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MOS:GENDERID being used in place of WP:Article titles and for category arguments

Latest comment: 4 years ago98 comments21 people in discussion

For some time now, a few editors have been invoking MOS:GENDERID as though it is a piece on article titles. This recently came up again with the Jill Soloway (now Joey Soloway) article mentioned immediately above. At Talk:Joey Soloway#MOS:GENDERID with regard to article titles, I argued that "Regarding this move by Rab V, I just want to inform editors that MOS:GENDERID does not apply to article tiles. It is not about that. The policy to look at is WP:Article titles, specifically WP:Common name and WP:NAMECHANGES in this case. That is why the beginning of MOS:IDENTITY, which MOS:GENDERID is a subsection of, states 'and article titles when the term appears in the title of an article.' Now if one wants to cite WP:Ignore all rules, then cite that. But 'Jill Soloway' is Soloway's common name." Rab V, who moved the article to "Joey Soloway", argued against that, clearly feeling that MOS:GENDERID applies to article titles. I stated that "as made clear at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style before, MOS:GENDERID has never applied to article titles, despite you and a few others using it for an article title argument. We have an article title policy and MOS:GENDERID is not it. The MOS:GENDERID guideline does not trump the WP:Article titles policy."

Other cases of applying MOS:GENDERID beyond pronouns and names in article text? There are a number of them. But another case where an article was moved in the name of MOS:GENDERID is the Paul Denyer article. It was moved to "Paula Denyer" despite the fact that sources barely refer to Denyer as "Paula." And despite the fact that, as the article used to state, "as of 2013, Denyer had not yet taken the step of legally changing names." This line was removed without any valid reason given for the removal. Also, like the article currently states, "Medical specialists evaluated whether Denyer could receive sex reassignment surgery and rejected the idea." This article was also moved by Rab V. It's not like the literature refers to Denyer as a female serial killer; Denyer is considered a male serial killer in the literature. And the way Denyer behaved doesn't align with how female serial killers behave anyway (not unless perhaps killing with a male partner who dictates the killings). When Snifferdogx moved the article back to "Paul Denyer," C.Fred overturned this, citing MOS:GENDERID. So, right now, instead of being based on a policy or guideline, that article title goes by a serial killer's preferred name. And given what Denyer did to women, I understand the outrage at Talk:Paula Denyer. Beyond this, it has also been argued that MOS:GENDERID applies to categories, a notion that SMcCandlish and I disagree with.

So does MOS:GENDERID apply to WP:Article titles? To categories? Should it be used to trump WP:Article titles? Should MOS:GENDERID be updated to speak on article titles and/or categories? Should editors simply be allowed to change these article titles to the significantly less common name with no regard to WP:Article titles but rather on what they personally believe is a WP:Ignore all rules basis? I'll alert Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons, Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography, Wikipedia talk:Article titles, Wikipedia talk:Neutral point of view, Wikipedia talk:Categorization, and Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) to this section for discussion. If someone wants to alert Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies, then do that. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 20:17, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Arguing that MOS:GENDERID doesn't apply to article titles is patiently absurd - it applies to all parts of article space, including categories and names; nothing in it says otherwise. The alternative would require us to use the deadname in the title (and possibly once in the lead), but would require us to otherwise use the new name and to use pronouns in the article, which would clearly be confusing. But beyond that, as I said on the page where you brought this up, the question is moot because you've overlooked the part of WP:NAMECHANGE that states that Sometimes the subject of an article will undergo a change of name. When this occurs, we give extra weight to reliable sources written after the name change. This is why the dispute you're trying to raise here doesn't generally come up - sources from before the name change don't matter very much; and in the modern world virtually no reliable high-quality sources are going to ignore a name change due to a transition, so we always end up following the subject's self-identification regardless. That said, it would probably be best to update WP:NAMECHANGE to reflect that common practice unambiguously so as to avoid confusion of the sort that you're expressing here. EDIT: Also, for categories, the guidelines for sexuality require that we respect trans self-identification (and only self-identification.) I can understand missing it since you presumably glanced at the subcategory for gender, but plainly respecting trans self-identification requires categorizing subjects under the gender based on self-identification as well. It was simply put in the wrong subheading because LGBT issues are often lumped together. --Aquillion (talk) 20:40, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
There is no confusion on my part. Is SMcCandlish confused as well? You stated, "This is why the dispute [I'm] trying to raise here doesn't generally come up." It does come up often. That is why I started this discussion. I expected you to make a case for MOS:GENDERID applying to article titles. But what is patently absurd is stating that MOS:GENDERID, which is a subsection of MOS:IDENTITY, which tells us that our WP:Article titles policy is for article titles, and which states that, beyond MOS:MULTIPLENAMES, "the MoS does not specify when and how to mention former names, or whether to give the former or current name first", trumps our WP:Article titles policy. So a guideline trumps a policy, does it? You state that I overlooked a part of WP:NAMECHANGE. I did not. I pointed to WP:NAMECHANGES, not WP:NAMECHANGE (which is a different matter), because I know what it states. And I do not see how "Joey Soloway" is now Soloway's common name. Furthermore, I was clear that I was not trying to get that article changed back to "Jill Soloway." If you want MOS:GENDERID to apply to article titles and categories, then I suggest you propose it instead of stating that it does when it clearly does not. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:27, 13 October 2020 (UTC) Tweaked post. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:57, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Also, I should add, glancing at the discussion on Talk:Paula Denyer, that it is clear that the people who are confused there are not primarily upset about the article title, they are objecting to MOS:GENDERID in its entirety; the main focus isn't the article name, they don't want us using female pronouns for Paula at all. That is not something that there is any policy-based question about - MOS:GENDERID is unequivocal. If your intent is to challenge MOS:GENDERID in its entirety you should be more clear about that, but otherwise I'm not understanding why you brought it up - obviously, MOS:GENDERID applies even to unsympathetic article subjects. In fact, much of what you're saying about that article is a bit of a baffling digression - what the literature says, your personally feelings about how Paula behaves, and especially your somewhat startling approval at the "outrage" there over MOS:GENDERID's requirement that we reflect self-identification are all completely irrelevant. Based on that it feels like the disputes over both categories and titles are an effort to re-litigate the RFC that led to MOS:GENDERID - obviously consistency is required; the title and categories must reflect the article body. And it's clear from that discussion that the main focus of confusion there is people who object to MOS:GENDERID entirely, not people who are genuinely confused about how to apply it to categories and titles. --Aquillion (talk) 20:53, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
If one is for consistency, WP:NAMECHANGE should be followed in the case of the Paula Denyer article. If I was focused on the pronoun argument there, I would have stated so. As many know, I adhere to MOS:GENDERID with regard to pronoun usage. So don't act like I'm against adhering to that. This is not about "an effort to re-litigate the RFC that led to MOS:GENDERID." I have adhered to and enforced MOS:GENDERID at various articles, including Brandon Teena. I pointed to the Paula Denyer article having been moved on the basis of MOS:GENDERID. It should not have been moved. Not only is "Paula Denyer" not Denyer's common name, it's not Denyer's legal name and it's not a name that newer sources routinely use. There was no change-over in the literature. Yes, in this modern world, reliable high-quality sources are ignoring Denyer's name change due to a transition. And as for the behavior of female serial killers? What I stated is a fact. Considering that the topic of serial killers is one of the topics I am well-versed on, I should know. But if wondering if I think that Wikipedia should be very concerned about respecting what a serial killer wants? No. My "approval at the outrage" concerns Wikipedia bending over backwards for a serial killer. Was Denyer refused permission by prison authorities to wear make-up, receive sex reassignment surgery, and legally alter their name? Yes. And Wikipedia is like, "Must respect this brutal serial killer of women who now claims to be transgender." Medical specialists evaluated Denyer and rejected Denyer's arguments. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:27, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
There is not separate name policy for serial killers names and arguments about how female serial killers behave are just straying into personal judgements over whether a trans person is truly their self-stated gender. The idea that wikipedia should only accept transgender people as their stated gender if they are good people or a random editor decides they are female acting enough is only is only going to lead subjective and biased policy. Rab V (talk) 21:39, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
MOS:GENDERID is a guideline, not a policy. And regardless of MOS:GENDERID being used for the pronouns in the article, the title of the article is a different matter. And WP:NAMECHANGES clearly is not being respected in the case of that article. As for personal judgment? Nah. Facts regarding female serial killer behavior are just facts. And categorizing Denyer as a female serial killer when the literature does not is plain misleading and not factual. But we can move on from that aspect. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:57, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
And let's not forget the fact that sources (and I don't mean trans-exclusionary radical feminist sources) address the topic of some in male prisons possibly claiming that they are female to get a lighter sentence or to be in a less violent facility. Female prisons are significantly less violent than male prisons. Transgender people (including academics) have also expressed concerns about violent offenders claiming to be trans when they really are not. But, yes, of course, all we can do is follow MOS:GENDERID in the case of Denyer's latest pronouns. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:09, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
Along this train of thought, I'd like to note that when it comes to terms like "female serial killers", the relevant experts such as criminologists, psychologists, and psychiatrists would be using this specific term in accord with both the sex and gender distinction and sex differences in psychology, both of which they are well aware of. Crossroads -talk- 03:17, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Eh, that sex/gender male-female/man-woman language is become passé. It's shifting to AFAB-AMAB these days. EvergreenFir (talk) 04:59, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Not in standard language. "AFAB-AMAB" is mainly used in the context of transgender and intersex topics. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 19:04, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, that's specialized jargon.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:58, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
It probably depends if the person is still notable after the name change. Hypothetical case: A John Smith has a notable career and retires at 50, and remains otherwise out of the public eye from that point. At 60, they transition and become Jane Smith. Does it make sense to rename? Not in this case: COMMONNAME would apply here. On the other hand, on the same hypothetical, but after retiring John becomes a vocal spokesperson for LBGT rights, remaining notable, and transitions at 60 while still a spokesperson, with new ongoing coverage using Jane Smith, then renaming would be appropriate. --Masem (t) 20:56, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
  • MOS:GENDERID aligns perfectly well with the AT guideline at WP:NAMECHANGES. If sourcing and coverage of gender identity are sufficient to cause edits per MOS:GENDERID, then of course people will discuss whether the deadname is still the most natural, recognizable, and consistent title, and AT has sections on how to handle that specific conversation. I don't see the conflict. — Wug·a·po·des​ 21:02, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
  • The full sentence that Flyer is refering to in WP:IDENTITY is "Disputes over how to refer to a person or group are addressed by Wikipedia content policies, such as those on verifiability, and neutral point of view (and article titles when the term appears in the title of an article)." There is nothing there stating that WP:AT overrides MOS:GENDERID; that same logic would mean that "Disputes over how to refer to a person" are not addressed by MOS:GENDERID at all, which is obviously untrue. In general WP:IDENTITY is not meant to override GENDERID. We can see that the on the other hand the first sentence of GENDERID ("Give precedence to self-designation as reported in the most up-to-date reliable sources, even when it doesn't match what is most common in reliable sources") overrides the first sentence of IDENTITY ("When there is a discrepancy between the term most commonly used by reliable sources for a person or group and the term that person or group uses for themselves, use the term that is most commonly used by recent[f] reliable sources"). GENDERID was always meant to change or augment policy for the specific case of trans and gender-nonconforming people after all. Rab V (talk) 21:28, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
You stated, "In general WP:IDENTITY is not meant to override GENDERID." And I never stated or implied that it is meant to do so. It is meant to complement MOS:GENDERID. It begins with general material and then goes into specifics. MOS:GENDERID is one of those specific aspects. Speaking of overriding, though, I repeat that MOS:GENDERID should not override our WP:Article titles policy. It was never meant to. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:36, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
There is nothing in GENDERID to suggest there are special portions of the article it does not apply to. Rab V (talk) 21:42, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
Yes, there is. It very explicitly states that beyond MOS:MULTIPLENAMES, "the MoS does not specify when and how to mention former names, or whether to give the former or current name first". And the section focuses on pronouns. SMcCandlish (who has significantly contributed to the MOS guideline as a whole) and others have been clear that its focus is on pronouns. There is nothing in MOS:GENDERID to suggest that it applies to article titles and categories. And if it did apply to those things, it would state so already. But I'm not going to keep debating you on this or anyone else on this. I await opinions from others. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 21:57, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
I'm afraid that I am not seeing the conflict between WP:COMMONNAME and MOS:GENDERID that Flyer22 is seeing, at least concerning Joey Soloway and similar cases. WP:NAMECHANGES reads, at some length Sometimes the subject of an article will undergo a change of name. When this occurs, we give extra weight to reliable sources written after the name change. If the reliable sources written after the change is announced routinely use the new name, Wikipedia should follow suit and change relevant titles to match. If, on the other hand, reliable sources written after the name change is announced continue to use the established name, Wikipedia should continue to do so as well.... Neither Flyer22 nor anyone else has presented any sources published since the name change that use the former name, as far as I can tell, so this seems to be an academic if not in fact a scholastic discussion. Newimpartial (talk) 22:25, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
Newimpartial, it's clear at the Joey Soloway talk page that I'm focused on whether "Jill Soloway" should be in the lead, not about moving that article back to "Jill Soloway." And at that talk page and here, I argued that MOS:GENDERID, which was invoked to move that article, does not apply to article titles. I stand by that. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:46, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
But then your argument presents the reader with a very confusing situation. In the first instance you are arguing that the article move may have been correct but was done citing the wrong policy (GENDERID rather than COMMONNAME) - this is what I meant by a "scholastic" discussion, since it doesn't have any bearing on the case cited.
In the second instance, you are arguing that the name "Jill Soloway" should appear in the lede of the Joey Soloway article. This may well be true, but if so the policy basis for this is MOS:GENDERID itself; it has nothing to do with the article title policy COMMONNAME, nor does it in any way hinge on your attempt to use MOS:IDENTITY to overrule MOS:GENDERID, the latter which is intended to guide the interpretation of the former. Whatever your motivation for this move (which also has no bearing on the case in point), it certainly gives every appearance of being an attempt to "circumvent" GENDERID, and strikes me as a bizarre argument to make since GENDERID provides appropriate criteria for an argument to include the deadname in the lede (so why circumvent it?), whereas IDENTITY provides no additional guidance one way or another. Newimpartial (talk) 23:00, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
I've mentioned two issues, yes. But I trust that editors who read, rather than skim, will see that. My initial post in this section mainly focuses on MOS:GENDERID. And MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention WP:NAMECHANGES, stating that it "calls for mentioning the former name of a transgender person if they were notable under that name." And WP:NAMECHANGES does concern WP:COMMONNAME. I fail to see how repeating what other experienced editors have stated over the years about MOS:GENDERID -- that it does not apply to article titles -- "gives every appearance of being an attempt to 'circumvent' GENDERID." This is especially the case since I have consistently adhered to and enforced MOS:GENDERID. I can point to numerous cases of having done so, and have already pointed to the Brandon Teena article as one example. I am all in the archives there. So circumvent what? I think you should cease casting aspersions and (like Aquillion) trying to make this out to be some "Flyer is just trying to hurt trans people" thing. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 23:23, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
De-evolution of human beings into potatoes begins here: limited relevance
Please do not cast ASPERSIONS on me: I do not make any assumptions about your intentions (which I find entirely opaque); it is your actions that I find confusing. For one thing, if experienced editors have stated over and over again that MOS:GENDERID ... it does not apply to article titles that is wonderful, but it only applies to disputed over article titles, and you have not brought such a dispute to our attention on this noticeboad.

Also, please do not confuse WP:NAMECHANGES with MOS:CHANGEDNAME. It is CHANGEDNAME - the MOS section - that GENDERID cites with respect to the inclusion of deadnames in the LEDE. You have previously cited NAMECHANGES - the section of the article name policy COMMONNAME - which gives no guidance relevant to the lede, since it is about article titles. Since this discussion (at least the specific case you have presented) is about inclusion in the lede rather than the article namex perhaps we could confine the discussion to the relevant policies? Newimpartial (talk) 23:37, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Casting aspersions on you? When you state something like "gives every appearance of being an attempt to 'circumvent' GENDERID.", as if I have an issue with MOS:GENDERID, when what I actually have an issue with is MOS:GENDERID being misused, what do you expect me to state? We have an article title policy. MOS:GENDERID is not an article title policy. It does not trump policies. I'm not confusing anything. For example, above, I already stated that "I pointed to WP:NAMECHANGES, not WP:NAMECHANGE (which is a different matter)." I know what all of the policies and guielines state. You also stated, "that is wonderful, but it only applies to disputed over article titles, and you have not brought such a dispute to our attention on this noticeboad." What? This section is titled "MOS:GENDERID being used in place of WP:Article titles and for category arguments." And I began by stating, "For some time now, a few editors have been invoking MOS:GENDERID as though it is a piece on article titles. This recently came up again with the Jill Soloway (now Joey Soloway) article mentioned immediately above." This section does not need to be about a specific dispute regarding articles, and it's not intended to be about a specific dispute. It's about MOS:GENDERID being used to move articles. And the Jill Soloway case is an example of an editor having done just that. I'm not debating you any further on this. I know how you debate, arguing against arguments that were never made, twisting arguments, and so on. No thank you. The section is long enough without all that. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 00:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Flyer22, you stated that MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention WP:NAMECHANGES but it doesn't, it mentions MOS:CHANGEDNAME. So don't tell me that I am arguing against arguments that were never made when you actually made the assertion that GENDERID references NAMECHANGES which is part of COMMONNAME. It simply doesn't. At all.
And indeed you entitled the section MOS:GENDERID being used in place of WP:Article titles and for category arguments but you haven't cited any category arguments, and you have also stated that I'm not trying to get the Joey Soloway article moved back to "Jill Soloway." So I don't see why it matters whether an article is correctly titled per GENDERID or per COMMONNAME, so long as it is correctly titled. You have asserted that But 'Jill Soloway' is Soloway's common name as if COMMONNAME conflicts with GENDERID on this matter but it actually doesn't - COMMONNAME tells us to ignore sources published before the name change in determining the common name, which is essentially the same as the consideration for article text in GENDERID. So I don't understand why you think it matters which policy people cite in making such a move, since they lead to the same outcome in the only instance you have pointed out.
Finally, your ASPERSION was, I think you should cease casting aspersions and (like Aquillion) trying to make this out to be some "Flyer is just trying to hurt trans people" thing. I didn't do that. I simply noted that you seemed to be trying to use MOS:IDENTITY to overrule MOS:GENDERID, the latter which is intended to guide the interpretation of the former. Whatever your motivation for this move (which also has no bearing on the case in point), it certainly gives every appearance of being an attempt to "circumvent" GENDERID. I didn't assume (nor do I belive) any anti-trans animus on your part in making this argument, but I don't understand why you would do so since neither IDENTITY nor GENDERID applies to the naming of articles, and since GENDERID provides explanatory treatment of IDENTITY and cannot "be overruled" by it, pretty much by definition. Newimpartial (talk) 01:33, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
It should be clear to anyone that, when I stated "MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention WP:NAMECHANGES", that I meant "MOS:CHANGEDNAME." That should especially be clear since I've quoted that piece in this section. That I used "WP:NAMECHANGES" once instead is a simple accident, given that these shortcuts are similarly named. It was a typo, pure and simple. Similar to me using "their" instead of "there", or "advice" instead of "advise", and then fixing the typo when I catch myself. But you jumped on it like I dont know what both WP:NAMECHANGES and MOS:CHANGEDNAME state. If I didn't, I would not have correctly cited both pages times before, including at the Jill Soloway talk page. As for the rest, it's more of what I stated at the end of my "00:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)" post above. You made this section about Soloway when I only mentioned Soloway as an example of an editor using MOS:GENDERID to move an article. It matters not that I stated that I'm not looking to move that article back to its previous title. This discussion is about MOS:GENDERID being used as though it is a policy or guideline on aticle titles or as though it trumps WP:Artice titles. As for "as if COMMONNAME conflicts with GENDERID"? WP:COMMONNAME is a policy about article titles. MOS:GENDERID is not. "Conflicting with" is not the focus. Misusing MOS:GENDERID is the focus. And in the case of the Soloway article, you act like WP:COMMONNAME/WP:NAMECHANGES was adhered to. It very obviously wasn't, which is why I stated there at that talk page, "So you are arguing that a day after Soloway announced that they preferred to be referred to as Joey rather than Jill, 'Joey Soloway' became the common name? That's 'routinely' to you? What? As seen in cases like Chelsea Manning, which had substantial debate and made its way into the news, we waited. Blueboar has noted this. We did not wait a day." As for you not claiming that you weren't casting aspersions on me, I don't believe you. And now I really am done allowing you to derail this thread. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 02:48, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
But Flyer22, you are continuing to make inaccurate or inconsistent statements. What you say now is, That I used "WP:NAMECHANGES" once instead is a simple accident, given that these shortcuts are similarly named. It was a typo, pure and simple. But what you said previously about NAMECHANGES is not true of CHANGEDNAME. Your passage was, MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention WP:NAMECHANGES, stating that it "calls for mentioning the former name of a transgender person if they were notable under that name." And WP:NAMECHANGES does concern WP:COMMONNAME. But CHANGEDNAME does not invoke, nor make any reference to COMMONNAME. That is not a typo - it is a mistake, presumably (per Occam) a simple confusion between COMMONNAME and NAMECHANGES. But it leaves you claiming that GENDERID makes some sort of indirect reference to COMMONNAME, when it does nothing of the sort.
As to the naming of the article (which, confusingly, you have said you do not propose to change) you say in cases like Chelsea Manning, which had substantial debate and made its way into the news, we waited....We did not wait a day. AFAICT this is pure OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and, as I have said elsewhere, To me, if all the reliable sources use the new name, then that is "routine" coverage. The argument that sources will appear in the future using the deadname strikes me as WP:CRYSTAL. And believe what you like: one of us is clearly casting ASPERSIONS on the other - and I am not. Newimpartial (talk) 03:20, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Others might be amazed at how you twist arguments, derail threads, and waste editors' time, but I'm not. I meant "MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention MOS:CHANGEDNAME." If I did not mean that, I would not have commented the following below to Tbhotch, "MOS:GENDERID clearly states that 'Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography#Changed names calls for mentioning the former name of a transgender person if they were notable under that name.'" It's completely disingenuous of you to act like I don't know what WP:NAMECHANGES and MOS:CHANGEDNAME (also known as MOS:MULTIPLENAMES) relay when, at Talk:Joey Soloway, I sated, "The policy to look at is WP:Article titles, specifically WP:Common name and WP:NAMECHANGES in this case." and "Because ['Jill Soloway' is Soloway's common name] and what MOS:MULTIPLENAMES states, I added 'Jill Soloway' to the lead." That shows a clear understanding of those pages being two different pages, with one (WP:NAMECHANGES) being about article titles and the other (MOS:MULTIPLENAMES) focusing on leads. There isn't a policy or guideline that I don't know about. When Aquillion stated "WP:NAMECHANGE" instead of "WP:NAMECHANGES" above, was that not a typo or getting tripped up on these pages having similar names? I stated that "WP:NAMECHANGES does concern WP:COMMONNAME" because it is a subsection of WP:COMMONNAME and very clearly states, "If, on the other hand, reliable sources written after the name change is announced continue to use the established name, Wikipedia should continue to do so as well, as described above in 'Use commonly recognizable names'." The argument that MOS:CHANGEDNAME invokes or make any reference to WP:COMMONNAME is not my argument. As for your OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and WP:CRYSTAL arguments, I already responded here. I'm not repeating myself on that again. As usual, you are simply aiming to derail a thread, WP:Bait, and get WP:The last word. And, yeah, just like you, I will continue to believe what I want. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 04:36, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
You are entitled to your own opinions, Flyer22, but not your own facts. If {tq|That I used "WP:NAMECHANGES" once instead ... was a typo, pure and simple}} and what you intended to write was MOS:GENDERID takes the time to mention WP:CHANGEDNAME then why would you continue immediately with And WP:NAMECHANGES does concern WP:COMMONNAME? In other words, why would you say GENDERID references CHANGEDNAME, and NAMECHANGES concerns COMMONNAME, all in one paragraph, given that these observations are not in fact related? That argument just has no throughline, since the scope of CHANGEDNAME and the scope of NAMECHANGES are so very different.
And on the substantive issue of the name change, you have not shown any evidence that the subject of the article's COMONNAME since the name change is not Joey_Soloway, per policy. No reliable sources written after the name change that continue to use the established name have been produced. The rest is noise. Newimpartial (talk) 04:54, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Uh-huh. More of the same nonsense from you, including harping on "No reliable sources written after the name change"...as if I am arguing that the Soloway article should be moved back. Not surprising. You just now asked a question that I already explained. You really should evaluate why you make arguments that weren't made. you argue against arguments that were never made. But then again, you are very likely aware that you do this and why. Other times, like your faulty understanding of WP:Edit warring, you simply don't understand a policy or guideline, or you put on your own spin on it. Your understanding of WP:CRYSTAL is completely off the mark, as any very experienced editor would tell you. But keep on keeping on, I suppose. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 05:06, 14 October 2020 (UTC) Tweaked post. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 05:16, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Some grade A WHATABOUTism there. Sigh. Newimpartial (talk) 05:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Apparently, you don't understand whataboutism either. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 05:16, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
But, hey, I congratulate you on derailing yet another thread. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 05:19, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
I don't know, Flyer22. Other times, like your faulty understanding of WP:Edit warring, you simply don't understand a policy or guideline, or you put on your own spin on it sounds a lot like tu quoque to me (though of course my AGF practices wouldn't let me use the word "spin" for your oblique interpretations of policy).

And as far as You just now asked a question that I alreay explained, you have not at all explained why you said that GENDERID references CHANGEDNAME and that NAMECHANGES concerns COMMONNAME, all in one paragraph, given that there is no connection between CHANGEDNAME and NAMECHANGES. You may believe you addressed that at some point, but you actually haven't.

And as far as "derailing" goes, you led off this section with the assumption that people have used MOS:GENDERID as a putative basis for article title changes that WP:NAMECHANGES would not support. I have simply pointed out that you haven't shown any examples of this, and that the logic of the two policies generally points the article name and the textual references to the article subject in the same direction. I wouldn't call that "derailing", unless your rails were supposed to go in quite a different direction than the declared topic. Newimpartial (talk) 05:31, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

I explained why I've mentioned what I've mentioned. You're just doing what you always do to try and win an argument -- make things up and stick to it no matter what. It's you acting like I don't understand what these pages state, as if I never knew that one (WP:NAMECHANGES) is about article titles and the other (MOS:MULTIPLENAMES) focuses on leads. I do wonder how I was able to argue WP:NAMECHANGES in the context of article titles and MOS:MULTIPLENAMES in the context of article leads (not just recently, but long before now) if I didn't know what these pages state. It's you twisting what I stated in silly ways. It's you making silly arguments about WP:CRYSTAL. Your "all in one paragraph" argument makes not a bit of sense, as if "all in one paragraph" is off-limits. I mean, what???? It's you, as usual, desperately trying to get the last word. Your need to get the last word is why I'm often inclined to not let you have it. I could pop popcorn and watch in glee while you try to get the last word all the time. I'm not the only one aware of how you debate and derail threads. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 06:03, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
And arguing that that "there is no connection between CHANGEDNAME and NAMECHANGES"...when WP:NAMECHANGES begins by stating "Sometimes the subject of an article will undergo a change of name." and MOS:CHANGEDNAME begins by stating "In some cases, subjects have had their full names changed at some point after birth."? Tsk. This is not about some direct connection between the two. When an editor changes the title of an article, the lead is changed after that -- to reflect the new title. That is the connection. I have not confused these two different pages. I am very much aware of what they state. Always have been. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 06:19, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

As a humanoid spud, I resent the implication that this noise is typical of my starchy species.  — Mr. Potato-Head ☏ ¢ 🥔 03:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

I've included a link at WikiProject LGBT studies to this discussion since editors there are likely to have experience dealing with this issue. Rab V (talk) 22:06, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Already said above, but once again, per WP:Article title: "If the reliable sources written after the change is announced routinely use the new name, |Wikipedia should follow suit and change relevant titles to match. If, on the other hand, reliable sources written after the name change is announced continue to use the established name...." Do you have post-October 12, 2020 sources that call Soloway "Jill" instead of Joey to make this complaint? (CC) Tbhotch™ 22:32, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
Tbhotch, complaint? I'm not trying to get the Joey Soloway article moved back to "Jill Soloway." Rab V argued against mentioning "Jill Soloway" in the lead. At that talk page, I argued that a good explanation has not been given for why the lead of that article should stray from our usual practice of including the name the person became notable under. There is no valid reason that we shouldn't do for it what we do for the Chelsea Manning, Caitlyn Jenner, and Chaz Bono articles. They are more famous than Soloway, but still. MOS:GENDERID clearly states that "Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography#Changed names calls for mentioning the former name of a transgender person if they were notable under that name." Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:46, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
Ah OK. In any similar situation WP:DEADNAME always has to apply ("In the case of transgender and non-binary people, birth names should be included in article space only when the person was notable under that name.") Soloway was clearly notable before the change. (CC) Tbhotch™ 00:54, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Just a note I wasn't saying not to include the name, only that MOS:DEADNAME does not require former names bolded and in the lead, just somewhere in the article space. I deleted a note [[1]] Flyer added to the article stating DEADNAME requires the former name in the lead. Rab V (talk) 01:04, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
It's the consistent way we do things. And MOS:DEADNAME currently only focuses on the lead. It's still the case that no solid rationale has been given for why we should be inconsistent with regard to the Soloway article. Mentioning at the end of the lead that Soloway now wants to be referred to as "Joey" instead of as "Jill" is not as clear as the lead sentence/bolding approach. It can be easily overlooked, which is a disservice to readers who (like WP:Alternative name indicates) want to know that they have landed on the right article. It's not like you or anyone else added this notable name to the infobox or "Early life" section. If we need to change MOS:DEADNAME to explicitly mention "in the lead" somewhere in its text, which seems to be the case if editors are going to argue what you've argued, then I'm all for that. This reminds me of editors having applied WP:ISAWORDFOR (a policy) and WP:Refers (a supplement page and formerly an essay) beyond the lead...when those sections are about the lead. WP:Refers was tweaked to make that clear. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 01:26, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Like Wugs, I don't see a conflict between the two. Giving extra weight to sources written after the name change, to me, means we look at all the sources written after the name change, and if those sources routinely use the new name, then so do we. The new name is the common name, if it's the common name now. Sources written before the name change are totally irrelevant because of course those sources wouldn't have the new name; it's only the post-change sources that matter when assessing common name, in my view. Additionally, we don't care what the common name was at any point in the past, we always care what it is in the present, because it's the common name for our readers, and our readers exist in the present. If every other publication refers to someone or something (any topic) as "X", then our readers will recognize it as "X", and so we should call the topic "X" as well. It totally doesn't matter what X was called last year or five years ago (except for redirects). What this amounts to is that the deadname is almost always the wrong title, just by means of a straight application of WP:COMMONNAME without even getting into MOS:GENDERID. Lev!vich 23:20, 13 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Overall, I really don't think there's a policypage conflict here. It's just that we don't have a single "Always do [x]!" rule that covers everything and anything that touches TG/NB subjects. Rather, we have a lot of rules that interact in complex ways (necessarily – real-life subjects are complex, and WP has learned the hard way that "one size fits all" rulemaking tends to fail the needs of a global and all-topics encyclopedia). So, it's always going to come down to a consensus discussion that takes all of those policies and guidelines, and the sourcing, and whatever other factors, into consideration. The consensus discussion may happen more than once, as the sourcing changes over time. I think Flyer22 is quite correct in this part: 'Not only is "Paula Denyer" not Denyer's common name, it's not Denyer's legal name and it's not a name that newer sources routinely use. There was no change-over in the literature. Yes, in this modern world, reliable high-quality sources are ignoring Denyer's name change due to a transition'. Which name contemporary RS are using is generally the key to questions of this sort, to whether consensus will consider satisfied the commingled expectations of WP:COMMONNAME/WP:UCRN and WP:NAMECHANGES, in turn interacting with WP:GENDERID and the general MoS principle that our article text and titles should agree when possible. It may actually be the case that, as of this exact date, '"Jill Soloway" is Soloway's common name'. But that may not mean much (UCRN is not one of the WP:CRITERIA at all, but rather an instruction to use the most common name in RS as the default choice of WP article title, to test against those criteria and against all other applicable policies, guidelines, and other considerations). And even if it true right now, it is not likely to be for long, because the media (the RS we most often rely on for contemporary bio subjects) are quick to adopt such changes for celebrities and such (much quicker than for, say, a little-known murderer in prison).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:52, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
    SMcCandlish, since you were quoted below as stating "UCRN is not one of the WP:CRITERIA at all", I have to ask you to elaborate a bit more on what you mean. I state this because WP:CRITERIA has a "Recognizability" bullet point, which corresponds to the "Use commonly recognizable names (WP:COMMONNAME)" section. This is why it states, "It may be necessary to favor one or more of these goals over the others. This is done by consensus. For instance, the recognizable, natural, and concise title United Kingdom is preferred over the more precise title United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. (For more details, see Use commonly recognizable names, below.)." Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:50, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
    See WP:CRITERIA. It lists five criteria that an article title ideally fits. These are tests to apply against any proposed title (sometimes more than once; e.g., if it has to be disambiguated, then the disambiguation term itself should also be recognizable, natural, precise, concise, and consistent, in descending order of importance). UCRN/COMMONNAME is not a naming criterion. It's an instruction to choose the most common name in reliable sources as the default choice to first test against all these criteria (and other P&G concerns). It's an application of WP:Common sense: the real world would probably not use the name and make it common if it were hard to recognize, hard to use or understand, vague, long-winded, or widely divergent from normal naming patterns. People mistake URCN as simply a restatement of RECOGNIZABLE. It is not; it's a statement about commonness (i.e., about reader expectations and the principle of least astonishment). Recognizability is a major factor in that commonness, both as a cause and a result (recognizability is our chief criterion primarily because of that both-coming-and-going positive feedback loop).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:57, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
SMcCandlish, of course I know what WP:CRITERIA states. But I'm saying that I don't see how WP:Common name is not one of the criteria. Yes, I've read what you've stated on this and I understand that you are stating that "People mistake URCN as simply a restatement of RECOGNIZABLE." But that is how it is widely interpreted. I've never seen an editor (until now) argue that it's not part of WP:CRITERIA. Then again, we know that Wikipedia editors interpret a number of our policies and guidelines differently. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 17:24, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
WP:CRITERIA is one section, it lists 5 things. COMMONNAME is not among them. It is a different section. Plain as day. The fact that some people misinterpret it as just regurgitation of RECOGNIZABLE (or vice versa) is unfortunate but immaterial. If it were really redundant material, it would simply have been deleted years ago.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:13, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
I don't think people interpret it as a regurgitation (I sure never have), but rather as an extension...just like the rest of that policy page elaborates on -- has sections on -- each of the bullet points. Otherwise, all of the other bullet points have a devoted section while "Recognizability" does not. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 18:26, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Sure, it originated that way. But it has evolved a lot in the intervening years, and is generally treated as a distinct operating principle. Arguments that depend on RECOGNIZABLE often do not depend on COMMONNAME or vice versa, because they have become distinct, one as a criterion to apply (which still applies even when, for some good reason, the most common name is not the one WP selects), while the other is a default starting point from which deviation is discouraged without good reason. Recognizability, like naturalness and precision, is largely a subjective analysis, while COMMONNAME is primarily a numerical one.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:29, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
  • What’s with the reference to “category arguments”. I’m not seeing anything justifying “category” in the section title. Category titles follow article titles. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:20, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
    SmokeyJoe, at Ezra Miller/Talk:Ezra Miller, it was that argued that MOS:GENDERID applies to categories. I argued against that notion. And SMcCandlish stated, "MOS:GENDERID on pronouns really doesn't have much to do with categorization. [...] Even the WP:ABOUTSELF/MOS:GENDERID angle doesn't support removing Miller from male categories, not at this stage, not by the content of the subject's own statements." Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 02:57, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
    Categorization is complex. For example, Jenner won Olympic medals as a man, and should be categorized in that regard as a male Olympian (and probably via the redirect from Bruce), regardless of the much later female gender self-declaration and related name change. As a reality-TV star, Jenner's transformation took place during that period, and those familiar with (or unfamiliar with but encountering) this subject in that context will be expecting Caitlyn. One of the reasons WP supports categorization of redirects is that the actual name of the article is not always the most appropriate for a particular category, and may not have any impact on the category name/scope. If we had an entire category devoted to Jenner, I would expect it to have Caitlyn in the name of it, but that might not be the case for someone notable under their original name who, say, changed it shortly before they died, years after their fame or notoriety had faded. That might be the case with someone in prison, for example. (That that prison in particular has anything to do with it; cf. Chelsea Manning, who was released and then ran for office, got in more legal trouble, and otherwise remained in the public eye, under that name). Also, a category for Jenner might be parent-categorized in some male categories (winners of men's [sport title], etc.).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:48, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Looking at the article and the discussion there, it looks like the conclusion was that MOS:GENDERID does apply to categories, which makes sense. I'm not understanding why you think there is any part of article space that it would be inapplicable in - if you accept that MOS:GENDERID is an important policy and recognize the validity of the underlying rationale for it, then why would it apply to article text and not to categories? If anything, it is more important for categories due to their blunt nature. --Aquillion (talk) 06:23, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
SMcCandlish has already been over this (at the Miller article and immediately above). Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:22, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
There was no conclusion, as in consensus at the Miller talk page, that MOS:GENDERID applies to categories. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:25, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
  • The simple fact of the matter is that MOS:GENDERID states, the MoS does not specify...whether to give the former or current name first. I don't see any way around the fact that here it is definitely not making a hard-and-fast rule regarding titles. After all, not only is the title the first appearance of a person's name, but the version of the name that appears first in the text is always (as far as I've seen) the one that is the article's title. Thus, there is no conflict with the policy at WP:Article titles (including WP:COMMONNAME and WP:NAMECHANGES). Arguments based on selective reading of MOS:GENDERID and on ignoring WP:Article titles are not valid; nonetheless, in the vast majority of cases, the new name will be favored over the deadname as the title under the existing rules. Regarding categories, WP:CATV has to be followed. Crossroads -talk- 03:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Without delving into the specific articles too much, my opinion is that some nuance and flexibility is needed. If a person is currently notable and comes out with a different name, we should update our article and its title accordingly if RS start using that name (e.g., Chelsea Manning, Raewyn Connell, Caitlyn Jenner). This would include even less high-profile people like Chaz Bono if their name change is part of their notability. For those whose name changes post-notability or those whose name change is not reflected in RS (e.g., Miley Cyrus, Salma Hayek), we note it but do not retitle. We will have odd cases where it's not immediately obvious what to do (e.g., Cat Stevens). I wont quibble on the wording of GENDERID and AT, and instead just point to WP:DUE. Now that RS generally respect trans folks' pronouns and names, this shouldn't be a huge quandary. EvergreenFir (talk) 05:15, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
  • The overriding policy here is WP:BLP. That deadnaming and misgendering are considered uniquely offensive by the trans community is hardly arcane knowledge, so we should defer to a person's preferred pronouns and name unless we have a really compelling reason otherwise. Deadnaming someone in the name of a house style guide is a dick move, so let's not do that. Guy (help! - typo?) 17:12, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
I feel that I need to respond to this since I'm indirectly called a dick and all, which upset me. JzG, I am not arguing to have a person at their deadname just for the sake of whatever. I'm arguing that we should wait and follow WP:NAMECHANGES, not use a guideline that isn't even about article titles in place of our WP:Article titles policy. There was no need to rush in the Denyer case. Per the literature barely using Denyer's preferred name and Denyer being considered a male serial killer in the literature, this is one case where the article should not have been moved. And SMcCandlish backed me up on that above. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 20:03, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
But you said I'm focused on whether "Jill Soloway" should be in the lead, not about moving that article back to "Jill Soloway." But now are you arguing that the article should be moved back so we can wait for more sources to use this DEADNAME (or not)? I am so confused.
Full marks for selective use of SMcCandlish as an authority, however. Outstanding. Newimpartial (talk) 20:24, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
This again? Didn't you collapse our last "debate"? Didn't SMcCandlish clarify things for you on the Soloway matter? One last time: This discussion is not about Soloway, despite an editor having combined this section with the Soloway section above. Soloway was given as an example of an editor moving an article based on MOS:GENDERID rather than on WP:Article titles. Yes, at the Soloway article, I'm focused on whether "Jill Soloway" should be in the lead, not about moving that article back to "Jill Soloway." I haven't made any argument about moving the Soloway article back. At the Soloway article, SMcCandlish also noted that the article had been moved too soon. But did he argue to move the article back? No. It's been months since that move and sources are picking up the new name. We might as well let that be. But the Denyer case is not the Soloway case. As for "use of SMcCandlish as an authority"? Well, he is one of the main MOS editors. You are not. He has also significantly contributed to many of our policies and guidelines. You have not. But either way, I mentioned him in my "20:03, 14 October 2020 (UTC)" post because he directly addressed my points. I highly doubt that you are "so confused." Move on. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 20:50, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
I'm just observing your enthusiasm to note SMcCandlish's backing of your position on Denyer, but they have directly confronted your position on Soloway, noting It may actually be the case that, as of this exact date, 'tq - citing your position but then continuing But that may not mean much (UCRN is not one of the WP:CRITERIA at all, but rather an instruction to use the most common name in RS as the default choice of WP article title, to test against those criteria and against all other applicable policies, guidelines, and other considerations). And even if it true right now, it is not likely to be for long - which is not at all the TOOSOON argument you have (sporadically) been making. Very selective, is what I'm saying.
I'm also saying that Soloway was moved correctly per WP:NAMECHANGES, and haven't seen anyone provide more than unsupported assertions to the contrary. Newimpartial (talk) 21:55, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
SMcCandlish hasn't confronted me on anything in this case. There is no selective anything on my part in this case. I obviously pointed to all of what SMcCandlish stated. And he began by combating your WP:CRYSTAL and common name arguments. He very much doubted that Soloway's new name is now their common name. He then went the "benefit of the doubt" angle. So, again, move on. You are unnecessarily rehashing. I realize that it must have been very hard for you to collapse the "debate" above, which is why you are at it again. But you know that this latest interaction between us isn't going anywhere/isn't helping. Moved correctly per WP:NAMECHANGES just a day after the announcement? Yeah...sure. But we've already been over that at the Soloway article. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:21, 14 October 2020 (UTC) Added to post. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:28, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
You cited SMcCandlish's post on Talk:Joey_Soloway but were less thorough about the one here, which is why I quoted it extensively above. The two comments overlap but also certainly differ in content and emphasis, so you were by no means pointing to all of what SMcCandlish stated, as claimed. That's what I meant by "selective".
Also, you have by now declared three times on this page and twice on Talk:Joey_Soloway that you do not intend to continue "debating" me on this topic. It must be frustrating for you to know everything there is to know about policy while finding your own intentions harder to pin down in Talk page discussions. (Not to mention the limitations of your mind reading: contrary to it must have been very hard for you, I actually found the DEVO collapse above to be quite satisfying to do.) Newimpartial (talk) 23:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
There was no selectivity. It's just you being out of arguments and trying to use another silly argument. As for stating that I'm done debating you? I stated it twice here, with regard to what is being discussed here -- which, again, is a different topic than the Soloway topic. I was then clear that I was not inclined to let you have the last word and why. It's certainly not because you are right, with your odd WP:CRYSTAL arguments and such. I also stated that I was done with you at the Soloway talk page. And did I reply to you after that? No. Interesting that you complained about mind-reading and then made a mind-reading argument of your own. LOL. I'm glad that you also put "debating" in scare quotes. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 17:24, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Digressive sub-thread
So how am I misinterpreting this sequence? It looks like you decide not to "debate further" but then proceed anyway. It must be taxing to be right all the time, though. You have my sympathy. Newimpartial (talk) 17:34, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Incorrectly, just like your counting on this matter was incorrect. I said I was done twice above. And twice at the Joey Soloway talk page. So that's four times, not three or five times altogether. At the Joey Soloway talk page, after I quoted myself stating "I'm not debating you any further on this.", you changed tactics by focusing on the title of the section. So I was done debating you on what I stated I was done debating you on before. I then commented on your "But what about the title of this section?" argument. And then I was done with you altogether there.
By the way, this is more silliness. Using SMcCandlish's post as an excuse to subject editors to our bickering? Only you get to decide when to collapse such a distraction? You didn't at all revert Crossroads because of your tempestuous history with him? Hmm. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 17:59, 15 October 2020 (UTC) Tweaked post. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 18:08, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Err, nope. I did exactly what I said I was doing, which was to endure the visibility of a relevant post. I happy to remove the current digression, however. I believe all the nits have been picked. Newimpartial (talk) 18:11, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
As I tried to indicate at Soloway's talk page, I'm not picking a side in that largely two-party argument (nor even addressing every claim raised). Rather, I'm suggesting that analysis of the source material in the aggregate will make it clearer (than continuing to argue from socio-political positions or personal policy interpretations) what WP should do, following rules we already have and which are not broken. It's often the case that WP doesn't follow a name change until months or even a year+, until we're sure that the new name dominates in recent RS (generally shorter for a personal name and longer for an organizational, commercial, or political change). Another approach to add is looking at incoming pageviews; if the vast majority of people reaching that page are looking for Jill not Joey, then it is arguably too soon to change the page name. But, redirects exists for a reason, and as long as both names are in the lead, there's not much confusion potential.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Flyer22 Frozen, no, I am not calling you a dick. I think you're following the style guides as you see them. My point is that style guides should not even imply that they override BLP in this case, because enforcing a deadname is a dick move on the part of Wikipedia the body corporate and we, collectively, should be better than that. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:40, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
JzG, I can see we have different views on this...because I agree with what SMcCandlish stated in his "03:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)" post a little above. I don't think that adhering to our WP:NAMECHANGES policy for trans people is a dick move. After all, it is a policy and was presumably written to be followed in all cases. If exceptions were meant to be there, they would be there. That stated, like I mentioned in my initial post above, we do have WP:Ignore all rules. I don't think our WP:BLP policy has anything to do with this. I don't think it should be invoked when moving an article. But as for Wikipedia doing better when it comes to handling retitling an article in the case of a trans person, I do think we should explicitly add something about it to the WP:NAMECHANGES policy. Some sort of leeway should be included there. I don't think editors should keep using MOS:GENDERID to move an article. That is what they cite to move these articles, not WP:BLP. Editors are using a style guide to trump a policy -- WP:Article titles. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 17:24, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
It has been my understanding the we are supposed to use the WP:Article titles policy to name articles, even when using the most recognizable name results in a factually wrong name. Up to this point I have been able to live with this idea, since it is applied (or should be applied) uniformly in all cases. The idea that the policy is labeled "uniquely offensive" by the trans community does not strike me as a convincing argument; instead it seems like an effort to use Wikipedia to bring about social change, which is not the purpose of Wikipedia. tahc chat 20:36, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
Tahc, WP:BLP trumps style guides. It's not as if we won't mention the deadname at all, and moved pages have redirects, but once reliable sources note a name change, we should follow them promptly. Guy (help! - typo?) 08:51, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
I'm sorry, I been trying to follow this discussion and there's a term that keeps getting brought up called "Deadnaming" and that's just something that I couldn't find in WP:BLP. Where exactly are you quoting from WP:BLP make any comment on naming conventions regarding trans? Blue Pumpkin Pie Chat Contribs 16:42, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Blue Pumpkin Pie, deadnaming. It's a thing. A really shitty thing done by transphobes and bigots. Let's not be those guys. Guy (help! - typo?) 22:33, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
@Blue Pumpkin Pie: Deadnaming is not explicitly mentioned, but it could be considered part of WP:BLP#Maintenance of BLPs, especially if the person's name changes after an article is written. In particular "...eliminate ... inappropriate material from these articles", because the use of someone's previous name could be considered inappropriate. Mitch Ames (talk) 23:28, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
In cases where the deadname is not well known it could also be considered under WP:BLPPRIVACY as private information for which we should respect the desire of the subject to keep it private, and WP:BLPNAME which asks to respect intentional concealing of names. We do not have to have the exact word "deadnaming" in WP:BLP in order to use BLP to keep out non-notable deadnames. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:55, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
But this isn't about cases where the birth name is non-notable, though. If the people weren't notable, they wouldn't have had a Wikipedia article to begin with (unless an editor unfamiliar with our WP:Notability guideline created one for them). And for article text, there is MOS:MULTIPLENAMES, which states, "In the case of living transgender and non-binary persons, birth names should be included in article space only when the person was notable under that name. If the subject was not notable under their former name, it should usually not be included in the article even if some reliable sourcing exists for it. Please bear in mind WP:BLPPRIVACY and treat the non-notable name as a separate (and usually much greater) privacy interest from the person's current name." The non-notable name is excluded from trans articles already. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 03:10, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
WP:Article titles is not a style guide. And WP:BLP is not about article titles. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 17:24, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
Per WP:BLP, Editors must take particular care when adding information about living persons to any Wikipedia page.[a] Such material requires a high degree of sensitivity and the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered when exercising editorial judgment. Therefore, if there is reason to believe using a particular name could somehow harm a subject, we have to take that into account; it is obviously not the only thing we consider, but it is something we are required to take into consideration and is part of the reason MOS:GENDERID exists. There is no particular reason why the logic behind MOS:GENDERID would not apply to article titles. --Aquillion (talk) 06:17, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
I repeat, "WP:Article titles is not a style guide. And WP:BLP is not about article titles." Simple as that. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 06:45, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
WP:BLP#Applicability of the policy says (with my emphasis) "BLP applies to all material about living persons anywhere on Wikipedia". I suggest that "all" and "anywhere" includes article titles. Mitch Ames (talk) 07:20, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
Mitch Ames, I do not need to be told what BLP applies to. It remains a fact that WP:Article titles is specifically about article titles and that our BLP policy is not about that. If you want it to be about that, then I suggest you propose it at the BLP talk page. But, regardless, that is not necesssary because WP:Article titles does seem to consider BLP. Such a proposal is also unnecessary because we already have policies specifically about article titles and guidelines specifically about handling non-notable names in the lead and elsewhere in the article. As noted above, we also have WP:BLPNAME (a policy to use against including non-notable names). We have WP:Alternative name, which is also a policy. We typically do not invoke BLP in article title matters and we do not need to start doing so. As should be clear by what SMcCandlish argued here, one cannot, for example, use BLP to argue that the Paula Denyer article should remain titled Paula Denyer. The MOS discussion in this section is about a guideline being used to override a policy. And like SMcCandlish stated at the Denyer talk page, "Guidelines operate within, not against, policies." Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:17, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
  • I haven't seen any compelling arguments for MOS:GENDERID to override WP:Article titles. Articles are not titled by official name or preferred name or brand name in the case of brands. Articles on people should also follow policy on article names. If the subject becomes more well-known by their new name than their old name, change the article title. If not, don't. Natureium (talk) 20:09, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
    That actually isn't what WP:COMMONNAME says, though. It instructs editors to consider only the reliable sources published since the name change. Newimpartial (talk) 20:12, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
    Putting aside the fact that we're required to prioritize sources after the name change, why wouldn't MOS:GENDERID apply to article titles? If you accept that it is an important and necessary policy, and agree that the logic behind it is sound, why would that logic apply to the rest of article space and not to article titles? What is different about titles that would make MOS:GENDERID inapplicable there, when it is an important and essential policy everywhere else? --Aquillion (talk) 06:17, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Comments: I have not dug into this but it should be noted that MOS:GENDERID states:
    Give precedence to self-designation as reported in the most up-to-date reliable sources, even when it doesn't match what is most common in reliable sources.
    The wording states "most up-to-date reliable source[s]", that would be indicative of updating per multiple reliable sources. I would be against name changes to reflect "updating" if the sourcing is limited or not on par with "what is most common in reliable sources". In other words, I would have to look close at a title name change if a subject "self identifies" with a different gender in one (maybe even two) sources against overwhelming sourced evidence to the contrary. A subject can decide to change a name and Wikipedia should not jump on starting to change title names on a whim as they would likely not automatically become more well known by a new name. "Ignore all rules" is actually only validated upon consensus. A better consideration would be "the best title by consensus", especially if this involves a living person and possibly controversial. We do use naming (descriptive titles) that may not specifically be used in sourcing. A determining factor would be if a new name becomes more notable (in sources since the change) than the current title and it does not conflict with WP:BLP or WP:Article titles. Wikipedia:Manual of Style is a style "guide" so any conflict would be decided according to relevant policy. If there is an opinion that WP:Article titles is not correct or needs updating that would need to be resolved at the appropriate place. Any interpretation arguments would certainly need consensus according to current policies. Otr500 (talk) 12:18, 16 October 2020 (UTC)
    Keep in mind that guidelines have to be interpreted within the context of policies, and are not anti-policies; nor are guidelines dueling with each other, but must be interpreted as interoperating compatibly. Ergo, "the most up-to-date reliable sources" doesn't mean if two (i.e. plural) sources can be found, and they are newer by one day than the sources already present in the article, change to do what those sources do – or we would be changing things back and forth every other day (a hyper-WP:RECENTISM fiasco, and essentially license for daily editwarring based on cherry-picked sourcing. A central purpose of both MoS and AT is stability (both for editorial friction reduction, and for reader experience continuity). A principle throughout MoS is to not apply any optional or uncertain style choice unless reliable sources (here narrowed to a subset thereof: "the most up-to-date") are using that style with overwhelming consistency. This supermajority idea (which applies to all of MoS and is not "eliminated" by this section, just not explicitly reiterated in it) reflects similar consensus about titles, at WP:RECOGNIZABLE and WP:COMMONNAME. The language that is leading to confusion here could use a tweak, which would remove all the confusion: "as reported in a strong majority of the most up-to-date reliable sources". The intent of the sentence (before and after such a revision) is simply to get around any WIKILAWYER/GAMING attempt to say that 100 sources before a transition must trump 30 sources after one. Or in other words, for purposes of this TG/NB question, do not base the decision on what is most consistent across all sources ever, but what is consistent in sources that are recent enough to be relevant to the question. We just need to say it slightly better.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:16, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
    I would go with "preponderance" rather than "strong majority" in the draft text, but that's just wordsmithing. I agree in principle. Newimpartial (talk) 11:25, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
  • If IAR needs to be invoked then sobeit, if a person has a new-to-us gender identity I think BLP decency requires us to update the article as soon as it’s reliably sourced.
    We’re the world’s repository of knowledge, so if we take our mission seriously we should respect them. If we need to update our policies to reflect decency then sobeit. Gleeanon 01:46, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
    The policies and guidelines and years of consensus discussions don't agree with you on this, and WP:IAR doesn't work that way. It applies to making a narrow exception for a particular case when the extant rules did not account for it, and ignoring them for that unusual case will objectively improve the encyclopedia for the readers. Here, the policies and guidelines, and the very, very long discussions that have shaped them regarding TG/NB people have absolutely clearly taken them into account (by definition); they are not a uniform "case" but are individuals with different sourceable preferences and concerns; and your expressed motive (unless I'm sorely misreading you) isn't improving the encyclopedia for readers but acting on behalf of a specific subset of encyclopedia subjects, for whom the WP:P&G are already accounting. PS: "Sobeit" isn't a word in Modern English; there was such a word in Middle English, but it doesn't mean what you think it means.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:24, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
  • This seems pretty straightforward to me without even delving into MOS issues. (Though I must admit my patience in reading the above discussion simply gave out about ¾ of the way through; insufficient participation from humanoid spud Wikipedians to hold my attention, I think.)
    The WP:NAMECHANGES subsection of the article title policy clearly states, as pointed out above by Aquillion, Sometimes the subject of an article will undergo a change of name. When this occurs, we give extra weight to reliable sources written after the name change. but beyond that, I don't think anyone has brought up the fact that the WP:COMMONNAME subsection also says, When there are multiple names for a subject, all of which are fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others anyways. The subject of an article explicitly rejecting a name in preference for another would definitely count as “has problems” for that name, to me.
    Do we ever have these kinds of problems when, say, a company changes its name? Or is it just in regards to respecting people enough to call them by their desired name? (Because if it's the former I might be partial to the idea of renaming the article of a certain chemical company something like “Gassing Indian Babies and Giving U.S. Miners Silicosis and Then Spying On Related Activists, Inc.” Under U.S. law it's only people who aren't subject to corruption of blood for criminal convictions, though to our shame I don't believe any criminal prosecution has taken place here, not even for the 1920s event.) --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 04:57, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
  • The comparisons to companies is an interesting point, since it does seem like, for whatever reason, self-identified name changes for WP:BLPs are actually treated more suspiciously here than for organizations, when the reverse ought to be true. AFAIK changes to company names are always, without exception, made immediately as soon as sourcing confirms the name change has taken place - I'm curious as to whether people think we should be treating them that way, and if not, whether anyone thinks there's an argument for treating people differently. eg. when the company formerly known as Blackwater USA changed its name to Xe, the page was renamed the next day with no discussion and with the only cite that used the new name being a press release republished by the AP. FWIW the new name was never commonly used in the media compared to the old one, which is what the company was by far the most famous under. The risk of harm to a company seems far lower than the risk of harm to an individual (companies obviously do not fall under WP:BLP), so I'm unclear why we seem to give so much more diffidence to name changes by corporate entities than we do to ones used by individuals. I do think that whatever we conclude, they ought to either be treated the same way or we should give more diffidence to self-naming when the article falls under WP:BLP as opposed to when it concerns eg. an organization or company. Or, to put it more simply - if I had reverted that rename to Blackwater and posted a bunch of refs from shortly after the rename that still used the Blackwater name (which I believe would have been easy to find, at least for a month or so), would people have agreed? Or would my position have been treated as absurd? For what it's worth, I should point out that most reliable sources today still refer to the company as Blackwater, not as Academi (even many of the few sources that mention Academi mostly do so as a passing mention to say that it is now officially called that, but still use Blackwater throughout; it is plain that, official name change notwithstanding, Blackwater remains the WP:COMMONNAME for the company.) Should Academi be renamed back to Blackwater USA? I was mostly bringing it up as an example at first, but after looking at those results I'm suddenly not convinced putting it under Academi reflects our current policies. There are still more stories referring to the company as Blackwater even from the past few weeks, even though the rename was eleven years ago. Plainly the new names have not stuck or become the WP:COMMONNAME. --Aquillion (talk) 06:09, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
  • I appreciate all of the points you make, Aquillion, and I think they have some merit, but I am given pause by the practical consideration that (as I understand it) there are legal processes in most jurisdictions that arrive at a canonical name for a company, and it seems like a good standard to leave most wrangling over a name to those legal systems. So I think that moving away from our current article titling practices for companies would generate lots of Sturm und Drang in the course of disagreements, for minimal gain, whereas a less deterministic approach for the names of persons in pursuit of the WP:NAMINGCRITERIA is more warranted. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 07:53, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
  • I mean, people have legal names and a formal process to legally change their name, too, and our treatment of people is definitely not "just use the legal name" (I'm not suggesting it should be - it would have obvious problems.) But why is Academi / Blackwater different? Why is their legal name change treated more seriously than a legal name change by a WP:BLP? I only skimmed the sources, but if the company is generally referred to as "Blackwater" in modern sources despite its legal name change eleven years ago, why is that treated any differently than a WP:BLP who has a legal name change but is still generally referred to by their older name in modern sources? --Aquillion (talk) 08:06, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
  • I'm definitely not saying that there's any fundamental reason why we couldn't alter our practice to open up wider battlefronts over company-related article titling, and certainly with specific cases like Blackwater there's always WP:IAR whatever current P&G says, I'm just saying that overall it doesn't seem like a prudent diversion of resources to me.
    But I could be wrong too, maybe fruitless fighting over it would be rare. (On English Wikipedia... okay, I can't say “rare” with a straight face; but still, though, I could be overestimating the amount of churn it would cause, and maybe you're right that the WP:NAMINGCRITERIA ROI would make it worth it.) --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 05:26, 7 November 2020‎ (UTC)

"Wikipedia:MOSCOLOR" listed at Redirects for discussion

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

  A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Wikipedia:MOSCOLOR. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 November 9#Wikipedia:MOSCOLOR until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 17:37, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Request on MOS revision

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Hi, I'm not sure if there is a better place to ask for this (as far as I know, WP:GOCE does not deal with the MOS), but I would like someone to review Union of Bulgaria and Romania, an article I have written, to see if it complies with the MOS. I am following a user's advices before nominating a FAC (which is my intention), which recommend doing this. Can someone do it or is there a better place to request this? If there is anyone interested, you can reply on the peer review that is currently taking place. Thank you. Super Ψ Dro 19:22, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Family as collective noun?

Latest comment: 4 years ago15 comments10 people in discussion

When mentioning a family characteristic such as religion or ethnicity, should we say (for example) "Her family were Jewish" or "His family was Jewish"? There seems to be a fairly even split of singular/plural in Wikipedia articles, even taking into account US vs UK English . Muzilon (talk) 22:00, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Afaik, "were" would simply be British English, while "was" would be American. Have you seen US English articles that use "were" or British English articles that use "was"? Armadillopteryx 22:22, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
Do a search for "...family was Jewish" and the first two "hits" are Henry Daniels and Solomon Joseph Solomon – both British. The biography of George S. Kaufman (an American) says "Kaufman's family were Jewish". Go figure. Muzilon (talk) 01:36, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
In American English, most collective nouns are treated as singular, with a singular verb. For example: The whole family was at the table.
In British English, most collective nouns can be treated as singular or plural. For example:
whole family was at the table.[singular collective noun; singular verb]
The whole family were at the table.[plural collective noun; plural verb]
I found this at https://www.lexico.com/grammar/matching-verbs-to-collective-nouns
So is this Wikipedia written in American English or British English? Figure that out and you then will know how to handle the verb. Like you said @Muzilon:, "Go Figure".
Osomite hablemos 04:17, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
It looks like Henry Daniels hasn't been checked for compliance with British English conventions since May 2012, and Solomon Joseph Solomon doesn't even have the British English template on the page. It appears that both those articles ought to use "are" but were perhaps written by a speaker of US English that wasn't aware of MOS:ENGVAR (though per Osomite's source, both options are ultimately fine in UK English). Likewise, George S. Kaufman doesn't have the US English template and probably just hasn't been reviewed for compliance with US English. Armadillopteryx 04:32, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
What prompted me to ask here is this edit in Annette Carell – German-born, acquired U.S. citizenship, then ended up settling in the UK. Muzilon (talk) 09:08, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
It seems that "was" is the safe choice, as it's acceptable in both US and UK English—though it would be pertinent to establish which variety of English the article is meant to use, anyway. Based on the date formats, among other things, it appears the article means to conform to UK English, so "were" is probably also fine. Armadillopteryx 10:26, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Note that the fact that BrE can use plurals with the word family does not mean that it must do so. See here and here. Doremo (talk) 09:46, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes, BrE kind of uses both. The Guardian style guide says:
Nouns such as committee, family, government, jury, squad and team take a singular verb or pronoun when thought of as a single unit, but a plural verb or pronoun when thought of as a collection of individuals:
The family can trace its history back to the middle ages;
The family were sitting down, scratching their heads.
Not that we follow the Guardian style guide, of course, just offering this as an example. Popcornfud (talk) 11:16, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
"...take a singular verb or pronoun when thought of as a single unit, but a plural verb or pronoun when thought of as a collection of individuals..." Eminently sensible policy. Captainllama (talk) 11:31, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Challenge problem (choose one);

(a) In times of adversity, the family keep a stiff upper lip
(b) In times of adversity, the family keeps a stiff upper lip

EEng 14:38, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

(b) before (a), except in the case of Stiff Upper Lips. Cbl62 (talk) 14:54, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
Version (a) could be a hortative subjunctive. --Trovatore (talk) 20:25, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
Nowadays we don't say "hortative"; we say "sex worker" or "erotic technician". EEng 10:21, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

The Guardian doesn't have the only style guide to make the distinction drawn above, and it's rather commonsensical, which is probably has much to do with why WP articles tend to be written with this kind of variation. People are more apt to write what makes the most sense in the context than try to exactly mirror a style preferred by one nationalistic style guide or another. If MoS were to address this, it should probably also approach this from the same angle: use singular when writing about something as a unit, and use plural when writing about something as a collective of independent units. I've long noticed this split in operation here already, even within the same article (e.g. when writing about a band as commercial/legal entity versus writing about a band as five musicians making decisions and doing things).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:57, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Hi, could someone familiar with sidebar best practice help resolve Wikipedia talk:Categories, lists, and navigation templates#Mass adding of sidebars by TheEpicGhosty? Thanks in advance, Jr8825 • Talk 21:33, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Indefinite article preceding parenthetical phrase

Latest comment: 4 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

@Dratman: I would like to see some guidance for indefinite articles preceding phrases in parentheses. Should the article agree with the first word in parentheses or with the word following the right parenthesis? E.g., should it be a (potentially multidimensional) array or an (potentially multidimensional) array?

The presence or absence of "n" is purely phonetic, not semantic. Therefore the first following word determines the situation. −Woodstone (talk) 05:46, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
Agreed with Woodstone.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:50, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Agree with McCandlish who agrees with Woodstone. EEng 01:34, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
An exception would be square-bracketed editorial insertions. If you need to clarify a quote, "an array", a better way to do this is "an array [potentially multidimensional]"; otherwise you'd be left with a confusing "an [potential multidimensional] array" or something even more hideous, like "a[... potentially multidimensional] array".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:31, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Failed "MOS:COMPUTING"

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I have moved "Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Computing", the target page of "MOS:COMPUTING", to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Computing (failed proposal), put {{Failed proposal}} on it, and re-categorized it in Category:Wikipedia style guideline proposals instead of in the MoS guideline categories. The template at the top summarizes the consensus discussions about this. The page failed as a guideline back in 2017, and again in 2018 as something from which to even merge-salvage a few points. We just forgot to actually deprecate it at the page itself (though it had already been removed from the {{Manual of Style}} navbox).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:06, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

"Section organization" section updated; conforming work needed at LAYOUT

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I've updated WP:Manual of Style#Section organization (the main MoS page's summary of WP:Manual of Style/Layout) to account for things like {{Authority control}}, {{Short description}}, sister-project link templates, sidebar navigation, disuse of "Bibliography" as a section heading, etc. Looked like this material hasn't been substantively updated in several years. It was also confusing that this section said a whole lot about the lead, and a whole lot about all the "appendix" stuff that goes after the main body of content, but nothing at all about pre-lead elements like hatnotes and cleanup/dispute banners.

The main page for this at MOS:LAYOUT also needs some conforming updates. Both pages are important, as newer users are apt to read the main-MoS summary section, since various welcome templates direct them to the main MoS page as a major guideline, while old hands are more apt to refer to MOS:LAYOUT, knowing that it exists and has all the fine-grained details about layout (or, rather should – thus the need to update).

A minor quibble: LAYOUT says that the rationale for putting {{Authority control}} where it goes is that it's metadata. Yet the RfC on where to put {{Short description}} rejected that as a rationale to put it down there or even after navigation hatnotes. So, that pseudo-rationale should be removed; it's perfectly fine for {{Authority control}} to go where it goes simply as an arbitrary decision by the community, without LAYOUT trying questionably to explain it.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:22, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 19 November 2020

Latest comment: 4 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

He said, "[[John Doe|John &#91;Doe&#93;]] answered." JEOLIVER001 (talk) 19:32, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

  Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 19:41, 19 November 2020 (UTC)
I looked at the code, and what JEOLIVER001 gave above is the same, character-for-character, as what is in the guideline's source code. Nor is there any error in it that needs to be fixed.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:25, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

English in the EU

Latest comment: 4 years ago9 comments6 people in discussion

Hello everyone, I was just searching on the web and I've found this map. In this map, the EU has been labelled as light red which means that British English words like organise and labour are active while of course Ireland, Malta and Cyprus are the only members who have English as their official language. This is English is based on British English and has thus the words organise and labour as words. Since these countries use English as their official language and the UK has left technically British English isn't the official language of the EU. However, it looks like the EU still uses British English in their English Style Guide.

My question is here should every member from Portugal to Finland uses British English as the main English style (with exceptions of the three countries above of course) or does this only apply to EU-related articles like Parliament, treaties, politicians, laws etc? Per MOS:TIES, we should use that type style of English in a country who has it as national ties which the EU kind of has. MOS:TIES does not say anything about the EU thus that's why I'm questioning here about this maybe "issue". If only EU-related articles should use British English can someone please add this into MOS? Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 12:39, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Non-English-speaking EU countries do not have English as an official language, and they are not former or current British colonies. There is no reason for an article about Portugal or Finland to use a particular variety of English. Doremo (talk) 13:19, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Yes that's indeed what MOS:TIES says but the EU officially uses British English as their English and since English is also one of the official languages I assume we should use it right? If so then that means everything EU-related should have British English. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 14:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
As you have been advised above, in general articles about continental Europe, there is no reason to use any particular variety of English. In relation to EU institutions, even without the UK as a member, the EU will continue to use British English as an official language; it is just too convenient (and if there were ever to be any question of dropping it, either Ireland or Malta would be sure to switch their official nominated language). The EU prefers British spelling, not least because the principal differences from American (such as the -our and -ise endings) mostly derive from French in the first place. MapReader (talk) 17:31, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Hmm if I'm not wrong all EU-related articles should not always be written in British English for instead this article European Union law could also be written in American English while the EU indeed uses British English? Because If I'm not wrong MOS doesn't say anything whether we should follow or not the styles of English in international organisations. For instead the EU follows British English since the UK was a member for some time, U.S.–Middle East Free Trade Area has the US so it follows American English but organisions like Central American Integration System who's members haven't English as their regional or national official language. Should we follow the organision's style of English or not that's what I'm bothering at the moment? Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 18:03, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Articles about the EU per se do take British (or at least Commonwealth) English, I think. Whether this should be revisited now that the UK is no longer a member — personally I'd rather not. Just not worth it.
    Articles about EU member states, or topics with strong ties to them, are another matter entirely. The EU is not a nation-state, or a nation, or a state, and very few articles have "strong ties" to the EU. In particular the article on the Portuguese parliament does not have "strong ties" to the EU, but only to Portugal, which is not an English-speaking country. --Trovatore (talk) 18:17, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
  • [OD] Agreed with "just not worth it", and with the fact that if the EU officially made any change, it would almost certainly be to Irish (for most WP or EU purposes, indistinguishable from British) or Maltese English (I don't remember much about that variant, right off-hand). If some particular EU agency has a policy of using American or whatever English, it would be fine to use that in our article on it, but we really don't need to invest much time and energy into hair-splitting. Balance ENGVAR with RETAIN: if we don't have a compelling reason to switch spelling, then don't. ENGVAR is best interpreted as permission to change dialect if there's a strong national tie, not a mandate to do so if there's some kind of maybe-kinda-sorta-arguably strong tie according to one interpretation but not others. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:37, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Need for clarity on linking major American cities

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Consensus is sought as to the correct way to refer and link to major American cities such as Los Angeles and Boston. The discussion is being held at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking#Need for clarity on linking major American cities. Cbl62 (talk) 00:01, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Italics...help

Latest comment: 4 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
  Moved to Help talk:Citation Style 1/Archive 72 § Italics 2

I know that sources like PBS, NPR, CNN, ABC, NBC, BBC, etc. should not be italicized. We save that for newspapers and magazines. Where is the MoS guideline for when NOT to italicize those listed news sources? An editor seems to think it makes no difference, and they are changing the citations all over the place. When I'm in doubt, I just look at the article for the source and see how it's done there, because I know that other editors have followed the MoS. -- Valjean (talk) 14:27, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

An apparent duplicate of this question has also been asked at Help talk:Citation Style 1 § Italics 2 where there have been some answers.
—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:55, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

Should further reading sections have "retrieved by" dates?

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

  You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Further reading § Should further reading sections have "retrieved by" dates?. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:41, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

A suggestion about Extended Latin letters

Latest comment: 3 years ago6 comments5 people in discussion

Hi. I've been recently noticed a discussion about whether should we use Extended Latin letters (for example; ç, ğ, etc.) or not. I see that MoS has not any rules about it, so I'm suggesting to use Extended Latin on article names as default for compatibility.--Ahmetlii (talk) 19:26, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

We use diacritics, yes. See MOS:DIACRITICS. --Izno (talk) 20:17, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
Yes, but unicode, not limited to ANSEL. —David Eppstein (talk) 20:25, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
... because everything on Wikipedia is encoded as Unicode (and not because the format matters in the MOS context). --Izno (talk) 21:00, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, ANSEL is a dead stick; we have no reason to care about it other than as an obscure encyclopedia topic (and barely at that; cf. the deletion (after transwiki to somewhere else) of most of our rather index-like articles on specific Windows codepages and other character-set documentation that was all primary-sourced and didn't contain truly encyclopedic content.

However, I get the sense the original poster is concerned about some particular dispute(s) involving when to use or not use such characters (e.g. Mexico vs. México), and isn't asking about the encoding standards. If I've sussed that out correctly, the general answer is that MOS:DIACRITICS is as close to a rule as we have, and is intentionally a bit loosey-goosey. Actual practice (almost entirely established by years of WP:RM decisions) is to use diacritics when reliable sources demonstrate that they belong there (even if many sources in English don't bother with them), with some WP:LOCALCONSENSUS exceptions made on an article-by-article basis. E.g., Mexico is at that spelling because it is almost never spelled in English with the diacritic, and is pronounced in English nothing like it is in Spanish. It's like Munich vs. München. When we give full Spanish names that include that name, we do include the diacritic, e.g. at Mexico City: "Mexico City (Spanish: Ciudad de México) ...".

Another kind of exception to the default to include diacritics is when a notable person has made it clear that they have dropped the diacritic from their name (at least with regard to them as a public figure; we have no idea how they sign their checks :-). A high-profile case, with significant debate that essentially settled this as a general matter, would be Stana Katic (vs. Katić). This can also be applied to organizations; e.g., various ones pertaining to the Sámi people officially use "Sámi", "Sami", or "Saami" in English forms of their names, and we do not "correct" them, even if we default to one spelling (I think Sámi) for the overall subject, and nationally preferred spellings for topics limited to Finland or Norway or Sweden in particular). There was also about a decade-running string of sports-related cases (involving some improprieties like setting up a bogus wikiproject to canvass and PoV-push against diacritics; it was deleted at MfD). The collective result of these is that WP doesn't care whether various lazy sport governing bodies or journalism sources nuke all the diacritics from the names of everyone; WP does not (in general, or on a categorical basis like "in tennis"). If it's clearly demonstrated that the subject actually uses the diacritic, then WP does, too. This is most often determined by the subjects' official websites and social media pages and such-like. So, ABOUTSELF works both ways on this question. The question frequently comes up with regard to American Hispanic celebrities who may or may not have retained the diacritics in names like González and Guzmán). Diacritics are just one of those areas where one size does not fit all, even if we default toward their inclusion.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:20, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Ahmetlii:
For transliterating non-latin scripts, one concern is whether to use a notation that allows one-to-one mapping, or at least round-tripping to latin and back again (e.g. ṣ or š rather than sh for ש श ش ). But łöŋġ řȕńş øƒ ħęåvıļÿ-pƣñţĕð text can be distracting. And an average Anglophone reader seeing ṣīn is going to pronounce it "sin" not "sheen".
There have been various discussions for individual scripts. I remember an old one somewhere at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Arabic where the agreement was to give a strict transliteration in the lead sentence or on first use (like with SMcC's example for Mexico City), but simplified spelling afterwards. That simplification included using straight apostrophe for both ʿayn and alif.
For latin scripts, consensus also depends on language. E.g. we use straight quotes and apostrophes, but curly ʻokina.
Even without diacritics, it can get messy, e.g. where Tamils pronounce a word with /s/ and Hindi-speakers with /ʃ/, and we have a culture war over s vs. sh for the English spelling.
I've also seen arguments that New Zealand articles must treat Māori [sic] words (not Maori nor Māori) differently from foreign or loan words in other articles because ENGVAR says "New Zealand English" can be its own special thing, and they get to make their own rules.
For what it's worth, my own preference is for either (a) anglicised spelling without diacritics in upright text, or (b) italic/oblique text with full diacritics. There is precedent for this: in older books it's not uncommon to see métier or rôle, which these days are usually printed as metier and role.
— Pelagic ( messages ) – (22:01 Thu 26, AEST) 12:01, 26 November 2020 (UTC)

Latinx

Latest comment: 3 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

I've noticed the term Latinx being used in a few places on the wiki. It is used instead of the gender-implying Latino or Latina, following MOS:GNL, as generic use of Latino may be comparable to a generic he. However, it is a neologism and used less than the gender-implying alternatives, so MOS:NEO might prohibit its use. How do MOS:GNL and MOS:NEO apply here? Wikinights (talk) 18:12, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

For article space, I'd question whether "latin(o/x)" is the right tone or if something more formal like "latin-american" is warranted. Also, "latino" strikes me as USA usage, so should it be avoided in non-US-specific contexts? Pelagic ( messages ) – (22:19 Thu 26, AEST) 12:19, 26 November 2020 (UTC) [Oops, forgot ping Wikinights. Pelagic ( messages ) – (22:21 Thu 26, AEST) 12:21, 26 November 2020 (UTC)]

Finished MOS:DIACRITICS merge

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Since a 2018 consensus discussion, we've been merging the old WP:Manual of Style/Proper names into other MoS pages, and sorting its parts to where they topically belong (because the PN page was disused and getting out-of-synch). As a consequence of some big-chunk merging, most of the diacritics-related material ended up in MOS:CAPS (MOS:PN for some time has redirected to MOS:CAPS#Proper names). The diacritics material was obviously off-topic there, so it was slated for merger into the related material on that subject in the main MoS page. No one seems to do MoS merger stuff but me, so I finally got off by wikibutt and finished it. :-)

I didn't change anything in the course of the merger, other than some copyediting twiddles: clarified an example; made a procedural point less of a non sequitur (and more neutrally worded); normalized punctuation; put examples in a bullet list to break up the large block of text; did some link cleanup, and added a link to ArbCom stuff in the footnote; then left behind a cross-reference at MOS:PN).

I would caution against any sudden urges to rush in and make substantive changes. Most of this material has been stable for years, and is the product of a lot of discussions, few of which have been characterized by calm and good cheer.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:53, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

For biography leads, do we prefer recent images or images from when the subject was most notable?

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

  You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images § Preferred lead image time period. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 01:59, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

MOS:EPONYM

Latest comment: 3 years ago27 comments4 people in discussion

There wasn't one, and it was a bit of a challenge to track down MoS's material on this, because the main MoS page never mentioned it, nor did MOS:BIO. It's common enough a set of questions to be in main MOS.

MOS:EPONYM, MOS:EPONYMS, and MOS:EPONYMOUS now go to a new bullet item in the main MoS page, adapting material from MOS:CAPS (at MOS:DOCTCAPS), and including a footnote on conventional exceptions. I do not think it says anything novel; it simply records what we're already doing. The MOS:DOCTCAPS versions can probably be compressed, with a cross-reference to MOS:EPONYM. I'll add a cross-reference at MOS:BIO as well, since people are apt to look for this over there.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:21, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

PS: It should not be relocated to Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biography#Names, since eponym also refer to things with non-human namesakes (e.g. named after places, after published works, after organizations, etc.).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:23, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

Can you be more specific about what existing text you've adapted to make your addition to MOS here? I don't see anything at MOS:DOCTCAPS that can reasonably be interpreted as "Adjectival eponyms are always in the uppercase". You started a 2017 RfC proposing that this text be added to the MOS and there was not consensus to support that change. So it at least doesn't seem non-controversial to add your preferred position to MOS now. Perhaps an RfC is indeed appropriate. Ajpolino (talk) 19:47, 28 November 2020 (UTC)
  See subsection below (since the original thread turned into a circular trainwreck.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:48, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
Unproductive back-and-forth:
It doesn't say "Adjectival eponyms are always in the uppercase". It even provides an example of one that's not, in the footnote.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:48, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
Also by way of background for anyone watching, as far as I can tell this addition was spurred by this thread. Ajpolino (talk) 19:52, 28 November 2020 (UTC)
I've reverted the addition. As I said above and in my edit summary, this was proposed in an RfC in 2017 and not accepted. So I don't think it's fair to call this adapting material that already exists elsewhere. Ajpolino (talk) 04:16, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
I'll mostly just recycle the same bullet points I used in response to your way longer version of this on my talk page:
  • An RfC that had too little input to reach consensus doesn't equate to a decision in your favor, much less a rejection of the view you don't like. It simply didn't do anything at all.
  • Meanwhile MOS:ISMCAPS has evolved to directly address the gist of this (and regardless of your pet style issue, is something that should be summarized on this point in main MoS page because it also has implications for MOS:BIO and other matters that don't pertain directly to ISMCAPS's doctrine-focused concerns). The only real clarity problem with it is that it didn't include the word "eponyms" despite being overwhelmingly focused on them.
  • Ironically, the MOS:EPONYM material you reflexively reverted included a footnote for recording consensus-accepted exceptions, and I added it mainly because the question you care so much about has not been properly RfCed yet and could actually go your way (very unlikely as that may be), resulting in another entry in that footnote.
  • You and a few of your wikiproject friends want to do something weird with style on a particular topic – which has repeatedly been challenged by other editors since 2004 – because you really like how CDC says to do it, or how AMA says to do it (though their two sets of "rules" on it don't even quite agree). But WP has its own style guide and doesn't follow either of the style guides of those other organizations.
  • Nor does most of the rest of the world, even in the same fields. It's easily provable (already proven [7]) that neither the specialist literature in the relevant fields, nor general-audience books in which these terms appear, prefer either of the quirks some of you want to force other editors (and worse, our readers) to have to deal with.
  • Those quirks are not an arbitrary, doesn't-matter style issue, but are directly confusing to the average reader for at least three reasons.
  • The fact that DOCTCAPS already addresses this entire class of things (just without using the word "eponym") has escaped you, but it remains true nonetheless.
But we can settle this out with some discussion here and, as needed, with new RfCs. Probably one to address writing "Gram stain" but "gram stained" (lowercase and with no hyphen) in the same sentence); and, if necessary, one to restore the MOS:EPONYM material, which was entirely accurate as to actual site-wide consensus on the matter (including the fact of some occasional exceptions).

"You didn't include my exception" sentiment isn't a revert rationale, especially since your exception is badly contradicted by real-world usage even among most specialists in the relevant fields (see all the links in this post), and has been opposed on WP by multiple other editors for 16+ years with no response from your sector but WP:STONEWALL, no matter how much evidence is presented against your stance.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:34, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish:, MOS:EPONYM, MOS:EPONYMS, and MOS:EPONYMOUS are not working for me. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:38, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: see above (and, if a masochist, the giant version on my talk page). Ajpolino has reverted MOS:EPONYM. You can see the material in edit history [8]. Or just read MOS:DOCTCAPS, which is all about eponyms (without including the word "eponym" for some reason). I recapitulated that material, in the main MoS page, and added a few examples and a footnote on exceptions, which show how we apply this to things that don't quite fit DOCTCAPS (i.e. are not doctrines, laws, schools of thought, etc.). I don't think there is any question whether the material is accurate.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
@SMcCandlish: I have never suggested that an RfC with minimal participation supported a consensus in "my favor". Merely that we had one, and your proposed wording was not adopted. I asked above and I'll ask again: where in MOS:DOCTCAPS is the text that you were "adapting"? I fail to read any part of MOS:DOCTCAPS as "Eponyms are capitalized". You claim The fact that DOCTCAPS already addresses this entire class of things... has escaped you, to which I'd say: yes, that's exactly what I claimed above. I'm asking you to please clarify. Ajpolino (talk) 16:36, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
@Ajpolino: Given the massive amount of material we've already been through at my talk page, what could still need clarification? I do not actually believe for a moment that you cannot understand that material at DOCTCAPS, all about eponyms, is not all about eponyms. You appear to be generating argument for its own sake, and we have better things to do around here.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
Also regarding your wikiproject friends and your sector I'd ask you to cool it with the vague references to some semi-secret cabal you're crusading against. You seem to be misinterpreting a few editors disagreeing with you to be some kind of organized resistance. You're mistaken. Ajpolino (talk) 16:40, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
Huh? There's no "secret". Anyone can simply read Talk:Gram-negative bacteria and related pages where this has come up, where they'll see the very short list of editors who've been in favor of "gram negative", what their arguments are, and that they're in part mutually incompatible, and in whole contradicted by real-world usage norms (even in journals).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

I don't see what problem Ajpolino sees in the material he reverted. Is it just that he would prefer capping "Gram-negative" and such (as most sources now do)? Dicklyon (talk) 17:18, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

My problem is that I don't see how the text at MOS:DOCTCAPS could reasonably be interpreted to mean what was added here. The "Gram" thing comes in because SMcCandlish has been posting here to the effect that the MOS requires adjectival eponyms be capitalized. I asked where this guidance is (he had proposed wording to this effect be added in 2017 but the RfC was poorly attended and the proposed wording was not taken up). He then wrote the subsection referenced here. His contention is that this clarifies existing MOS guidance. I don't read existing guidance this way, so I instead read this as codifying his preference that wasn't taken up at the 2017 RfC. I asked for clarification, but received no answer, so I reverted the addition. Ajpolino (talk) 18:14, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
This pretense that DOCTCAPS, overwhelmingly focused on eponyms, is not about eponyms just because it lacks a statement that it's about eponyms, is particularly pointless, a wikilawyering vs. common sense matter. Another is the idea that, now that it's become clear that we already had long-standing MoS material on this, just rather mis-placed and in need of clearer wording, it's all invalid anyway because some RfC several years ago to basically re-answer the same question didn't get enough input and archived without closure.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
In his last round of Gish-gallopping material in the big version of this thread at my talk page, he indicates he really doesn't have any preference after all but is just trying to prevent anyone from changing any [G|g]ram[–| ] pattern to any other at any article, because he believes it's just arbitrary. But it's not arbitrary in effect on reader comprehension, and this has been made clear by multiple editors from 2004 onward in the article talk page discussions, and this thread. This looks like a mixture of NOTGETTINGIT and POINT – generation and perpetuation of circular argument just for the hell of it. And it's clearly not about any request for clarification and supposed lack of getting one, since we've been over this several times already.

I'm skeptical of this claim of indifference, since Ajpolino's wall o' handwaving for purported style-agnosticism isn't a pattern he applies topic-by-topic, nor one he's applied in this one except toward "Gram-". This appears to be all and only about [G|g]ram[–| ] and some (probably older and American) specialists' favoring of "gram negative", a style never in the majority, seriously declining since the 1990s, and mostly found in a few US organizations' house style guides. It could just be coincidence, but this closely fits SSF patterns seeking wikiproject control (often to impose a particular off-site organization's stylistic preferences) over the content of articles a project claims within its scope – about which see CONLEVEL policy, and ArbCom's take. This seems to be about gatekeeping, not substance. If it is just coincidence, it's a remarkable one.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:43, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

No attempt to SATISFY Ajpolino, here, in article talk, or in user talk, appears to have any result but generating more circular argument. Since he professes no interest, after all, in the actual content matter at issue, I don't think further attempts to address proceduralism-based filibustering will be productive. I'll return to what I said in article talk: "We don't actually need a new RfC on this, but we should do one anyway just to put this matter to bed forever, since it's been re-re-re-argued without a clear WP:CLOSE since at least 2004, which is ridiculous and counterproductive." I'm not sure whether it's better to open one here, or at that article talk page, or at a different one (it affects all the articles that relate to Gram staining and that topic's intersection with bacteriology).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:48, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

I'm only repeating myself because you're swamping the talk page with walls of randomly indented posts. We disagree on whether you summarized existing MOS guidance, or added your personal preference as a subsection. The specific bit I quibble with is that you claimed at Talk:Gram-negative_bacteria#Standardized_spelling_&_punctuation that MOS requires us to use the style of the majority of sources. I had never seen that rule, so I asked where that is written. You said MOS:DOCTCAPS. I don't see it there. So you added this with the footnote claim that it's really the "majority of major Enlgish-language dictionaries" that decide when an eponym is used in the upper/lowercase. I thought you might just be codifying your personal preference. So I reverted and asked here for more opinions. I think this is unimportant enough that we can wait to see what others think. Ajpolino (talk) 23:45, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
I'm (and surely anyone else reading this is) interested in hearing from someone[s] else now. If you still just cannot understand that DOCTCAPS, rife with examples of when and when not to capitalize eponyms, with explanation, is about eponyms, then neither I nor anyone else is going to be able to help you. PS: See Help:Talk: the indentation is not "random"; it corresponds exactly to which previous post is being replied to.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:41, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
SMcCandlish, please read what I said just above. I feel you've invented a rule that the "majority of major English-language dictionaries" determines our house style on eponyms. I don't see that at DOCTCAPS. You can tell me 5,000 times that DOCTCAPS is about eponyms. It still doesn't have a prescription for the situation at Talk:Gram-positive bacteria. You invented a "solution" that we enforce site-wide whatever the majority of dictionaries do. You've pretended that "solution" is already in the MOS. It is not. If we're going to adopt that "solution" I feel it should be discussed first. Ajpolino (talk) 03:52, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
Also, struck the "randomly indented" bit as it is both beside the point, and wrong. Sorry. Ajpolino (talk) 03:59, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
"It still doesn't have a prescription for the situation at Talk:Gram-positive bacteria." YES. This is what I've been saying to you for over 24 hours. You came here (and much more loudly on my talk page), in revert and rant mode, because you were just so sure I was claiming some upper hand and legislating my own preferences. For hopefully the last time: I've been doing routine maintenance (MoS is always, though slowly and very incrementally, undergoing maintenance to better consolidate related material into one place, with cross-references where needed, and to ensure the main MoS page summarizes all the key points). I've made it clear here, at the article talk page, and in user talk, that the 16+ year slow-editwar stuff at that article is something that clearly needs its own RfC, and that it is not addressed yet by MOS:EPONYM material. It has a footnote for exceptions we're sure about (not because I said so, but because we've already written them down, just in scattered places). The Gram/gram thing may or may not end up in there, depending on how resolution of that eventually goes. "Consult dictionaries" is not something I made up; it's an instruction all throughout the MoS pages on how to get an answer to nit-picks MoS doesn't need to record (or we would have tens of thousands of them by now).

"I feel it should be discussed first"? No one can meaningfully discuss anything, because you're mega-bludgeoning, then not listening, turning the discussion totally circular. It is now well past the stick-dropping hour. No one is controverting anything about this but you, focused on dwelling on imagined motives not the content and meaning of the material, and you've explicitly stated you don't even care what the outcome is. If you do not have substantive, constructive, and non-repetitive input for the subsection below – which I had to open because you've train-wrecked the main thread with all this IDHT hot air – then please just move on to something else. This is not a good use of your time or anyone else's.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:20, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

You're missing my point above. I'm saying DOCTCAPS does not have a prescription for the gram/Gram situation. Your text does: follow the majority of major English-language dictionaries. If your footnote instead says "...been conventionalized in lower-case. For example..." then I'm happy. What has and has not been "conventionalized in lower-case" can be worked out on a case-by-case basis. Ajpolino (talk) 17:04, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
No, I am not missing your point; you are missing pretty much every point in every post about this entire topic, since it has begun, including inability/refusal to see when the post you are replying to has already addressed (and was not the first to do so) the thing that you are raising yet again. I'm not taking any more of this circularity bait.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  19:10, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

On the actual text

I've put the MOS:EPONYMS line-item back in, but with an {{under discussion inline}} tag, pointing to this thread. The total disappearance of the material, and the breakage of links to it, had cause the discussion to flounder and to be confusing for people (see, e.g., comments above from Guy_Macon).

The text, as of the timestamp below:

...

Notes

...

  1. ^ There are some rare additional exceptions to capitalization of eponyms, in which a term has been strongly conventionalized in lower-case, i.e. is preferred that way in a majority of major English-language dictionaries. For example, parkinsonian describes a patient exhibiting symptoms of Parkinson's disease. Linguistics/orthography use of the terms latinize, romanize, and anglicize are increasingly lower-case, and italic[s] in typography always is.

To get to the actual substance of the matter:

  1. As explained above, we have occasional recurrent disputes about eponym typography.
  2. We've actually long had advice about this, but it has been buried at MOS:DOCTCAPS, and not clearly labeled as about eponyms, despite covering them in some detail, both with examples and with reasons.
  3. The section over there is also entirely about DOCTCAPS matters (doctrines, eponymous laws, schools of thought, etc.), while WP obviously has other eponyms to consider. I adapted the original wording and added broader examples (real ones, from our actual articles).
  4. For line-item brevity, stuff about exceptions was moved to a footnote. But it is more permissive than the original "embedded" material about this, because WP itself is more permissive on this in general than DOCTCAPS might have indicated.
    • E.g. the parkinsonian example was pulled in from one MED-related advice page or another
    • The linguistic and typographic exceptions were drawn from MOS:ANGLO-
    • There will almost certainly be additional examples squirreled away in various places like MOS:BIO, MOS:MUSIC or whatever. Consolidating material like this and cross-referencing takes time (e.g. the "recent", that is recently completed, MOS:DIACRITICS merger, which sat unfinished for 2+ years; "there is no deadline".
  5. Advice to consult mulitiple of major English-language dictionaries is a stock MoS instruction, found in many places, for getting an answer to questions about specific cases, where they are arbitrary style twiddles that MoS has no reason to "legislate" about in detail.
    • It's clearly pertinent to this. E.g., WP would not be writing parkinsonian if this were not the broadly accepted practice.

I'm failing to see how any of this is controversial (especially since the only objection raised is procedural, not substantive, and was predicated on a case that has been under discussion for 16 years and needs its own RfC; it is neither forbidden nor given imprimatur by the material in MOS:EPONYMS, since there is no answer yet, though there's a footnote in which it may or may not end up being listed, after there's actually a consensus decision about that particular case).
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:12, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Fixing the accidental return of decorative quotations

Latest comment: 3 years ago9 comments4 people in discussion
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
  Resolved
 – MediaWiki:Common.css has been changed to revert the new MW defaults back to en.wiki's established blockquote style.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:49, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
  Moved to MediaWiki talk:Common.css § Fixing the accidental return of decorative quotations
 – The bulk of the discussion about this has already relocated to that other talk page.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:16, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Apparently without bothering to consult the community, the MediaWiki devs have recently pushed a change in the underlying software that renders all <blockquote>...</blockquote> instances (including templated ones like {{Quote}}) with a weird grey sidebar (a style borrowed from a particular blogging platform). This looks especially awful when there nested block quotes (as at Twain–Ament indemnities controversy).

We've had repeated RfCs, TfDs, and other consensus discussions against decoration of this sort, so now we need to figure out exactly how to fix this. We may need to track down where in the stylesheet cascade this is entering our code that gets sent to the browser. I believe the place to fix this is in en.wikipedia's MediaWiki:Common.css. Just adding border-left: 0; to the blockquote { ... } definition may be enough to do the trick.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:27, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

To wit, this is only in Vector. The sidebar was already in place on Minerva, where I think the style is actually reasonable; giving up space for the mobile use case doesn't make sense. The implementing task is phab:T265947, where yours (and him) truly has complained already :^). --Izno (talk) 01:56, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Ha, I noticed this during a rare use of blockquote and spent awhile trying to figure out what I'd done wrong, to no avail. Two thumbs up to fixing it; I wish I had more thumbs. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 04:07, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I noticed this showing up in the last week or so. Please make it go away if possible. We have spent so much time and energy getting rid of these unwanted decorations in article space. – Jonesey95 (talk) 06:05, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
I'll see about testing this in user CSS first, and at least removing it from Vector and any other non-mobile skins. I think whether this should be done in the mobile skin is a separate question, and one that was not asked of the community, but again just imposed by the devs without any consultation.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:17, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
SMcCandlish, I was able to hide the border this way in my vector.css: blockquote {border-style: hidden !important;} My understanding is that the !important flag is not usually recommended, but I was unable to get it working without that flag. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:54, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
I'm going to continue this discussion at Common.css. --Izno (talk) 17:28, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

When the preferred pronoun is not a pronoun

Latest comment: 3 years ago12 comments6 people in discussion

Keiynan Lonsdale has stated that Lonsdale's preferred pronoun is "tree", and there has been a start at the article changing all instances of "he" to "tree". Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Gender_identity doesn't really provide guidance in this instance. How do we generally address this in articles? Schazjmd (talk) 01:42, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

How do reliable sources refer to this person when using a third-person pronoun, excluding times when the word "tree" is itself a part of the coverage of course. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 01:47, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
Good question. I checked news results in the past 30 days: [9], [10], [11] — they all use "he". But although I haven't kept up with all of the gender identity discussions on wikipedia, I'm vaguely aware of them and wasn't sure what the protocol was for complying with an expressed preferred pronoun. Schazjmd (talk) 01:56, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
WP has come to accept singular they as an appropriate catch-all, generic, gender-neutral pronoun, following the lead of major off-site style guides (which, like WP, also use other tactics like repeating the name instead of using a pronouns, and doing other rewriting to avoid pronouns). This "tree" case is not any different from "hizr", "zie", "shim", and other made-up pseudo-pronouns, or cobbled-together construction like "(s)he" and "his/hers"; WP doesn't use them, nor do many other publishers we would consider reputable.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:14, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, SMcCandlish, I'm sure you'd have known if the WP community had decided to always adhere to a BLP's stated pronoun preference (which is the point I was unsure on). I've changed the article back to the pronoun used by RSs. Schazjmd (talk) 16:19, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
@Schazjmd: I'd observe that is not among the approaches SMcCandlish proposed; of those, I'd personally be inclined to go with the one you yourself used in the initial comment here—repeating the name instead of using pronouns. --‿Ꞅtruthious 𝔹andersnatch ͡ |℡| 16:44, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
A combination approach typically works pretty well (including various sentence restructurings to avoid both pronouns and yet another name repetition). I have not looked at the article in a long time, but I used combo approach to clean up Genesis P-Orridge a long time ago. It was peppered with the subject's novel construction back in the day, something like "s(h)e". I don't remember exactly, but I'm sure the article has it in there somewhere, and should, as an WP:ABOUTSELF primary-sourced fact; it's just not a style WP should itself be using in our own running prose.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:23, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
PS: I just checked, and the article is still appropriately written, and has been updated with more specific information and more sources: 'P-Orridge used a variety of pronouns throughout their life; including first-person plural, and the idiosyncratic "s/he", "h/er", and "h/erself".' And I learned rather belatedly that P-Orridge died this year. Not sure how I missed that, but I'm now bummed. Well, more bummed, after so many other deaths this year, both of the influential and of the COVID-taken everyday folk down the street.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😿  01:28, 18 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Are you people on drugs? Here's what this superannuated teenybopper told Billboard:
    Keiynan Lonsdale doesn't care for labels all too much, as admitted in an interview with BIllboard. Now, rather than identifying with any specific pronoun, Lonsdale wants to go by “tree."
    The Love, Simon star opened up about sexuality and gender pronouns in an intimate Instagram Live session on Tuesday.
    When a fan asked if Lonsdale was gay, the actor was surprised to keep getting that question. “Now it just depends on the day. Sometimes I’m bisexual, sometimes I’m gay, sometimes I feel straight, sometimes I’m not anything,” Lonsdale said on Instagram Live. “It doesn’t matter. Either way, throughout all of that, I’m Keiynan.”
    Lonsdale further explained: “I don’t want to go by ‘he’ anymore, I just want to go by ‘tree.’ I want people to call me ‘tree,’ because we all come from trees, so it doesn’t matter if you’re a he or a she or a they or a them. At the end of the day, everyone’s a tree. I want to call my friends 'tree' and me 'tree' and everyone 'tree.' So, I think, like now, when people ask me what my preferred pronoun is, I’m going to say ‘tree.’"
    In a duo of Instagram posts, Lonsdale displayed an affinity for trees. In one, the actor stands shirtless, shrouded by a leaf-filled tree branch. In another, Lonsdale holds a branch of leaves.
    Lonsdale concluded the Instagram Live remarks by saying: “I’m not high by the way, this is just me.”
And we actually have editors sufficiently mush-brained to take that seriously? Are you fucking kidding me? The above appeared two years ago and I have been unable to find a single source published since then which refers to the leafy Lonsdale as anything other than he (and that includes Billboard itself [12]), nor any evidence that Lonsdale himself even remembers saying all that. (I need hardly point out that when people go out of their way to volunteer that they're not interviewing under the influence, you should consider taking that with a grain of salt.) In particular, news releases from Lonsdale's own PR firm, as recently as last month, refer to him in the third-person masculine faunal (not floral) [13][14] Please, someone let me know when sanity reigns again. I'm changing the article back to the its pre-delusional state. EEng 03:41, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
Yeesh. I'm having an essentially impossible time interpreteting this as anything but cynical and possibly mocking exploitation of LGBT+ concerns to get attention. WP shouldn't cover this at all unless multiple, independent, reliable, secondary sources devote non-trivial coverage to it (and if that happens it'll probably be negative coverage about controversy generated by such exploitative PR antics). It is not even faintly plausible that this person's gender identity, sexual preferences, and sense of self vary radically day by day based on mood. Even people with profound psychoses do not experience such things. I'm reminded of other cases where WP:ABOUTSELF cannot be employed because the person is clearly not credible as to their own beliefs, personality, history, etc. (e.g. many criminals, Trump, Rudolf "Minnesota Fats" Wanderone, etc.).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:22, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
There is a fair practical long-term question that if someone sane does ask that they have a non-standard pronoun used (outside the he, she, they, or perhaps xie variations) what do we do with that? We're still a global work and while I can see something like the "xie" form gaining some global acceptance, anything off that is going to cause massive confusion. To point, we should likely default to the "they" pronoun form. We can't cater to all these personal requests for special naming or pronoun treatment for a global work. --Masem (t) 21:41, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
I would say follow, not lead. If major media outlets that are reliable and independent of the subject use some one-off custom pronoun, we should follow, otherwise, use whatever major media outlets use. If they are inconsistent, that is, if some major media outlets use one style and some use another, "what to we do then" might be a good discussion to have when the issue arises. My guess is that by the time we've finished talking about it, the major media outlets will be mostly using the same term for that person. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 21:55, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Last names of children in infobox

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

In Template:Infobox person, the explanation box for the "children" parameter says (in part) "only list names of independently notable or particularly relevant children", but it does not specify whether to list only first names or first and last names. I sometimes see infoboxes, such as the one in Natalie Wood, in which the link is piped to show just the first name. It seems logical to me to use the name of a notable son or daughter as it appears in the title of that person's article. Also, display of just the fist name seems inconsistent when all other names in the infobox have first and last names. Does WikiPedia have a style guide that applies here? Eddie Blick (talk) 02:36, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

@Teblick: Should use the full names, especially since adult female descendants are fairly likely to change surname upon marriage, some notable people use mononyms, etc. There are all sorts of reasons not to just do first names in such a case. Should probably address this at MOS:SAMESURNAME, which omits mention of infoboxes.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:32, 4 December 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, SMcCandlish. I appreciate the feedback. Eddie Blick (talk) 03:00, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

Quote from an American speaker published in a UK work in a US-based article

Latest comment: 3 years ago9 comments7 people in discussion

Specific news article is from The Guardian (UK) [15] where US Phil Spencer is quoted multiple times, including the word "apologise" as printed by the Guardian. This quote (I just added) is being used in an article that has been US variety from the start Xbox Series X and Series S. Do we change that quote to be US since it seems unlikely that Spencer here "said" the UK spelling, or do we need to keep the Guardian's exact version? --Masem (t) 18:20, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

We keep quotes straight, always. Once you start fiddling them with OR guesses as to the spelling, anything can happen. Johnbod (talk) 18:41, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
The British media do this all the time: adapting spellings such as aeroplane here and tyres here, and even changing vocabulary, such as petrol stations here. Media sources often adapt quotes for domestic consumption, and by their nature they lack scholarly precision. If The Guardian is cited, the quote should be reproduced as printed in The Guardian. If it is particularly jarring, a [sic] could be added, or a US source with authentic spelling could be sought. Doremo (talk) 18:46, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
The American media do this all the time... DuncanHill (talk) 21:25, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
Absolutely. Non-fiction book authors also. JG66 (talk) 16:49, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
If it's a direct quote we don't mess with it: '"I know it seems manipulative and I'll apologise for that..." [Direct quote from The Guardian]'
If Wikipedia is paraphrasing then go with the article engvar: "Spencer said he would apologize...[paraphrasing The Guardian]'" Captainllama (talk) 19:23, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
Perfect. I quoted with the UK spelling on inclusion and I don't think, in the context, paraphrasing that part of the quote will help at this point, so I will leave it be. --Masem (t) 20:30, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
Masem: For the best part of a day, I've been thinking what a brilliant, interesting question this is. I would usually stick with the source wording/spelling, but I know other editors wouldn't and don't; when I see their changes, I can see the logic, or I find myself able to live with it ... In BritEng music articles, though, I do struggle with the idea that Robert Christgau, eg, would be saying "civilise", "colour" and the like. Personally, I welcome that "other" voice, especially when their words reflect an obvious American sensibility. But I appreciate that if the source imposes Brit English spelling, it's OR for us to change it. JG66 (talk) 16:49, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
Well, first we do have MOS:CONFORM, and its exact interpretation is a little loose. More importantly, one can always do a square-bracketed editorial change e.g., of "tyre" to "[tire]" (or I guess "t[y]re", though that might be annoying).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:24, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

Should we suggest years of photo for Photo sidebars?

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

I'm relatively new to Wikipedia. It is standard and good for biography articles to have photos of their subjects in a sidebar in the lead section, along with basic info like birth date. I'm wondering if it would be good to suggest at some level (style manual, or template, or somewhere else) including a date of the photograph. This would be useful since people look different at different ages. But is it worth the space it would take up? (Note that I am not suggesting this be *required*, which would be a bad thing, just asking what people think best practice is and where best practice should be specified.) --editeur24 (talk) 17:32, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

See WP:CAPTION. MB 19:21, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. Yes, that article puts it well-- well enough that I feel no urge to edit it! --editeur24 (talk) 20:35, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

Handling of non-technical jargon, such as for games

Latest comment: 3 years ago11 comments3 people in discussion

I noticed a tendency for editors to handle non-technical jargon inconsistently, and when I looked up the policy guidance, it doesn't seem sufficient on this topic. The policy on handling jargon is at MOS:JARGON, which is mainly about technical jargon, and the fact that it should be generally avoided when possible. However, there are articles on topics such as sports and games that use jargon unique to the topic, and the policy at MOS:JARGON doesn't seem sufficient.

Here are some examples:

  • Tennis#Game, set, match has lots of game-specific jargon such as "love" and "ad out". These terms are all italicized and surrounded by double quotes.
  • Polo mentions chukkas (or "chukkers") with one term used with no emphasis and the second one in double quotes. And then later it mentions arena mallets, which is in italics.
  • Baseball talks about scoring "runs" in double quotes.
  • Poker defines blind and ante in italics and later defines "call" and "raise" in double quotes.
  • Chess introduces castling in italics in the first use and later with no emphasis. It also defines ways to win such as checkmate in italics (and resignation also in italics even though it is not a jargon specific to chess)

Other articles than games use jargon that are fairly common in the vernacular, and it doesn't make sense to simplify as per MOS:JARGON. For example:

One possible convention for handling topic-specific jargon is to emphasize (italicize) the first use in the article, and then to use the term normally with no emphasis later in the article. This approach is as described here. The emphasis in the first use queues the reader that this is a specialized term and to note it as distinct usage in this context. Later the term is used normally with no emphasis.

Editors often emphasis the jargon term, especially in the first use, but they do it inconsistently. Some editors italicize the first use or they italicize all instances of the term in the article. Other editors put the term in double quotes. This inconsistency is why I think there should be clear policy indicating the convention to be used in Wikipedia. Coastside (talk) 23:18, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

The relevant MOS section is WP:MOSWAW. At first mention the word is italicized or quote-marked, then written normally. Primergrey (talk) 16:35, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for the reference. I was actually aware of WP:MOSWAW for "words as words" but missed that the second half discusses the use of technical terms or jargon in a normal grammatical role. This follows the convention of emphasizing the first use. I think it would be helpful if editors looking for help on handling "jargon" could more readily find this information. In any case, it's done so haphazardly now, it might be helpful to make the second half of WP:MOSWAW more readily recognizable as a convention for handling technical terms or jargon per se. Finally, I noticed that it says the first use can either be italicized or in quotes. I would think this convention should be followed consistently throughout an article, but maybe that's just me.Coastside (talk) 17:12, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
Maybe a redirect like WP:MOSTERMS. Primergrey (talk) 21:53, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
  Done. It's now got anchors and a shortcut box (reachable via MOS:TERM, MOS:TERMS, WP:MOSTERM, WP:MOSTERMS). Compressed out some redundant blather, and added some cross-referencing links.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:26, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
@SMcCandlish: Thanks for doing this! The redirects, however, appear to be broken. You either need to change them to link to #Words as Words, or you need to create a new section header "Terms". As it is the redirects just land at the top of the page. I'd fix them, but I'm not sure your intent. Did you mean to add a section header?Coastside (talk) 06:16, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
Fixed. I just forgot to add a "Terms" anchor in addition to "Term", "TERM", and "TERMS". I will blame this on lack of coffee. And maybe also brain-wave interference rays from space aliens. PS: It was just intended as an anchor link, not a new heading. Page has way more than enough headings already.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:35, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
@Coastside: On the stylization matter, see also MOS:GAMECAPS, with some advice on avoiding over-capitalization. But, yes, mostly see MOS:WAW. It would prefer that a term of art be italicized on first introduction, but quotation marks are okay in material otherwise thick with italics (e.g. because of non-English terms being used heavily in the material). There seems to be a loose quasi-consensus that neither style is needed if that first occurrence is a link, since the link stylization already makes it stand out. There's no actual rule about that (I think), and The rule seems to want the italics/quotes and the link, but I don't know that anyone feels strongly about it either way. In the jargon-heavy cue sports articles we don't always italicize them unless they're foreignisms (or very explicit term introduction, like "and this is called a foo"), nor put them in quotes unless they're amateur slang not usually used by professionals, but we make heavy use, at first occurrences, of glossary links (see below). The jargon's so thick in that field that it would be an annoying read if every few words something was italic or in quotes.

On the comprehensibility matter: From a practical-solutions angle (rather than a rule-thumping one) this is arguably really a MOS:GLOSSARIES thing. (That's still technically a draft guideline, though it has for years informed a lot of the well-developed glossaries we already have. Some of the technical detail in it probably needs to move to a Help:Glossaries page; that's why it's been sitting around in draft form for ages. The material in it is entirely stable, though.)

The genesis of it, happily for you, was precisely the problem you're raising, of sports/games jargon, and certain articles being thick with it. We developed it with cue sports as a testbed, since it's pretty much the most jargon-heavy sports and games sector of all time (with the terminology even widely varying by sub-discipline, ENGVAR, sub-national region, generation, professional versus amateur play, etc.).

In summary, the solution is to build a rich, encyclopedic glossary (not just WP:DICDEF) of key terms. That's a list article, and it can be structured a certain way with templates that auto-generate link anchors and yadda yadda. Then use the {{glossary link}} meta-template to make a convenient topical term-linking template for use articles, that ties jargon terms in them to their glossary entries, e.g.: ... divided into periods called {{pologloss|chukka}}s .... It's covered in the draft guideline in general, and in the template documentation in particular. To see it in action, have a look at Glossary of cue sports terms, and the {{cuegloss}} links in articles like Eight-ball and Snooker. (One wrinkle is that the {{Defn}} template that's part of this system ended up being replaced with : or <dd> markup in many instances in that glossary, when the extra functions of that corresponding template were not needed in those entries, because that glossary is so large it was hitting the parser-function limit. So, the code doesn't read quite as cleanly as intended.)
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:08, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: Thanks for the detailed reply. This is very helpful. It's also a lot to digest, and I will spend some time to understand the references you provided. I appreciate you taking time to explain the policies and some of the history behind them.Coastside (talk) 21:21, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

@Coastside: The crash course version: At a "Glossary of weird stuff" article (or whatever – I use silly examples), do: 

{{glossary}}
 ...
{{term|snorkelweasel}}
{{defn|A weasel trained in underwater activities, using a weaselsnorkel or other breathing apparatus ...}}
 ...
{{term|weaselsnorkel}}
{{defn|An underwater breathing device for weasels and other mustelids ...}}
 ...
{{glossary end}}

Then, at a regular article (after making a simple link template for that glossary with the {{glossary link}} meta-template, e.g. a {{weirdgloss}}), you can do "Jones was a professional {{weirdgloss|snorkelweasel}} trainer from 2004 to 2007, and then ran for governor of Nebraska." The catch, of course, is being willing to write and source the glossary article. It can be some work, but in the long run can save a tremendous amount of time and verbiage, by not having to re-explain things in article after article within a related topical scope (which also gets tedious for the reader).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:15, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

I'll give it a try. I have an topic in mind that has several related articles and a glossary of terms where this could help a lot.Coastside (talk) 05:17, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

Gender-neutral language for occupations?

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments4 people in discussion

Did I imagine that somewhere that there were guidelines for using gender-neutral language as they pertain to occupations? Doe we have any consensus opinion about this? I'm looking at WP:GNL, for instance, but it's not clear to me if we should be using "actor" vs. "actress" when describing a woman who acts. Comedienne? Dominatrix seems fine, but aviatrix? I know the guideline points to some essays, but we know that always means "Those are just essays!" Would be nice to have something written down in the MOS, unless I'm idiotically missing it. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 23:18, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

It would be a fierce battle, unfortunately. Why not just do good by correcting to GNL when you see it. You can even do an "advanced search" for a list of articles containing, for example, "comedienne", and work through them. Occasional reversions/complaints can be ignored, because there are plenty more to do. Tony (talk) 23:41, 5 December 2020 (UTC)
Gotcha. I just noticed in a page move discussion about a female actor that the community uses "actress" as an article title disambiguator, so I get your point about it being an uphill thing, as it seems fairly systemic. Thanks for the reply. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 23:50, 5 December 2020 (UTC)
There is also the "what do people want to be called" which is going to vary by culture and historical era, not to mention by individual. I would say, by default, use the individual's preferred title (particularly for living and recently-deceased individuals), what modern-day reliable sources use, or what increasingly-older reliable sources use, in that order. There will be exceptions of course, for guidance, look to how we have handled similarly-situated individuals. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 00:03, 6 December 2020 (UTC)
I concur with Tony1. And with a component of what davidwr said, which can be recast in shortcutty terms as: WP:ABOUTSELF often matters, especially for current, WP:BLP subjects, i.e. modern people asserting their own preferences, in contemporary English. (I don't think it matters whether Amelia Earhart preferred "aviatrix", back in a period when that was normal English.) MoS doesn't have a strict "rule" about this because it's been argued many times in many places without a clear and consistent result. It's not MoS's job to try to force a result, just (as with all our guidelines) to record what actual consensus best-practice is, on matters about which this can be determined and about which we should write the result down because it keeps coming up again. I think a consensus on this may emerge over time, but probably not until "actress" and a few other terms become as real-world disused as "comedienne" is becoming and as "aviatrix" did a long time ago.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:21, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

"Serving as" in lede of politics articles

Latest comment: 3 years ago18 comments5 people in discussion

There appears to be a tacit consensus that "serving as" is the appropriate phrase to use when a politician is currently in office. So, to take a completely random example, the lede of Ro Khanna reads:

Rohit Khanna is an American politician, lawyer, and academic serving as the U.S. Representative from California's 17th congressional district since 2017.

But "serving as" has always struck me as odd and faintly ungrammatical, as opposed, for instance, to "who has served". Is my view an idiosyncrasy, or is there a policy statement somewhere that "serving as" is actually correct, or am I on to something here? Thanks for any thoughts. AleatoryPonderings (???) (!!!) 18:10, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Articles are always saying that "X currently serves as the president of Y" when they could just say "X is the president of Y". Like any fancy structure, serves may sometimes be helpful given the surrounding sentence structure, but that's rare. In this case, just say
Rohit Khanna is an American politician, lawyer, and academic who has been the U.S. Representative from California's 17th congressional district since 2017.
EEng 21:02, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
EEng, Ah, "who has been" is even better! Thanks. I had just assumed that, given the prevalence of "serving as", there was some policy or guideline recommending it that I had missed. AleatoryPonderings (???) (!!!) 23:10, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
"Serving as" can mildly imply "less than ideal", AleatoryPonderings, as in "we had cardboard boxes serving as tables because our furniture hadn't yet arrived." Bus stop (talk) 23:26, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
It can have that denotation, but that's completely inapplicable here. But I gather we're all agreed it's unnecessary verbiage. See WP:LOCATION#Are_you_being_served?. EEng 23:33, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
"Serving as" is not found at WP:LOCATION. Bus stop (talk) 23:40, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
Better look again. EEng 00:00, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
"Serving as" is not found at WP:LOCATION. Bus stop (talk) 00:03, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Better look again. EEng 01:00, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Cut-and-paste it here. Bus stop (talk) 01:27, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Okey dokey:
A closely related construction is Smith currently serves as the President of Ruritania when you could just say Smith is the President of Ruritania.
Is it necessary for me to explain that serving and serves are forms of the same word? EEng 03:38, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
When I point out that "serving as" is not found at WP:LOCATION, why don't you point out in a straightforward manner that what you feel is a related phrase is found at WP:LOCATION? Bus stop (talk) 04:04, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Because I clung to the hope you'd succeed in finding the relevant sentence (in its own section headed Are you being served?) on a page consisting of, literally, four sentences [16]. EEng 05:35, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Sorry, you said you posted it in this thread, but I'm still not seeing it. Do you think you could print it out and fax it to me? jp×g 16:32, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Rather than faxing it to me could you carve it in marble, limestone or granite and send it by FedEx? Bus stop (talk) 16:45, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
What manner of thing is this "faxing" of which you speak? EEng 22:28, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
Agreed with EEng's revision suggestions. "Serv[ing|ed]" has also been raised multiple times at WT:MOSWTW as a "word to watch" because it is PoV-laden. Why is working as parliamentarian, cop, or navy cook more of a "service" than being the executive director of a nonprofit, working as an armored-car security guard, or working at a corner store in a rough neighborhood? That was a rhetorical question, really; the answer for why this term has gotten attached to certain kinds of work is probably a confluence of three things: the notion of filling a predefined role for a while rather than defining or being defined by it longer-term; the phrase "civil serv[ice|ant]"; and a sense of potential danger (though many private-sector civilian jobs are at least as dangerous as police and military jobs).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:09, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Neutrally noting that there is relevant discussion at Talk:Marcia_Fudge#How_should_we_word_the_lead_sentence?. AleatoryPonderings (???) (!!!) 18:10, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Update and simplification of MOS:FRENCHCAPS proposed

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
  FYI
 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/France and French-related articles § Proposed simplification of MOS:FRENCHCAPS, which is more than a decade outdated
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:10, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

Do template transclusions in section headings cause technical issues?

Latest comment: 3 years ago13 comments6 people in discussion

@JsfasdF252: You recently added *Not contain template transclusions. to the "Section headings" section in the part that talks about things that cause technical issues.[17]

Is this inherent or is it just a risk that someone will change the template we are using in a way that "breaks" section headers? For example, would {{pi}} or for that matter {{Mvar}} in a section header cause technical problems? What about {{smiley}}? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 🎄 17:40, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

  • I think there is (or used to be) something about section edits -- what shows in the edit history and whether, after you save, your browser jumps to the section you just edited the way it's supposed to. EEng 17:59, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
    You are right, it's still a problem. It tries to jump to the actual section name, so after editing == {{pi}} ==, the web browser would try to jump to the section == <nowiki>{{pi}}</nowiki> == or something that looked like it if such a section existed, or to the top of the page if it didn't exist. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 🎄 18:10, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

π

Test to see if the link in the table of contents takes you to this section. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:13, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

It works for me. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:14, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
Let's try four different ways of linking to a section.
Testing using open in new tab.
--Guy Macon (talk) 19:19, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
The first three just take me to the top of Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style.
The second one doesn't even have Pi in the URL; it just stops at the #
The fourth one isn't even a link.
I am going to try this on a couple of other browsers now. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:25, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
Same results in Firefox, Chrome, IE, and Edge. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:29, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
One last test: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#π --Guy Macon (talk) 19:31, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
That one worked. Took me right to the proper section.
I think this shows that MOS should say not to use template transclusions in section headings. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:33, 12 December 2020 (UTC)
MOS:FORMULA says to avoid <math> tags and math-template formatting for formulas in section headings, instead using only html. (I think even html math formulas should be discouraged but sometimes they are difficult to avoid.) —David Eppstein (talk) 20:44, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

Accessibility issue

As I understand it (subject to correction/rebuttal of course) anything other than plain text in section headings causes screen readers to fail to render or handle the heading correctly. That constitutes a rather serious violation of the WP:ACCESSIBILITY rules. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 20:18, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

Well, "anything" is an overstatement. Templates do seem to cause problems, but like links and other complex markup, it mostly seems to interfere with parsing the rest of the heading after the markup (this is one reason to move templated anchors embedded in headings to the end of the heading as <span id="Anchor name"></span>, another being that this also stops breakage of /* Heading name */ in the edit summary). So, aside from the mess reported above, where the section links don't work anyway, the thing to do here would be use the Unicode pi symbol, italicized as a variable: ''π'', which would just be π without italics markup in a #-link to a section. For "weird math stuff" that doesn't have a Unicode symbol, use headings that are plain English (e.g. the name of the constant or whatever), to the extent possible. As David Eppstein says above, there are some cases where some math might be needed, but this should be done with pure HTML, per MOS:FORMULA.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:19, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

Proposal to re-address pull quotes directly, closing system-gaming loophole

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion

Some while back, we removed from MOS:BQ any references to pull-quote templates, after consensus discussions indicated that pull quotes are not actually encyclopedically appropriate at all (so MoS shouldn't advise about how to use/not use such templates). We even had a successful proposal to stop supporting pull quotes in articles at all (after some earlier weaker consensuses along "usually, with exceptions" lines, e.g. in 2016).

However, the well-intended MoS trimming had the unintentional effect of removing any mention of pull quotes from MoS, anywhere. The loophole result has been a creeping increase in pull quotes in mainspace, which was the opposite of the intent of either of those consensus results. I keep running into pull quotes, especially at bios of high-profile individuals, articles on major public-policy debates, coverage of current events, and articles on published works. (I've fixed two in just the last week, without looking for them; this one was particularly bad, in that its caption including information missing from the main body of the article, and the purportedly quoted text did not match between the body and the pull-quote.)

I propose reinstating this to MOS:BQ in a to-the-point statement, that no longer dwells on particular templates. Something like the following:

Pull quotes do not belong in Wikipedia articles. These are the news and magazine style of "pulling" material already in the article to reuse it in attention-grabbing decorative quotations. This unencyclopedic approach is a form of editorializing, produces out-of-context, undue emphasis, and may lead the reader to conclusions not supported in the material.

Without something like this, there no longer appears to be any clear WP:P&G rationale for removing any pull quote from any article. Consensus was reaffirmed earlier this year (after many prior discussions) to deprecate and now actively prevent (by changing template code) the "giant quotation marks" decoration of block quotes in articles, for most of the same reasons cited in the above proposed text. And, at MediaWiki:Common.css we recently undid a community-undiscussed decision by the MW developers to make all blockquotes decorated with a left-side vertical bar (like the {{Talk quote block}} used above to present the proposed text). And that was after TfD deleted a template that did the same thing in mainspace (with consensus against merging its decoration features into {{Quote}}).

System-gaming to draw excessive attention to particular material at articles is clearly neither desirable nor acceptable. Yet all anyone has to do to evade this consensus is put the material first into the main article text, then pull-quote it into some decorative box. That actually makes it worse than the original "giant-quotes" problem, by doing all of that objectionable UNDUE attention stuff, plus having redundant content.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:14, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

  • Subject to the usual "self-reference/example" exemptions, such as in Pull quote which currently uses a graphic to illustrate the point, this seems reasonable. As with many other "non-encyclopedic" styles, pull quotes are legitimate in project-, discussion-, and some other non-encyclopedic pages. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:23, 6 December 2020 (UTC)
    I thought of another exception: When the topic is the quote itself, the use of a pull quote MAY be acceptable, subject to the usual editorial discussion on the talk page. This will vary on a case-by-case basis. But for the usual things, like if the article is about a book, song, or writer, no, pull quotes distract rather than enlighten. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:28, 6 December 2020 (UTC)
    Well, I don't think even that would be a pull quote, per se. The quote would probably just be presented prominently, at least by being at the top of the article after whatever intro is needed for a lead, and one could maybe get away with boldfacing it, if it were short (I don't think we should have a bolded or otherwise "LOOK AT ME!" emphasized entire paragraph. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:23, 14 December 2020 (UTC)
  • Support restoration of this guidance per past and continuing consensus. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:15, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

Citizenship for a BLP

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

If a celebrity was born and raised in Hong Kong and a Chinese ethnic, but due to her mother's background having naturalized Japanese citizenship, she'd held Japanese citizenship at birth, then how should we describe her in the opening paragraph? I was leaning towards "a Hong Kong-based Japanese celebrity", but is that correct? Or should we describe her as "a Hong Kong-Japanese celebrity" or "Hong Konger-Japanese...? Please advise or give me some suggestions. Thanks.--TerryAlex (talk) 01:48, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

TerryAlex, the relevant policy here is MOS:ETHNICITY: The opening paragraph should usually provide context for the activities that made the person notable. In most modern-day cases, this will be the country of which the person is a citizen, national, or permanent resident. ... Ethnicity ... should generally not be in the lead unless it is relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, previous nationalities or the place of birth should not be mentioned in the lead unless they are relevant to the subject's notability.
Based on that, I'd suggest that a citizenship from naturalization that hasn't affected her life seems like it would not be particularly helpful as context, so I'd likely say a Hong-Kong celebrity. However, if her Japanese citizenship has played a major role in her life, or if she's spent a lot of time in Japan, I'd suggest a Hong Kong-Japanese celebrity.
Gbear605 (talk) 01:57, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
(side note: although Hong Konger is the demonym, other articles about people from Hong Kong such as Carrie Lam, Sam Hui, and Anita Mui seem to just say "a Hong Kong ...") Gbear605 (talk) 02:01, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
Concur with Gbear605. It appears that this person's nominal Japanese dual citizenship is a de jure (and more specifically jus sanguinis) technicality that has nothing to do with [notable aspects of] this subject's actual life. If it's mentioned at all, it should be in the body. This can also apply to jus soli cases; e.g., if the eldest of my sisters were notable, she would be described as American, not British-American or an American with dual British citizenship in her lead; her jus soli British citizenship is effectively meaningless, as she has not set foot there since she was about 2 years old. PS: TerryAlex's statement "a Chinese ethnic" is a very good example of why to avoid ethnic claims on Wikipedia; it's rather nonsensical, under most senses of "ethnic", to refer to a half Japanese and half Hong Kong Chinese person as "a Chinese ethnic".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:44, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Confused

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion

Can someone explain WHY we capitalize “Department of Education” but not “secretary of education”? (I accept that we do... I just don’t understand WHY). Blueboar (talk) 13:57, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

See MOS:JOBTITLES.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:46, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
More particularly, one is the proper name of department, the other is a job title. If you do a web search for both, you'll find Department of Education consistently capped, and secretary of education very mixed; we at least have a consistent rule for when to cap it and when not. Dicklyon (talk) 04:54, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Blueboar: If you mean what the underlying WP reasoning is, see The Chicago Manual of Style, New Hart's Rules, Garner's Modern English Usage, Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage, and other major style guides. Our style guide is largely derived from the leading ones (that are intended for book publishing), not just from editors deciding on their own how they wish English would work to suit their personal senses of logic or aesthetics.

If you mean what the out-in-the-world underlying reason is, in short it's because Department of Education is a proper name (or the contextual short form of a longer one like United States Department of Education), like England and Great Pyramid of Giza, while secretary of education is simply a role, like early-evening-shift bartender at Jimmy Joe's Bar & Grill (a business entity that has a proper name, like Microsoft or BMW), or NASA astronaut, or captain of the HMS Centaur, or king of Denmark. It's conventional to capitalize formal job/role/position/rank/peerage titles when attached to a name (i.e., when they effectively are a part of the name), though even this is decreasingly the case with commercial job titles. Less so, there's a quasi-convention to capitalize when the title itself is the subject and is unique and important ("King and Queen of Scotland ceased as formal titles with the 1706–1707 Acts of Union").

If you mean what the ivory-tower reasoning is behind the Gestalt, cultural treatment of certain kinds of things as proper names (proper-noun phrases) and others not (as common-noun phrases), this is something that linguists/philologists and philosophers have been arguing their heads off about for 200+ years, with no apparent end in sight. You can think of it as a WP:GREATWRONGS matter that WP cannot resolve, if that helps. If you had the wading-though-obtuse-jargon stomach for it, and a lot of money to burn, there are expensive, pretty recent academic volumes published about this stuff fairly often [18][19][20][21][22].
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:27, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

See also [23] this post in response to SmokeyJoe at Talk:Snakes and Ladders#Extended discussion. I'll see about distilling that into an essay at Wikipedia:Proper names and proper nouns.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  08:49, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Ref tags before closing paren

Latest comment: 3 years ago42 comments13 people in discussion

Since we're on the subject of punctuation vs. ref tags (that is, the little superscript [99] thingamajigs), I want to bring up the current provision that ...

Where a footnote applies only to material within parentheses, the ref tags belong just before the closing parenthesis.

While this has a superficial logic to it, it actually makes no sense and serves no purpose. Consider this passage:

The earth revolves around the sun. (It also rotates on its own axis.)[1]

Fine. But under the guideline, if each statement is supported by its own source, we're supposed to move the last ref tag inside the parens, like this:

The earth revolves around the sun.[2] (It also rotates on its own axis.[3])

Why? A ref tag logically covers all material back to the next-prior ref tag, whether that material's in parens, not in parens, or a combination. Period. Without this special provision we'd be doing this:

The earth revolves around the sun.[2] (It also rotates on its own axis.)[3]

... which is perfectly sensible and unambiguous. Moving the ref tag inside the parens achieves nothing and looks awful. By the logic of this "parenthesis" exception, if a ref tag applies only to material within a single sentence, then we should move the ref tag before the period/stop closing the sentence[1]. That would be dumb of course, and so is the current special provision for parentheses. I propose we remove it. EEng 02:35, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ They actually do this on frwp, and it looks ghastly. Here's passage from fr:Donald_Trump:
    Trump n'est pas envoyé sous les drapeaux pendant la guerre du Viêt Nam 19. Durant ses études, de 1964 à 1968, il obtient quatre reports d'incorporation 20. Puis, après avoir été jugé bon pour le service en 1966, il est réformé en octobre 1968 21. Dans une interview accordée en 2015, il affirme avoir été réformé en raison d'une épine calcanéenne au talon 22. En 1969, il obtient un chiffre élevé à la loterie organisée pour la conscription, ce qui lui aurait de toutes manières permis d'échapper au service 21,23,24.
    Lovely, huh? But they eat frogs and snails and endangered birds, so go figure.
  • I couldn't   Agree more. El Millo (talk) 04:09, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I   Disagree. What you call "perfectly sensible and unambiguous", to me is not. That way you suggest that whatever is in the footnote, it is also responsible for placing the sentence between parentheses, which is however an editing choice. I think you are trying to fix something that is not broken at all. Eissink (talk) 10:11, 17 August 2020 (UTC).
By the way, what you may consider some sort of joke about French people, probably intended to somehow strengthen your point, I find pretty tasteless and quite offending, actually. Is it considered normal here to make such condescending remarks to other language wiki's? I don't think so, but it might be that I'm missing some clue. Eissink (talk) 10:20, 17 August 2020 (UTC).
I don't know what joke you're talking about. From our article on the Ortolan bunting:
 
Excuse me while I go drown the ortolans, mon ami.
The ortolan is served in French cuisine, typically cooked and eaten whole ... The birds are caught with nets set during their autumn migratory flight to Africa. They are then kept in covered cages or boxes. The birds react to the dark by gorging themselves on grain, usually millet seed, until they double their bulk ... The birds are then thrown into a container of Armagnac, which both drowns and marinates the birds.
The bird is roasted for eight minutes and then plucked. The consumer then places the bird feet first into their mouth while holding onto the bird's head. The ortolan is then eaten whole, with or without the head, and the consumer spits out the larger bones. The traditional way French gourmands eat ortolans is to cover their heads and face with a large napkin or towel while consuming the bird. The purpose of the towel is debated. Some claim it is to retain the maximum aroma with the flavour as they consume the entire bird at once, others have stated "Tradition dictates that this is to shield – from God’s eyes – the shame of such a decadent and disgraceful act", and others have suggested the towel hides the consumers spitting out bones. This use of the towel was begun by a priest, a friend of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin ...
Ortolan hunting was banned in France in 1999, but the law was poorly enforced and it is thought that up to 50,000 ortolans were illegally killed each year during the autumn migration ... France's ortolan population fell 30% between 1997 and 2007.
Quintessentially French from start to finish, n'est-ce pas? If you like, I can insert similarly mild national stereotypes about Brits, Jerries, Russkies, or Yanks, for balance.
Returning to the actual point at hand, I honestly cannot understand what you're saying.
  • You say
The earth revolves around the sun.[2] (It also rotates on its own axis.)[3]
is ambiguous (presumably in something about its citations). In what way? You say I'm trying to fix something that is not broken, but unless you can explain what's wrong with the above (which is what we would do as a matter of course if the guideline didn't go out of its way to tell us to do something else) then it's the guideline that's trying to fix something that isn't broken. WP:MOSBLOAT is a serious problem, and every unnecessary provision we can remove is a victory.
  • What does
That way you suggest that whatever is in the footnote, it is also responsible for placing the sentence between parentheses, which is however an editing choice.
– mean?
EEng 16:37, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Suppose we have two footnotes in a parenthetical remark. (Like, one footnote for one claim,[1] and then a second footnote for a second claim.[2]) If we put the second footnote outside the parens, the grouping of the parentheses would make it appear that the second footnote covered the whole parenthetical remark, when actually it is only intended for the later part of the remark. So to accurately describe what the footnote covers, we would necessarily need it to be inside the parens. Now imagine the same scenario, but where a sloppy editor has omitted footnote 1 and left the first claim uncited, keeping only footnote [2]. Still, the footnote must be inside the parens, to avoid the false implication that it covers the whole remark. So requiring footnotes to be outside enclosing parens can lead to logical trouble. In some circumstances, footnotes must go inside. If they cover the entire parenthetical remark (or more), and only if they cover the entire parenthetical remark or more, they can go outside. If you want a real example of this, consider the lead of a biography that has separate citations for birth and death dates, or maybe only a citation for the death date but not the birth date. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:09, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
If the parenthetical isn't very long, we could also have both references outside the parens. El Millo (talk) 17:18, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  • @EEng: I have a major problem with you altering your initial contribution significantly áfter two other editors have responded to it (also see WP:REDACTED). For new readers, it is now totally unclear what I was reacting upon. This is not how one should react, you are obscuring the dialogue tremendously. I would have undone it, if not others had already responded to it all, but please don't ever do that again.
I think it is totally clear what I meant with both my contributions. Concerning my opposition to your proposal, I could not have been more clear, so I regret that you seem not to be able to grasp what I said. Concerning your comparison of one French (editorial) habit with another cultural habit (eating certain animals), thereby implying that the former is somehow a poor choice which one must 'go figure' bad taste as is, presumably, the national diet: to me that's not only childish, but condescending. I may be wrong in assuming you like to use Wikipedia Talk pages as some sort of personal blog where you try to be the most funniest Wikipedian on the planet, but I find such attention grabbing, if that is what it is, rather presumptuous and pathetic. Anyhow, I remain strongly opposed to your proposal – that you don't seem to be able to understand what I mean by a totally clear sentence on the range of a footnote as compared to an editorial choice to place a sentence between parentheses, might not be your biggest problem, but maybe you could give it another try. Eissink (talk) 17:49, 18 August 2020 (UTC).
All I did was change my link to the frwp article to an actual quote from it, thus saving people a click. So sue me.
Beyond that I'll just note (a) that you didn't answer my two straightforward questions, and (b) I'm not the only one – see below – who can't understand what you're trying to say. To be honest (and it pains me to say that but you drive me to it) much of what you write is unintelligible. EEng 23:20, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
@Eissink: I, for one, did not understand your stance on the subject. Ignoring the attempts at comedy displayed above, what is your position on refs inside or outside the parentheses? Do you think it is ambiguous to have (something like this)[1] instead of (something like this[2])? Because I think it would be equivalent to, as EEng said, doing something like this[3]. instead of doing it like this.[4] El Millo (talk) 18:16, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
@El Millo: I think your examples consist of a dependent clauses, where EEng's example focussed on an independent clause, on a self-contained proposition:
The earth revolves around the sun.[2] (It also rotates on its own axis.)[3]
Do you see the difference? If an editor chooses to add an indepedent clause and for one reason or the other chooses to place it between parentheses, with the period preceding the closing bracket, the latter is an editorial choice that should, imo, not be attributed to an external source. Eissink (talk) 18:42, 18 August 2020 (UTC).
Well, that example there is plain bad grammar. That should be The earth revolves around the sun (it also rotates on its own axis). in which case I would personally put both refs after the period. We should base ourselves on sentences that are clearly grammatically correct and that represent a common use of parentheticals, instead of focusing on uncommon or outlandish examples. El Millo (talk) 18:50, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Um, no, it's The earth revolves around the sun (it also rotates on its own axis) that exhibits bad grammar. It's run-on sentence – basically a parenthetical version of The earth revolves around the sun, it also rotates on its own axis. EEng 23:23, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Well, El Millo, please don't blame me for reacting on exactly that example, that is pretty much the core of the proposal. While the example might be bad grammar or outlandish, as you say, the principle exhibited was quite clear, and that was precisely what I reacted upon. How should I react on something that is not proposed? (And the choice of the editor to completely alter and fancy the contribution later doesn't make all of this more clear.) Eissink (talk) 19:00, 18 August 2020 (UTC).
I don't blame you, I'm asking you to move past that in order to have a meaningful discussion from now. El Millo (talk) 20:02, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
We weren't on that point when you asked me to elaborate on what, according to yourself, "would be equivalent to" what EEng proposed, which it wasn't. But sure, why not just pretend and agree my contribution was not meaningful anyway, right? Guess I'm responsible for the mess of others. I'm done here. Bye, Eissink (talk) 20:19, 18 August 2020 (UTC).
Okay, if you want to purposefully misinterpret my comment in order to feel accused, blamed or aggravated in some other way, go ahead. I'm trying for you to ignore something you might consider childish or inappropriate in order to actually discuss the subject, instead of just arguing against that particular user for said inappropriate childishness. El Millo (talk) 20:31, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Well, the French consider Jerry Lewis a comic genius, so I'm inclined to discount their idea of what constitutes childishness. EEng 23:27, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  •   Agree - I suggest we adopt the Chicago Manual of Style policy: "Though a note number normally follows a closing parenthesis, it may on rare occasion be more appropriate to place the number inside the closing parenthesis—if, for example, the note applies to a specific term within the parentheses."[1] (I don't want to copy-and-paste the whole section [14.26] since it's copyrighted material.) There's also a public web page that addresses the topic in more general—but still applicable—terms at FAQ item: Punctuation:

Question: When using a superscript footnote number at the end of a sentence, should the period precede or follow the footnote number? What about footnote numbers in midsentence that fall next to some other form of punctuation (comma, semicolon, etc.)? Answer: Please see CMOS 14.26: “A note number should generally be placed at the end of a sentence or at the end of a clause. The number normally follows a quotation (whether it is run into the text or set as an extract). Relative to other punctuation, the number follows any punctuation mark except for the dash, which it precedes.”

  - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 18:16, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Chicago Manual of Style, 17th ed., (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017), §14.26
  •   Agree with Mark Worthen's clarification: we should remove the guidance that the ref tag always belongs inside the parens (because when it applies to the whole clause it should be outside) and instead adopt the same principles as Worthen's Chicago Manual of Style quote. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:24, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  •   Agree with Mark Worthen's proposal. El Millo (talk) 18:37, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I think I   Agree. How about we replace
Exceptions: Ref tags are placed before dashes, not after. Where a footnote applies only to material within parentheses, the ref tags belongs just before the closing parenthesis.
with
Exceptions: Ref tags are placed before dashes, not after, and may be placed inside a closing parenthesis to parallel other ref tags within the parenthetical:
The earth is round.[1] (And it rotates and revolves.)[2]
but
The earth is round.[1] (And it rotates[2] and revolves.[3])
Does that capture it? If so let's give plenty of time for others to opine, because I know from experience that this is the sort of unimportant thing people can attach great importance to. EEng 23:03, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Maybe if you find it unimportant, you shouldn't annoy people who do take it seriously with your remarks. Eissink (talk) 00:23, 19 August 2020 (UTC).
Clearly I find the issue important enough to have opened the thread and made the bulk of the contributions to it, so perhaps there's some subtlety here you're not discerning. For your benefit here it is: while in the great scheme of things the specific choice is comparatively unimportant (not to say that there isn't a best choice, nor that it's not worth going to reasonable trouble to identify it), people get very exercised about challenges to their personally favored conventions. Now if you could focus for a moment on the issue at hand instead of your offended sensibilities, do you have any comment on my proposed guideline text? EEng 00:55, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
@EEng: I've been rather strident about precision in this stuff, but I could live with the above, provided there was a footnote that encapsulated the gist of my point way below, about being cognizant of later additions that don't have a cited source (but which may neverthless be permissible as "verifiable not yet verified" under WP:V), as it might require moving such a citation to a more precise position. I think the earth examples above are good, and the CMoS rule (recast in our own wording) is clear enough to work with. May've been a bit late to say so now but if this comes up again, I would go along with it.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:38, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
  • I don't know if we should be strictly advising the reference come after the parentheses, but certainly from the examples given I   Agree with removing the advice and/or adopting some variation of the Chicago advice. CMD (talk) 01:10, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I tend slightly differently I think. Assertion: we should prefer placing the reference after some punctuation, but not parentheses. In the case of a full sentence in parentheses, that places the ref inside; in the case of some partial sentence, then the ref goes outside after the following punctuation mark. That leaves parenthetical statements with multiple clauses internal but no terminating punctuation before the parenthetical and some mix of the set; my preference is that such cases be rewritten. (In fact I think parentheses have very little place in encyclopedic writing at all and articles with should be rewritten without or removed as beneath notice, but I don't want to bring that into the conversation [he said parenthetically].) --Izno (talk) 20:51, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
    @Izno: For more clarity, could you illustrate your preference with an example? Thanks. El Millo (talk) 20:57, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
    The earth revolves around the sun.[1] (It also rotates on its own axis.[2])
    The earth revolves around the sun (and also on its own axis).[3]
    But rewrite usually The earth revolves around the sun (and also on its own axis, though sometimes a figgity bob).
    mostly to avoid messes of citing much internally to the parentheses, but also to avoid excessive awkward/lengthy parenthetical constructions. --Izno (talk) 21:06, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose change. We've been over this many times before, and the answer is always the same: Putting it outside the parenthetical leads to mis-citation (especially after later editors add, remove, and otherwise change bits of it), and even when it does not it confuses the reader about what the citation is being used to verify, since the ref outside the parenthetical implies that the source is being cited for everything – including the material before the parenthetical – all the way back to the previous citation (or the beginning of the article). There is nothing "superficial" about the logic. What is in fact superficial is the desire to move the citation outside the parenthetical because you subjectively feel that it looks better.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:04, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
    But the the ref outside the parenthetical should imply that the source is being cited for everything – including the material before the parenthetical – all the way back to the previous citation. If it doesn't then there should be another ref tag before the opening paren. If I'm wrong please give an example. EEng 04:19, 25 August 2020 (UTC)
    We usually do not use citations in leads (other than of stubs, which pretty much just consist of leads) at all, except for potentially controversial or surprising statements that some readers are apt to disbelieve before reading the meat of the article. More importantly, the WP:V policy is that claims must be reliably sourceable, not already sourced before being added to an article (otherwise over half of Wikipedia's content would have to be deleted). I'm surprised you're making this argument, EEng, since we have been over this before at least twice, though I suppose the last time was a few years ago.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:59, 25 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Disagree as written. The example given is flawed. A parenthetical statement will rarely be a new sentence. Further, the more common example is a paragraph that has an overall source at its end and a parenthetical within it that is separately referenced. The logic that the reference applies to all material back to the previous reference is clearly not true in this case for either reference. In most cases a ref outside the parenthesis will work just fine, but there is a difficult case when the parenthetical occurs at the end of the para. For clarity, the parenthetical reference needs to either be inside the paretheses, or else it goes between the closing parenthesis and the period. Moving the general ref in front of the parethetical clause (which at first sight seems to be a solution) will actually cause more confusion since it is now in the middle of the last sentence. So does it apply to just half a sentence or what?
We really shouldn't be micromanaging formatting at this level. Better to leave it to article editors to find the best solution in specific cases. SpinningSpark 15:49, 27 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Disagree as written. Spinningspark has put the case very clearly; especially the last paragraph. Leave it to article editors to achieve the necessary clarity. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:04, 27 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Could one of SMcCandlish, Spinningspark, or Peter coxhead please give concrete examples of what they're talking about, and in particular how the presence of parentheses somehow creates a new, different situation? EEng 03:22, 29 August 2020 (UTC)
    "Louise McKenzie Doodah (1 January 1901 – 31 December 2001) was a transwoman (born intersex[1]) activist and writer, best known for her novel The Unlightable Being of Bareness." If this is not a stub, then it is unlikely any other citation in the lead is needed, because it's unlikely anything in this lead is potentially controversial about this hypothetically well-known figure, other than the claim to have been born intersex rather than clearly male or female, which (again hypothetically) hadn't been well-publicized. Maybe someone on the talk page has already challenged the assertion, and required that a citation for this appear in the lead. If the cited source is only a source for that particular fact and not for, say, the birth date and middle name, then the citation must go inside the parenthetical, or it will falsely be posing as a citation for everything from the first word up to "intersex".

    Problems like this get even worse in long main-body paragraphs, which are frequently peppered with verifiable but not yet verified additions by drive-by editors, sometimes in mid-sentence. It's not uncommon for single sentences in controversial- or complicated-topic articles to have several citations for specific clauses making severable claims in the sentence. If one of these is parenthetical, then the only way a citation specifically for that is not going to be misleading is if there is another citation immediately before the opening parenthesis (round bracket), which we cannot guarantee. Even if it's incidentally a true condition at this moment, this situation only holds as long as no one ever inserts anything new between those two elements without a citation, which on this wiki is a very unsafe bet. In short: citation accuracy is far more important than subjective typographic quibbles.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:25, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

  • The worst thing about the examples right up at the top is that hideous full stop inside the brackets. Stick the full stop outside the brackets, and drop the full stop after sun, and they all look a lot better. MapReader (talk) 06:34, 29 August 2020 (UTC)
    No, the stop/period belongs inside that "(It also rotates on its own axis.)" example; it is a full parenthetical sentence, not a parenthetical clause with in a larger sentence. Doing "(It also rotates on its own axis)." is an error, about which every style guide ever published would concur. Of course, rewriting without a parenthetical to begin with is often a good choice. WP uses brackets too often as it is.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:25, 30 August 2020 (UTC)
    And too many parentheses as well. EEng 05:35, 30 August 2020 (UTC)
 
This isn't over, McCandlish! EEng 03:32, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Strikeout text in article

Latest comment: 3 years ago16 comments5 people in discussion

Berlin Schönefeld Airport is now closed, although much of it appears to have been absorbed into Berlin Brandenburg Airport. Some info about the airport has been marked with Strikethrough text. I can't find anything in the MOS that says don't do this, although it is obvious to me that bold, italic, color, etc. is used sparingly and strikethrough is only for talk pages. The lead prose indicates the airport is closed, so it should be implicit that the everything else in the article applied to the airport when it was open and not currently. Should the plain text be restored? A query at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airports has gone unanswered. MB 01:13, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I replaced the struckthrough text with "formerly ...", since that seemed sensible to me. Having struckthrough text in article space seems wrong, although I don't have any guidelines to back my opinion. Gbear605 (talk) 01:43, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
MB, hmm, so I've looked at other defunct airports, and a number of them use strikethrough for the airport code, so it does seem to be the status quo style. In addition, WP:Strikethrough says that it can be used when the article itself discusses deleted or inserted content, such as an amendment to a statute. I think that unless we want to propose a specific MOS guideline for this, we should probably go with the strikethrough text. Doubly so for reasons of not biting the newcomers. Gbear605 (talk) 19:13, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Accessibility/Archive 15#Strike to denote "defunct", "former" or "no longer applicable" is relevant I think. --Izno (talk) 20:46, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
MOS:NOSTRIKE says strikethrough will not be conveyed by screenreaders and thus shouldn't be used "for objectionable text". It sounds like it shouldn't be used at all in articles if the meaning is reversed (ignored) by a screenreader. MB 21:41, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
NOSTRIKE may not have been updated since HTML gave a definition to the element in question. --Izno (talk) 22:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
Oh, yes, that's a serious accessibility issue we missed. NOSTRIKE should surely be updated to account for this problem. It's vaguely possible that most screen readers by now do support the semantic HTML elements <del> and <ins>, though there's been some dispute (off-WP) about exactly when <del> should actually be used, versus <s>. And we've learned the hard way not to just make assumptions about what screenreaders are actually doing (many of them are not yet even nearly making as much use of semantic markup as they should). It's conceptually similar to the MOS:CURLY problem: by now, all browsers should be able to treat "Poem Title" and “Poem Title” as equivalent for search purposes unless explicitly told not to, yet they somehow just aren't all there yet.[To wax techno-political about it, I think problems like this are primarily because WHATWG has insufficient buy-in, and only represents a handful of companies that have anything to do with browsers and other Web user agents; and it seems that what time and resources WHATWG does have are too often squandered picking fights with W3C (which has massive buy-in, but not from a handful of WHATWG browser vendors), instead of cooperating.]  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:27, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
Indeed. As far as Windows is concerned, NVDA supports announcing struck-outt/inserted text in most regular configurations (but by no means all ... it's a long story), and JAWS supported it by default briefly but that decision was later reversed (search for "inserted"), I'm guessing due to abuse of the tags on certain sites. Graham87 14:43, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
@Graham87: Do you have any suggestions for specific revision of MOS:NOSTRIKE?  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:30, 20 November 2020 (UTC)
Nope, I'm happy with it as it is. I first pointed out the problem which led to the existing text way back in 2007 ... Graham87 04:16, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
@SMcCandlish and Graham87:, I really think MOS:NOSTRIKE should be updated because of the ambiguity of "objectionable text". The discussion linked above by Inzo seems to say strikeout is appropriate for "contents that are no longer accurate or no longer relevant" per the HTML definition. A clear statement in NOSTRIKE like In articles, do not use strikethrough. would end different interpretations. MB 14:27, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
Except, as always, there are exceptions. E.g., it's used (in templated form) at the list of HTML elements to indicate deprecated elements, and I've also seen it used (hopefully in the semantically correct <del> versus <ins> form) in blocks of legislative and other textual analysis. I think we'd need to identify:
  • How it is being used in articles
  • Which (if any) of them are actually appropriate
  • What HTML element (<s> or <del>) is the right markup for each case
  • Whether some other markup could be used instead (and whether that in turn has other accessibility issues).
  • Probably something I'm not thinking of.
Needn't be a perfect analysis. Just an hour or so of trawling around in articles for <s> or <del> and the invalid but still fairly often used <strike>, would probably be enough get a bead on it all.

PS: I agree "objectionable text" is a weird thing to say there. I think what someone was trying to convey was "Do not add <s>...</s> around article content you think is inappropriate or incorrect; instead, use an appropriate inline cleanup/dispute template, and raise the matter on the talk page." It doesn't address anything about allegedly proper use of strikethrough as an intentional part of the content, though, which is what I'm getting at above.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:11, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

I've revised MOS:NOSTRIKE (in MOS:ACCESS) to make more sense. I don't think anything it says will be controversial in any way, though it does not address all the bullet-points I mentioned above. It's a (belated) start. I tagged it "under discussion" and pointed to this thread. PS: Weirdly, MOS:TEXT never mentioned strikethrough at all; I've fixed this with a summary of, and {{Main}} cross-reference to, MOS:NOSTRIKE.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:46, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

What started this was Berlin Schönefeld Airport. See this version where it was used to strike out information that was correct until it changed. Some editors have said the text should be marked in prose as "former" or just left alone as "historical". There has been some edit-warring putting back in the strikeout version. There is a message on my talk page saying this is commonly done in "defunct" airports that gives more examples. MB 00:03, 4 December 2020 (UTC)
FWIW the new text is fine with me. Graham87 01:53, 4 December 2020 (UTC)
Oh, gawd, that version is just completely out of the question. That is absolutely not how to encyclopedically write about changed facts, of any kind.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:44, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Section head that starts with digits?

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments4 people in discussion

How would you capitalize "2021 mayoral campaign" as a section head? Does "mayoral" get an upper-case M? -- RoySmith (talk) 19:58, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

No, the first word is 2021. It's the same as if you spelled it out, "Two thousand twenty one mayoral campaign". —David Eppstein (talk) 20:17, 25 December 2020 (UTC)
Use a capital 2, obviously, like this: @021 mayoral campaign. EEng 21:03, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
Ha ha!  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:30, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

MOS:GAMECAPS not being implemented expeditiously

Latest comment: 3 years ago18 comments5 people in discussion

Back in early 2018, we had a near-unanimous RfC concluding that WP does not capitalize the names of traditional (non-trademarked) games and sports, except where they contain a proper name (Canadian football but gridiron football; Texas hold 'em but royal hold 'em). This was implemented as MOS:GAMECAPS (a.k.a. MOS:SPORTCAPS).

While this has been pretty consistently deployed throughout sports articles, very little has been done address over-capitalization in table/board game articles and children's game articles. We're now seeing WP:CONLEVEL-problematic pushback, including patently false claims that names for non-commercial, folk games like snakes and ladders "are proper names", despite obviously failing to qualify. See, e.g., this multi-page RM at Talk:Snakes and ladders#Requested move 14 December 2020. Given that WP:RM discussions on obscure topics are easily subject to wikiproject canvassing to produce WP:FALSECONSENSUS, I'm not really sure what to do about this. It's similar to a short-lived pattern by WP:DANCE participants to resist de-capitalization of dance move terminology (also covered by MOS:GAMECAPS).

Should we open another RfC on it, to reconfirm the results, and maybe host it in WP:VPPOL? I don't like rehashing style-quibble stuff in such RfCs because the community has better things to spend its time on. But it really isn't permissible for wikiprojects (on games or anything else) to "revolt" against guidelines they don't like after RfCs did not go their way, and take a posture that "failure" by the community to force compliance at "their" pages at warp speed is somehow an excuse to ignore the RfC consensus and defy the guidelines.

However, I'm not even certain this is a wikiproject problem this time. Several commenters at that RM are long-term gadflies who who habitually make clearly incorrect claims that things are "proper names", without any interest in or understanding of the topics in question, but seemingly just out of a "disrupt MoS application as much as possible" pattern, and most especially to keep capitalizing things the guidelines and the bulk of the sources do not capitalize. Five+ years of these antics from the same editors is far too long.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:34, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

User:SMcCandlish, that last paragraph, is that a barely concealed personal attack on specific individuals readily identified by following your links? And is this not poisoning the well for MOS watchers who you seek to rally into backing you up? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:48, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
Being critical of editors engaging in unconstructive behavior patterns is not a "personal attack". Please actually read WP:NPA. See also poisoning the well and what it actually means. It certainly does not refer to drawing additional editorial attention, at the most appropriate venue, to issues of WP:P&G implementation and interpretation problems. Reporting and trying to resolve unconstructive behavior and failure to follow the P&G is what every noticeboard on the system exists for, and WT:MOS has served as the WP:MOS / WP:RM noticeboard – more so than as a talk page about guideline text editing – for 15+ years (a proposal about half that time ago to set up a separate noticeboard for this was rejected, actually, because it would be redundant). So: right back atcha. If you want to accuse me personal attacks and bad-faith canvassing, you know where WP:ANI is. I doubt I'll need to post anything further there than what I have already posted in the rest of this reply.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:35, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
To be specific: Do you accuse me of being a gadfly making "incorrect claims that things are "proper names", without any interest in or understanding of the topics in question", when I am arguing that Wikipedia should be led by its sources, the bulk of which do capitalize in some cases, counting sources starting with the existing reference list? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:54, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
Why do you think I was referring to you? I didn't even notice your username in there, until you pinged me at 04:42, 16 December 2020 (UTC) [24]. I would have to dig back through RM history to know whether or not you have a history of making false "proper name" claims. However, if you find that this description of behavior does uncomfortably fit your habitual approach to style matters and you just don't like the tone, I don't think the problem is on my end. (I don't read minds, so I'm not sure what you're on about, frankly.) Much more substantively, your statement "sources, the bulk of which do capitalize in some [of these] cases" is already shown to be counterfactual (with one possible exception which is probably due to false-positives for a TV show and other works, but this doesn't matter anyway, since per all of MOS:CAPS, not just MOS:GAMECAPS, our standard is to not capitalize unless sources do so with remarkable consistency, not just some of the time or even a bare majority of the time). I've addressed at the article talk page your attempt to (again) argue incorrectly that only the sources already present in the article can be used for such an assessment, which is not how RM approaches these matters, ever. I'm hard-pressed to think of a single other editor still engaging in that fallacy.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:21, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
I suspected your vitriol was directed at someone else, but don’t care to follow that line. I think we disagree on what is meant by “source”. I never said “only” sources in the article matter, but I do say they should get first consideration, and if they are not the best sources, the sources should be examined and improved. That, at least, would cause these time wasting titling battles to lead to article improvement. Do you consider google ngram results to be “sources”? I consider that absurd, google ngram includes data scrapped from inappropriate sources. If you drop the word “only”, do you still consider it a fallacy? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:27, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
Yes, even that is wrong. When we are assessing the real-world consensus about something, we use all the available source material, in the aggregate, that we can bring to bear, not just what someone today happens to prefer to have cited in the article (which may well be outright WP:CHERRYPICKING). This has serious policy implications, and goes far beyond style quibbles. Just for you, I've written this up in clear essay form at WP:Fallacy of selective sources. The obvious hole in your variant of the fallacy here is that we have no policy to use only the best sources, just sources at all that qualify as reliable, and we have no formal process by which to assess an individual source against others, nor the overall sourcing quality of an article. It's just more loosey-goosey consensus discussion, and it usually does not even begin until the WP:GAN phase, often not until WP:FAC (GA just requires that the sources be valid and actually be cited for the proper claims in our articles). Many of our game articles have no reliable sources at all (yet even this is permissible under WP:V, which requires that claims be sourceable not already sourceed except when they are apt to be controversial, are categorically controversial (e.g. per WP:BLP), or have already been controverted).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:26, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
  • I've withdrawn my !vote at Snakes and Ladders, but this drive for decapitalizations does not feel right. The "near-unanimous" RfC does not speak to the sort of cases it is being applied to. It feels like MOS aficionados are winning the long war through border skirmishes on the lowest importance articles, like Fuzzy duck, and not by making an understandable case. It feels wrong that a trademarked name gets capitals, but an iconic ancient game does not. The real question for me is "what is a proper name", and where are the boundaries. Again, it feels like MOS aficionados are winning on cases that no one cares about, and steers away from cases where editors do care. Why is "Boyle's law" not a proper name, but "Queen's Gambit" is? Is there a logic to it, or is it just how things are changing, and the gas physicists care less about the capitals than chess players, and is it just a matter of time, decades, until the popular opening is the queen's gambit? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:06, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    "It feels wrong that a trademarked name gets capitals, but an iconic ancient game does not." Really? The logic is not that complicated. In the first place, nobody would lowercase a trademarked game name like "Hungry Hungry Hippos", but the majority of sources do use lowercase "snakes and ladders" and "law" in most such laws; and caps are pretty overwhelming on "Queen's Gambit", too. So if you don't understand the logic, at least know that we are in general not doing very different from what other sources and authorities do. Dicklyon (talk) 04:31, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    Yeah, the most "iconic ancient game" (for which we have a known rule set) of all time is surely chess, and we do not capitalize it, nor does much of anyone else out there. I think much of what is going on here is actually MOS:SIGCAPS problems: capitalization as a form of "signification" emphasis, either as a stab at unnecessary disambiguation ("it's game called snakes and ladders, it's not actually a bunch of ladders and bunch of snakes" – as if our readers had dain bramage), or more often as an attempt to signal subjective importance (e.g. "iconic ancient" status), which in turn is a WP:NPOV problem.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:19, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    I think Nine Men’s Morris is a bit older. Go (game) older again. I suspect is it more to do with recognizability than emphasis. It’s awkward to refer to snakes and ladders and go. I’ve accepted that these are not proper names. You seem very sure of anything, can you say where the boundary lies for proper names. Why don’t theorems have proper names? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:25, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    @SmokeyJoe: I've tried to address this in the WP:PNPN essay. The short version is that they do, in the philosophical sense of "proper name" (which WP doesn't use, and which doesn't have any implications for capitalization); but theorems, eponymous laws, etc., are not conventionalized in English as things to capitalize. Some sources do it, but most don't. It's another of those "WP follows, it does not lead" matters. Or "WP is not the place to reform the language", etc. As for "It's awkward to write ...", yeah, this the same argument that was tried with capitalizing vernacular names of species, and many other things. It's just a fact of WP life that some things have to be spelled out more clearly for a global, general audience (and readers who often lack context, e.g. due to following a link directly to a subsection), than would be necessary in insider-to-insider communication. Also, the "signification" effect of capitalizing something as "special and important in this subject area" varies radically by topical audience; to the average editor who is not an expert in that particular field, it just looks like crappy writing and doesn't actually signify what was intended. Signification has to work in the receiving brain, not just the authoring one. And, since pretty much everything is the subject of one specialization or another, and many of them want to use SIGCAPS (often in conflicting ways), we would just end up with a confusing morass of every other thing being capitalized to make someone somewhere happier. (I'm summarizing from WP:SSF here.)

    When it comes to terminology-heavy subjects, I've long pointed out that it's very helpful to both readers and editors to create and make extensive use of glossary articles, and the term-link templates that reference them (derived from the Template:Glossary link meta-template). Example: {{cuegloss}} is used thousands, probably tens of thousands, of times in cue-sports articles for pinpoint links to entries at Glossary of cue sports terms, to obviate the need to re-re-re-explain terms in situ in every article in the category. I'm not sure every folk game needs a glossary, of course, while some major games like chess already have one, but we might could use "Glossary of traditional board games", "Glossary of bowling games", etc. And various geeky topics have needed glossaries for a long time (e.g. Unix and Linux terms). It's kind of a bummer that Category:Wikipedia glossaries isn't far larger than it is (and with better-developed existing articles).
     — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:19, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

    (Go is older than chess but less iconic, at least in the west.) Popcornfud (talk) 17:48, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    (Go should be decapitalized in its use in that article too, but I would never do such a thing while this discussion was open. ;) --Izno (talk) 18:16, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    Yes, very uncomfortable that this is a rallying ground to prepare for the battle. Talk:Go (game) won't know what hit them. Personally, I prefer weiqi, and don't understand the lack of mention of this name. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:18, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
    I would think that all names of it that are likely to be encountered in Eng-lang sources should be mentioned there, and Chinese ones are probably important since the game goes back to ancient China (which any good sources will get into). However, go being Japanese (transliterated), from earlier igo, means it should be italicized per MOS:FOREIGN (ideally, it would be done as {{lang|ja-Latn|go}}; one could also use the {{Nihongo}} template, but it has a lot of parser overhead, and is better for cases where we need to generate "Japanese: " and Kanji or other non-Latin characters, and indicate the transliteration scheme, and ...). The italics would make it clear that it's a foreignism not the English word "go" (present tense of "went"), and thus obviate the alleged recognizability/disambiguation rationale for capitalizing it. That said, I have generally been personally disinclined to get involved in lower-casing {{lang|ja-Latn|go}}; as with chess people and their capitalization of gambits, the drama level involved would be too high for my blood pressure.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:19, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

SMcCandlish – re "not being implemented expeditiously". As you should know, these things never happen expeditiously. It takes work from those of us who notice and care. Many thousands of my edits went to implement MOS:JR. Thousands more for the revised river naming conventions. Hundreds at least on WP:USSTATION, which got me into deep yoghurt. Thousands over the years on MOS:CAPS. Hundreds at least on MOS:POSS. Though only about 1% run into opposition, dealing with those cases is what takes much of the time. Remember the MOS:LQ! Dicklyon (talk) 04:38, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

True. It's just odd that cleanup in this regard has swept through sports articles (even edge cases like cue sports, more often thought of as games than sports) but has not swept through non-sport games articles. My guess is this is just due to a smaller "fan base" of interested editors, which is why I think it needs some focused editorial attention, since it's clearly not getting enough just incidentally from what people are watchlisting or randomly working on.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:29, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Non-breaking spaces

Latest comment: 3 years ago7 comments5 people in discussion

Pardon me for a moment while I rant about non breaking spaces. Somebody came by an appropriations act article today and put nbsp in between all the $10 million, $5 billion, $7 million type numbers. This particular article uses bulleted lists, and probably has 100 of this kind of number. It makes it a little hard to read in the source code editor, but especially hard to read in the visual editor. I'd say it's almost unreadable in the visual editor. Big giant "nbsp" boxes everywhere. Honestly, I wonder if these non breaking spaces are worth the trouble. It takes a wikipedian extra time and effort to add them, and it clogs the visual editor with visual noise. For what is, in my opinion, not much of a benefit. Am I out in left field here, or do others also feel this way? –Novem Linguae (talk) 09:34, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

I don't get it. What does it look like? --editeur24 (talk) 17:34, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
Editeur24, good question. Here's a screenshot. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:33, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
  • As it happens, your post itself beautifully illustrates why nbsp is needed. By the happenstance of my window size, it read
                                                                and put nbsp in between all the $10
    million, $5 billion, $7 million type numbers. This particular
Someone reading this will think, "all the ten dollar ... oh wait, ten million dollar ...". That (among other things) is what nbsp exists to prevent. Having said that, in most of the bullets in your screenshot nbsp isn't needed since there's zero chance of a linebreak one word after the *. For the items like $82 billion for schools and universities, including $54 billion to public K-12 schools, nbsp is needed for the second and subsequent dollar amounts.
Our priority is what the reader sees, not our own convenience. My advice is to stop using VE. EEng 19:55, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
Actually, his post does not demonstrate the issue at all. The issue is for nbsp used near the beginning of bullet points. Unless the reader has an unrealistic screen width of 100 pixels or so, then the browser will never do an automatic line break on those numbers. Hence there is the downside of visual clutter in VE (and when editing directly) but there is no upside at all. In the interest of simplicity, I would convert them back to normal spaces. However, nbsp that are not near the beginning of a line should remain as nbsp.  Stepho  talk  23:04, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
Huh??? What part of in most of the bullets in your screenshot nbsp isn't needed since there's zero chance of a linebreak one word after the * did you not understand? EEng 18:29, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
Is the graphical "[puzzle piece icon] Nbsp" display in that editor not an option that can be turned on and off? I would think it would be, and if it's not this is worth a ticket in the MediaWiki bug/feature request system (Phabricator). Start here: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Phabricator

Agreed with EEng and Stepho that most of the cases in that example are unnecessary, because they are at the very beginnings of lines. Also agree to avoid Visual Editor, or at least switch into source mode any time it is bothering you, and before saving. VE tends to booger up a lot of markup, and it is safest to re-examine what it thinks it is doing before saving changes.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:23, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Punctuation inside or outside

Latest comment: 3 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

I found this useful MOS page via a google search: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Punctuation inside or outside. Strangely, it is in the namespace "Wikipedia talk". Any interest in moving it into the "Wikipedia:Manual of Style" namespace? And giving it a shortcut code like MOS:PIOO? I'm happy to make the move if we get consensus. Thanks. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:44, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

This appears to be an old essay. The topic is covered already; see MOS:INOROUT. Mathglot (talk) 19:54, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
Good thing I checked. I'll tag it as {{Historical}} {{main|MOS:INOROUT}}. Thanks. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:04, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

"MOS:" redirecting to "Wikipedia:Manual of Style"

Latest comment: 3 years ago7 comments4 people in discussion

"MOS:" redirects to "Wikipedia:Manual of Style". There is a disambiguation page named "MOS". Therefore, I added a hatnote of MOS: redirecting to manual of style to the MOS disambiguation page since anyone might be looking of what MOS could also refer to. Seventyfiveyears (talk) 14:18, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Is there a conscious reason a reader would enter a colon with MOS? I can't see it happening accidentally.—Bagumba (talk) 15:14, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
"MOS:" stands for "Manual of Style:" (which also redirects to "Wikipedia:Manual of Style:", as both of them have colons. There's also a redirect for "Manual of Style", which redirects to "Study guide". IF a reader intentionally types "MOS:", they're likely looking for "Wikipedia:Manual of Style". Seventyfiveyears (talk) 18:18, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
IF a reader intentionally types "MOS:", they're likely looking for "Wikipedia:Manual of Style": Which is why I think a hatnote is unneccessary: a reader is unlikely to have mistakenly gotten here.—Bagumba (talk) 01:38, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
Reader entering a colon. EEng 02:23, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
It is at about the most prominent spot on an already cluttered page. It feels unnecessary and I'd favor removing it. SchreiberBike | ⌨  02:27, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

I've removed it, given the lack of consensus to include it.—Bagumba (talk) 18:11, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

Talk:Louis Riel#How should Journal of Canadian Studies be cited?

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

This is something MOS regulars may have an opinion about, so please comment. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:38, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

"Do not invent abbreviations or acronyms"

Latest comment: 3 years ago11 comments6 people in discussion

Perhaps it should be pointed out that articles about organizations with long names are exempted from this rule? For example, abbreviating Human Rights Defenders and Promoters as HRDP may not be a standard abbreviation (and thus invented), but writing Human Rights Defenders and Promoters everywhere in the article is cumbersome and needlessly repetitive. Another example is Moscow Research Center for Human Rights which in the article is abbreviated MRCHR. ImTheIP (talk) 14:23, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

I think the idea is to encourage people to either use the abbreviated names that the organization uses for itself or that independent, reliable sources use for it, or to use a descriptive term like "the company" or "the organization" etc. as you would do in spoken English, where hard-to-pronounce acronyms are avoided when possible. That said, I can see the rare case where there is no existing acronym and using an "invented acronym" is less awkward than using a descriptive term, but that's going to be the exception, not the rule. WP:Ignore all rules exists for one-off exceptional cases where it's obvious the best thing to do is to "do it wrong."
On the other hand, if it's becoming standard practice, maybe the "consensus against using invented acronyms" is changing or has changed, so it might be worth discussing.
(humor) Of course, if you are doing an article on a future remake of the Schoolhouse Rock episode "Rufus Xavier Sarsaparilla" that used organizations, well, you might want to spell out the very long organizations in the first half of the article, "because pronouns." davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 16:59, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
After writing all of the above, I would say our style guide should mean something like this: "Avoid inventing acronyms. Suggested alternatives include using the full name (e.g. Moscow Research Center for Human Rights), using a shortened form of the full name (e.g. Moscow Research Center), using other phrases (e.g. "the center") for second and subsequent uses when doing so would not detract from readability."
I don't care what the actual verbiage is, but it should include a short list of recommended alternatives, leaving it open to the editors to be creative to come up with a way to communicate clearly and effectively. WP:Ignore all rules shouldn't be explicitly spelled out, it's implicit in all Wikipedia policies and guidelines save perhaps those with legal implications. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 16:59, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
So I shouldn't have invented "TDOTSCIFOGLHology"?[25] --Guy Macon (talk) 22:03, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
After the first use, "the cover" or "the sewer cover" would've been adequate.   davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:12, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
Thanks for sharing your views. It's very enlightening! For me, it is not easy to know what works best in English so I'm grateful for the style guidelines that spells it out in details (as well as for all the copyeditors that fixes my prose). In the articles I've written about some organizations I have indeed invented abbreviations but I'll try to avoid that in the future. I guess that means that if one is writing about the English Defence League one would perhaps prefer "the League" over "the EDL," in International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights one should prefer "the Covenant" over "the ICCPR," and in International Observatory of Human Rights, "the Observatory" over "the IOHR"? I believe (but I'm not sure about it) that the pronoun should be capitalized. E.g "the Observatory" with a capital O. ImTheIP (talk) 22:55, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
@ImTheIP: Wouldn't "the organisation" (or "the document", etc.) cover most of those cases? Mathglot (talk) 23:07, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
I've seen the capitalization go both ways. In this case it would probably be capitalized, but if it were "The Naval Observatory" I think it depends on if you mean "the observatory" as in "the observatory we've been talking about" or "the Observatory" as in "The Naval Observatory" - since they both mean exactly the same thing if the topic of discussion is The Naval Observatory both ways would be correct, with slightly different shades of meaning/emphasis. By the way, I appreciate the humor value of TDOTSCIFOGLHology - in your own user space, use whatever style suits you. Likewise off-Wiki, it's perfectly okay to "invent acronyms" if you define them on the first use and the usage isn't cumbersome or awkward or confusing. "New American Science Acadamy (NASA)" is a bad "invented algorithm" for obvious reasons (the name's taken) but if the term "NASA" weren't already a "well-known acronym" it would be fine to use off-Wiki. Wikipedia has adopted a convention of NOT doing so. That convention fits very well with and may be because of our policy of WP:No original research. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 23:15, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
Some clarification: If I used the term "pronoun" to refer to using a shorter version of a long name, I was in error. Wikt:pronoun has the definition of pronoun. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 23:19, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
You didnt. You were - I THINK - drawing an analogy between use of pronouns in contexts when it is unclear who the pronoun refers to, and using generic references to subjects like 'the organisation' in contexts which it is unclear what organisation is being referred to. ;) Firejuggler86 (talk) 09:26, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
Summary response: I'm skeptical that something named Human Rights Defenders and Promoters, or Moscow Research Center for Human Rights cannot be found as HRDP or MRCHR (respectively) in some source somewhere. That kind of stretches credulity (perhaps of the subject's notability, if there are so few sources available, and so short/trivial, that they never said enough to want to abbreviate the name upon a later occurrence, e.g. because there wasn't one). If you're writing about something named the Naval Observatory (or Harvard University), do not refer to is as "the Observatory" or "the University". It doesn't matter that this is the preferred style in some other publications; it is not in this one (first rule of MOS:CAPS: if it's not capitalized with near-uniformity in independent reliable sources, don't capitalize it on WP). If you're writing about something named International Observatory of Human Rights, do not refer to it as "the Observatory" or "the observatory", since it is not in fact an observatory; it's just got a rather silly metaphoric name. If you literally cannot find any source anywhere calling it IOHR, then refer to it later as "the organization", or something like that. None of this is new discussion, and answers to all these questions were already available by just applying the relevant guidelines without trying to second-guess them (and WP:Common sense in the IOHR case), by reading MoS archive discussions, or just by looking at high-quality WP articles. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:14, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Clarification for tense (periodicals vs podcasts and the like)

Latest comment: 3 years ago8 comments5 people in discussion

The section states:

However, articles about periodicals that are no longer being produced should normally, and with commonsense exceptions, use the past tense. Generally, do not use past tense except for past events, subjects that are dead or no longer meaningfully exist, or periodicals and similar written material that are no longer being produced.

I find it a bit strange that we have this artificial split for periodicals but would exempt radio and TV shows, podcasts, and so on. So a discontinued magazine was but a discontinued radio/TV show or a podcast still is? What's the logic here? This leaves a lot of blurry boundaries not addressed. What about a website? What about a website that was both a podcast and a magazine? I think we should try to standardize this better. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 03:14, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

You can read the related RFC. I think introducing the inconsistency was rather dumb, and would prefer to return to the way it was (not least because several editors advocating for the inconsistency seemed not to want to distinguish between publisher and publication, and formal versus informal English and where each may be used), but there you go. --Izno (talk) 06:58, 28 December 2020 (UTC)
Yes, this is worth revisiting, but I'm of the mind that such matters should be left alone for at least a year, maybe two, or people get their undies in a bunch. Frankly, it helps to have a good list of problem examples, complaints, etc., arising over time to see if consensus will change.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:28, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Tense seems inconsistent

 
Tense
 
Past tense
 
Not to be confused with Tents.

I'm looking at these three examples:

  • Earth: Final Conflict is a Canadian science fiction television series that ran for five seasons between October 6, 1997, and May 20, 2002.
  • A Prairie Home Companion is a radio show that aired live from 1974 to 2016 (not A Prairie Home Companion was a radio show).
  • Jumbo Comics was an adventure anthology comic book published by Fiction House from 1938 to 1953

Why are discontinued TV shows and radio shows in present tense, and discontinued comic books in past tense? —Naddruf (talk ~ contribs) 20:43, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

@Naddruf:, MOS:VERB says,

By default, write articles in the present tense, including those covering works of fiction (see Wikipedia:Writing better articles § Tense in fiction) and products or works that have been discontinued. However, articles about periodicals that are no longer being produced should normally, and with commonsense exceptions, use the past tense. Generally, do not use past tense except for past events, subjects that are dead or no longer meaningfully exist, or periodicals and similar written material that are no longer being produced.

Does that help? Your question was the subject of an Rfc (here). You could try raising the issue again, if you disagree with it, but the consensus is only six months old, so you could consider waiting a bit. Mathglot (talk) 22:17, 6 January 2021 (UTC)
I think your quote from the MOS doesn't really explain what the consensus is, because it doesn't state a difference between printed works and electronic media. However this is stated in the RfC in a slightly obfuscated way. So thanks for providing the RfC, this page is very confusing. —Naddruf (talk ~ contribs) 22:22, 6 January 2021 (UTC)
Literally the same discussion as the comment at #Clarification for tense (periodicals vs podcasts and the like); since you don't know why it is, you're looking for Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 219#RfC: Should "is" or "was" be used to describe periodical publications that are no longer being published?. As above, I am annoyed that we have now had to field 2 questions about it. --Izno (talk) 21:28, 7 January 2021 (UTC)
I've merged this to be a subsection of the original, to centralize discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:32, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

Capitalisation for direct quotes?

Latest comment: 3 years ago8 comments4 people in discussion

I can't seem to find what I'm looking for in the Manual of Style, but does Wikipedia follow the MLA's style and capitalise the first letter of direct quotations? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 21:11, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

I suspect the guidance you seek is at the end of MOS:CONFORM. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EEng (talk • contribs) 01:24, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
MOS:PMC is more pertinent to this, and CONFORM is "subservient" to it (i.e. outlines minor exceptions to the PMC general rule).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:57, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
Not sure. All I can say is I do as long as a capital letter appears in the original text. If it doesn't, I believe we should retain the lower-case treatment. Some editors go overboard with this, imo – retain the lower case and insert an opening ellipsis. To my way of thinking, the ellipsis is unnecessary. JG66 (talk) 01:53, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
Hmm, I personally wouldn't add the opening ellipsis either. I guess until this is revisited I'll just leave these cases be when I come across them. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 22:44, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
Yeah, only do that if there is missing earlier material that is contextually important, but in that case it's better to use a longer quote rather than make readers to try to find it in the original material.
@Tenryuu and JG66:The two typical approaches are these (and they can of course be adapted to blockquotes):
  1. According to Elbonian Prime Minister Jane Q. Public, it was "the worst disaster in the port's history".
  2. "[T]he worst disaster in the port's history" was Elbonian Prime Minister Jane Q Public's description of the event.
In neither case should this be changed to "The  ..." if the original material didn't have that capital T. If it did (e.g. because the original quote was "The worst disaster in the port's history was today."), then what you're looking for is 'According to Elbonian Prime Minister Jane Q. Public, it was "[t]he worst disaster in the port's history".' Honestly, I'm also skeptical that MLA would actually advise 'According to Elbonian Prime Minister Jane Q. Public, it was "The worst disaster in the port's history".', which is what the OP's characterization of their style guide suggests, but I have not read theirs on quotation matters in a long time (and if I still have a copy, it's in a box somewhere.) If they do, that's downright aberrant; I don't think any other style guide would agree with that.

PS: The answer to every single question that begins with something like "does Wikipedia follow the [some other publisher] style" is no, because WP has its own style guide. If MLA or APA or MHRA or AMA or whoever say something eminently sensible in their style guide and WP has a consensus it should be in ours, then it will be. MoS is largely built from averaging all the academic style guides, plus various WP-specific adjustment. If MoS doesn't address something at all, it means it's left to editorial discretion on a case-by-case basis, as something not likely to affect encyclopedic tone, accuracy, or reader comprehension (or to spark recurrent editorial strife). But for this particular matter, we already have MOS:PMC, and it's central concern is in fact accuracy.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:57, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

SMcCandlish, yep, I agree with that ("In neither case should this be changed to ..."). I imagine Tenryuu's referring to instances where the quoted text constitutes a full sentence in its own right – even with a phrase or word omitted up front – rather than just a fragment. That is, surely that's all the MLA style guide would be advising ... Otherwise, they seem to be suggesting the (gratuitous) use of an initial cap as some sort of secondary inverted comma. JG66 (talk) 05:29, 26 January 2021 (UTC)
Ah, I see. Well, that would be directly misleading, arguably outright falsification of source material. One of the purposes of logical quotation is to avoid manufacturing fake sentences and fake complete clauses out of partial source material. Lots and lots of fragments can by themselves incidentally form grammatically viable sentences, but we should not mislead readers into thinking that they were. Silly example: "Prosecuting animal abuse is my life's work" → "animal abuse is my life's work".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:20, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

What should Sharif Sheikh Ahmed be called throughout the article?

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

If you have an opinion, please share at Talk:Sharif Sheikh Ahmed. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 16:49, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

A drawing, photograph, or video who's direction of view, e.g. due north is known is better in many cases.

  Moved to Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images § Facing north should be preferred

Appropriate wording for when someone doesn't use gendered or non-binary pronouns

Latest comment: 3 years ago44 comments19 people in discussion

There is a discussion HERE on the talk page for musician Sophie's article over pronouns. Sophie preferred not to use gendered or non-binary pronouns (Pitchfork and Slate sources) so we're not sure the best way to phrase things without the sentences becoming very awkwardly written. Could we get some input? Thanks. Abbyjjjj96 (talk) 23:19, 30 January 2021 (UTC)

I would suggest using Sophie or nouns like "the musician" & "the musician's" as much as possible. It looks this has already been suggested at Talk:Sophie_(musician)#Pronouns, so probably best to continue the conversation there. Peaceray (talk) 23:27, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
I think this is a good suggestion and I second it. Jilliangrace (talk) 23:34, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
Someone with a better memory than me can hopefully point to some featured or good articles that deal with people whose pronouns are not clear (usually historical articles) and what the precedent is there. As for MOS:GENDERID, the relevant parts are: Give precedence to self-designation as reported in the most up-to-date reliable sources [...] Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. To me I don't see a reason that shouldn't apply to a preference for averting pronouns entirely. — Bilorv (talk) 23:41, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
Here is a ship FA with no “she” or “her”: HMS Calliope (1884). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:53, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
That is, stylistically, a fine example of using a name and title, (such as "the musician") in lieu of pronouns. And I second Bilorv's last point, we should defer to Sophie's self-identification. I think we now have some guidance on how that can be accomplished. Jilliangrace (talk) 23:57, 30 January 2021 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but I must dissent: that article contains some of the most wretchedly twisted-out-of-shape writing ever seen on earth or any other planet. For example:
The crew of the helpless and doomed American ship cheered Calliope as the corvette slipped past. The British ship's drive for the open sea was called by the American commander on the scene "one of the grandest sights a seaman or anyone else ever saw; the lives of 250 souls depended on the hazardous adventure." Making for the harbour mouth, the British ship's bow and stern alternately rose and plunged ...
Believe it or not, all the bolded stuff refers to the same ship, for crying out loud, and that's in Wikipedia's voice. I mean, seriously??? This is what's it's come to? (And while we're on the subject, see WP:Queen Elizabeth slipped majestically into the water. EEng 01:46, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
P.S. And, no, we shouldn't defer to someone's preference for averting pronouns entirely. Ridiculous. Singular they is fine. EEng 02:00, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
P.P.S. I'd completely forgotten that my esteemed fellow editor SandyGeorgia and I have discussed Calliope before -- see WT:Manual_of_Style/Archive_217#Commentary_on_"follow_the_sources". EEng 02:23, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
When a person has expressed a clear preference for pronouns not to be used about that person, I don't see any particular challenge in respecting that preference, myself. Newimpartial (talk) 02:05, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
And if they want us to refer to them as "The Emperor Eternal", then what? EEng 02:19, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
EEng, if this article is the most wretched writing you have ever seen, you need to get more active in the Wide World of Wikipedia. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:54, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
SandyGeorgia, you know I know better than to imagine there can ever be a final answer to the question, What is the most wretched writing on Wikipedia? Read what I wrote again, which was that it's the most wretchedly twisted-out-of-shape writing on Wikipedia (or, I actually said, in the solar system). That's different. For the amusement of the editors assembled here's a post of mine from the discussion just linked:
I'm compelled to say that the Calliope article shows only how to jump from the she frying pan into ... well, another frying pan. In an apparent attempt to avoid the she/it controversy, the Calliope article eschews all pronouns by indulging in an orgy of headache-inducing elegant variation:
  • After retirement from active service, Calliope served as a training ship until 1951, when the old corvette was sold for breaking
  • ... which gave the corvette one more knot of speed, a difference that would be crucial in the disaster that made Calliope famous
  • The vessel nevertheless was a fully rigged sailing ship
  • The ship was not activated until 25 January 1887, when the vessel was placed in commission for the China Station
  • The vessel was reassigned to the Australia Station later in 1887. The cruiser was in New Zealand at the end of that year
  • The crew of the helpless and doomed American ship cheered Calliope as the corvette slipped past. The British ship's drive for the open sea was called by the American commander on the scene "one of the grandest sights a seaman or anyone else ever saw; the lives of 250 souls depended on the hazardous adventure." Making for the harbour mouth, the British ship's bow and stern alternately rose and plunged ...
  • Captain Kane then took his ship to Sydney
  • Calliope returned to service on the Australian station after repairs were complete. At the end of 1889 the cruiser was recalled to the United Kingdom.
  • Calliope was returned to reserve and promptly stricken from the effective list. The cruiser laid up at Portsmouth, and in 1906 was listed for sale for a time. The next year Calliope was moved to North East England
First prize goes to ... cheered Calliope as the corvette slipped past. The British ship's drive for the open sea ..., in which Calliope, the corvette, and the British ship are all the same thing, but referred to by three different names to keep you on your toes, or possibly for comedic effect. It's like one of those bedroom farces in which the characters go out one door then reenter via another in different guises ("Let's see... so Count Evander and the undergamekeeper and the barmaid are all the same person ... I think ...") Truly wretched.
EEng 04:58, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
@EEng: You've summarized your statement as "or, I actually said, in the solar system" when what was actually said was "on earth or any other planet". This is obviously an attempt to retroactively construe the statement as excluding exoplanets, in light of recent revelations that even more wretchedly twisted-out-of-shape writing exists on Gamma Cephei Ab. For all intensive purposes I could care less, but it's high time to set the wrecker's strait and rain in the peddling of blatant Ms. Information. jp×g 21:45, 3 February 2021 (UTC)
Your mother wears army boots.[FBDB] EEng 03:05, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
The challenge is honouring that preference while avoiding clunky sentences. E.g. this current sentence uses 'their': "At the age of approximately nine or ten years old, Sophie confessed to their parents a desire to drop out of school to be an electronic music producer (although they did not let Sophie do so, and Sophie continued their schooling)." What is the alternative way of writing that without resorting to the ridiculous "Sophie confessed to Sophie's parents"? And there's this sentence, "Sophie was asked by a half-sister to DJ her wedding, later Sophie admitted that the half-sister "didn't know what I was doing in my room on my own" and had assumed Sophie was a DJ." You can't even specify that it's Sophie's half-sister, unless you want to use "Sophie" five times in one sentence. Abbyjjjj96 (talk) 02:58, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I think the rewrite is, At the age of approximately nine or ten years old, Sophie expressed a desire to drop out of school to be an electronic music producer (although Sophie's parents would not allow this, and Sophie had to continue in school). Not going to win a Pulitzer, true, but not unencyclopaedic or terribly contorted IMO. Newimpartial (talk) 03:43, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I'm just going to say this again, and then I promise I'll leave the rest of you to it: It's one thing to worry about pronoun genders and so on, but the idea that we're supposed to go out of our way to accommodate someone's absurd pretension that they don't want to be referenced by any pronoun at all is just idiocy. I'm sorry but there's no other word for it.
Oh, but guess what? The source [26] doesn't say Sophie eschewed all pronouns; rather, it says that they preferred not to use gendered or nonbinary pronouns. They is neither gendered nor nonbinary. This entire discussion has been based on a failure to read the source carefully, or (though I'm not pointing any fingers) an apparent desire to find an issue where there is none. EEng 04:58, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
I am trying to think of prounouns that are neither gendered nor non-binary and am having trouble. I admit to having a couple of cocktails. Can anyone help me? Cullen328 Let's discuss it 05:11, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
They. It's neutral, a nullity. It's the NPOV of pronouns. EEng 05:19, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
"They" has at least three usages in English: as a plural pronoun, as a person-of-unknown-gender pronoun, and as a person-of-known-nonbinary-gender pronoun. Unfortunately, all (or at least most) of the potential uses of "they" in the article would have represented the last of these three, and for this purpose there is no difference between "they" and the nonbinary pronoun neologisms - this is what we are told Sophie preferred not to use.
On the bright side, first and second-person pronouns, and demonstrative pronouns, are apparently fine. :). Newimpartial (talk) 01:31, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
Isn't there still discussion on the article's talk page over whether that request is considered to supercede what reliable sources have referred to the artist as? —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 02:24, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
There certainly is still discussion, although the most recent RS follow the expressed preference and don't use pronouns. Newimpartial (talk) 03:57, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
The reported choice of wording is indeed questionable; why say "don't use gendered or non-binary pronouns" if the intended meaning is "don't use pronouns at all"? It would have seemed "nonbinary" was meant to refer to xe/ze etc. However, the Guardian does plainly say, "Sophie’s team said that pronouns should not be used when describing the artist."[27] I'm in agreement with EEng here though, in that it's not our duty to acquiesce to every absurd personal preference when it's going to be detrimental to our task of writing a readable encyclopedia (e.g., we're not referring to the subject as SOPHIE as some sources do, as the MOS is clearly against that). Pronouns are an integral part of the English language; would we be willing to follow a request to avoid adverbs or conjunctions in an article? The subject was also fine with being referred to as she/her a few years ago, according to the Vulture: "She offered no concrete details about herself, gave few interviews, and, until recently, didn’t use third-person pronouns in her press materials, leaving just enough space for most of the music media to assume she was a man."[28] It's not very clear whether the obituaries repeating the no-pronouns request are necessarily more up-to-date regarding the issue. --Paul_012 (talk) 12:32, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
Alright time's up and none of you have got the correct answer: it's John/Eleanor Rykener. This is what I was thinking of as the precedent for averting pronouns entirely on the biography of a person where it is unclear from the historical record which pronouns fit best. With the case of Sophie the sources seem similarly unclear and contradictory, and so I think the same outcome is logical. — Bilorv (talk) 23:33, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
  • The kow-towing to the old men who poke eyes out to get their way with sexist she-as-ship is shameful. These codgers scratch and shriek like cats when crossed. So no one's willing to take them on any more. Meanwhile en.WP lags in the wholesale movement of the English language toward non-sexist wording. Calliope certainly is a clumsy example of addressing sexism in a maritime article; I'd volunteer to fix it if I weren't scared of the nasties who would bite my head off. Tony (talk) 07:28, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
    • The question in this thread does not appear to be about whether we should use non-sexist language (singular they; of course we should do that when a subject requests it and in many circumstances even when they don't), but rather whether we should acquiesce to SOPHIE's wishes to always refer to SOPHIE as SOPHIE and not to use pronouns in order to ensure that we always write SOPHIE's name as SOPHIE in place of the more common ways we might fail to write SOPHIE's name when referring to SOPHIE. I don't consider that to be a reasonable request. Pronouns are a basic part of English grammar and, if this request was not made with promotional intent this time, it surely will in future. —David Eppstein (talk) 08:15, 3 February 2021 (UTC)
      In deference to my username, I request that future posts use no words which include the letter E. EEng 03:08, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
No, we should not "acquiesce to SOPHIE's wishes to always refer to SOPHIE as SOPHIE and not to use pronouns". This project is written in English. The language is a pre-existing thing. This language happens to make use of pronouns. We use the language as it exists. We should not be caving in to unreasonable demands. The English language also happens to sometimes use gendered pronouns in reference to inanimate objects, ships, for example. Some say this is sexist. I disagree. And I haven't heard any ships speaking up about this. Here is an article from 2018 from the exceptionally erudite The Economist, containing sentences like "She never reached her destination: in June that year she was sunk by a squadron of British ships. For more than three centuries her final resting place remained a mystery." Bus stop (talk) 03:27, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Please, not this shit again. You just can't resist shoehorning in your old hobbyhorse, can you? "Speaking of the weather, did I mention that ships are referred to as she?" You're like the honourable editor from the 18th century. EEng 07:51, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
I'm not "shoehorning" anything in, EEng. Bus stop (talk) 15:21, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
@David Eppstein: a stronger form of the argument to avoid pronouns goes as follows: it is not clear whether Sophie wished to use "she/her" or "they/them" pronouns, or something else entirely (as Sophie was known to avoid media appearances and withhold personal life details, this is not hugely surprising), and to demonstrate this ambiguity we have several editors completely confident that Sophie wished to use "she/her" only or wished to use "they/them" only. There is precedent like at John/Eleanor Rykener to avert pronouns entirely for a historical figure whose pronouns cannot be ascertained with confidence. There is no way to write an article with pronouns without implicitly assuming correctness of one of multiple valid but mutually exclusive perspectives on which pronouns are correct. This sidesteps the counterargument you make on the premise that people with COIs should not unduly dictate the content of our articles about them, because it becomes about us not knowing a piece of information rather than a figure making demands of us. — Bilorv (talk) 14:48, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Singular they is always correct regardless of subject preference. (It is not always the best choice — if we have a preference for he or she, or we have a well-established cisgender identity and no stated preference for he or she, then the gendered pronoun is probably better, but even then singular they would be valid.) —David Eppstein (talk) 18:10, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
I am going to go out on a limb here and say that that just isn't true. For example, in conversation about a trans person who uses "she" pronouns, to refer to that person systematically as "they" while respecting the gendered pronouns of other people discussed in that conversation would be a clear example of misgendering, and would rightly (IMO) be considered offensive. I don't see how the same principle wouldn't apply to written text. Newimpartial (talk) 18:22, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Do we actually defer to "exotic" pronoun usage anywhere? (As in, xir or any bespoke formulation etc. instead of he/she/singular they?) I feel like that's the moreover guiding principle. The MOS' respect for individual's gender expression is not a suicide pact, and indeed in looking at this in terms of branding (which it is, on top of gender expression) we don't honor stuff like ALLCAPS NAMES or putting trademarks and service marks in common language.
In the examples above, singular they would make the article read much better (although not without problems; in the example of schooling, you'd have to make it clear "they" referred to either the parents or Sophie.)
As to HMS Calliope (1884), that seems like a good place where "it" works much better than the constructions of trying to avoid "her", but also an example of where we should just be following the balance of sources. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 15:14, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
The problem we have with that is that we have the singular they (indeterminate) and the singular they (nonbinary), and I don't see how we could use the former in the SOPHIE article without appearing to the reader to be using the latter - and the latter would be misgendering in two scenarios out of the three currently imaginable ones (if SOPHIE rejected the use of gendered and nonbinary pronouns, as the most recent RS state, or if SOPHIE preferred feminine pronouns, as some interview subjects and the record label imply). If we could somehow communicate that we were using the indeterminate they and not the nonbinary they, we would be off the hook, but I'm not convinced we have the linguistic technology to do that. Newimpartial (talk) 15:40, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
I don't see how we would be misgendering if we used "they". Bus stop (talk) 16:02, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
This BLP subject seemed to have expressed a preference for feminine pronouns some time ago, so using the nonbinary "they" would clearly be misgendering if that preference were still to apply, as some editors believe to be the case (and we don't have a way that I know of to indicate an indeterminate "they" rather than a nonbinary "they", within a WP article). I won't get into the more esoteric question of whether a nonbinary BLP subject can be misgendered through the use of "they" pronouns - some editors clearly believe this is possible, and some don't - because in this instance there is another unmistakable issue that emerges without invoking that rarefied concern. Newimpartial (talk) 17:40, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
MOS:NEO. --Izno (talk) 02:53, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
  • I would argue that as we have to stay written in an form of English that is understood by readers who may have English as a second language, that we can only respect the choice of using a non-gendered pronoun as "they", though as indicated above, it is often possible to write these articles clearly withough any pronouns, and thhis use of "they" should only be a fallback if there's no way around it. We cashould still identify (if sourcable) what their hav estated their preferred pronouns are in a section related to their gender identity, but outside that, we should default to "they" to keep the language as simple as possible. Introducing the odd varities like "xir" and "sie" will confuse readers. --Masem (t) 17:48, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
    • Agreed. I expect there is a strong consensus against the use of esoteric pronouns in WP articles no matter how strongly the BLP may express their preference for one or another neologism. Newimpartial (talk) 17:52, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
    • The playwright and performance artist Taylor Mac wishes to be referred to by judy rather than with conventional gender pronouns; our Taylor Mac article just repeats "Mac" a lot. I think it would be best in this case to avoid pronouns by recasting sentences or repeating "Sophie". Cheers, gnu57 18:15, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
      I think we have to bear in mind that this is not a legal document. "They" suffices for our level of need for specificity. If this were legal writing we would want to leave no room for loopholes. We would want to remove all ambiguity. This source writes: "Contract language is limited and stylised," says Adams. He compares it to software code: do it right and everything works smoothly. But make a typo and the whole thing falls apart. When errors are introduced into legal documents, they’re likely to be noticed far more than in any other form of writing, he says. "People are more prone to fighting over instances of syntactic ambiguity than in other kinds of writing." Bus stop (talk) 18:20, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Rewriting to avoid is probably the best option, but at some point WP:Common sense has to kick in, if that starts producing tortured prose. WP is here to provide a readable encyclopedia for our readers, not to pander to whims of celebs who try to make others' lives more difficult. The fact that a subject doesn't personally use singular "they" in no way actually ties WP's hands to not use it, since it has become a standard, accepted way of generalized writing in a gender-neutral manner (has become again – it was for a long time before Victorian-era prescriptivists effectively banned it for a century). A similar comparison is that Genesis P-Orridge used various idiolect neo-pronouns like "s/he", "h/er", and "h/erself", but this does in any way require us to use them in Wikipedia's own voice, or to avoid singular "they". Cf. also prior discussion of someone claiming their preferred "pronoun" is tree. We did not take this seriously, and neither did the press.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:43, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Explicit translation as opposed to simple glosses

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion

The MOS says use single quotation marks for simple glosses, e.g. "Cossack comes from Turkic qazaq 'freebooter'." But what about explicitly mentioning a translation, i.e. "The Turkic word qazaq means freebooter"? Is freebooter here being mentioned as a word, in which case it should be formatted in italics? But using quotation marks seems more common, and I sometimes see single quotation marks used, though this usage isn't really a simple gloss. The lang series of templates does this, e.g. {{langx|tr|qazaq|lit=freebooter}} gives "Turkish: qazaq, lit. 'freebooter'." Is it still a simple gloss if preceded by lit.? Or should double quotation marks be used? This would be correct if the sentence said: "The Turkic word qazaq is defined by the dictionary as "freebooter"." Is there a general rule that covers this though? --Paul_012 (talk) 11:31, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

@Paul 012: Yes, the general rule is MOS:SINGLE, which you are overthinking and trying to find a way around, for some reason. :-) No, 'freebooter' would not take italics here, since the single quotes are already serving as distinguishing markup (this time as a gloss or translation, rather than a stand-alone "words as a word" case). Otherwise, the examples in MoS would be of terms inside single quoted and also italicized, yet they are not. So, there was never any reason to suppose that italics would go here, as if MoS were still broken on this point after 20 years. Heh. Next, the {{lang-tr|...|lit=}} output is correct, and is consistent with the output of all similar templates. If they were wrong, this would have been noticed a long time ago. And, if the sentence said "The Turkic word qazaq is defined by [source name here] as 'freebooter'", then we would still use single quotes, because it still qualifies as a gloss or short definition. If it were a complicated and unique definition, then it should probably be directly quoted and given as a quotation rather than presented as if a gloss/translation (but we usually do not use dictionaries this way, anyhow, but summarize them as we would any other source material). A publisher has no copyright/plagiarism interest in a very short definition/gloss, especially one also appearing in other similar works, so we have no reason to treat it as a quotation. Aside: WP would never write "defined by the dictionary as" since there is no such thing as "the dictionary" from any kind of encyclopedic perspective, only particular dictionaries. Moving on, WP does not stylistically draw a distinction between a loose gloss, a simple definition, and a literal translation; they take single quotes, same as is typical in linguistics journals (when they are not doing something fancified like an interlinear gloss table). The distinction between them is quite blurry anyway; many concise definitions will precisely coincide with a gloss, and most translations of terms are glosses, except when they're being done morpheme-by-morpheme in the most technically literal way possible – which is not how WP does them except to illustrate specific linguistic points, e.g. about the grammar of a Turkic language. A simple example would be that Spanish perro will be glossed as 'dog', will be be defined in Spanish–English dictionaries as 'dog', and in a literal translation of a phrase containing it will be translated as 'dog'. If some dictionary somewhere has something complicated, such "dog, inclusive of any domesticated dog type such as a hound, but generally exclusive of a dingo or other non-domesticated canid", it's unlikely we'll have any reason to quote that verbatim.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:10, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
Thanks, SMcCandlish. I guess I am overthinking it. Maybe it's partly due to the current wording; "Simple glosses that translate or define unfamiliar terms take single quotes, with no comma before the definition" seemed rather specific, so it seemed unclear to me whether the above examples were actually simple glosses according to the guideline. That it's one of the less consistently followed aspects of the MOS didn't help either. Indeed, going through a few biology FAs, most of them actually seem to use double quotation marks for constructions like "Iguanodon (/ɪˈɡwɑːnədɒn/ i-GWAH-nə-don; meaning "iguana-tooth")". I wonder if these are trivial errors that should be corrected or a sign that this point of the MOS is not widely accepted. --Paul_012 (talk) 12:18, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
That's kind of ironic. :-) I crafted that wording to blur these kinds of distinctions on purpose (the first clause has "glosses", "translat[ions]" and "defin[itions]" in it, implying them being effectively equated for purposes of this MoS line-item). "Simple glosses" just means "as distinguished from interlinear glosses" (gloss tables), which WP doesn't use except when presenting complicated linguistic information. I think the original version just said "glosses" so people were sometimes putting single quotes around the English-language glosses inside interlinear tables, which isn't useful to do and which isn't how it's done in linguistics publications. "I wonder if these are trivial errors that should be corrected or a sign that this point of the MOS is not widely accepted": The former. Many of the foo meaning "bar" cases in articles pre-date the existence of MOS:SINGLE (or this part of it), and its important to remember that no one has to read MoS before editing here, nor does anyone memorize every single line-item in it. MoS primarily exists as a reference for WP:GNOME cleanup, and as a "rulebook" for dispute settlement, with goals of predictable and consistent output for the readers, and reduction in editorial strife over trivia. The average editor never reads a word of MoS unless led to it in the course of some dispute; most editors just write like they are used to writing, and other editors clean up after them later. That's how it's always been. There is no line-item in any guideline or policy that is universally followed, and if that were a requirement WP would simply have no rules at all. This particular line-item matters because quotation marks already serve other important purposes on Wikipedia, which can be contextually confused (the most obvious are actual literal quotations, and for words-as-words markup as an alternative to italics when italics are already used heavily in the same material for something else, such as non-English terms). This sort of potential confusion is why single quotes for glosses/definitions became a norm in linguistics writing to begin with (at least in works in which double-quotes are the normal style for direct quotations).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:37, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
PS: To clarify, if the interlinear gloss ends with a "free translation" (loose gloss) in English, that goes in single quotes, too. The word-by-word and morpheme-by-morpheme stuff doesn't (and would be much harder to read with that markup, as it is usually already laced with all kinds of special characters and grammatical-function abbreviations anyway).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:52, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Proposal to tweak MOS:CONFORM to avoid conflict with MOS:PMC and MOS:LQ

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Over time, MOS:CONFORM (on making conforming changes to quoted material) has drifted away from the intent of MOS:PMC (principle of minimal change) and the rationale behind MOS:LQ (use of logical quotation for precision/accuracy, especially to avoid confusing readers about whether the quotation is a sentence or a fragment).

What it says now:

When quoting a complete sentence, it is usually recommended to keep the first word capitalized. However, if the quoted passage has been integrated into the surrounding sentence (for example, with an introduction such as "X said that"), the original capital letter may be lower-cased.

  • LaVesque's report stated: "The equipment was selected for its low price. This is the primary reason for criticism of the program."
  • LaVesque's report said that "the equipment was selected for its low price".
  • The program was criticized primarily because "the equipment was selected for its low price", according to LaVesque.

It is not normally necessary to explicitly note changes in capitalization. However, for more precision, the altered letter may be put inside square brackets: "The" → "[t]he".

  • The program was criticized primarily because "[t]he equipment was selected for its low price", according to LaVesque.

What it should probably say:

When quoting a complete sentence, keep the first word capitalized, even if the quoted passage has been grammatically integrated into the surrounding sentence:

  • LaVesque's report stated: "The equipment was selected for its low price. This is the primary reason for criticism of the program."
  • LaVesque's report said that "The equipment was selected for its low price".
  • The program was criticized primarily because "The equipment was selected for its low price", according to LaVesque.

It is permissible to make a change of capitalization with square brackets:

  • The program was criticized primarily because "[t]he equipment was selected for its low price", according to LaVesque.

If only the opening fragment is quoted, and is not likely to be mistaken for a complete sentence, it is permissible but not required to simply lower-case the first character without annotation:

  • The report did not specify who authorized the program's purchases, stating only that "the equipment was selected" and that the choice was cost-based.

This would better reflect actual practice (and even a recent discussion of such matters on this very page), has more in common with text treatment by other publishers with high textual-accuracy standards (i.e., academic vs. news publishers), actually acknowledges more variance in practice in some ways, is a bit less pedantically worded, and is more consistent with the rest of the guidelines, which are heavily weighted toward precision. That is, LQ and PMC are the rule, to which CONFORM permits some exceptions, not at all the other way around. We don't need to be excessive about this stuff, of course, like mandating "[...]" instead of just "..." as some academic publishers do, but we should not be undermining two important guidelines with one that is clearly subordinate to them.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:05, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

MEDLEAD

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles#MEDLEAD about Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles#Lead (WP:MEDLEAD). Input from editors across Wikipedia would be most welcome. -- Colin°Talk 10:37, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

== Heading text == or ==Heading text==

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion

Should we use == Heading text ==, ==Heading text== or both. 2600:1700:6180:6290:299D:E8B3:B374:1B32 (talk)

Are you asking about the difference between having spaces and no spaces between the Example text signs and the heading text? —El Millo (talk) 23:01, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
Yes. 2600:1700:6180:6290:299D:E8B3:B374:1B32 (talk) 23:02, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
As far as I know, there's no difference whatsoever between the two. You can use whichever you prefer, as long as it's consistent within an article and you don't go around changing it from one to the other. —El Millo (talk) 23:10, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
Ok 2600:1700:6180:6290:299D:E8B3:B374:1B32 (talk) 23:38, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Gender identity

Latest comment: 3 years ago15 comments9 people in discussion

Duplicate discussion here closed. Main discussion is at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography#Implementing deadname RFCs. Dicklyon (talk) 06:46, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.


There is a duplicate discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography#Implementing deadname RFCs. One of these WP:TALKFORKs should be closed and soft-redirected to the other with {{Moved discussion to}}.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:11, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Not sure this section should be the biggest here....what talk was there about adding a mass amount of text here? Has this wording been vented? This seems overwhelming to say the least. Why is this not added to the main BIO page about this over all added here with no talk here?--Moxy 🍁 18:48, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

With transgender and non-binary gender people and similar cases, people should primarily be referred to with the gender (e.g. "man", "woman", "person"), pronouns (e.g. "him", "she", singular "they"), possessives (e.g. "his", "her", "theirs"), and gendered nouns (e.g. "chairman", "chairwoman", "chairperson"; but these are often disfavored - see MOS:GNL) they have most recently declared for themselves. People who have chosen names to match their gender identities should primarily be referred to by those names (most recent if changed more than once). Give precedence to recent reliable sources, even if a different name is more common in older sources.

Wikipedia sometimes mentions a name which the referent has asked not be used, known (sometimes pejoratively) as a deadname. These are minimized and mentioned but not used to avoid distracting readers who consider deadnaming offensive, and to avoid unnecessary harm to that person. Harm may range from mild distress to unemployment to death, potentially more serious if a name or pronoun reveals a previously private gender history. Wikipedia mentions these names when necessary to correctly inform readers about facts of public interest.

  • By default, use a person's chosen name and pronouns as the primary name (in main body text, infobox, tables, etc.) for events in the present, future, and past. Do not mention the name the subject used in the past, except as noted below and possibly in their biography as noted at MOS:DEADNAME.
  • If a person prefers the name and pronouns used at the time when discussing the past, make that name primary and use those pronouns. If they happily accept either, use as primary whichever form minimizes reader confusion, based on which name is better known or better matches context.
  • If a living person was not notable under a former name, the former name must not be included in any Wikipedia article (including direct quotations), even if it can be documented with reliable primary sources or a small number of obscure secondary sources. Treat that name with a strong privacy interest separate from the primary name. (See WP:BLPPRIVACY.) Self-disclosure can obviate the privacy interest e.g. if the name is mentioned in a recent autobiography, but WP:INDISCRIMINATE also applies.
  • If a living person's transgender status is not public, they must not be outed by Wikipedia; an even stronger privacy interest applies, as does WP:OR.
  • If a living person must be mentioned under a former name, e.g. as the author of a cited work, connecting that name to the current name (either with an annotation or by substituting a chosen name) would also be a violation of privacy unless the connection is already public and documented.
  • If a gendered name or pronouns are confusing or surprising to readers because of a perceived contradiction with other context, explain in a brief note in prose or footnote (depending on length of explanation, relevance, space available, readability, etc.) Examples:
  • Avoid unnecessarily creating perceived contradictions. For example, instead of (Jane Doe fathered a child) simply write (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If it is important enough to mention, Jane Doe's biography would already explain her transgender status, and this phrasing would be jarring to some readers without adding information. In other articles where that is not relevant, it would simply create the need for an off-topic explanation.
  • When describing names, never imply any name is not a "real" name. Use specific terms like birth name, legal name, credited name, chosen name but not preferred name which some people perceive as offensively implying that gender identity is simply a preference.
  • Avoid stating or implying that someone has changed gender or e.g. was previously a man when they report or it is presumed that they have always had the same gender identity. When discussing such changes, refer to gender presentation (as is done in the article gender transitioning). For example, say Jane was then known as John instead of Jane was then John because "known as" uncontroversially refers to a specific aspect of presentation rather than the essence of a personality.

A notable non-primary name (typically a "deadname") is sometimes mentioned when relevant to past circumstances:

  • When the non-primary name is part of a mentioned work, note the non-primary name in a brief parenthetical (or footnote if space is limited or the non-primary name is not well known). This may be necessary to find the work, verify the citation, or find mentions of a person in primary or secondary sources. Mentioning e.g. transgender status is not necessary to explain a simple name mismatch (it would be undue weight) unless it is relevant to the context. Examples:
  • Noting the non-primary name is only necessary at first prose reference, for prominent references (like an infobox or the first in a series of consecutive table rows), to prevent confusion, and to explain a perceived contradiction. For example, the actor starring in Juno (film) can be referred to as Elliot Page (credited as Ellen Page) on first reference and Page (following MOS:SURNAME) or Elliot Page later in the prose.

In direct quotations, when dealing with notable non-primary names (typically a "deadname") or mismatched gendered words:

  • It is strongly preferred to replace the quotation with a paraphrase or reduce the quoted material to avoid non-primary names or mismatched pronouns. This is very strongly preferred to avoid altering the quote in multiple places or avoid creating the type of perceived contradiction explained above (which would need explaining). Paraphrasing is generally preferred in encyclopedic writing in general (see MOS:QUOTE).
    Instead of: Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job."
    write: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required fine acting talent, and that Page had proved perfect for the job.
  • Paraphrasing or reduction is required if the alteration of a direct quote would result in outing; for example said "[he] was the clear winner" draws attention to the possibility that the original quote may have been "she was the clear winner" but said he was the "clear winner" does not.
  • In the rare cases where paraphrasing is not possible, quotes should be edited to use words compatible with the primary name and matching gender identity.
    • This must be done in a way that indicates to readers how the quoted text differs from the original, and must follow the principle of minimal change at MOS:PMC.
    • MOS:PMC does not consider using a different way to refer to the same person to be an impermissible change in meaning, and encourages this if it clarifies the referent. (For example, the same person might be referred to as "Richard Feynman", "Dick", "him", "her father", "the other guy", or "my honeybuns" with varying levels of clarity.)
    • Compatibility with the primary name and matching gender identity is important in quotes so that readers unambiguously know that the person referred to in the quote is the same person referred to in the rest of the article.
    • The non-primary name and misgendered words should be substituted out even if the non-primary name is documented in the article, because the primary name is expected to be the most visible name in and across article text and titles, because that is how the person will be referred to in present-day conversation, and for the other reasons mentioned in the intro to this section.
    • If possible, remove words without adding any new words to minimize changes and to avoid the perceived contradiction of using a name before the referent was known by that name. This often works when the last name has not changed. For example, "[Page] was outstanding" instead of "[Elliot] Page was outstanding". To avoid ambiguity over what is missing, it is preferred to use brackets around the last name instead of using an ellipsis to indicate a missing first name.
    • Substitute pronouns and derived possessives using brackets.
    • Consider using an ungendered alternative if that would avoid a perceived contradiction. For example, instead of "[his] depiction of a pregnant teenage girl was excellent" write "[Page's] depiction of a pregnant teenage girl was excellent".
  • In extremely rare cases where a quotation cannot be paraphrased and the name or pronouns cannot be altered (for example where there is a pun on the name or an intentional deadnaming is being exhibited) note the chosen name in nearby prose or footnote. It may be necessary to explain if the use of the name was intended to be offensive, or to represent a particular point of view, or that it was not considered offensive because that was the name the subject was known by at the time, or whatever the reason was for leaving it unaltered.
This is about Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography#Implementing deadname RFCs. I argued over there that this should be a section at that page. It's too long for main MOS. Crossroads -talk- 19:14, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Where does this text come from? Has it been vented by the community for here or anywhere? No text of this nature at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography TEXT WAS RESTORED AT SOURCE PAGE.--Moxy 🍁 19:18, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
This wasn't anywhere in the RFC. A few points, yes, but nowhere near this body.
I would suggest that there are a few strong RFC-agreed MOS points that can be made, but most everything else at this point yet to have consensus, but have good advice that would be appropriate for a supplemental guideline or essay related to this which doesn't need to have consensus but should be recognized as not being MOS-level required standards. --Masem (t) 19:25, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Are there actually any points made in the draft text that didn't reflect the two recent RfCs at WT:MOSBIO or their closes - or previous RfCs, in some cases? I get that we don't at the moment have any consensus as to where the resolution of these issues should reside in the MOS, but I didn't see anything in this draft that didn't emerge directly from consensus as articulated by the community at some length. Newimpartial (talk) 20:01, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Questions of whether the text reflects the RFCs should be at the discussion started on WT:MOSBIO. --Izno (talk) 22:09, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
That would be fine, if participants here are willing simply to accept the insertion here of the text agreed upon at WT:MOSBIO. Is that a plausible assumption? Newimpartial (talk) 22:39, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Er, that's not at all what I meant, though you're welcome to misinterpret, I guess. The 10 paragraph text needs discussion about whether it meets the RFC intents. Per WP:MULTI, that discussion started elsewhere, so don't fork it for no reason.
What is a reasonable question here or there is where it should live. I don't think that 10 paragraph version has any business living here. If a shorter version should show up, or a SUMMARY version show up, it should probably be a talk page discussion here. But that's not what you and Masem are discussing, and why I made the note. --Izno (talk) 00:41, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
So in your view, Izno, we should have a discussion at WT:MOSBIO to finalize implementation text and then another discussion here about how much of it should be in the main MOS? You don't think that where the text is going should influence what text is actually drafted? I'm still getting a NIMBY vibe here, as I mentioned in the MOSBIO discussion. The fact is that Masem's comment has not really been supported in either venue, and they are the only one that has questioned whether the draft text matches the RfC closes. As far as I can tell, Moxy had not read the RfC closes or the MOSBIO discussion at the time this section was created, so perhaps we could have a more focused discussion here about how much of the guidance belongs here, versus MOSBIO or a freestanding page, and stay away from max NIMBY. Newimpartial (talk) 00:51, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
You don't think that where the text is going should influence what text is actually drafted? I don't. If there's a reasonable consensus-based belief that the 10 para version, without unnecessary omission nor addition, accurately reflects the close of the RFC (and no, 2 editors who think that is not a consensus either), then that's a good start, but it has no bearing on what lives where. As it is, at least two editors here have objected to that version living here; I have objected specifically on point of its length on this page. I don't much care where the discussion about where it lives occurs, so long as appropriate notification is given; at this point, I'd say that this thread is sufficient notification that there is a discussion about implementing the RFCs.
Lastly, a minor issue: only a day or two was given for feedback on the version in question. We can and should give it more time to bake if we need to. --Izno (talk) 01:05, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
I'm happy to have this live on the Biography subpage; we were thinking it would be good to have a "Gender identity" section there. I put it here at least temporarily because the guidance on this page is now somewhat incorrect given the recent RFCs. I was expecting folks to move it to a better place if they had strong feelings about it, but not to just bounce it back out after it's been discussed for two and a half months. Placement on the subpage will require some readjustment of pointers. I will make an attempt. -- Beland (talk) 03:18, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
We should not have duplicate discussions about these matters open at the same time.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:13, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Foireign-language alternative names in the first sentence

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

As per MOS:NICKCRUFT, "foreign language details can make the lead sentence difficult to understand" and should be "avoided". However, on Talk:Michael_the_Brave#Hungarian_name? it is suggested that the policy is not violated when such foreign names are presented. There are even articles, like Matthias Corvinus, with 5 foreign-language names. Which are the recommendations is such cases? 77wonders (talk) 15:11, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Language order

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

If there is a geographic object which is split between two countries with identifiable language/translation each, which language/translation should be given first and is there a policy/guideline/RfC/etc to determine this? — CuriousGolden (T·C) 15:47, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

I’ll add to the question, also based on what the translation order should be determined? --ZaniGiovanni (talk) 17:13, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names)#General_guidelines says to put them in alphabetical order, which makes sense; it's a common "neutral" way of ordering things. -sche (talk) 07:46, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
Thanks for the response!--ZaniGiovanni (talk) 11:08, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Use of em dash in latin abbreviations such as —e.g., and —i.e.,

Latest comment: 3 years ago7 comments5 people in discussion

There is an absence of guidance on how to format exempli gratia (e.g.) and id est (i.e.).

In my internet research on typography and style guides, the most formal presentation when immediately following a sentence is with the use of an em dash and comma like this: —e.g.,

Ironically, the strongest source of information I could find on the use of various types of dashes is Wikipedia itself. But this article doesn't yet cover the use case of —e.g.,

As of March 2021 the Wikipedia editor's text field erroneously renders the em dash as an en dash. In other words, if you are authoring an article in the text editor, you go to Advanced > Special characters > Symbols and click on the em dash button (or you can press the keyboard shortcut for an em dash), then an en dash is erroneously displayed in the text field. However, if you publish your changes, the resulting HTML page correctly renders the em dash with the correct unicode character. This is a call to action that there is a bug that needs to be fixed in the editor but I don't know where to report it. Also, I'm not yet sure if its a browser bug or wikipedia/MediaWiki bug.

Note, this is not an invitation to debate if i.e. and e.g. should be discouraged or avoided. That ground has been covered in archived discussions here. Likewise, the use of commas ( here, here, here, and here), full stops, italics, and even brackets have been debated. There are a lot of external links here.

The MoS itself is not internally consistent with the typography of e.g.. It varies from using hyphens before e.g. and commas following it. It even has an instance of a colon following e.g.

Two proposed actions:
1) fix the editor bug
2) create a bot that judiciously changes wikipedia to use an em dash before e.g. but only in cases where it starts a new clause but not in cases where it does not create a new clause such as where it may appear following an opening parenthesis or the beginning of a table cell, etc.

Chris Murphy (talk) 10:17, 15 March 2021 (UTC)

  • en dash is erroneously displayed in the text field – There is no bug. It's a longstanding problem that hypen, minus, ndash, and mdash (respectively: - • − • – • —) are hard to distinguish as they are rendered in the edit window some edit windows. That doesn't mean they're the wrong charater.
  • The MoS itself is not internally consistent – MOS is an ecumenical zone where various WP:ENGVARs and other style choices coexist side by side in peace and harmony. I quote from User:EEng#A_rolling_stone_gathers_no_MOS:
    In the last 48 hr I've become aware of a simmering dispute over whether the text of MOS itself should be in American or British English. With any luck the participants will put that debate (let's call it Debate D1) on hold in order to begin Debate D2: consideration of the variety of English in which D1 should be conducted. Then, if there really is a God in Heaven, D1 and D2 will be the kernel around which will form an infinite regress of metadebates D3, D4, and so on -- a superdense accretion of pure abstraction eventually collapsing on itself to form a black hole of impenetrable disputation, wholly aloof from the mundane cares of practical application and from which no light, logic or reason can emerge.
    That some editors will find themselves inexorably and irreversibly drawn into this abyss, mesmerized on their unending trip to nowhere by a kaleidoscope of linguistic scintillation reminiscent of the closing shots of 2001, is of course to be regretted. But they will know in their hearts that their sacrifice is for the greater good of Wikipedia. That won't be true, of course, but it would be cruel to disabuse them of that comforting fiction as we bid them farewell and send them on their way.
  • create a bot that [etc etc etc] – You say This is not an invitation to debate but – trust me – that's an invitation to debate. Anyway, I don't know who's going to develop this bot that knows what a clause is and so on.
EEng 22:21, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
  • are hard to distinguish as they are rendered — Thank you, your user experience helps to isolate where the bug may reside. For you, the en and em characters are merely hard to distinguish in the text editor, but for me, they are pixel for pixel identical. Therefore, you must be on a different platform or browser from me and that then suggests that this is possibly a browser bug, not a bug in MediaWiki. What OS and browser are you using?
  • I don't know who's going to develop this bot that knows what a clause is — The bot can skip areas where the em dash is not appropriate. As I said, the beginning of table cells, after opening parenthesis, etc. The bot doesn't need to know what a clause is to accomplish this logic. I would be willing to work on it eventually, if granted the authority to do so.

Your concern about British English is slightly germane to the e.g. debate, but localization is not an important aspect of the issues I raised. If it's important, maybe someday there can be a read-only ben.wikpedia.org with reasonable BE translation. Chris Murphy (talk) 11:03, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

I use Windows 10 + Chrome, and you can avoid whatever problem you're having by using templates like {mdash} instead of literal characters. The quote about British vs. American English was simply to dramatize that MOS is consciously inconsistent in the styles and formats used in its own presentation. It's a waste of time to keep talking about a bot until you get agreement that everything should be conformed to the one style you describe, and that's never going to happen. EEng 16:17, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
This is not a bug. Your operating system and/or browser simply does not have/is not loading a font which differentiates the horizontal straight line (to your liking). You can add personal CSS which selects some saner font for the window in question. Izno (talk) 01:42, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
@Chris Murphy: For the US, I can give two guidelines. The Chicago Manual of Style recommends commas before and after, except in contexts where a semicolon, dash or parenthesis is appropriate (see here and here). The Associated Press Stylebook only states they are "always followed by a comma."
I can't speak for British usage or other style guides, but it seems like there is no hard and fast "rule" about what comes before. Personally I don't think it's worth articulating one in the Manual of Style. Fredlesaltique (talk) 03:12, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
This is basically not an MoS issue:
  1. If there's an actual bug with one of the available editing interfaces, that should be reported via WP:PHAB; MoS regulars and other WP editors, who are not also among MediaWiki's developers, have no way to fix such a problem.
  2. I rather suspect this is actually a browser problem of what font is being used in the editing window. Make sure you have downloaded a monospace "programmer font" that takes pains to distinguish between all similar characters, and tell your browser to use that for monospace, and maybe even force the matter in your user CSS on this site; see Help:User style#User CSS for a monospaced coding font. A dead giveaway that this is the issue is you are seeing "the wrong character" in editing mode but not when you save. I don't think it's actually possible for what you think is happening to actually be happening (the software certainly would not have been coded to sneakily change – input into — output to mess with you then change it back to – upon saving.
  3. Aside from that stuff, the underlying "—e.g." question ... just kind of "isn't a thing". What there are, are various ways to set off a parenthetical, all of which are valid: "Blah blah, e.g. yak yak, snort snort." "Blah blah – e.g. yak yak – snort snort." "Blah blah—e.g. yak yak—snort snort." "Blah blah (e.g. yak yak) snort snort." All of these are also valid at the end of a sentence instead of mid-sentence. It simply isn't the case that one of these is "correct" and the others are "wrong". Your "—e.g." thing is just a preference of whatever writer(s) you've been reading lately. It's perfectly valid, but WP would never require that version, since doing so would directly conflict with other parts of MoS, e.g. MOS:DASH. And in fact you should not (per MOS:DASH) use that version if the article already has an established style of using spaced en dashes instead of unspaced em dashes, for the parenthetical dash function. Aside: As for "e.g. yak yak" versus "e.g., yak yak", that's another editorial-discretion matter. Some editors always use the comma, some never do, and most of us do so when it seems to aid clarity, e.g. when what follows "e.g." is long and complex. It's even possible to do "e.g.: ..." when introducing a list of stuff.) Remember that English has no formal rule-making body that dictates its stylistic particulars.
PS: Please use <br /> not <br>; while both will parse in HTML 5, the latter breaks the editing-mode syntax highlighter (at least the one available under the Preferences menu).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:00, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

CfD regarding MOS:SUFFIXDASH

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
 

Category:21st century-related lists has been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. 𝟙𝟤𝟯𝟺𝐪𝑤𝒆𝓇𝟷𝟮𝟥𝟜𝓺𝔴𝕖𝖗𝟰 (𝗍𝗮𝘭𝙠) 11:11, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Is there a rule somewhere on whether to use "actor" for all thespians, or just male ones?

Latest comment: 3 years ago49 comments22 people in discussion
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
  Moved to Talk:Isa Briones § RfC Lead sentence
There is already an open RfC on this question, so I'm soft-redirecting this discussion there per WP:TALKFORK / WP:MULTI. (non-admin closure)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:58, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

In other words, is the term "actress" deprecated, or not, or is there nothing in the MoS about that? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Herostratus (talk • contribs) 22:53, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

There once was a male lesbian Thespian from Nantucket
Whose gender was no drop in the bucket
But rather than quibble
With lesser minds that spew dribble
He is now simply known as Pat.

😊 Atsme 💬 📧 12:36, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
Hey, that's pretty good, considering the material you have to work with. EEng 18:51, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

There was a Young Person of Thespiae,
Whose toilette was so grim to espy;
She dressed in a some jeans,
Spickle-speckled with greens,
That ombliferous person of Thespiae.

(with apologies to Edward Lear). Martinevans123 (talk) 19:02, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
I'm not sure an apology is enough. EEng 20:19, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
I've tended to use what the article subject prefers. Indeed, this discussion began on the talk page of an article (see above) the subject of which is described as both in numerous RSes, is called "actor" by her employer and at least one co-star, and refers to herself "as a theatre actor". With that said, I just found another interview where she says "as a young actress", so her preferred title has now been rendered a bit more ambiguous. 🤦🏻‍♂️ —ATS (talk) 20:25, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
Hmph, I don't much care about self-descriptions, as long there aren't WP:BLP implications. It's one data point of many. That's why we don't call Grey Owl an Indian, Anna Anderson the Grand Duchess Anastasia, and so on. And if we really did that, we'd have a lot of articles about honest self-made billionaires, politicians who live only to serve the public, and so forth.
But whatever, it's fine. But in that case, I no longer wish to be referred to as "Herostratus" or "the editor Herostratus", but by my preferred self-description: "that beloved editor of near-preternatural wisdom, Herostratus", thank you very much. Herostratus (talk) 15:34, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
Maybe you'd like to be called tree [30] EEng 01:01, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Dang. But who is this "you" of whom you speak. First of all, my preferred pronoun is "thee" (I've no use for the kids and their "you" and "y'all" and "youse" or whatever is hip this century), and I only respond to "thee, beloved editor of near-preternatural wisdom". I will, on consideration, and to be fair, also permit "That ****ing vandal Herostratus". Herostratus (talk) 02:11, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

It is just an act
Kimono open to all
Gender still unknown

-- RoySmith (talk) 03:21, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
I'm not sure those two usages are contradictory. Describing herself as a theatre actor places her within the larger group of all who act in theatre, regardless of their sex or gender. Speaking of when she was a "young actress", she may cover situations that are rare or nonexistent in relation to male actors, so her being female would be relevant to the story.--Khajidha (talk) 12:34, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Well said. —ATS (talk) 21:16, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
"... situations that are rare or nonexistent"? Whatever do you mean? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:10, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
Garner discusses this topic.[1] Short version: Although we still have Oscars for Best Actress, etc., actress "is on the wane" in favor of actor. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 05:31, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Bryan A. Garner, Garner's Modern English Usage, 4th ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 823.
Meanwhile, a longtime admin has pointed me to MOS:GNL and WP:WAW. 🖖🏻 —ATS (talk) 21:15, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
It is entirely consistent with WP:GNL to use only "actor". Tony (talk) 22:52, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
The trend seems to be to actor for all, but as long as large award shows with all the RS they generate continue with actress, it seems unlikely Wikipedia will mandate the actor only form, and the discussion will be had over and over again. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:06, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Executive summary of this post: 1) "Actor" for both genders is kind of retrograde and anti-feminist, really; 2) gender is (unlike most professions) important when discussing thespians; 3) we mostly use "actress" here; 4) "actress" seems to be used more, at least in top google results. Here's the details:

So... in the language, we have (altho it's on the way out) "man" meaning human, and then "man" (the subset of humans that are male) and "woman" (the subset of humans that are female). The two meanings of "man" engenders confusion and can be insulting to women. It the past, we used the generic "he" for generic humans (when a particular person isn't involved). "The clown blows up the balloons and then he pops them". That "he" can be taken to mean "male", so that's not good. So instead we use "they" a lot more (other words like "xe" have been used, but "they" has caught on). And this is all to the good.

For thespians, we are doing the opposite, here. "Pat Carroll took the stage, and damn if that actor didn't make a great speech" can be taken as "Pat Carroll took the stage, and damn if he didn't make a great speech". We are introducing confusion, and also disregarding (and thus basically deprecating) Pat Carrol's femaleness (if they are female -- and we don't know, do we.)

We don't have an acceptable generic word where person-who-acts is the superclass, and "actor" and "actress" are the subclasses, as we do with "they" for humans generally. "Thespian" is obscure and "actron" hasn't caught on.

The other thing is, even if we did, gender is really important for thespians. It just is. It's not important for pilots or doctors or welders. It is for actrons. If you replace a male pilot with a female pilot, it doesn't matter. If you replace one of the male leads it Brokeback Mountain with a female, it matters. It's a different movie. When giving a person's profession to the reader, we don't need "aviatrix" but we do need "actress", because that matters in helping the reader get a sense of where the person fits in the theater and film world. We're here to serve the reader.

As to what's generally used, it appears to be "actress" here in Wikipedia (by random sample), and we are encouraged to follow regular practice for most things. As for the world in general, I googled Cate Blanchett (chosen at random) and without fear or favor came up with this result, in order of rank:

  • IMdb: actress
  • Wikipedia: actor
  • Rotten Tomatoes: actress
  • Britannica: actress
  • Instagram: doesn't say
  • A fansite (cate-blanchette.com): doesn't say, that I could find
  • Roger Ebert's website: doesn't say, that I could find
  • Fandango: actress
  • People Magazine: doesn't say
  • (next three are YouTube, I skipped)
  • Variety: doesn't say
  • Lord of the Rings fansite: actress
  • Daily Mail, quoting George Clooney: actress.
  • popsugar.com: doesn't say, that I could find
  • Golden Globes: doesn't appear to say, except when describing "Best Actress" awards where of course they have to use "Actress".

That's the first two pages and I stopped. If you count Wikipedia (not sure you should) that's 6-1 for "actress". That doesn't seem consisted with a claim that "actor" is generally used for females and males. It may be a trend with the hip crowd, but we're supposed to lag not lead trends. Herostratus (talk) 03:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

This is now at least the second time this editor, with all respect, has posted a massive wall of false equivalence and complete irrelevance in an attempt to hide the fact that, in his mind, 'actor' must mean 'male'. (I say 'his' because only the male mind could justify the twisted logic that a gender-neutral term is somehow more insulting to women than a diminutive.) —ATS (talk) 05:59, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

No, no such "rule" exists.  Spy-cicle💥  Talk? 04:36, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

I know, right? 🤦🏻‍♂️ —ATS (talk) 06:52, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
  • No rule exists, nor is there a need for one. Blueboar (talk) 10:24, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
  • No, no rule and "actress" is certainly not deprecated. It is usual practice to refer to female actors as actresses unless there is strong proof that they prefer to be called an actor or they are usually referred to as an actor. In English, "actress" is still the common term. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:37, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

I see that MOS:GNL says, "Use gender-neutral language, and the table headed Examples of gender indication in occupational titles in the Gender indication section of that wikilinked article may be relevant. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 14:35, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

No, "actor" can mean male. It's confusing, and the reader has to figure it out. If the meaning is "male" it misleads the reader on an important point, and switches the actress's gender. If it means "thespian" it removes important information from the reader's purview. It's an exception to using gender-neutral language because of the peculiarities of that particular profession.
"[T]his editor, with all respect, has posted a massive wall of false equivalence and complete irrelevance" is an insult not argument (and is false). It's not helpful, and no, I'm not going not build arguments point by point just because there are a lot of good ones. I provided an Executive Summary after all. You can read that and take my word for it, or if you don't want to but lack the time, interest, or attention span to vet it you're excused from the discussion I guess. Herostratus (talk) 16:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
I found your survey of sources quite instructive. But that's just Cate Blanchett, isn't it? Martinevans123 (talk) 16:49, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
Yes, I picked her at random. Herostratus (talk) 17:01, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
Not confusing in the slightest.
  • Literally every pronoun in the lede and in the rest of the article is "she". I am confused by your insistence there is confusion. She is an actor.
  • We are at Wikipedia, not an awards show. In the face of GNL and WAW in particular, invoking the unrelated is indeed completely irrelevant.
—ATS (talk) 18:36, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
No, I don't think it's excellent to require the reader to drill down into the second or third sentences of an article and read the pronouns to figure out the gender of Gene Tierney or Cary Grant, which is important. We don't do that with other professions. We have "Peter Beauvais was a German television film director..." His gender's not important but his country and job is. That's why we don't have "Peter Beauvais was a German person. He directed many television films including..." See the difference? What the point of making the reader play guessing games regarding key core aspects of the subject? Herostratus (talk) 17:01, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
This discussion started with the article for Isa Briones, actor and singer. A veteran of musical theatre, Briones rose to prominence for her—a 12-word gap. 'Her' is in the article 26 times (twice in the lede); 'she', 28 times (four in the lede); 'he' once (clearly referring to her father [a second to Alex Kurtzman in a citation]); 'his' twice (clearly referring to a reviewer and to Data); 'him' does not appear. No reader reasonably versed in the English language could find any confusion with Ms. Briones' gender identity. —ATS (talk) 17:30, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
Come to think of it, upon re-read I could rephrase that to shorten the gap. Edit there to follow. —ATS (talk) 17:38, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
AFAICT actress is not deprecated, indeed the MOS tacitly accepts that it may be used, by providing "Courtney Michelle Love [...] is an American singer, songwriter, actress ..." as an example of acceptable writing. Gender-neutral use of actor is clearly also allowed; Wikipedia uses it in category names, "Actors" as the top-level category with subcategories for "Male actors" and for "Actresses" (e.g. Category:21st-century American actors; nonbinary actors remain in the top category, alongside people whose entries haven't been subcategorized yet). If an article is stably using one or the other, it's probably best not make changes just to change the word. -sche (talk) 19:14, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
Yeah, I guess. It may well be true that this is one of those things where it doesn't matter if we're consistent between articles. But I'm not 100% sure of that. Maybe "female actor" would be a good compromise that people could agree on? Herostratus (talk) 17:01, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
No. How about not having to flag every non-straight-white-protestant-male as a non-straight-white-protestant-male for the benefit of those straight-white-protestant-male readers and editors who think that everyone else must be a straight-white-protestant-male unless explicitly told they are non-straight-white-protestant-male. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:11, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
Um it's not a contest to see who's more woke? It's an encyclopedia not the student union. I do kind of get a vibe that some people think it is somehow based to use the male term for everyone. It's not. Your subsuming women actrons under the male term, it's kind of appallingly reactionary if you think it through. But that's not a major consideration here. Herostratus (talk) 05:26, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

I see acter would seem gender neutral. If acting exists, why not acter‽ Kautr (talk) 20:50, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

"Actron" already exists, but it remains non-standard. If we were going to use uncommon words "thespian" would be best. But we're not. "Acting person" at least doesn't pretend that only men exist or matter on the stage and screen, but... I'm more and more thinking that, since we obviously want tell the reader the subject's gender right off, that "female actor" would be a way forward. "Actor who primarily plays female roles" would sort of get the point across, but it's kind of convoluted and maybe confusing. Herostratus (talk) 05:26, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
  • I asked someone who is a professional in movie and television production in New York City. They said that the crew says "actor" to everyone regardless of gender. They said that the term "actress" gets used in award ceremonies because awards were going to males, and the industry wanted a path to recognize females by making awards for actresses. Also, for on-location movie sets, the portable restrooms are labeled Lucy and Desi from I love Lucy rather than having conventional gender labels. To me the field seems to have a complicated relationship with gender where sometimes people are careful to use labels and sometimes people want to avoid them. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:21, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • We don't need a rule about this. The real world is fine using actor generically (which should be our default, as it generally is off-site), and yet using actress in circumstances where the distinction seems to be matter (e.g. in the context of gender-divided awards, etc.), so we also have no reason to ban actress. But we have no reason to use it outside of such contexts where the distinction is contextually important. If people really, really want a rule about it, I suggest putting it in either MOS:TV or MOS:FILM and cross-referencing the other to it, and cross-referencing from MOS:BIO and MOS:GNL: {{Crossref|For "actress" versus "actor", see ...}}. This doesn't rise to the importance level of needing to be specified in the main MoS page, or even living in MOS:BIO (where the section on job titles is already overly long).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:05, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

INFOBOXFLAG

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

A discussion (not a formal RfC, yet) regarding the "military conflicts" exception of the above is under way at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Military_history#Coats_of_arms_in_infoboxes. Input of further editors would be welcome. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:25, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

  You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) § RfC: Modification of Agatheira for syntactic compliance with linguistic precision guidelines. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 01:03, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[April Fools!]

It makes one's breast swell with pride to read that One of the most comprehensive sections of the Mos, the section on dashes, stretches to more than 14,000 characters and covers a variety of dash-related concerns. EEng 02:28, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
And perhaps "it has been present at least since last April" was part of the joke? It's actually been about 10 years since the section was created in nearly its current very-long form, settling lots of arguments (and maybe provoking a few more). Dicklyon (talk) 01:19, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Here's something truly sad: there have been so many knock-down-drag-out hyphen-dash (or hyphen–dash) controversies over the years that I actually failed to recognize an RfC on whether
    the reign of Eumenes II (188-158 BC)
should be changed to
the reign of Eumenes II (188–158 BC)
as an April 1 joke. Well played, Sdkb – well played indeed. EEng 16:10, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Stability RFC

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

See Wikipedia talk:Stable version to revert to#RFC for a RFC involving RETAIN. Crouch, Swale (talk) 18:11, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

"Early" hyphenation question

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments4 people in discussion

Do we write "the early 20th-century upper class" or "the early-20th-century upper class"? Wolfdog (talk) 15:43, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

  • The Chicago Manual of Style recommends late nineteenth-century literature, stating that it is "clear without a second hyphen" as an adjective modifying a compound, but a mid-eighteenth-century poet because CMS classifies mid- as a prefix. (CMS 16th ed., §§ 7.83, 7.85) Following this recommendation, it would be "the early 20th-century upper class". Doremo (talk) 16:33, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
    Well, it depends on the larger context:
    The early 20th-century upper class considered sexuality propriety paramount. but
    He subscribed to the early 20th-century upper-class attitude that sexual propriety should be paramount.
    EEng 17:24, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
    • Right. I meant "upper class" as a noun. Wolfdog (talk) 23:14, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
      • This seems reasonable to me on first approach. However, the more fully compounded style ("early-20th-century") is clearly well-attested, and we have no reason to legislate against it. MoS should not impose a rule that serves no practical purpose. There are probably 10,000 things would could have a new rule about (given the size of the major off-site style guides), but we keep MoS constrained to only those things that matter for reader comprehension and an encyclopedic tone, or which we need to have a rule about to stop constant infighting.

        Anyway, I think usage on this exact question is going to vary even by individual, depending on context. For example, I would be more likely to use "early-20th-century" when it proceeded another modifier. Ex.: "early-20th-century nationalistic movements", because it is in fact clearer for the reader, that "early" is modifying "20th[-]century" not the entire string about the movements. And they were not in fact early nationalistic movements, but direct outgrowths of late 19th-century proto-fascism. But that last clause makes me notice for sure something that I suspected: I'm disinclined to do it if what follows the construction also contains a hyphen, because lots and lots and lots of hyphens become more of a problem than a help. I would feel compelled to add it anyway in a case like "late-19th-century proto-fascist sentiment" (modifier modifier noun), again because it was not late proto-fascist sentiment but early (even taking into account that proto- implies early – the proto-fascist period lasted well into the 20th century). Nor do me mean "among the proto-fascism examples toward the end of the 19th century, select only last few of them". We just mean "proto-fascism examples toward the end of the 19th century", the end. In messy cases like that, however, I would strongly consider just rewriting, e.g. "proto-fascist sentiment of the late 19th century" which has only one hyphen (required because proto- is a prefix not a word).

        In short, I would oppose making a rule requiring or even recommending "early 20th-century", since it should be left to editorial discretion, and MoS is already overlong with examples, so we don't need to add a new block of "sometimes do this, sometimes do that" stuff, especially given that there are no recurrent knock-down, drag-out fights about this stuff. If someone does what to fight with you about it, just rewrite to avoid (it's the first rule of MoS!), as I did in an example here.
         — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:47, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Italics in captions question

Latest comment: 3 years ago10 comments7 people in discussion

I have question about how MOS handles italics in captions on mainspace articles. Should words or phrases be in italics when in brackets when it is something like "(pictured)" or "(left)" in captions, etc? I have seem this kind of implementation around at WP:TFA Examples or WP:DYK Examples or in some mainspace GAs (e.g. D'oh-in' in the Wind, 200 (South Park)) but it seems to be inconsistent. Kind regards  Spy-cicle💥  Talk? 15:10, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

I know this will sound incredible, but MOS is silent on this; there have been discussions but no resolution (unless it happened the month I was comatose). Thus you and your fellow editors are free to write (r) or (r) or (right) or (right) (though I suspect fewer will mind if you use italics than will object if you don't). If you want to open at discussion aimed at standardizing this sort of stuff, do it at WT:Manual of Style/Captions. But I don't recommend it. Really I don't. EEng 01:21, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
Your warning not to discuss it is a bit (sinister). pburka (talk) 02:27, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
Get involved in enough generally unnecessary MoS arguments, and you'll understand the warning. It's WP:DRAMA we don't need. People can be amazingly emotive and petty about their WP:BIKESHED nit-picks.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:28, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
Thanks for the response, I'll keep that in mind. It is tempting to want to start an RfC on such a matter but your warning is convincing.  Spy-cicle💥  Talk? 08:46, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
While not entirely relevant to the question of italicization, I'm not sure that (r) and (r) would be compliant with MOS:ABBR. 207.161.86.162 (talk) 07:23, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
Good point. EEng 17:47, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
I would say our rules on text formatting tend toward conservative. That is, use less, not more. --Izno (talk) 03:38, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
Right. It's usually "don't use it unless there's a reason to use it", that is, not purely on stylistic grounds. —El Millo (talk) 03:49, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
People do this because WP style is to italicize self-references, including "talking at the reader" (e.g. all our hatnotes, all of our inline cleanup/dispute templates, etc.). We don't do it for large blocks of stuff like menus, navigational templates, and the whole "See also" section. But we do it a whole lot in mid-article, where the instructional commentary is being distinguished from the content per se. This is really a grey area, yet another of those cases of "conflicting consistencies" that cannot really be resolved to everyone's perfect satisfaction. E.g., we have dispensed with the obnoxious italicization habit of various bibliographic styles that italicize all cross-referential interpolations ("See Johnson 1938 p. 3", etc.), which tends to come off as inappropriate emphasis and really serves no practical purpose (I always hear it in my mind as some browbeating schoolmarm trying to force homework on me!). But bibliographic citations are metadata, not part of the article content proper. One can kinda-sorta make that argument about image captions, but it's pretty weak, and we generally treat the contents of them as part of the article content (e.g. subject to MoS rules that citations can sometimes skirt, either by being subject to a more specific cite-specific rule, or by the article using an established citation style that diverges from MoS's expectations).

In the end, given that people are apt to keep italicizing these things, and there's not a burning need to legislate against this, nor to require it, we should probably have a template for them ({{caption note}}, shortcut {{capnote}}, using the {{inline hatnote}} meta-template) that marks them up with CSS classes like hatnotes and other claptrap get, so they are distinguishable from the real content, including by WP:REUSE tools, by user CSS, and so on. They are basically inline hatnotes, of a sort similar to {{cross reference}} and its shortcuts: {{crossref|printworthy=y|see [[#Brobingnagese language|below]]}}, or {{xref|For additional details, see [[Lilliputese dialects]].}}
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:28, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Use of "Gameography" vs "Ludography" in headings for biographies

Latest comment: 3 years ago13 comments11 people in discussion

Gameography and ludography are both words regarding the works of a game designer, or people who have otherwise worked on games (a lá discography or bibliography). On biographical articles on Wikipedia, there seems to be no consesus as for which to use, for instance, Derek Yu and Hideo Kojima use gameography, while Edmund McMillen and Peter Molyneux use ludography. See also Shigeru Miyamoto ludography, which was recently moved from Shigeru Miyamoto gameography. Results from Google search of Wikipedia:

109 results for ludography
183 results for gameography

This topic stems from a disagreement between Heffner000 and I on Cr1TiKaL (see User talk:Heffner000#Rationale behind use of "Gameography" instead of "Ludography"), and I think a third opinion would be appreciated. I believe there needs to be some consistency between articles; MOS:HEAD states the following: "Section headings should follow all the guidance for article titles". MOS:AT states the following: "A title should be a recognizable name or description of the topic that is [...] consistent with those of related articles". Ergo, headings should be consistent between articles.

To resolve this issue, I propose the usage of one term over the other. Therefore I suggest ludography over gameography for several reasons:

  1. It enjoys wider usage outside of Wikipedia, especially within academic literature[1][2][3][4][5]
  2. Greater consistency with other Graeco-Roman derived terms used on Wikipedia (discography, bibliography, ludology, ludomusicology)
  3. Subjective: The use of a native English term with a Greek morpheme in gameography just sounds like an odd neologism rather than terminology used in an encyclopaedia

References

  1. ^ 938 results for ludography on Google Scholar
  2. ^ 290 results for gameography on Google Scholar
  3. ^ doi:10.14361/9783839445976-016
  4. ^ doi:10.5040/9781501316647.0008
  5. ^ doi:10.2307/j.ctv65swb6

What are your thoughts? Kind regards, Orcaguy (talk) 18:32, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

I have pinged the video games wikiproject on this thread, as I know we don't really have a project-level set guidance either so this may be useful. --Masem (t) 18:37, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
I don't have a preference if Ludography is more preferential and more widely used. So long as it's not WP:JARGON and widely accepted term, then we can use it. In my humble opinion, I don't think it's necessary to use either the term "Gameography" or "Ludography". A lot of times I see just a table that is listed as "Works". But I'll go with whatever the consensus goes by.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 20:37, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Filmography is recognizable for the average reader, the word "film" is common. Bibliography is itself a fairly common term. Discography is very common too, and includes the word "disc" which is common as a music-related term. But the issue I have with "ludography" is that is it not recognizable to the average reader at all, "ludo" not being a common word/prefix in English whatsoever, whereas "gameography" is immediately readable by everyone ("oh it's like a discography but for games"). I don't buy the linguistic etymology argument, game is an English word like film and they both have Proto-Indo-European roots if you go back far enough. We also have some articles use musicography instead of discography, both are appropriate terms in that case, and there's no big debate there. In the end both ludography & gameography are pretty recent neologisms and perhaps we should think of more universal alternatives like "Works" or similar. Ben · Salvidrim! ✉ 20:52, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
    • Filmography is recognizable for the average reader, the word "film" is common
There is no word for filmography aside from filmography that sees common use. Filmography also feels strange to me, but there's nothing that can be done there (aside from coining a neologism for Wikipedia, which seems a bit daft). Of course, how a word sounds to my ears should have little to no bearing on whether or not it's included on Wikipedia.
more universal alternatives like "Works" or similar.
For biographies of people who have made more than just video games, this approach does not seem very feasible. See e.g. Haden Blackman, PewDiePie or Jordan Mechner. I don't think Wikipedia should necessarily be adverse to words readers won't understand, though I do understand your point.
We also have some articles use musicography instead of discography, both are appropriate terms in that case, and there's no big debate there.
"musicography" has 58 results on Wikipedia.
"discography" has 314 000 results on Wikipedia.
"musicography" and "discography" are not synonymous according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary (though, if they saw widespread use as synonymous, then I might see your point). The reason there's no debate is because no one uses the word musicography, while the usage of "gameography" or "ludography" is fairly evenly split. If one of the words saw near-zero usage, then this wouldn't be a debate either.
I don't buy the linguistic etymology argument
Of course, the words used on Wikipedia don't necessarily have to be 100% etymologically sound, as is already concluded with the usage of filmography, though I would prefer it. I should probably explain my usage of "odd neologism": something akin to nonce words like "kookology" (the study of kooks) or other newly coined words like "fatphobia" (fear and dislike of fat people). As stated earlier, how certain words sound shouldn't really have any bearing on its usage, as it's mostly subjective whether a neologism sounds encyclopedic or not.
As an aside, -graphy links to ludography, currently a redirect to Lists of video games, which seems a bit silly. It may need to be expanded into an article, as every other -graphy word has its own article (if it's notable enough, of course). Orcaguy (talk) 21:46, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Prefer general simple term Wikipedia has a goal of easy reference and simpler more common language is best, especially in cases like this where there is no precision lost by using a more understandable term. The count of Google search results is not evidence which persuades me because the counts for both ludo- and game- are so low as to indicate that neither is a popular term, perhaps because there is no online resource like Wikipedia which cares so much to match games to creators. I support the suggestion of Blue Pumpkin Pie and Salvidrim! to use "works" instead of a subject matter specific term. I might support this in general in favor of getting rid of "discographies", "bibliographies", and similar terms which describe particular works from past generations. Increasingly, music comes with video, books come with interactive supplements, and movies and games come with stories and soundtracks, so multimedia is the new norm. I support using terms like "ludography" in the article text, but in the title as the most public facing aspect, uncommon terms are not providing maximum benefit to the most users. Also thanks to WikiProject Video games for continually being at the center of interesting discussions and good test cases. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:08, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Prefer general simple term per Blue Pumpkin Pie, Salvidrim, Bluerasberry. Why can't we just go with "works", which eliminates the entire issue here? I feel like we are trying to force a style here simply because actors have "filmography" and musicians have "discography". The only time I can see "works" not being enough is in biographical articles where the subject has done works outside of gaming entirely, such as acting in films or being a musician in a band. In cases like that then I suppose ludography would be preferred due to its more academical nature, but I'm not fully sold on that either. ~ Dissident93 (talk) 23:28, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • "Works", for the reasons given above - plus WP:PLAINENGLISH. Popcornfud (talk) 23:34, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Works, as above — keep it simple. Games would be fine, if all of the works are games — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 09:29, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
    • I did think of "Games" too, though I think it's conceivable biographies of game staff may already have a section called "Games" that summarises stuff they've worked on in prose (ie not just a list of games). Popcornfud (talk) 13:12, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Works as general heading for all: actors, writers, painters, video game programmers, etc. With subsections when necessary: novels, films, games, etc. --Khajidha (talk) 13:05, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Use "Works". "Gameography" is a neologism that clumsily mixes Anglo-Saxon and Greek elements. "Ludography" is a neologism (not found in any major dictionary, just in Wiktionary) using an element most people will not recognize (and the few who do will probably think it's a reference to gladiators).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:47, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Works works. GenQuest "scribble" 19:29, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Defining common abbreviations

Latest comment: 3 years ago12 comments6 people in discussion

In many fields, abbreviations and acronyms are used quite commonly. Sometimes this such an extent that the full name is not so well known, sometimes the initialism and the full words are used interchangeably. People might search for information using the acronym. Where an article is giving scope to some area it may be helpful to list both the full name and the acronym, even when the abbreviated form isn't used elsewhere on within the article. This appears often the case where the abbreviated thing doesn't necessarily have (or warrant) its own page.

Is there a correct way to handle this?

Options may include:

  • (A) Tea cannot be made in a Chocolate Teapot (CT).
  • (B) Tea cannot be made in a CT (Chocolate Teapot).
  • (C) Tea cannot be made in a Chocolate Teapot. [ we have a #REDIRECT to the article on a new page "CT", so people can at least find when searching with "CT"]
  • (D) Tea cannot be made in a Chocolate Teapot, commonly referred to in the industry as a CT.
  • (E) Tea cannot be made in a CT (the common industry shorthand for a Chocolate Teapot).
  • (F) Tea cannot be made in a Chocolate Teapot. [You're out of luck if you search using "CT"]
  • (G) Tea cannot be made in a CT. [You're on your own trying to find out what CT means]

Are there further options?

What is our preferred stance on this? And what types of evidence should be considered when choosing an approach to this?

For options (D) and (E) above, will we need to find a WP:SECONDARY to demonstrate that the acronym is indeed commonly used? Or would a definition on some primary source be acceptable? (Perhaps counts of google hits may be inaccurate, or indeed for some short initialisms they may be tricky to disambiguate.)

Considering relative frequency of use of the full term versus initialism would be sensible, but again what level of evidence is required? Chumpih. (talk) 06:38, 14 March 2021 (UTC) + edits to clarify 11:46.

  • Can you please give an actual example from an actual article -- ideally two or three? I'm having great trouble appreciating the issue from this farfetched hypothetical. EEng 07:03, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
    • For example lots of (B) style on ENodeB, RANAP or for (A) style see CSFB on System Architecture Evolution, List of Bluetooth profiles, or QMS on HDMI. For (C) style see ECCN. For (D) see HP in Health (game terminology). For (E) see Video Random Access Memory. (F) is very common, but has the disadvantage that the text isn't discoverable through a search. (G) is contrary to MOS:1STOCC. Chumpih. (talk) 07:18, 14 March 2021 + 15 March 07:30 (UTC)
      • This discussion was started (and I was pointed to it) after I undid the addition of the initialism ECJU (for Export Control Joint Unit) to Export control. Per MOS:1STOCC "When an abbreviation will be used in an article, first introduce it using the full expression." If we are not using the term elsewhere in the article there is no need to introduce the initialism at all. As far as I am concerned, It should not matter if the term is commonly used in a particular field. There are thousands upon thousands of such industry-specific abbreviations and initialisms. In this case the term "Export Control Joint Unit" is not used elsewhere in the article, and in fact, it is not used anywhere else in English Wikipedia. It is clearly not a common term in general. Meters (talk) 20:04, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
        • There are two three issues you raise: firstly whether a commonly-used initialism is worth spelling out on some page, even when there is no further reference on that page, and the other is whether ECJU is a common term. ECJU is out of scope on this talk page, and should be discussed on Talk:Export control. MOS:1STOCC doesn't clarify the situation on commonly-used initialism being shown on a page, and having some clear policy in this area would be appreciated. You state "If we are not using the term elsewhere in the article there is no need to introduce the initialism at all.", and for a commonly-accepted initialism that is debatable. Chumpih. (talk) 20:20, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
        • And regarding the initialism 'ECJU' not appearing elsewhere on English Wikipedia, it is precisely because of this that there is reason to include the initialism on that page. In this example, if someone were to conduct a search using 'ECJU' they will then find some relevant information about a UK government department, as opposed to turning up empty-handed. (It's open to debate if that gov't department is of sufficient importance to warrant its own Article.) In the hypothetical example, if someone were to search for "CT" then they woud at least find a page including references to chocolate teapots.
          There is an attempt at a policy for initialisms that don't get a second mention on Talk:Export Control, which basically permits (A) style above. It offers justifications. It's only for that page. Is it plausible? Chumpih. (talk) 22:57, 14 March 2021 (UTC) + highlighting 07:30 15 March.
          • I sometimes find it helpful to see how other style guides treat the issue. Here's what the Associated Press Stylebook says for Abbreviations and Acronyms:
            "A few universally recognized abbreviations are required in some circumstances. Some others are acceptable, depending on the context. But in general, avoid alphabet soup. Do not use abbreviations or acronyms that the reader would not quickly recognize.
            "Abbreviations and acronyms should be avoided in headlines.
            "Guidance on how to use a particular abbreviation or acronym is provided in entries..."
          The stylebook will usually say a particular term is 1. acceptable on all references (HDMI), 2. acceptable on first reference, but should be explained in the story (HDR, "high-dynamic range"), 3. acceptable on second reference (HD, "high-definition"), or 4. where possible, avoid using the term (HIPAA).
          So basically, it depends on the term and what is most comprehensible for the reader. I would err on the side of spelling it out, as Wikipedia's Manual of Style suggests. Cheers, Fredlesaltique (talk) 02:17, 15 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Given that A–E are all used on a regular basis, whichever one works best for the context, there is no issue to solve here. I think maybe the OP has not read MOS:ABBR.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:32, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
    OP? But... Optimus Prime is not real, how did he get in this discussion. But right, do we need a written down rule, just use common sense, mnmh? User:Meters points out that the question came up when "I undid the addition of the initialism ECJU (for Export Control Joint Unit)" per some rule. Well easy solution there: if it's a matter of undoing a recent addition, just WP:BRD it back out if you want; ball's in the other person's court. Per WP:1Q you obviously only do that if you feel that adding the ECJU is a bad thing on the merits; if you don't, just ignore the rule. If the EJCU had been standing material, maybe leave it alone; some editor thought it was good to have and there's no need to gainsay her on minor matters of form. Or remove it if you like, if you don't get BRDed back you're good, if you do move on. If an article's an alphabet soup, that's different. It doesn't sound like this article was broken. Herostratus (talk) 23:52, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
    Bumblebee thinks you're nuts for not believing in Optimus Prime, but says he'll let it slide. Anyway, yeah, I'm having a hard time seeing a need for a new rule or a rule change here. What we don't want is people making up fake acronyms/initialisms out of their own heads, nor wallowing in MOS:JARGON just to be geeky. If the abbreviations appear in the sources, they can be used, and probably should be to avoid being browbeatingly repetitive, but not be used just to sound geeky/insider. As long as they're explained on first occurrence one way or another: "Export Control Joint Unit (ECJU)", "ECJU (Export Control Joint Unit)", they're generally okay, but the longer the article is the more time they may need explanation (once in the lead, once in the body at least, and sometimes more than once in the body of along article with sections that get a lot of incoming direct visitors who won't start from the top). I.e. "[abbreviations] that the reader would not quickly recognize" is easily mitigated by make sure they get recognized, though not to excess.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:05, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Perhaps then the consensus regarding the use or not of initialisms that common even when the abbreviated form isn't used elsewhere on within the article, is that it depends on the context, and keeping in mind that we are for the benefit of Wikipedia, we should WP:BRD on a per-case basis. Sounds reasonable to me. (Edit away the highlights if you like.) Chumpih. (talk) 15:48, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
    Sure. We need to keep in mind that the intended audience for articles varies; articles on highly technical subjects that require some background to understand much at all will probably have an audience for whom various contextual abbreviations are relatively more common (maybe massively more common) that the same jumble of letters would be for someone new to the subject. Like, at the Prehistory of Scandinavia article, if you peppered it with "PIE" in reference to Proto-Indo-European, that would probably be a problem (even if it were properly explained on first use), but it would be an appropriate acronym to use a lot of at Proto-Germanic.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:05, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
    PS: I will go through my semi-annual promotion of the idea of creating a topic-specific glossary article (using the richer, templated syntax, which makes linking and formatting robust), and using a topically customized variant of the {{glossary link}} template to provide links to definitions. This proved to be a godsend when it came to writing about cue sports (billiards, snooker, pool), which is perhaps the most jargon-heavy sport of all time. That would be a very useful approach for any acronym-heavy field. You just explain the terms once in the glossary, then link to them with something like {{astrogloss|UHTC}} any time it seems prudent. Well, maybe explain it outright in the article one time, for WP:REUSE purposes (someone might rip the bare text of the article).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:14, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

MOS:COLLAPSED seems wrong / misleading

Latest comment: 3 years ago7 comments4 people in discussion

The notion that tables shouldn't be collapsed upon the loading of a page seems to be based on some incorrect ideas and some misleading positioning of sentences. The current wording gives the impression that the mobile version of the site will strip auto-collapsed tables; this is false, only navboxes are stripped from the mobile view.

Any information hidden in this way when the page loads will be irreversibly invisible to the aforementioned classes of users, as well as a growing number of low-bandwidth users in Asia who reach a Wikipedia article via Google.

The second half of this is crystal balling and outdated. Google Lite is only available as a hidden "advanced" feature in the mobile version of Chrome, that was barely announced beyond 2016. No data shows that this number of users is either A) significant or B) growing. Also, Google cached pages / LITE searches display the exact same as their mobile and desktop counterparts on my phone. Disabling javascript simply displays collapsed data as uncollapsed. I think this section needs to be updated as it seems unnecessarily regressive. - Floydian τ ¢ 15:32, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

  • I've confirmed that even without JS and CSS enabled, the mobile website now defaults to showing collapsed tables at least - I didn't have examples handy to test it on other collapsed things and am not familiar enough with how collapsing is done outside of the table class to comment on those. However, the iOS app defaults to collapsing all tables, and it is reasonable to assume that, for various reasons, third parties may utilize collapsing of tables/data via CSS classes to not download that data at all. While it's great that the mobile website now "un-auto-collapses" tables/various things and that the site does so as well when JS/CSS are not active, that does not eliminate other reasons to avoid collapsing things in articles. On the subject of the "lite" versions, there are many places in the world where Google caching is not the primary means of reducing bandwidth - thus I would welcome input from users who may have knowledge of whether or not non-Google/WP low-bandwidth technologies display this content.
    There are also other reasons to discourage/prohibit auto-collapsing in articles. As the second-to-last sentence of the section states: If information in a list, infobox, or other non-navigational content seems extraneous or trivial enough to inspire pre-collapsing it, consider raising a discussion on the article (or template) talk page about whether it should be included at all - and this is what should be made the focus of that section if any changes are made. I would also welcome input as to whether there are accessibility issues that involve CSS classes which provide collapsibility - examples being screen readers and other software/devices which automatically alter/change the way content is produced. Furthermore, we must (per MOS:PRECOLLAPSE) remember that Wikipedia content can be reused freely in ways we cannot predict as well as accessed directly via older browsers and adding complexity via collapsing things when there is a better solution is contrary to that goal of WP. If information is important to an article, it is important to the goal of Wikipedia that virtually any reasonable reuse-of-content case be able to obtain a complete picture of the important content of said article - which auto-collapsing may prevent by suggesting the content is not important. The better solution is listed in MOS:COLLAPSE already - either un-collapse the content if it is important enough to be in the article, change the way in which it is presented to make collapsing or not a moot point, or remove the content altogether.
    To summarize, I do not support altering MOS:COLLAPSED to decrease guidance against (auto-)collapsing things in articles, but I do support revisiting why it's important and rewording the section accordingly - including clarifying that current modern browsers and official websites display the content even when CSS/JS are not used. I also think that it should be made clear that auto-collapsing is not a means for "visual" changes to an article - i.e. making an article "flow" better, or allowing people to "skip" tables/etc - but is instead only to be used as a way to include information which is relevant and has a good reason for inclusion, but outdated or supplementary - the prime example being historical data on pages it is not likely to be the primary topic, but is still useful for historical data. We must primarily remember that we are not an indiscriminate collection of information, and information which is "hidden" by default should be evaluated with serious weight given to the idea that maybe that information/data is not in line with Wikipedia's purpose. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez (User/say hi!) 02:52, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
  • "There are also other reasons to discourage/prohibit auto-collapsing in articles." Yes, and the devs messing around again with what the mobile version is doing by default (always a moving target) does not change this. We cannot depend on it remaining even that much semi-functional. And it really is just semi-fuctional, since it will have no effect on other kinds of collapsed content.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:35, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
    • I'm not sure I agree with the premise that data is either worthy of being displayed in full or hidden. To me this is akin to saying "We shouldn't allow endnotes because that information either is worthy of inclusion in the prose or not at all". Some topics are physically long, and while the data is surely important, it makes for a scrolling nightmare and should only be expanded by those who want that in-depth information. As to your point SMcCandlish, that's certainly a good reason for discouraging... but prohibiting? Also considering the stability implications of changing accessibility behaviours, is this not something that should've been hammered out years ago (i.e. as opposed to developing a guideline around it, get the commitment issue addressed)... or does Wikimedia also suffer from unmetered developer creep like Facebook and Google? Quickly, Nerdlinger! We have to come up with a new feature before they start questioning our purpose! - Floydian τ ¢ 22:57, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
      References are long but this particular guideline prevents changing that, and we have multiple times rebutted attempts to change that. Why are tables different? How are they the same? Izno (talk) 00:32, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
      • References are placed below the main content, as footnotes. Tables are often placed within the prose. Footnotes are collections of external links and information, tables are collections of relevant data to the prose which they accompany. - Floydian τ ¢ 15:29, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
      "I'm not sure I agree with [long-established consensus]" is never an argument that makes a dent. If you're certain consensus has changed, feel free to open an RfC to revise or remove the guideline passage in question. Otherwise, please just accept that WP is not made in your own image, and that like everyone else there are lots of WP:P&G pages with line items to comply with even if you don't like them. WP:NOT#WEBHOST is also relevant; this project is not for people to experiement with their own preferences and ideals when it comes to website design. This site is intentionally text-heavy, rudimentary in layout, and avoidant of JavaScript-dependent gimcrackery, at least if it has any impact at all on access to the content. You're welcome to use WP:User style and user JS to hide every single collapsible element by default for your own viewing, but you don't have a right to force it on people who can't undo it because of the tools they have available.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:19, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking § Linking non-major countries

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

  You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking § Linking non-major countries. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 21:28, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Latest comment: 3 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

The section §Italicized links seems to be covering proper syntax rather than a preferred style. That's more suitable for a help page on formatting than a MoS. The MoS is already long enough, let's cut the fat. Opencooper (talk) 00:25, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Agreed. I killed it. EEng 04:10, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Reviving MOS:IDENTITY

Latest comment: 3 years ago8 comments5 people in discussion

I found interest in reviving discussion of this failed proposal, which is not covered by any current guideline and includes points that are not explicit in any existing guideline; for example, the use of the dated and inaccurate term Caucasians for White people. A major factor in its failure was being mislabeled as a proposed naming convention for articles. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 17:35, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

I am confused... MOS:IDENTITY is currently a shortcut to an existing section of our main MOS, not to a failed proposal. Are you asking whether it should be hived off into its own MOS subpage? Blueboar (talk) 20:06, 17 March 2021 (UTC)
I think what is meant is Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Identity (failed proposal). It was originally created as a draft naming convention, but spent very little verbiage on naming and was almost entirely about style matters in article content, so I moved to a more appropriate name, then proposed (after cleaning it up some) that it be integrated into MoS (rather than sit for more years as a moribund proposal). The response what not exactly positive: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 194#Merge draft WP:Naming conventions (identity) to MOS:IDENTITY?.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:07, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
You could rename it as an essay and remove the failed-proposal tag. Then at least people could quote from it or point to it to explain their opinion. Which I guess if you do that to a failed proposal will not have much impact. It's a lot of words, are the problems occurring which this would help address? If not, leave it as an essay maybe. (My take on on the general subject is that persons are mediocre sources for information about themselves, for various reasons, particularly self-dealing. If "When writing an article about specific groups or their members always use the terminology which those individuals or organizations themselves use" means we have to call the Proud Boys "freedom fighters" or whatever in our voice, I'm not in favor of that.) Herostratus (talk) 09:49, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
Thanks for the clarification. I would agree that making it an essay would be the right way to go here. I too would oppose reviving it as a guideline. My feeling is that we should always note what labels people or groups apply to themselves, but we should also note the labels others (reliable sources) apply to them. When these conflict (and especially when they are controversial), we should bend over backwards to avoid stating ANY of the labels in WPs voice. Attribute, so the reader knows who applies which label. Blueboar (talk) 11:58, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
Yep (other than see below on making it an essay; the pigs-and-lipstick cliché comes to mind).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:35, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
"people could quote from it or point to it to explain their opinion. Which I guess if you do that to a failed proposal will not have much impact". Yes, it would be rather self-defeating. It's not impossible to re-work a failed proposal into a viable essay, but it won't work without understanding why it failed and resolving all the problems in the material that led to that. (And, yeah, one of the most obvious flops is "When writing an article about specific groups or their members always use the terminology which those individuals or organizations themselves use"; this kind of myopic "I'm only here to soapbox for the social-justice concern I think about all day long and have no idea what fallout my propositions would have in an actual encyclopedia" stuff never goes anywhere, and is a clear indicator why we need to not have this page be anything but a failed proposal). 'Pedians have a long memory. An essayized version of this that retained a recognizable amount of the original material would probably trigger opposition, derision, etc. It would likely be more practical to just start a new essay, and not even crib from this one. It's maybe instructive to look at WP:Notability/Historical and the weird stuff found there. The old, draft approaches to the idea have pretty much no wording in common with the current guideline. They each just had to be nuked from orbit, starting again from a clean slate. Somewhere around here, someone is actually trying to "recover" another failed proposal and essayize it, and I don't think it's going to work. I forget what the topic was though.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:35, 4 April 2021 (UTC)
What sources are there declaring that 'Caucasian' is dated? Its use is still common in the US. Historical accuracy is not relevent, and words/names having multiple meanings in English has never been proscribed (i.e., it does not matter that Caucasian means a person from the Caucasus, or a person of European ancestry, or more broadly a person with ancestry from Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, or South Asia, regardless of skin tone; this broader definition is largely obscure to many Americans now, but in India it is still in general use, and is still used by American forensic anthropologists (forensic anthropology being one of the last remaining fields where deternining race based on cranial features is still needed, and the US being one of the only countries in the world where any given skeleten that turns up has multiple possible races that it has a significant chance of belonging to)). Firejuggler86 (talk) 10:46, 7 April 2021 (UTC)

The capitalisation of UK political offices

Latest comment: 3 years ago16 comments7 people in discussion

Under MOS:JOBTITLES, UK political offices (like Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Secretary of State for the Home Department etc.) are rarely capitalised. I'd like to put forward the idea of reversing this presumption.

The first reason for doing this is for consistency with many other sources, like the gov.uk website and the parliament.uk website. While other outlets, like BBC News, generally don't capitalise job titles, I'd certainly argue that Wikipedia is much closer in substance to the first two examples than a news website. The second reason for this is because MOS:JOBTITLES specifically makes use of a distinction between titles and offices, however that distinction isn't really known in the UK; Boris Johnson isn't Prime Minister Johnson or Mr Prime Minister, but The Right Honourable Boris Johnson MP, who also happens to hold the offices of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Minister for the Union. While the distinction between titles and offices might work for US Presidents and Senators, for example, it doesn't really work in the UK, as for our articles it means that almost every use of these terms are in lower case. Finally, MOS:JOBTITLES deems offices common nouns, but I'd argue that it is much more nuanced than that. According to Wikipedia's own entry for proper and common nouns, proper nouns refer to a single entity, while common nouns refer to a class of entitites. Surely, you could call the office of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom its own entity? It may have had many holders who all fall into the category of having been Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, but it's still a corporation sole in itself that, in itself, gives its current holder (and only its current holder) certain powers. What do other people think? FollowTheTortoise (talk) 16:55, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@FollowTheTortoise: Hi and thanks for starting a discussion here. I respectfully disagree and oppose the proposed change to MOS:JOBTITLES.
With respect to your first point: Yes, it is true that government offices, in the UK as well as in the United States, generally capitalize titles in most/all usages, as do corporate entities. Their usage need not govern ours, however. Also, while Wikipedia may be different in substance from a news agency, it's much closer to an encyclopedia than to a government website. Notably, the Encyclopedia Britannica lowercases prime minister and other offices (see, e.g., the Britannica article for William Pitt the Younger).
To your second point: I'm not sure I agree. The title–office distinction is, after all, just a distinction between referring to the office itself, or referring to the name of the office (i.e., the title). This is really a form of the use–mention distinction, which of course exists regardless of which regional or national dialect of English (or other language) you're using. Additionally, BBC news articles refer to Bojo as "Prime Minister Boris Johnson", and to other officeholders similarly. And finally, to your point that "for our articles it means that almost every use of these terms are in lower case", first, I don't think this is necessarily correct—the Boris Johnson article contains five titles in the first three sentences, and all are uppercase, as they should be under the existing version of MOS:JOBTITLES. Second, to the extent that it *is* true that MOS:JOBTITLES results in job titles being lowercase more often than not, I think the same is generally true about articles about U.S. offices.
I would add, finally, that I actually disagree with the distinction MOS:JOBTITLES draws between titles and offices. It's difficult to discern a policy rationale for capitalizing the one and lowercasing the other, and, notably, the stylebooks of both news outlets and ordinary encyclopedias lack this distinction and capitalize job titles *only* when before a name. So to the extent that the distinction is inapposite, I think the remedy is to lowercase nearly everything. However, I don't know that I'd go so far as to propose removing the distinction from MOS:JOBTITLES altogether, and I mention my opinion on this subject only to say that I do understand your frustration with the distinction, to a point.
Thanks again for starting the discussion. Wallnot (talk) 17:34, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
I agree with Wallnot. The first sentence of MOS:CAPS is "Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization." The government sources are self-published primary sources, and I give more weight to secondary sources such as the BBC. I also see no reason to make an unnecessary distinction between the UK and other countries. All the best, Miniapolis 21:23, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
It's not necessarily the correct place for this point given the topic is specific to the UK, but manuals of style that I used for years in the US generally eschewed capitalisation where the title was not the full legal title or did not immediately precede the person's name. For example, Jen Psaki is press secretary to the president; Jen Psaki is press secretary to the President of the United States; Press Secretary Jen Psaki works for President Joe Biden. —ATS (talk) 00:54, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
ATS You said what I was going to say. The US style guide (2020 AP Stylebook) I use only capitalizes when the title is directly before a name (not offset by commas). The only minor exception is nobility titles when they serve as an alternate name (e.g. The Duke of York spoke yesterday). I would be curious if British style guides differ, though. Fredlesaltique (talk) 07:16, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
Fredlesaltique From what I'm seeing on the BBC's website, they seem to follow the AP rule, more or less. I'm curious which stylebook ATS is referring to that calls for caps for the full legal title — does CMS do that? Wallnot (talk) 14:33, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
I'd have to look it up, but AP and/or CMOS was all I ever used. —ATS (talk) 16:08, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
Ah, ok. FWIW, the most recent CMOS (17th ed.) lowercases titles in all usages, unless before a name, or "in such contexts as a toast or a formal introduction, or when used in direct address" (see 8.19-20). Wallnot (talk) 16:16, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
@Wallnot: Thanks for looking up the Chicago Manual of Style. I checked the BBC which follows AP usage like you thought BBC Style Guide (under "political titles"), but their treatment of nobility is slightly different. The Guardian just avoids it all: "David Cameron, the prime minister; not prime minister David Cameron or "prime minister Cameron"" But I can only access online stuff, so take my limited, amateur research on British usage with a grain of salt. Fredlesaltique (talk) 00:38, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
@Fredlesaltique: Thanks for sharing—the Guardian's take is interesting. On the whole, I'm not seeing any major news agency, British or American, that capitalizes job titles in the instances FollowTheTortoise is suggesting we ought to. Not sure what the procedure for closing these discussions is, though I'd definitely like to have some kind of consensus to back up my edits on, e.g., Home Secretary going forward. Wallnot (talk) 15:31, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
@Wallnot: @ATS: Incidentally the Times mentions that they recently stopped capitalizing prime minister—which makes me think that some British style guides continue to capitalize it. I'm also inclined to trust FollowTheTortoise that British sources treat "prime minister" differently than US sources treat "president," in that it usually doesn't precede the name.
Just to clarify, the question is whether UK government offices should be consistently capitalized? (Also I like to remind myself that at the end of the day the article will still be legible whatever capitalization is there). Fredlesaltique (talk) 00:52, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
@Fredlesaltique: Yes, the question is whether to capitalize references to these offices in all usages—if the Times used to do that, it was in the minority, even in the UK. I also don't buy FollowTheTortoise's claim about the treatment of job titles in UK as compared to the U.S.—it took me all of five seconds to find multiple examples in British media of prime minister and other job titles used before a name. So if there is some difference between the two countries in the treatment of job titles, that ain't it. The article will certainly be legible, but one could say the same thing about disregarding basically every MOS rule, and, as Miniapolis notes above, the first line of MOS:CAPS is "Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization." I haven't seen a single reason so far that we'd make an exception to that rule just for British offices, as, again, the clear majority of British secondary sources, including encyclopedic and news sources, follow something resembling the MOS:JOBTITLES rule. Wallnot (talk) 01:04, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
@Fredlesaltique: Thanks for the update. 🙂 —ATS (talk) 15:45, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback, everybody! I think that all I really had to say on the matter was included in my original comment, but it's clear that the consensus is that MOS:JOBTITLES shouldn't be changed. FollowTheTortoise (talk) 09:45, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

Rewording of hyphen section

Latest comment: 3 years ago12 comments5 people in discussion

I want to propose a simplification of the section on hyphens.

Current

=== Hyphens ===

Hyphens (-) indicate conjunction. There are three main uses:

  1. In hyphenated personal names: John Lennard-Jones.
  2. To link prefixes with their main terms in certain constructions (quasi-scientific, pseudo-Apollodorus, ultra-nationalistic).
    • A hyphen may be used to distinguish between homographs (re-dress means dress again, but redress means remedy or set right).
    • There is a clear trend to join both elements in all varieties of English (subsection, nonlinear). Hyphenation clarifies when the letters brought into contact are the same (non-negotiable, sub-basement) or are vowels (pre-industrial), or where a word is uncommon (co-proposed, re-target) or may be misread (sub-era, not subera). Some words of these sorts are nevertheless common without the hyphen (e.g. cooperation is more frequently attested than co-operation in contemporary English).

Proposed

=== Hyphens ===

Hyphens (-) indicate conjunction. There are three main uses:

  1. Personal names (Daniel Day-Lewis)
  2. Certain prefixes (vice-president, ex-boyfriend). Note that general usage tends to avoid hyphens for many prefixes (subsection, nonlinear). Use a hyphen in the following situations:
    • If it changes the meaning (re-dress dress again versus redress set right)
    • To separate the same letter (non-negotiable) or vowels (pre-industrial) unless doing so goes against general usage (cooperation not co-operation)
    • To avoid misreadings (sub-era not subera)
    • Uncommon words with no established usage (co-propose)

Thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fredlesaltique (talk • contribs) 04:44, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

I think "personal names" is too telegraphic and open to misinterpretation. We only use hyphens to separate parts of the personal name of a single person; we do not use them to separate names of two people. The current text is worded circularly and doesn't clearly indicate this but the new wording is worse in this respect. —David Eppstein (talk) 08:29, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
@David Eppstein: I don't think such a misinterpretation is likely, and rewording would probably add to confusion. We could add a second well-known name for clarity, though. Fredlesaltique (talk) 10:04, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
I agree with the general trust of this, but concur with David (especially on his main point, that people will misinterpret this to mean "write Comet Hale-Bopp"; we know for a fact that various editors are perpetually confused about en-dash usage with human names so we do have reason to avoid worsening it). Given that names like Day-Lewis have a term for them and we have an article on it, at Double-barrelled name, just use that term and link to it. However, not all such surnames are hyphenated any longer. And it's not always surnames; hyphens are common between Chinese and Korean given names (in either family-name-first or Western order), and among some French and Southern US given-name clusters. So what we should probably say is something like the following (and I even managed to find someone with a hyphenated forename and a hyphenated surname):
  1. A double-barrelled surname or compound give name that is hyphenated for a particular subject in most reliable sources (Daniel Day-Lewis, Yu Myeong-Hee, Jean-Louis Vieillard-Baron)
This wording accounts for the fact that (especially for Asian cases) source treatment may differ as to the spelling, and we should use the dominant one in RS. And we should use cross-references more liberally, to avoid restating rules (which provides an undesirable opportunity for WP:POLICYFORKing). I notice that MOS:DASH not once but twice makes the point that double-barreled surnames take hyphens, and this would be better done with cross-references to the rule rather than restatements of the rule.
Next, "cooperation not co-operation" is flat-out wrong. The original text was correct about frequency of usage, but the revised version goes too far in marking one as an error. "Co-operaticon" "Co-operation" is a very well-attested spelling, and there's nothing wrong with it. Plenty of editors and readers prefer it. This vowel-separating hyphenation is only commonly used when pronunciation might be uncertain (esp. to a non-native speaker or school child) because the combination forms a common diphthong. The e[-]u case seems to be among the least frequently hyphenated, so a better example would be the following:
  1. ...
    • ...
    • To separate the same letter (non-negotiable) or vowels (pre-industrial) unless doing so goes against general usage (reunion not re-union)
Basically MoS shouldn't be prescribing against a usage that still has currency in formal writing, but should illustrate avoidance of a misusage that almost all readers would take to be an error.
Finally, remove "Note that"; just say "General usage tends ...", or "However, general usage tends ..." if we think that reads better. We should actually search all the MoS pages for "note that" and similar phrases, and remove them. We advise avoiding their use in articles, so MoS should practice what it preaches. PS: The footnote (to what MoS means by "recent", "current", "modern", etc.) will probably no longer be needed, given how this is being revised, so I've removed it (including from the original quote, since it throws an error here on the talk page due to the note itself being missing).
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:04, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
Co-operaticon (noun): A joint convention of fans of both Italian and German opera. EEng 15:41, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
Ha ha.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:31, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
Personal names: I think that lengthening the wording on personal names would make the principle more convoluted than it needs to be.
As I see it, the guide should simply answer the question "When do I use a hyphen" with "in personal names." In other words, if a personal name has a dash-like symbol, then it should be a hyphen. I don't think it needs to mention what all the specific examples of hyphens in names are; by keeping it simple they are all included anyways. The current and proposed wordings make no mention of when to remove a hyphen or keep it, since that is a separate issue. I also think that introducing new terms like double-barreled surnames is pertinent but not strictly necessary, and should be avoided to keep things concise.
What about changing the wording to "in personal names"? Then the question "how to combine two personal names" is neither raised nor answered, as far as I can see. Putting a note mentioning that the answer to this separate question is below, like one of you proposed, seems like a good solution, though I worry it just makes things more confusing. (Also I noticed John Lennard-Jones is used elsewhere as an example, so should not have been removed.)
  1. In personal names (Daniel Day-Lewis, John Lennard-Jones)
Prefixes: We can change the wording on prefixes to be less prescriptive, I was trying to make it more cut-and-dry but I may have gone too far. What about this?
  1. ...
    • ...
    • To separate the same letter (non-negotiable) or vowels (pre-industrial) unless doing so goes against general usage (reunion not re-union). Note that some words commonly lack a hyphen (cooperate versus co-operate)
Note that: the Manual of Style states "Avoid such phrases as remember that and note that, which address readers directly in an unencyclopedic tone and lean toward instructional." Since the manual is not an encyclopedia article but rather a guideline that is meant to instruct, I don't think using "note that" is an issue.
Wow that was a lot longer than I intended. Cheers, Fredlesaltique (talk) 13:08, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
I agree that concision on this matter would be an improvement. On the MoS-should-do-as-it-advises matter, I don't think you've been around long enough, or you'd know that any time MoS doesn't do as it says people who don't agree with the line item in question leap on that as an excuse to claim it doesn't have consensus, yadda yadda (the "fight against MoS" b.s. we've been deailing with for nearly 20 years. Everyone has at least one bone to pick with MoS (an every other style guide there is), so we should not feed them opportunities to manufacture drama over style trivia.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:04, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
MOS doesn't apply outside project space, in particular not to itself. Nor should it. Nonissue. EEng 23:17, 20 March 2021 (UTC)
It's actually come up as an issue many times. People see MoS not following its own rules (when they can logically apply), and argue that it's not really a rule, that it doesn't have consensus, that it's obsolete and no longer being followed, etc., etc. We can avoid all this bullshit by simply writing MoS in MoS style. It's already routine to apply most of MoS even to policy pages, so the actual "nonissue" here is the idea that there's anything faintly controversial about doing so. Cf. WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY: The fact that MoS doesn't officially apply to projectspace as a set of per se rules is meaningless in the face of the fact that they're our writing best-practices and that not using them consistently causes internecine problems. Trying to enforce non-compliance just for the hell of it, on a jurisdictional-technicality argument, absent a particular non-compliance being objectively an improvement to the wording or other formatting at hand, is a WP:SPITE matter. It buys us absolutely nothing yet comes at non-trivial and predictable costs. Another way of looking at it: the fact that it's not illegal in most places to tattoo your eyelids doesn't make it a good idea to exercise the right to do so.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:38, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

Post–World War II or Post-World War II?

Latest comment: 3 years ago19 comments12 people in discussion

I left a message at Talk:Post–Cold War era#En dash or hyphen? —hueman1 (talk • contributions) 02:16, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

HueMan1, I agree with Fredlesaltique; should be a hyphen (particularly item 3). —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 02:54, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
Good point; I hadn't thought of it like that. — Christopher, Sheridan, OR (talk) 08:19, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
No. Cold War functions as one single lexeme lexical item (specifically a collocation); for any kind of grammatical constructions, suffixes, prefixes, etc, Cold War is treated as if it were a single word. Firejuggler86 (talk) 09:45, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
And oh, another thing, about PTSD. Why should it be an exception to the MOS? —hueman1 (talk • contributions) 08:07, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
I'm not arguing for or against the dash in PTSD on WP, but noting that the hyphen is overwhelmingly common usage in reliable sources, which is another WP principle. It's just because this rule or principle (like many) doesn't get applied consistently. If I were writing it for my own publication, I'd probably use a dash (and my editor would probably change it to a hyphen anyway). The "post-election pendulum" is a pendulum after the election, so the premodifier post-election is simple + simple (i.e., one word + one word), so it's just a hyphen, the same as "a man-eating shark" or "a well-cooked steak". Doremo (talk) 10:28, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
@Doremo: I agree, I guess a majority would oppose its hypothetical RM (P-TSD to P–TSD). Thank you for your response! —hueman1 (talk • contributions) 13:44, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
I think it's a hyphen in PTSD because it's a stress disorder that arises after trauma, not a disorder of trauma stress. I could be wrong. Good Ol’factory (talk) 22:49, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
Exactly. "Post—traumatic stress disorder" would seem to be an awkward adjective or adverb meaning "after one has gotten over 'traumatic stress disorder', whatever that is". PTSD is a disorder involving trauma-induced stress. The post- is modifier only of trauma.
In general for hyphens and dashes, I would say 1. if something is technically correct but overly-distracting, then ignore it and 2. deference should be given to reliable sources. Cheers, Fredlesaltique (talk) 11:13, 27 February 2021 (UTC)
My great-grandmother had a saying: "Straining at gnats and swallowing horses". If we're gonna keep up the insistence that page ranges must use endashes instead of hyphens, then we're damn sure not gonna give a pass to pre-World War artillery, as is there was war artillery before there was a world. EEng 01:58, 28 February 2021 (UTC)
Maybe more to the point, Fredlesaltique's argument is trebly faulty.
  1. There's no evidence that en dashes versus hyphens are, to readers or to editors, "overly distracting". (Note the lack of a hyphen in that, by the way; anyone who hyphenates after a -ly adjective isn't in a position to be offering hyphen-related advice.) At most, they're faintly inconvenient to some editors who are neither Mac users nor (on Windows or *n*x) users of keyboard macro utilities, and who also don't use the "Wiki markup" or "Insert" utility right underneath the editing window. If this sort of minor expediency matter were a valid rationale, we'd also drop all MoS matters about the minus symbol, em dashes, ×, non-breaking spaces, language markup, diacritics, mathematical symbols, etc., etc. "It's not one of my default keyboard-layout characters" isn't a reason we take seriously. (And typing efficiency is the reason that news publishers eschew en dashes; it's not because it's "more correct" to do so, it's simply a matter of deadline pressure. Same goes for all the punctuation- and capitals- and space-dropping, the avoidance of diacritics, the clipped grammatical structures, the formulaic "newsspeak" clichés, and other hallmarks of news writing. News style guides have had virtually no impact on MoS for good reasons.)
  2. Second, CMoS and other off-site style guides are not reliable sources for how to write Wikipedia; only our own internal consensus in developing MoS (and AT, and the naming conventions guidelines, etc.) is that, and it already takes all the major off-site style guides into account. Carol Fisher Saller, Bryan A. Garner, and the handful of other people who determine the content of CMoS – and fail to fix factual errors in it a decade after they're reported >cough cough< – don't dictate how WP is written. And no style guide in a vacuum is an authority on English, even as source for encyclopedia material like Comma#Uses in English; they have to be used in the aggregate because they all contradict each other on hundreds of points (even when they don't contradict themselves internally, which is too often).
  3. Last, and most obviously, CMoS doesn't even say not to use en dashes for this, it just observes that some don't use it. CMoS makes many observations of this sort, as do most other style guides. Many of them have been bending over backwards the last 20 years to be more descriptive, which kind of defeats the purpose of being a style guide; New Hart's Rules under Waddingham's editorship and Fowler's under Butterfield's are especially crappy in this regard. This throwing up of the hands by some particular other publication (which amounts to "we give up, so just do whatever the hell you want") has no effect on whether MoS advises, deprecates, or avoids addressing any style point. (The main impetus of this new wishywashiness in some style guides that were formerly bastions of a particular "academic" writing style appears to be pressure to be inclusive and permissive of some news-style and business- or marking-style writing habits, to sell more style guides. Paper publishers are under increasingly intense pressure to drive up sales any way they can to survive at all in the 21st century, and it tends to result in dumbed-down, least-common-denominator results. The effects are more obvious in this niche than in many others because the traditional divide between styles has a long history and – until lately – rather sharp lines, so their sudden blurring stands out.)
The perpetual "style warfare" people bring against MoS line-items they don't personally care for, however, is very much a distraction from editorial productivity (theirs and everyone else's). Editors have to understand that there is no one who agrees with 100% of the statements in this or any other guideline or policy, and there are no guideline or policy rules that have agreement from 100% of editors. Perfect unanimity is not possible to achieve, ergo lack of unanimity about any given line item is not an argument against it. Consensus can change, but WP:IDONTLIKEIT is a codified fallacy on this site. So are WP:OTHERSTUFF and WP:CONTENTAGE and WP:NOTFIXEDYET, which are frequently also thrown up as anti-guideline lobbying points; the fact that no policy or guideline line-item has 100% compliance, and some failures to comply are in articles that haven't been corrected on the matter for years, is not reasoning against a rule's existence and applicability, or the whole project would be unworkable. Cf. WP:NOTPERFECTION, WP:NODEADLINE, WP:NOTUNANIMITY.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:15, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
and fail to fix factual errors in it a decade after they're reported >cough cough< May I ask to what this is referring? 207.161.86.162 (talk) 07:01, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
This thread isn't really the place to dig into it. If you want one quick example, see here, where I already documented a double error in some detail (CMoS directly contradicting itself in the same passage, and then trying to cite an "authority" that has nothing to do with the subject at all. I reported these errors to them some time around 2007–2009, both directly in e-mail and on their forum. They've released two editions since then without fixing either error.) CMoS is not alone in such problems; I pointed out similar problems is my Amazon reviews of the latest (Waddingham and Butterfield) edition's of New Hart's Rules and Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage. I could do likewise with Garner's English Usage, which makes a lot of incorrect linguistic claims. The author is a lawyer not a language specialist. He's also quietly the principal author of most of CMoS's grammar and usage information since at least the 15th ed., so you can see how these problems can interrelate. Similarly, the former long-term editors of NHR and Fowler's, Ritter and Burchfield, were in close communication with each other through years of OED-related work. When Waddingham made all kinds of willy-nilly changes to NHR out of nowhere (mostly in the direction of being excessively descriptive in a "there are five ways do this, so just do whatever you like" vein, which is the antithesis of what a style guide is for), Butterfield just deferred to all of them blindly. Poor material and poor thinking about language jumped from one into the other.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:58, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

Preferred term for romantic partner?

Latest comment: 3 years ago13 comments10 people in discussion

When speaking about a romantic partner, what set of terms should be employed? "Boyfriend"/"girlfriend" or just "partner"?

I believe it should be the latter, for two reasons:

  1. It has (in my opinion) a more encyclopedic tone.
  2. It is gender neutral, which improves readability.

Envysan (talk) 03:46, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

There's nothing written in the main Manual of Style. As far as I know, terms like boyfriend/girlfriend are generally acceptable, as is partner. It depends on context.
I would use whatever is appropriate for the article in question, and check how the subject is treated in reliable sources for guidance. Just be consistent within that article. Cheers, Fredlesaltique (talk) 04:30, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
I've used "lover" one or two times, for unmarried romantic partners. It's a word of long-standing use, well-known and quite clear (unlike the squeamish "partner" which is vague), perfectly acceptable in formal writing, and the most accurate description of the emotional situation in play often enough.
"Roerick, who was gay... lived with his partner and longtime collaborator..." sounds a bit... flat. The were fucking each other with wild abandon I suppose, not setting up a joint-stock company. That matters. Why not use use "roommate" if we're going to be that squeamish. I don't much recommend this or often use it, tho, even though it's possibly the best term in many cases, because people might consider it too florid and unusual, and you're just going to get into disputes. You'll be in the right, but still: disputes. Herostratus (talk) 15:46, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
@Herostratus: note that "roommate" means different things on different sides of the Atlantic. In the US it seems to be used interchangeably with "housemate" (i.e. a person with whom one shares a dwelling) but in the UK it specifically means a person with whom one shares a bedroom but not (usually) a bed, whereas "housemate"/"flatmate" is used for someone who lives in the same house/flat but has a separate bedroom. Thryduulf (talk) 09:34, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
I'm not sure that there is a good option. The obvious terms that I can think of, e.g., partner, room-mate, are subject to ambiguity, and terms such as Person of Opposite Sex Sharing Living Quarters (POSSLQ) are too narrow in scope.
Do you want to include partners in short term sexual relationships? Partners in Platonic relationships? Romantic partners not living together? Relationships that don't involve emotional ties? There are lots of ways to interpret the question. Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 19:16, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
Well speaking personally, I'm certainly open to including partners in short-term sexual relationships. Use the Email this user feature if you're interested. EEng 06:14, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Why not try the good old fashioned technique of using the term that the preponderance of reliable sources use? EEng, do not bother checking your inbox. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 06:22, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
do not bother checking your inbox – You mean like "If the phone don't ring, you'll know it's me"? EEng 06:41, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Just wanted to thank you for that song reference. --Khajidha (talk) 12:40, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
Generally, we should agree with the dominant usage in sources on that particular pair of individuals. As Chatul, et al., have indicated, there is no one-size-fits-all solution here. For one thing, "partner" even when interpreted as intended (i.e., not as business partner) tends to imply much more than "girl/boyfriend" does, at least a long-term relationship, and depending on the reader it may also imply long-term cohabitation, and might even imply "essentially a married couple but not married for some particular reason like laws in their jurisdiction refusing to permit the union". Of all those I've ever termed "girlfriend" in my life, only two would rise to "partner" level, because of long-term cohabitation. At any rate, it certainly is not true that "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" are too informal; they're the most common usage in news and many other contexts.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:55, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
Follow the sources. I agree with SMcCandlish that "partner" implies a much closer relationship, it's closer to "spouse" than "boyfriend"/"girlfriend", indeed in some cases (e.g. civil partnerships) it is equivalent to "spouse". "Boyfriend"/"girlfriend" are more casual and could be used after a few dates, but partner indicates a degree of long-term commitment. Thryduulf (talk) 09:34, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
  • It is usually not our concern to investigate the exact sexual or romantic situation. I think this is another case where we would want to follow the way the person uses it if we know it. Other..eise, "partner" seems to be the current multi-meaning term. *Btw "lover" is not clear historically; prior to the 20th c., it usually mean suitor, somebody who a person is in love with, with no physical meaning implied).
Ah I did not know that. Thanks. Realistically, "partner" is probably the best term for most romantic relationships. It seems somewhat accepted in the real world. Special cases where there's clearly a romantic relationship (but maybe, best guess based on sources, not sexual, or anyway clearly pretty casual) and we need to mention it are pretty rare and we probably don't need advisement for that. We mostly wouldn't mention it I guess.
"Partner" also means "business partner" and certainly did in older times. But really the reader can mostly get it from context I guess (altho remember we are also writing for ESL readers not familiar with our mores and terms). Herostratus (talk) 17:01, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Comment, I fail to see how anything and everything that's gender neutral "improves readability". Really, the only example I can think of is using the generic singular "they/their" in place of "he" "she" or the exceeding clunky "his or her" (and truly, this we were doing in speech for decades and decades before its recent acceptance in formal writing). Anyway, with regard to significant other: given how fixated society at the present time is with regard to sexual orientation, I think we should avoid using language that that could be reasonably expected to cause wild speculation in readers. But also, I think this is one of the few areas where the subject's self descriptors (about their relationships) may be the best route. Two more things I would note: 'partner' rock typically implies cohabitation as if married, but without being married. If they've not been living together for a good number of years, boyfriend or girlfriend is likely more appropriate. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly: we are not a gossip tabloid ;D. Firejuggler86 (talk) 23:48, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

Use of "Mr."/"Ms." in tables/lists of elected officials

Latest comment: 3 years ago19 comments15 people in discussion

I've twice reverted edits by Entitled2Titled to Loudoun County, Virginia that have introduced "Mr."/"Ms." honorifics into the tables of government officials. I cannot find any other examples of such tables/lists including these, so I do not see any precedent for doing so. The wording of MOS:MR is somewhat vague to me, but my takeaway is that including an honorific on subsequent mentions is inappropriate, but it does not say that including them on the first mention is appropriate. This seems to agree with MOS:HONORIFIC, which states "[i]n general, honorific prefixes—styles and honorifics in front of a name—in Wikipedia's own voice should not be included, but may be discussed in the article." Thus, I believe that the inclusion of such titles contravenes the MOS, and they should be removed. Is there an actual consensus on this and/or is my interpretation reasonable? I searched the talk archives but was unable to find anything definitive. Thanks. --Kinu t/c 17:52, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

I agree with your interpretation. "Mr." and "Mrs." are merely terms of etiquette and shouldn't be used in articles, except for the niche case of historical women for whom we only have their married name ("Mrs. Paul Brown"). Schazjmd (talk) 17:59, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
Also agree. You can look to the general usage in other articles (as you mentioned) as a de-facto expression of the consensus also. MB 18:05, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
My motive behind adding the Mr./Ms. titles was to make it clear the gender of the elected officials. The gender of those in office is something many people care about, and these are not well-known officials (therefore gender may not be common knowledge). Specifically, I am concerned when someone in office has unisex name (Jordan, Taylor, etc.) and their gender is not clear. Entitled2Titled (talk) 18:31, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
We don't need to use Mr/Mrs/Ms with names that have an obvious gender. Almost all of the honorifics you added were unnecessary. Meters (talk) 19:04, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
Gender is irrelevant information in a non-biographical context. --Kinu t/c 19:07, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
I'm fine with using that reasoning and not using the honorifics even when the gender is unclear from the name, but I'm not aware of any consensus to do so. Meters (talk) 19:26, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
While well-meaning, using honorifics to indicate gender is problematic. Some people may have earned genderless honorifics such as Dr. or Adm. or might use different honorifics such as Mx. or Sr. Using Mr. or Ms. could be disrespectful in these instances. If gender is actually an important attribute to describe in a table then add an explicit column instead of honorifics. pburka (talk) 20:50, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
MOS:MRS is clear. We don't generally use Mr. or Mrs. unless in exceptional circumstances (such as mentioning that a women was known as Mrs. Husband's Name, in times when that was the style). This is not an exceptional circumstance, so we shouldn't use them in this case. Additionally, Entitled2Titled's claim that this is intended to disambiguate unisex names, while based on bad premises (why should we need to disambiguate such names) is also dubiously applicable in the list in question. What that list does contain is a number of non-WASPy names. When you find yourself reacting differently to those names than to the WASPy ones, it might be time to question your motivations. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:15, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
I accept the decision of the group, however I do think titles add information for the reader. Titles show whether someone has earned a doctorate or is a man, woman, or does not identify. This is something many people care about as they do want to know, for example, how many women are in elected office. I also resent the suggestion that I am racist and need to question my motivations because I wanted to add titles to a list that contains "non-WASPY names." Entitled2Titled (talk) 22:10, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
For the record, I believe your edits were made in good faith. --Kinu t/c 05:50, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Why are we including lists of nonnotable minor local officials, like school board members, in the first place? And given that we do (which -- in case it's not clear -- I think we shouldn't) why do we list the party affiliations (from voter registrations, presumably) of those holding nonpartisan offices? None of this stuff passes WP:TENYEARTEST. EEng 23:10, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
  • "The gender of those in office is something many people care about"— User:Entitled2Titled, you might care about the gender of the officials, but it should largely be irrelevant. Tony (talk) 08:24, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
    • "Should be" irrelevant and "is irrelevant" are two different things. And for that matter, I am not sure that it ever could be irrelevant. Even if all the socioeconomic inequities between the sexes were to disappear tomorrow (and we all know they aren't), the fact that women are more physically vulnerable than men, and the fact that they are the ones that can get pregnant, will always mean that women and men will not have the exact same perspectives, and a government body with nothing but men in it will not be as effective at serving the interests of all the people as a government body that is more equally representative. So, yes, to a white man it might not matter, but to women and/or minorities, it (justifiably) very well might matter. Firejuggler86 (talk) 23:14, 27 April 2021 (UTC)
Gender (male/female/other) and title (Mr/Mrs/etc) are different things, although the latter is sometimes indicative of the former. If gender is sufficiently important, hypothetically speaking, it would make more sense to add a "Gender" column than include honorifics in the names. Mitch Ames (talk) 23:22, 27 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Agree with EEng that local and county level officials are not noteworthy, and that we should cut some of the lists entirely (Ok with listing state and national level officials). Definitely agree that the gender of the various office holders is irrelevant, and so we should omit the honorifics. Blueboar (talk) 11:32, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
    • Concur with User:Blueboar and User:EEng on these issues. It doesn't make sense for WP to be merely regurgitating information that can be easily obtained from counties' current Web sites. See WP:NOT. The correct way to handle information on local officials can be seen at Los Angeles County. If a particular local government office is really, really important, then it should be able to satisfy Wikipedia:Notability in its own right and then we can mention historical officeholders in that article. I also agree that honorifics should not be used on WP in such tables. --Coolcaesar (talk) 18:04, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
Do reliable sources always use "Mr.", "Mrs." and "Ms."? Do they combine those with other honorifics? Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 12:14, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
@Chatul: In English some papers like The New York Times insist on that but most do not AFAIK. WhisperToMe (talk) 21:12, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

En dashes and merged jurisdictional names

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments4 people in discussion

We have a long-standing problem of confusion about whether to use a hyphen or an en dash in names like Travancore–Cochin (AKA Thiru–Kochi or State of Travancore–Cochin), a merger of the formerly separate Travancore/Thiru and Cochin/Kochi. Despite MOS:DASH being for a long time eminently clear to use an en dash for mergers between coeval/comparable entities (and in other cases involving them, such as relations between or collaborations involving separate entities), there keeps being regurgitative debate about this at WP:RM. I've traced this perennial conflict to the addition of the following to MoS (the MOS:DUALNATIONALITIES subsection of MOS:DASH), seemingly without discussion:

Wrong: Austria–Hungary; the hyphenated Austria-Hungary was a single jurisdiction during its 1867–1918 existence

That's a nonsense "rationale", as every merged jurisdiction (or dual-named meta-jurisdiction) like Travancore–Cochin is "a single jurisdiction during its ... existence". I.e., someone has forced the guideline to directly contradict itself. I've commented out this line, pending further discussion, but believe that it should simply be deleted. I think what has happened here is that someone got confused about Austro-Hungarian Empire using a hyphen, and assumed it must also apply to Austria–Hungary then made up a rationale to get that result. But Austro-Hungarian uses a hyphen for an entirely unrelated reason: Austro- is not a word but a combining form. It's the same kind of construction as Afro-Cuban and Franco-Prussian.

Despite this confusion, the majority of RM discussions have understood the overall gist of MOS:DASH and have concluded to use the en dash for names of merged or superset jurisdictions that have the names or parts of the names of component places in the combined name and which use short horizontal lines to separate those components (thus Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia, etc., etc.). But the injection of this "Austria-Hungary" pseudo-rule has caused and continues to cause confusion and counter-argument, which defeats the purpose of having a clear and consistent guideline. And it has produced some inconsistent results, e.g. North Rhine-Westphalia (which is not northern "Rhine-Westphalia" but North Rhine combined with Westphalia), and Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province, though these do not appear to be the result in most cases of RM discussions being misled by the line quoted above (they mostly seem to be article titles chosen before MOS:DASH existed, or more recently by editors who have no read it).

PS: This stuff has no effect on Wilkes-Barre or Guinea-Bissau or Vitoria-Gasteiz, which are hyphened for entirely different reasons and which are not merged jurisdictions or supra-jurisdictional names. (The first is a place with two kind of randomly chosen namesakes that had nothing to do with the place or each other, and which could as easily have been named Badger-cake or Hospitality-Socrates or Pottery-Holstein. It ended up hyphenated just because it did, and if had been established recently it probably would not be since we don't use hyphens that way in contemporary English. But it has no reason to take an en dash. The second is due to a French convention of using a hyphen to stand in for something like "containing" or "related to" or "associated with"; it means 'the Guinea that has Bissau', basically. German has a directly reversed convention where such a name is applied to the enclosed place not the surrounding one: Berlin-Charlottenburg, meaning essentially 'the Charlottenburg of/in Berlin'. The handful of places with these sorts of names take hyphens are are all former European colonies or are in Europe. The third is a case of two languages' names for the same place being given at once, in this case Spanish and Basque. Various places with names of that kind don't take hyphens, e.g. Papua New Guinea.)
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:22, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

  • From looking over the requested move discussion from 2010 where the dash was changed to a hyphen in Austria-Hungary, there does seem like there was consensus that in general a compound placename should use a hyphen and not a dash. Consensus can obviously change over time, but it should be discussed first before this is officially removed from the guideline. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:18, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
    You seem unclear on the fact that purpose of a guideline talk page is to have such discussion, and this is such a discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:30, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
  • I think the conclusion of the argument (that we ought to use a hyphen) is correct, even if the argument itself is flawed. Perhaps the better argument would be to say that Austria-Hungary is one entity, whereas to use an en dash would imply they are usually separate but somehow related in a particular context. Right, Dallas–Fort Worth has a dash because Dallas and Fort Worth are separate things, connected only by proximity to a metroplex. But the rest of the time, when I say "Dallas" I don't mean "Fort Worth." On the other hand, if I say "Austria" when it should be "Austria-Hungary," I would be wrong: it is not separable from Hungary. JarmihiGOCE (talk) 16:51, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Youch. Tough one. Jarmihi makes a fair point. The counterexamples of North Rhine–Westphalia and Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu Province would use an en dash anyway due to the spaces in the linked components (see the logic of MOS:PREFIXDASH, though it is apparently not mentioned for hyphenated compounds; it should be). Thus, a single compound name and a compound of two names would be distinguished by the use of a hyphen and dash respectively. I am leaning to towards this interpretation. —Quondum 23:07, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

Page number ranges?

Latest comment: 3 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

Does Wikipedia:Manual of Style#In ranges that might otherwise be expressed with to or through include ranges of page numbers, e.g., 123-456 – 123-789? If so, should the first sentence include them? Should there be an example? Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 13:25, 15 April 2021 (UTC)

Your example is unclear. That section does include the example pages 5-7 – 5-9, which is a range between hyphenated page numbers. —Quondum 13:57, 15 April 2021 (UTC)

Contractions of "cannot"

Latest comment: 3 years ago18 comments10 people in discussion

As I said before, contractions are to be avoided in formal writing. However, I was going to say that cannot is usually one word, though "can not" does exist. 68.197.54.51 (talk) 15:04, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your point is. But before we go further: can not and cannot are different. EEng 18:22, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
In what way are they different? Other than the obvious, two words/one word, space/no space. Is can not not just a nonstandard and/or archaic form of cannot? More specifically: are there any cases where 'can not' would be required and 'cannot' would be improper? Firejuggler86 (talk) 23:57, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
No, can not is not just a nonstandard and/or archaic form of cannot. They mean completely different things:
  • "I cannot X" means I am incapable of doing X, or in some way prevented from doing X.
  • "I can not X" means I am capable of not doing X if I so choose; for example: "You say I must do X, but the fact is that, if I wish, I can not do X".
You cannot change can not to cannot, or vice versa, in these examples because to do so would completely change the meaning. Assuming that you do not feel that you cannot believe me about this, then you can believe me about it or you can not believe me about it. EEng 01:40, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
What EEng says makes perfect sense, and I really wish it were a widely recognised distinction. But it is not. Most sources on the web either say the two terms are interchangeable, or that "can not" is more emphatic, or that "can not" should only be used in constructions like "You can not only do this, but also do that". See, for example, [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], [38], and [39]. These aren't all fantastic sources, but they show that EEng's view is not widely held. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 14:21, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
Huh? No, what they say (typically, and as you note a lot of the sources you link aren't that great) is something like "You would use can not when the 'not' forms part of another construction such as 'not only'". My example fits that description. EEng 18:24, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
I think the point is though that while such a construction requires "can not" to be written as two words, writing it as two words is not necessarily limited to such a construction, and using two words instead of one in a passage such as "I can not believe it" does not automatically assign the "not" to the "believe" instead of the "can" (much as "I do not believe it" is clear that the "not" goes with the "do", not the "believe"). The sentence just as easily means "I am incapable of belief" as it mean "I am capable of disbelief". Such a "rule" seems non-existent, because if the meaning is not clear from context anyway, the best thing to do is rephrase. oknazevad (talk) 19:28, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
Adrian J. Hunter is correct. The difference is in agency: "I cannot believe it" states, that a person is unable to believe something. "I cannot do it" states, that a person is unable to do it for some reason, and has little choice about it. Whereas "I can not believe it" states a person's declared ability to choose not to believe something, if presented with some fact. It's equivalent to "I'm able to not believe it". OTOH, cannot is usually equivalent to unable. Can't is a contraction of cannot. The latter is used in speech to avoid any and all ambiguity, so that can and can't would not be confused by any recipients of said text in general, and by listeners in particular. -Mardus /talk 08:05, 15 May 2021 (UTC)
But Mardus, that's not what I said. I said I wish the distinction you're claiming was real, and when I am king, I will mandate it as law. But the distinction you're claiming is not widely recognised. If it were, it would be easy to find multiple reliable sources to prove it. So far no-one has offered any. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 12:14, 15 May 2021 (UTC)
This is true. However, it is also true that "can not" is also sometimes used as an alternative for "cannot" (I've seen it many times, even in supposedly reputable publications). And it shouldn't be. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:35, 15 April 2021 (UTC)
It would be reasonable for a guide to discourage such alternative use, if this ever became an issue. —Quondum 17:41, 15 April 2021 (UTC)
Well, I know that the uncontracted "do not" is not one word, along with "it is" though, since "donot" would be confused with "donut".68.197.54.51 (talk) 20:24, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
Good point. Now then – remembering that, as they say, "When you're up to your ass in alligators, it's hard to remember that your initial objective was to drain the swamp" – was your original post in pursuit of some change to the guideline? EEng 21:34, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
The IP editor previously commented in this discussion - perhaps they meant to put these comments there? GirthSummit (blether) 10:38, 12 April 2021 (UTC)

Capitalization of Black, White, Brown, etc people

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

I was patrolling edit requests and came across this and was wondering if there was an existing consensus about this? It seems like the kind of thing that would already have a megabyte of argument and discussion about. I didn't want to answer the request yea or nae without knowing if I was going to go awry of a guideline or somesuch. Thanks. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 11:07, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Currently, the discussion is at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Discussion about capitalisation of Black (people) and the subsequent section on that page, but I haven't checked whether that led to a MOS update (yet). --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
Thanks. I knew that it would have been discussed, or would be discussed currently. Looks like it's a whole thing. Maybe I'll just close the request with the "get consensus" template and note that "it's a whole big thing." ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 11:31, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
That has been incorporated into MOS:PEOPLANG. Short version: B&W or b&w, but not B&w or b&W. Capital preferred when used with other ethnic terms that are capitalized.--Khajidha (talk) 18:19, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
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