Talk:List of states and union territories of India by fertility rate

Consensus to use templates {{DecreaseNeutral}} and {{IncreaseNeutral}}.

In accordance with Wikipedia's

Neutral Point of View and other policies, there is general agreement that Wikipedia should avoid asserting a favorable or unfavorable stance on the data. Alsee (talk) 22:43, 16 August 2020 (UTC)[reply

]

Currently the table uses template(s) DecreasePositive() in columns 1981-99 and 1999-16.

Question: What is the best template for columns 1981-99 and 1999-16?

1. (a) Template:DecreaseNeutral -- This template is a grey down-arrow indicates decrease that is neither viewed in a positive(green) or negative(red) light and is not noticeable.
2. (b) Template:IncreaseNeutral -- This template is a grey up-arrow indicates increase that is neither viewed in a positive(green) or negative(red) light and is not noticeable.
3. (c) Template:DecreasePositive -- This template is a green down-arrow that indicates decrease that is viewed in a positive light and is predisposed towards a viewpoint.
4. (d)
   Template:DecreaseNegative
   -- This template is a red down-arrow that indicates decrease that is viewed in a negative light and is predisposed towards a viewpoint.
5. (e) Template:IncreaseNegative -- This template is a red up-arrow that indicates increase that is viewed in a negative light and is predisposed towards a viewpoint.
6. (f)
   Template:IncreasePositive
   -- This template is a green up-arrow that indicates increase that is viewed in a negative light and is predisposed towards a viewpoint.
7. (g) No template
8. (h) Other. Please identify.

Manabimasu (talk) 17:45, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Survey

• Neutral (grey arrows), weakly - I didn't ever realize this might be a controversial issue, but assuming it is, and that's the reason for this RFC, using a neutral color seems to be the obvious choice. If either a green or a red arrow can be viewed as taking a side on a controversial issue, wikipedia should avoid using either. However, I don't see any discussion as to what the level of controversy around this is. Perhaps someone can shed some light on this? Unless it's well agreed on by reliable sources though, we should avoid assigning value to an increase or decrease. Arathald (talk) 00:27, 22 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Edit: the discussion below has convinced me to strike out the "weakly" in my vote. Besides the NPOV implications, there's extremely good practical reasons for this. In addition to the maintenance issues, I think Danre98's point makes using anything but neutral arrows a nonstarter. I'd be interested to hear the opinions of more editors at this point. Arathald (talk) 09:36, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• Neutral per above, and also this: When the birth rate goes from above 2.1 to below 2.1, this tasks Wikipedians with deciding whether it is good, bad, or neutral. In edge/close cases (as to whether it was more neutral or good/bad), this would constitute
  Summoned by bot) --Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 01:52, 23 July 2020 (UTC)[reply
  ]

See the discussion below - there's definitely good reason to consider 2.1 to be an objective level for population replacement, but there's still the question of whether we should contribute a value judgment to that. If it's truly entirely uncontroversial that population replacement is the correct goal, it should be safe to treat 2.1 as a target and I'd change my vote. However, if there's any controversy about whether the population should be reduced, replaced, or increased, it's best to stay neutral. Arathald (talk) 01:54, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Arathald, I did. Moved the rest of my response outside the survey into the discussion. Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 02:36, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• Neutral (grey arrows, 1(a) and 2(b)), since Wikipedia should not assign a subjective positivity or negativity to the direction of change regardless of government policy. As a side note, the numbers in the two "Change" columns are very confusing to me because they are not equal to the difference between the numbers in the start and end years. What are these numbers? < Atom (Anomalies) 05:17, 7 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Threaded discussion

• At first, the and seemed to have the neutral sense. It neither seemed to encourage or condone population control. Then I read this article which stated that the targeted fertility rate is 2.1. So a combination of ,,, and can be an option for each row depending on the change relative to the target. For example, if the fertility rate fell below 2.1 would be used likewise if a low fertility rate increase toward 2.1 then . The other two is when a fertility rate above 2.1 reaches 2.1 then and a fertility rate above 2.1 which increase over a time would have a . There isn't a style manual on templates on infoboxestables but the thoughts of others in this rfc can start the discussion.Manabimasu (talk) 05:07, 14 July 2020 (UTC);Manabimasu (talk) 12:40, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • As someone with no direct context on the politics involved, your suggestion strikes me as *more* POV than having a standard (e.g. all the up arrows are green and all the down arrows are red), since it attributes weight to the specific value of 2.1. Is 2.1 generally recognized by reliable sources as an uncontroversial and desirable goal both to meet and to not exceed, or is there disagreement about this number? I'd support your suggestion if and only if this number is generally considered uncontroversial. Arathald (talk) 00:22, 22 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  @Arathald:The government of India has a target of 2.1 which is viewed as the optimal fertility rate see here https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2018/5/22/17376536/fertility-rate-united-states-births-women#:~:text=The%20%E2%80%9Creplacement%E2%80%9D%20fertility%20rate%20of,the%20optimal%20level%20for%20stability . There are two sources that claim that 2.1 is the target

  • https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/fertility-rates-exceed-target-in-a-fourth-of-india/article8835853.ece
  • https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/what-works-for-india-s-family-planning-programme/story-ETZyCMNAYFIHa2P937ZTEP.html

  . This is a government goal provided by sources. I did find disagreement from sources on population control in general but I don't know if that can be expressed in the list columns.

