User:Kmm257/sandbox

Draft of Tobacco Politics

(Tobacco Politics lead, revised)

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v t e

Tobacco politics refers to the politics surrounding the use and distribution of tobacco. (new ->) In the United States, from the 1950s until the 1990s, tobacco industries wielded great influence in shaping public opinion on the health risks of tobacco.^[1][2][3] Despite the efforts of public health advocates, scientists, and those affected by smoking, both Congress and courts favored the tobacco industry in policy and litigation.^[2] It was not until the 1990s when public health advocates had more success in litigating against tobacco industries, including the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between major tobacco companies and 46 state attorney generals. Although public opinion in the United States on cigarette smoking is more unfavorable, many large tobacco companies continue to find success internationally.^[1][2]

As of 2018, 169 states have signed the World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), which governs international tobacco control.^[4][5] However, many nations have had difficulty complying with the FCTC, with higher rates of smoking especially in developing nations.^[6][7] There are currently close to one billion smokers worldwide.^[6]

Taxation (small edits)

Tobacco has been taxed by state governments in the United States for decades.^[8] The cumulative revenue of US tobacco taxation exceeded $32 billion in 2010, creating a major source of income for government.^[9]

The

In 2010, the tobacco industry spent $16.6 million on lobbyists to represent the industry to Congress.[12]

Major tobacco lobbying companies include Altria Group (the parent company of Philip Morris USA), Philip Morris International, and Reynolds American.^[13]

Major

In the early 1950s, several studies demonstrated a causal relationship between smoking and lung cancer.

In 1964, the Surgeon General released a report confirming the causal link between smoking and cancer.^[1][2] Tobacco industries formed the Tobacco Institute, a trade association that acted as a lobby for tobacco industries in Congress.^[3] This lobbying was generally successful, as the tobacco industry was well-funded and southern states relied on tobacco revenues.^[2][3] For example, after the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) mandated warning labels on cigarette packages, tobacco companies successfullly requested Congressional regulation in place of FTC regulation.^[2] The Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act (FCLAA) of 1965 originally required cigarette warning labels to include a warning of cancer, but this was removed from the final bill.^[1][2]

Although tobacco companies had considerable influence throughout the twentieth century, anti-tobacco advocates also had some successes. In 1967, anti-tobacco advocates successfully argued that the

Tobacco companies continue to play a large role in politics, although not as extensively as in the twentieth century.[13] In 1990, the contributions of tobacco lobbies totalled to over $70 million.^[13] In 2017, tobacco lobbies paid $21.8 million.^[13] Tobacco companies tend to donate more to Republican candidates, contributing over $50 million since 1990 to Republicans, including Vice President Mike Pence.^[14] Proposals for relaxed electronic cigarette regulation, such as the Cole-Bishop Amendment in the 2017 omnibus bill and FDA Deeming Authority Clarification Act of 2017, have emerged, none have passed yet.^[15] In 2006, courts ordered tobacco companies to run anti-smoking advertisements, but tobacco companies delayed this order through mutliple appeals until 2017.^[16] As of 2017, tobacco companies must now run advertisements detailing the negative health impacts of smoking for a year.^[16]

Litigation

The

There has been an increased number of deaths related to tobacco smoking in the past decades.^[citation needed] People are more aware of the risks and dangers that can be associated with tobacco smoking.^{[citation needed]} People have died as a result of lung cancer from tobacco smoking and were often unable to prove that it was the cigarettes of the tobacco manufacturer that caused the person's death. Tobacco litigation is not new but has involved thousands of people in class-actions as well as individual private lawsuits since the mid-20th century. There was an explosion of tobacco litigations in the mid 1990s, worldwide, but in the United States in particular.^[18]

The first major study that showed the causal link between smoking and lung cancer was published in a study done by Sir Richard Doll in 1950.^[19]

The history of tobacco litigation in the United States can be divided into three waves: (1) from 1954 to 1973, (2) from 1983 to 1992, and (3) from 1994 until today.^[20] During the first two waves, tobacco companies had enormous success, winning all but one of their cases, with the only case they lost, Cipollone v. Liggett, being reversed.^[20][21]

During the first wave, a growing abundance of evidence linked tobacco to death and disease.^[20] Individual smokers filed lawsuits against the tobacco industry, claiming negligence in manufacturing and advertising, breach of warranty, and product liability.^[21] However, the tobacco industry responded by challenging the science of smoking causing disease and claiming that smokers assumed any risks.^[21]

During the second wave, plaintiffs charged tobacco companies with failure to warn about the addiction and disease risk of cigarettes and strict liability.^[21] The tobacco companies argued that people assumed the risks of smoking and that federal laws preempted state laws, which the lawsuits were filed under.^[21] In addition, the tobacco industry poured a massive amount of money into these cases, trying to overwhelm plaintiffs with legal costs.^[20] An internal memorandum by an attorney for the RJ Reynolds tobacco company described their strategy as, “To paraphrase General Patton, the way we won these cases was not by spending all of our money, but by making that other son of a bitch spend all [of] his.”^[20]

The third wave of tobacco litigation was much more successful for plaintiffs, with plaintiffs winning 41% of cases between 1995 and 2005.^[20] It also saw a greater number and variety of lawsuits overall.^[20] State attorney generals charged the tobacco industry of using misleading marketing, targeting children, and concealing the health effects of smoking.^[21] These cases resulted in settlements across all fifty states in the United States.^[21]

Recently, there has been mixed success for plaintiffs in tobacco litigation. In Florida, a large class action lawsuit was rejected, because the court argued that each individual case must be proven.

• 1992: In Cipollone v. Liggett Group, Inc. the US Supreme Court held that the Surgeon General's warning did not preclude suit by smokers against tobacco companies on several claims, and that the federal laws on tobacco regulation aren't worded to override state laws.
• 1995: The Supreme Court of Canada in
  RJR-MacDonald Inc. v. Canada (Attorney General)
  upheld the constitutionality of the federal Tobacco Products Control Act, but struck out the provisions which prevented tobacco advertising and unattributed health warnings.
• March 2001: The US Supreme Court affirmed the Circuit Court's ruling that the
  Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. (FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.
  )
• June 2002: A District Court in Kansas awarded $15 million in punitive damages against R.J. Reynolds Tobacco after calling the company's conduct "highly blameworthy and deserving of significant punishment." (David Burton vs. R.J. Reynold's Tobacco)
*June 2002: A Miami jury held three cigarette companies liable for $37.5 million in a lawsuit involving an ex–smoker who lost his tongue to tobacco–related oral cancer. (Lukacs vs. Philip Morris)
• October 2002: A Los Angeles jury issued $28 billion in punitive damages against Philip Morris. This was later reduced to $28 million. (Betty Bullock vs. Philip Morris)
• 2003: A Madison Country, Illinois jury awarded $10.1 billion against the tobacco company Philips Morris for deceptive cigarette advertising in a class action led by attorney Stephen Tillery (Price v. Philip Morris).[26]
• 2004: A New York jury issued $20 million to the wife of a long-term smoker who died of lung cancer at the age of 57. This was the first time that a New York court had held a tobacco company liable for an individual smoker's death. (Gladys Frankson vs. Brown and Williams Tobacco Corp)
• 2005: In
  Imperial Tobacco v. British Columbia the Supreme Court of Canada found that the provincial Tobacco Damages and Health Care Costs Recovery Act
  , which allowed the government to sue tobacco companies, was constitutionally valid.
• 2007:
  State Farm v. Campbell
  . The appeals court ultimately upheld their original damages.
• 2008: The
  Altria Group v. Good
  US Supreme Court case said that state law is not preempted by a federal law regarding cigarette advertisement regulations.

Claims of design defects allege that tobacco companies designed tobacco products with additional adverse health risks. Examples of design defects include cigarettes that increase addiction risks and deliberately choosing to not develop less harmful cigarettes.[28]

In response, tobacco companies have argued that they have not intentionally made cigarettes more dangerous, but instead carefully and thoughtfully design the least hazardous tobacco product for smokers.^[28]

Strict liability (revised)

The strict liability of the product.

Strict liability means that tobacco companies must be responsible for possible damages or injuries resulting from cigarettes.^[29]

Product liability

The liability of the product lies on the manufacturer.^[30]

Depriving of health hazards information (revised)

There is an ongoing civil court case in Finland, where three plaintiffs have sued tobacco companies on the basis that they marketed "light cigarettes" as non-hazardous to health, a claim the plaintiffs initially believed, before contracting serious lung diseases.[9][10] The Helsinki district court rejected the claim in 2008, and the appeals court considers the appeal in 2010. "Light cigarettes" are actually more hazardous to health than regular cigarettes — they contain less nicotine, so that the smokers tend smoke more of them. "Light cigarettes" were officially recommended against in 1986 and banned in 2002 in the European Union[citation needed]. Other claims in the case are marketing to minors, purposefully aggravating nicotine dependency in smokers and denial of the hazards of passive smoking. The defendant Amer claims that the hazards of smoking have sufficiently been discussed publicly since the 1950s.

Lawsuits against tobacco companies have asserted that tobacco companies mislead the public on the risks of smoking, environmental smoke, and nicotine addiction.^[31]

Environmental smoke (new)

Cases against tobacco companies have found success arguing about the negative consequences of

Another argument in tobacco litigation concerns tobacco-related costs born to third party groups like health insurers. For example, in US Department of Justice v. Philip Morris, Inc (1999), the federal government sued tobacco companies to reimburse the tobacco-related costs on federal programs like Medicare. However, the courts dismissed this claim, showing the mixed success of reimbursement grounds.^[32][31]

Defenses

Volenti non fit injuria

Volenti non fit injuria, or "to a willing person, no injury is done", is a common law doctrine which states, when applied to these cases, that there is no damage to someone who willingly places themselves in a position where they are negatively affected by tobacco consumption.

Contributory negligence

Contributory negligence is a common law defense to a claim based on negligence, that before the cases, the adverse effects were unknown. This has been one of the commonly used defences. Most of them will assert that it was the plaintiff himself that has contributed to his own injury as he has prior knowledge of the harm associated with tobacco smoking.

Tobacco advertising fails to influence non-smokers (new)

Tobacco companies argue that

Tobacco companies claim that epidemiological evidence cannot show direct causation in individuals.^[34] This reasoning was used in the 2005 McTear v. Imperial Tobacco Limited case in Scotland, arguing that the plaintiffs could not reasonably prove that the plaintiffs’ smoking caused lung cancer.^[34] In addition, tobacco companies challenge the way epidemiological evidence is collected.^[34]

Tobacco politics and litigation outside of the United States (new section)

Introduction

Litigation also continues in several countries outside the United States. Citing third party reimbursement, several countries, such as Bolivia, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, have filed lawsuits both in the United States and in their own courts against tobacco industries.^[32] Individual suits have also been filed in a multitude of countries, including Argentina, Finland, France, Japan, Ireland, Israel, Norway, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Turkey.^[32]

Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC)

The

Initially, the concept of an international tobacco control treaty received little enthusiasm.[4] However, in 1998, Gro Harlem Brundtland became director general of the WHO, creating momentum for the FCTC.^[4][7] Organizations and events within the United States also played a key role in the creation and adoption of the FCTC globally. The American Public Health Association helped support the development of the FCTC, while the wave of successful tobacco litigation helped generate interest in tobacco control.^[4][7] In addition, the FCTC lacks mandates on transboundary tobacco issues.^[7] As a result, implementation of the treaty fell short, despite widespread ratification.^[7] In response, organizations such as Bloomberg Philanthropies and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation increased their philanthropic contributions to the WHO.^[7] This resulted in the creation of MPOWER, which focuses on implementation of FCTC.^[7]

Australia

In Australia, tobacco companies have faced several lawsuits, although not to the scale of litigation in the United States.^[32][36] In 1991, the Federal Court found advertisements denying environmental smoke to be misleading.^[32] In the 1999 case Nixon v. Philip Morris (Australia) Ltd, plaintiffs claimed tobacco companies misled them on the risks of smoking, although Courts ruled the case could not continue as representative proceedings (similar to class action lawsuits in the United States).^[32][37] Personal injury cases are less common in Australia, as unsuccessful plaintiffs must pay the legal fees of the defendant, less profit incentives exist for Australian lawyers, and momentum from successful tobacco litigation has not been generated.^[36]

McCabe v British American Tobacco (2002) was the first personal injury case outside the United States to win a verdict against a tobacco company.^[38] The plaintiff Rolah McCabe, who was diagnosed with lung cancer, claimed British American Tobacco Australia misled her in estimating the risk for smoking cigarettes.^[38] The verdict was later overturned, although McCabe died before the court proceedings finished.^[38] This case has been influential in litigation and legislation concerning document destruction, as British American Tobacco destroyed several documents in this case.^[38]

In 2005, a court-enforceable settlement between the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and Philip Morris (Australia) Limited, British American Tobacco Limited, and Imperial Tobacco Australia Limited, was reached.^[39] The companies agreed to stop describing cigarettes as “light” and “mild” and provide $9 million for corrective advertising, in exchange for the ACCC to no longer pursue certain legal action against the companies.^[39] Afterwards, the companies started to describe cigarettes with terms such as “rich”, “classic”, “smooth”, “fine”, “ultimate”, “refined”, and “chilled”.^[39]

Tobacco companies have not been the only defendants in tobacco litigation. In cases regarding environmental smoke, the defendants are often the owners or managers of locations where environmental smoke occurs.^[40][41] In Meeuwissen v Hilton Hotels of Australia Pty Ltd (1997), the plaintiff argued environmental smoke in a nightclub constituted unlawful discrimination based on disability, and was awarded $AU2000 in compensation.^[32] Aside from disability discrimination, environmental smoke lawsuits have also cited common law negligence, occupational health and safety law, and occupiers’ law.^[40] The result of such litigation has been increased bans on smoking in the workplace and certain public places.^[40]

Tobacco companies have also initiated litigation domestically and internationally, claiming government measures against tobacco have infringed on their commercial rights.^[42] In 2011, the Australian government introduced plain packaging legislation.^[43] Philip Morris Asia Limited challenged this directive under a bilateral trade agreement with Hong Kong, but did not succeed.^[44] Cuba, Honduras, Dominican Republic and Indonesia also filed a World Trade Organization complaint, but the WTO upheld the plain packaging law in 2017.^[45]

China

Although China faces many tobacco-related health problems, with over 1.2 million tobacco-related deaths per year, the government has had a limited response.^[46] The tobacco industry provides 7 to 10 percent of tax revenue for the government, while also providing many jobs in agriculture, sales, and other businesses.^[46] In addition, the government considers anti-smoking measures as potentially destabilizing, given the resentment and unrest it could cause.^[46]

The tobacco industry and some bureaucratic institutions oppose anti-smoking measures. In China, the tobacco industry is heavily monopolized.

Some regional governments also oppose tobacco control policies. For example, in Yunnan Province, tobacco is the largest industry, with tobacco taxes supplying one half of its local government revenue.^[46] Other provinces like Guizhou, Henan, and Sichuan, also rely heavily on revenue from tobacco production.^[46]

The Chinese government has implemented some tobacco control measures. Through the 1980s and 1990s, the national government and local governments implemented various bans on smoking in public places.

After the Meiji Restoration in the nineteenth century, Japan began taxing tobacco.^[47][48] Historically, tobacco revenue has been used to fund military endeavors.^[47][48] In the late nineteenth century, following the deficits from the Sino-Japanese War and in preparation for the Russo-Japanese War, the government imposed a monopoly over tobacco production.^[47][48] In 1985, this monopoly was privatized into what is now Japan Tobacco (JT), although the government still exhibits great influence over and benefits from tobacco tax revenue.^[47][48] In 1999, Japan Tobacco created its international branch, Japan Tobacco International (JTI).^[47] JTI is now the world’s third largest transnational tobacco corporation (TTC).^[47]

In 2014, the Tokyo High Court ruled that there was not definitive scientific evidence that passive smoking causes cancer, although the evidence they were presented was discredited outside of Japan.^[49]

In 2017, in preparation for the 2020 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games hosted in Tokyo, the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry called to ban smoking in public facilities.^[48] Japan has some of the least stringent tobacco control measures in the world.^[50] The food service industry, which includes public premises like restaurants and bars, strongly opposed this measure.^[48] In 2018, the plan for a total smoking ban was revised to include certain exceptions, such as separate rooms for smokers in restaurants in exempting “small-scale” establishments.^[51]

Russia

In Russia, smoking is very prevalent, with tobacco industries wielding great influence in Russian politics.^[52] Several Russian Duma members have also worked within the tobacco industry.^[52] After a protest caused by cigarette shortages in 1990, transnational tobacco companies began to invest in the Russian tobacco market, particularly in production.^[52] This growth in industry has been accompanied by an increase in smoking, and Russia has the highest rates of smoking in Europe.^[52]

Although the Russian government has attempted to implement tobacco prevention and control programs, most of these have had limited success. In the mid-1990s, the

In 2017, the Ministry of Health proposed a cigarette ban that would apply to all born after 2014, although some have expressed concern that a ban would result in a cigarette black market.[53]

See also

• A Frank Statement
• Operation Berkshire
• Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement
• Tobacco MSA (Alabama)
• Tobacco MSA (Hawaii)
• Tobacco MSA (New York)
• Merchants of Doubt and 2014 film Merchants of Doubt based on the 2010 book

Week 6 - Discussion Questions

• What do you think of Wikipedia's definition of "neutrality"?
  • Wikipedia sees itself as sharing facts without taking sides. Although this seems simple, I think it can be a lot harder to do. Writers come in with their own opinions and biases, so divorcing these predispositions when writing is not necessarily intuitive. For example, in writing my article on Tobacco Politics, I am trying to stay neutral on how I feel about the tobacco industry, even though the fact that smoking is harmful seems like common sense to me.
• What are the impacts and limits of Wikipedia as a source of information?
  • Wikipedia is extremely helpful in disseminating easily accessible information on a wide range of topics. It is especially helpful for introducing concepts for beginners or people unfamiliar with a topic, while its neutrality means that differing opinions are all represented. One limitation of Wikipedia is that anyone can contribute, so unless someone catches a mistake or error, it can go uncorrected. As Wikipedia is so widely used, misinformation (intentional or not) can be particularly harmful.
• On Wikipedia, all material must be attributable to reliable, published sources. What kinds of sources does this exclude? Can you think of any problems that might create?
  • In the context of medical articles, one qualification for "reliable" sources is for the sources to represent consensus. This can be problematic for topics that are "popular" in that they receive extensive news coverage. Especially when "fake news" concerns many people, having Wikipedia as a source of neutral, unbiased information is incredibly helpful in countering misinformation. Because many people rely on Wikipedia for at least basic knowledge on an unfamiliar topic, if not enough medical articles are written to generate consensus, a Wikipedia page for that topic may not exist. As a result, some people might turn to news that is not entirely factual.
• If Wikipedia was written 100 years ago, how might its content (and contributors) be different? What about 100 years from now?
  • I think its content would be less accurate than it is today, as we we have made great advancements in human knowledge since 100 years ago. In addition, the breadth of articles would be reduced, as a century ago, fewer people had access to education and the Internet has facilitated the spread of information at a rapid pace. In a century from today, it could be possible that computers automatically generate and write Wikipedia pages.

Week 5 - What I want to work on

• Improving the lead
• Adding missing citations
• Expanding the history sections of the litigation section
  • https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/settlement/timelines/fullindex.html
  • Explain the lack of success in the first several decades
  • Explain why litigation (as opposed to legislation?) was used as a tool
• Adding more to the non-US litigation section
• Expand the grounds of claims / defense subsections of the litigation section
• Adding more to the tactics of the tobacco lobby, including recent actions regarding e-cigarettes
• Use the syllabus to find more information

Week 4 - Selecting an Article

Discussion

• Blog posts and press releases are considered poor sources of reliable information.
  • These are not verified sources, don't represent consensus, and often are not neutral.
• What are some reasons you might not want to use a company's website as the main source of information about that company?
  • The company has an incentive to show a one-sided view of the company, so it might not be the most accurate source.
• What is the difference between a copyright violation and plagiarism?
  • Copyright violation is using things like images without the owner's permission, while plagiarism is trying to pass off someone else's words/ideas as your own.
• What are some good techniques to avoid close paraphrasing and plagiarism?
  • Try to read the entire text and summarize the key points in your own words.
  • Cite the source!

Bibliography

I will try to improve the page for tobacco politics. I think the introduction, taxation section, lobby section, and history section can be expanded. It looks like citations need to be added for several points, and the grounds of claims and defenses sections have been marked as needing expansion. I also think a section on e-cigarettes should be included (possibly within lobbying). There could also be a cross-national section to look at other countries as well.

Lobby

• https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1965/09/the-quiet-victory-of-the-cigarette-lobby-how-it-found-the-best-filter-yet-congress/304762/
• https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/13/tobacco-industry-trump-administration-ties
• http://www.who.int/tobacco/en/atlas24.pdf
• https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/11/02/500212602/why-tobacco-companies-are-spending-millions-to-boost-a-cigarette-tax
• https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/big-tobacco-in-2017-full-steam-ahead_us_590a3e36e4b05279d4edc24b
• https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/low-tar-cigarettes/481116/
• https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/13/tobacco-industry-america-poor-west-virginia-north-carolina
• https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/big-tobacco-is-still-in-the-business-of-deceiving-americans_us_5a202d96e4b0392a4ebbf5f3

History

• https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/settlement/timelines/fullindex.html
• http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/06/19/tobacco.decline/
• DOI: 10.1002/j.1538-165X.2012.tb00732.x
• https://www.gq.com/gallery/blowing-smoke-tobacco-us-politicians
• http://www.jstor.org/stable/3331040
• http://www.publichealthlawcenter.org/topics/tobacco-control/tobacco-control-litigation (could also be used for grounds of claims/defenses)
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0009.2009.00555.x

E-cigarettes

• https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/03/us/politics/e-cigarettes-vaping-cigars-fda-altria.html
• https://www.publicintegrity.org/2016/03/25/19468/how-big-tobacco-lobbies-safeguard-e-cigarettes

Cross-national perspective

• Japan: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2017/04/23/commentary/japan-commentary/poverty-politics-tobacco-policy/#.WpMUlma-IWo
• China: https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-political-mapping-of-chinas-tobacco-industry-and-anti-smoking-campaign/

Defense

• DOI: 10.1136/tc.2006.016956

Week 2 - Evaluate Wikipedia

Article Evaluation

The article I chose was "Radical mastectomy."^[54]

One area I think it undercovers is the shift from radical mastectomies to lumpectomies, as well as the role of Bernard Fisher and medical feminisim in producing this shift. I don't think it clearly explains the problems with radical mastectomies that produced the shift to lumpectomies.

The sources are from reliable medical sources, and the citations I checked seemed to work.

On the Talk Page, it says that this page is a part of WikiProject Medicine and WikiProject Women's Health, and was part of a Wiki Education Foundation project. Both WikiProjects rate the article as a C-Class for quality, meaning that the article could use more work.

What's a content gap?

• Wikipedians often talk about "content gaps." What do you think a content gap is, and what are some possible ways to identify them?
  • I think a content gap is where relevant information on a topic is missing. Some ways to identify a content gap is to research the topic well to understand what main points and perspectives should be represented.
• What are some reasons a content gap might arise? What are some ways to remedy them?
  • Sometimes the author may not fully understand the topic they are writing about. To remedy this is to research from varied sources. The input of other editors would also be helpful. Another reason for a content gap is that a new development in the topic may have occurred since the last time the page was updated. To remedy this, Wikipedia users should stay caught up with developments in their topic.
• Does it matter who writes Wikipedia?
  • I think Wikipedia is very democratic in that anyone can edit it. However, people who have more expertise or knowledge of the topic may be better suited to writing the article. On the other hand, anyone can become an expert (or close to an expert) in the topic by researching extensively.
• What does it mean to be "unbiased" on Wikipedia? How is that different, or similar, to your own definition of "bias"?
  • Unbiased Wikipedia writers don't write with an agenda or aim to persuade the reader. They simply present the information on a topic in an informative, accessible manner. