to be included.198.161.4.56 (talk) 17:40, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

Hi all,

Felicia here again, writing to request one more correction.

The page currently states: "With the guild's support she unsuccessfully sought to get her job back."

This is not correct. The Guild and I are still seeking to get my job back. It's a lengthy process and will likely take a while longer.

Many thanks and all the best,

Felicia Fsonmez (talk) 01:49, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Fsonmez, the cited source doesn't support "unsuccessfully", so I'm inclined to go with the indeterminate "she sought to get her job back", which makes no claim about the success/failure/status of the effort. I'll change. Thanks for your input. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 01:58, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Any chance we can include Bill Maher's assessment of this whole situation? Sonmez doesn't come off well in that telling, but of course, she doesn't deserve to. Quoting far left sources like CNN and Wapo which are in lockstep with each other ideologically seems ill-considered.2604:3D09:C77:4E00:A48B:6316:66DB:2BD8 (talk) 04:21, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

New Rule: Democracy Dies in Dumbness | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO) - YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tu9JGK_yHo

2604:3D09:C77:4E00:A48B:6316:66DB:2BD8 (talk) 04:22, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Hi all,

Felicia here. Writing to request a correction to this page.

The page currently states: "Sonmez again drew attention in July 2021 after having sued The Washington Post, alleging that the paper had discriminated against her by blocking her from covering sexual assault cases after she came forward as a survivor, with her discrimination referring to Simon Denyer, who was the Tokyo bureau chief at the Post at the time."

Simon Denyer's name is mentioned nowhere in my lawsuit. Could someone please correct this?

Many thanks!

Felicia Fsonmez (talk) 14:22, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

@Fsonmez, I just made several fixes to the page. Looking at the sourcing, there is widespread speculation that the person alluded to in the lawsuit is Denyer, but it notes as you say that he is not directly mentioned in the lawsuit. I don't think the info on Denyer is pertinent enough to warrant mention on this page, so I have removed it (we still cover it on his page). {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 15:45, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Hi all!

Felicia here again. Thank you for your response to my last message. I’m sorry for my delay in writing back!

I’m wondering if it might be possible to update the last part of the page -— I currently live in Asheville, North Carolina, not Washington, D.C.

Many thanks again!

All the best,

Felicia Fsonmez (talk) 16:34, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Hi Felicia — I've updated that information, and added some further details to the article, all based on this recent profile.

For verifiability purposes, we require references for all information in an article like this one, and your talk page comments alone unfortunately cannot suffice because there is no way to verify your identity. So for future updates, it's always helpful to have a link to a potential reference if one is available.

Cheers, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 00:21, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

Thank you very much for this guidance, and for the updates! I will keep this in mind and will provide a link in the future.

Also, I realized I never followed up with a link to my previous request for the timeline to be reversed. (I started my journalism career in DC, not in China.) Here is a link if helpful:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/pr/wp/2018/06/12/felicia-sonmez-joins-politics-breaking-news-team/

(In a nutshell: I taught English in Beijing after college, then moved to D.C. to cover the 2008 presidential campaign for a Japanese newspaper’s D.C. bureau. I then continued covering U.S. politics, including for The Washington Post. Then, in 2013, I moved back to Beijing and worked as a foreign correspondent. I returned to DC in 2018 and rejoined the Post that June. Please don’t feel obligated to include all of these details —- just wanted to provide them in the interest of clarity!)

Many thanks again! Fsonmez (talk) 00:56, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

Due weight

The content of this article, as of right now, consists of a summary of her biography and career, including some notable social media scandals. This is relatively normal; however, I note that her entire life and career are covered in eight sentences, whereas the social media scandals are covered in three full paragraphs (indeed, the bulk of the article). Of course, one could say that she sought (and achieved) notoriety through scandal, but it nonetheless seems rather disproportionate to me -- after all, she spent many years being a journalist, and comparatively little time being a centerpiece of social media discourse. jp×g 22:24, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

I'd like to include additional info about her career beyond its controversies, but there's not that much information publicly available. Podcast interviews are sometimes the best source for this sort of thing — if Sonmez goes on something like the Longform.org podcast, they'd probably walk through her background in a way that would give us lots to cite. Until then, I think we're probably stuck with what we have. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 23:15, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

This is true, User:Sdkb. There are several problematic issues related to a potentially more proportionate article. 1) While she has been a journalist, there is little reliable source news coverage to indicate she has achieved extraordinary notoriety for her work in journalism. 2) Coverage of the scandals in which she has been involved heavily outweigh any secondary source coverage of her work in journalism. It may be unfortunate, but thus far, her career has been known more for the scandals and controversies than anything else. Fair or not, it is what she is known for and the primary basis for any notoriety she has achieved. 3) She herself has fanned the flames of these controversies and helped elevate them well beyond what would otherwise be the case. It seems odd for her to embrace these controversies, often with the very public mindset that she is in the right on the topic at hand, and use her platform as a journalist to elevate the issue, then have a COI editor ask to balance out her Wikipedia bio. I do not take a stand here on the merits of the controversies, and won’t edit the article in any case. But I do believe that, to this point in her career, her notoriety is disproportionately due the scandals, and therefore the fact that her article skews that way is appropriate. ABT021 (talk) 14:47, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Tweet

She retreated a joke she *considered* misogynistic.

LOL … Wikipedia ftw! 2600:1700:A710:A3B0:8510:461B:878C:26A3 (talk) 20:55, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Timeline in Dave Weigel incident?

Isn't the timeline of events in the Dave Weigel incident out of order? Or perhaps the text is just misleading. It seems to imply that the first event was her firing after criticizing Weigel, and then later he apologized and was suspended, but I believe he apologized almost immediately and then she was fired later after attacking him and her employers for 3 days on social media. 118.6.228.36 (talk) 08:09, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

The timeline did appear misleading. I updated it to match the references cited and added an additional reference. Buckeyeback101 (talk) 06:27, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

@Buckeyeback101, per WP:NOTNEWS, we don't need to be including every detail of the back-and-forth that appeared in news reports at the time. Clarifying the timeline is fine, but we should be careful to maintain due weight in the coverage of her career as a whole, in which the firing is only one moment. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 18:38, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I'll see later if I can condense it into one paragraph. Buckeyeback101 (talk) 23:31, 14 December 2023 (UTC)