  • https://www.orfonline.org/research/why-india-must-move-policy-away-from-population-control-50032/
  • https://thewire.in/rights/india-population-control-policy

  Wouldn't government goals be more appropriate for the choice of the template instead of general showing of change? An asterisk in the column header can be inserted that the template is chosen based on government target. Thoughts?Manabimasu (talk) 06:02, 22 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  @Manabimasu: The second two articles only support the assertion that 2.1 is the rate that the government is targeting, which I don't think is the most relevant thing here. The Vox article, however, does cite 2.1 as a widely-accepted replacement rate in a global context, and following the chain of their citations leads to this academic study, which uses 2.1 as the replacement birth rate for developed nations: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7834459/. Given that, unless someone can show there's significant controversy over this number, I think it's safe to say that it's widely accepted that 2.1 is the replacement rate. However, I still have a question of whether there's any controversy over whether replacement is the right goal - in other words, is it a common view, or an uncommon view by particularly qualified or notable people, that population reduction or increase should be the goal? Wikipedia isn't in the business of saying what should be, so if there's any controversy on that point, we should still remain neutral and default to the grey arrows. If it's completely uncontroversial that the goal should be replacement, I think it's safe to use colored arrows indicating 2.1 as an ideal. Arathald (talk) 01:50, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  @Arathald: Can't we have a note in the table header that that arrows reflect government targets and so the templates are colored? I don't know how I can prove that fertility rate is uncontroversial. The topic itself has many opinions. To be safe, I will agree that there is controversy, but a note should help in a neutral point of view because the templates reflect government opinion not that of wikipedia or the editors.Manabimasu (talk) 21:17, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  @Manabimasu: We can't treat a government's position on a matter as NPOV if there's any legitimate dissent or disagreement about it. It would be entirely appropriate to present the government's position with the citation you gave, but to use it as the basis for Wikipedia's own content can't be neutral if we consider the topic to be controversial, any more than we'd accept something any other world government said as inherently true and neutral (I won't mention any specifically, but I think we can all think of several examples of governments we don't trust to disseminate neutral information). This is especially true as the "correct" approach is inherently subjective. I think WP:NPOV may be a bit of a moot point, however, as I think there's a much stronger practical and WP:OR reason that this won't work. See the discussion below. Arathald (talk) 02:19, 29 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• My main point was that the proposal using positive and negative arrows causes issues when the birth rate goes from above 2.1 to below 2.1. Example: Say that the birth fertility rate of an area goes from 2.7 to 1.5. Is it good, bad, or so-so(neutral)? I would say probably neutral. What about 2.6 to 1.5? 2.5 to 1.5? 2.4 to 1.5? 2.3 to 1.5? Even 2.2 to 1.5? For that final example, I would say negative. If you answered all the above questions in order, at some point you would probably start answering "negative". The inevitable determination of said point constitutes
  WP:OR unless the government of India has a chart/table lying around saying what birth rate changes are positive, negative, and neutral. That is my main point. I said "per Arathald" because I thought it was a good argument, even if it was a weak one. --Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 02:17, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply
  ]

Addendum: I recognize that we don't have to deal with neutral arrows if we don't want to. If we used only positive and negative, the same issue would occur, but if the hypothetical example 'started' at 2.6 to 2.0, then went 2.6 to 1.9, and so on and so forth until it got to 2.6 to 1.5 (and continued as above). A point would still be set where the assessment of "positive" suddenly changed to "negative". --Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 02:30, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Addendum 2: Maybe next time I should read the discussion more closely next time. Another option is if the birth rate went from, say, 3.2 to 2.0 to make the arrow negative because it went below 2.1. I disagree because it decreased in a "good" direction 11 times as much as it decreased in a "bad" direction. What about 3.1 to 2.0? 3.0 to 2.0? The same thing occurs as above, where we are forced to draw a line/mark a point between the good increases and the bad decreases. --Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 02:47, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't consider these sorts of scenarios, but this is a very good practical reason to avoid green/red arrows for such a statistic. I was coming here to add to my argument up above another practical argument against this: it's likely to be a maintenance nightmare, since this discussion shows that the proper treatment of the arrow isn't obvious. I'm more than convinced to change my opinion above. Arathald (talk) 09:29, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• WP:NPOV, and the practicality of deciding what color the arrows should be to be suitably convincing or if you'd like to make an argument for using colored arrows. Arathald (talk) 09:44, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply
  ]

i prefer to use colored arrows for 2 reasons:
1 - the government is in process of trying to manage fertility rates to deal with overpopulation and the resulting negative effects. 2,1 is the target overall for the country, that's why any declines in fertility is displayed with green arrows, even if already below 2.1 since overall target hasn't been reached yet.
2 - the color are more aesthetically pleasing. in fact If it was up to me, i'd rather remove the grey arrows altogether.Belevalo (talk) 10:16, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• @Belevalo: I feel like the way it is currently displayed makes some sense, however, I feel like places like Kerala and Sikkim may have issues if their current fertility rate stays the same. Provinces (like Kerala and Sikkim) can have underpopulation issues even if others have overpopulation issues because it's not like the Indian government can just pick up a million or several thousand people from one place and drop them in another to correct population imbalances. Because of that, I feel like Kerala and Sikkim's rate should be listed as negative. The fertility rate of each individual province matters to that specific province and not just to India as a whole, so we need to judge whether the fertility rate of each province is positive, negative, or possibly neutral (if we were to use those arrows). If you want to show how India as a whole is doing, in my opinion, the proper place to do that is in the "India" row and not in each province's arrow. --Happy editing, Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 10:54, 28 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Belevalo: I would buy this argument (green arrow for down, red arrow for up) for India's overall population, assuming that overpopulation being a problem isn't horribly controversial. I don't know for sure that it's not, but I'll readily accept that unless someone would like to make an argument that "India has an overpopulation problem" isn't NPOV. For individual provinces, Danre98's point makes me wary of using either because then we as editors become the judge of which provinces are overpopulated and which aren't, unless there's a widely agreed reputable source we can use for that data (a nonpartisan government agency, for example). As I'm entirely unfamiliar the politics of India except at a very base level, I'll have to leave it to other editors to educate me on these points. Arathald (talk) 02:28, 29 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Arathald: You bring a question. What is overpopulation? I would agree based on the 2.1 reference,if that is uncontroversial, that India is “overfertile”. The question is what is the reference population number? India can be thought of as its own continent. For example, the European Union where each member state has their own language and subculture, but India is more of a stronger union. For example, if Europe was its own country it would easily be as of now the 3rd largest country in population, but overpopulated? In order to say so, we need to first know the carrying capacity of the land/sea mass as a reference. In the end, the sources should speak not an editor like me. Following this discussion, I would say say plainly to avoid editors having a NPOV dispute “India has a high fertility rate relative to the government target of 2.1^[1][2]" instead. Manabimasu (talk) 23:24, 29 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Manabimasu: While I agree that the language you propose seems appropriate, the RFC is about the arrows, not about phrasing in captions or other parts of the article. Even with a disclaimer like that, using anything but neutral arrows in a chart is implicitly making a value judgment about what should be. Overall, I see an okay argument to using colored arrows for the total population, but I also don't see a compelling reason not to simply use neutral arrows besides that they're visually more interesting. Arathald (talk) 19:11, 30 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@AnomalousAtom: I agree that the change should be the difference. Now, why it is not I am not sure you could look at the history of the page.Manabimasu (talk) 04:58, 15 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

AnomalousAtom, read Beevalo's statement above. Danre98^{(talk^contribs)} 10:34, 15 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion revising original question

• likely a Malformed RfC -- I suggest this be withdrawn and editors collaborate on whatever the question is rather than have respondents try to guess what is being asked. This page is a list. There is no infobox. Are you proposing that an infobox be added? If so, what infobox would that be? And where would said infobox say something about positive, negative, etc.? The question is too confusing for non-involved editors to answer.--David Tornheim (talk) 11:12, 14 July 2020 (UTC) Removed. Concerns about Original question addressed below. Thx! --David Tornheim (talk) 18:33, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@David Tornheim: I meant table.Manabimasu (talk) 12:40, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Manabimasu: Thanks. That helps. Can you provide a list of options in the question, and explain the difference as neutrally as possible? Is there already a choice that has been made? If so, what is it? Since only you and I are the only ones looking at it, I don't think you have to be so careful about tracking the changes. I won't object to your revising the entire question above to make it clearer, and we can move this section to something like "Discussion revising original question."

How about changing the original question to something like this:

Currently the table uses template(s) _____ and _____ in columns 1981-99 and 1999-16; [<--- Use this if templates are being used already]

Currently the table does not use any template in columns 1981-99 and 1999-16. [<--- Use this if no template is being used]

Question: What is the best template for columns 1981-99 and 1999-16?

(a) Template:DecreaseNeutral -- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(b) Template:IncreaseNeutral -- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(c) Template:DecreasePositive -- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(d)

Template:DecreaseNegative

-- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(e) Template:IncreaseNegative -- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(f)

Template:DecreaseNegative

-- [include short description of how the function of this template is different than the others]

(g) No template

(h) Other. Please identify.

--David Tornheim (talk) 16:53, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@David Tornheim: Thanks for the rfc feedback. Are there other neutral changes I can make?Manabimasu (talk) 17:45, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for listening to my advice. Looks great!

I'll give my feedback when I have more time to review. I created survey section for short answers. I suggest you add your short answer there, or you can wait to see what others say. If you haven't, check out some other RFC's to see typical short answers. --David Tornheim (talk) 18:36, 14 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]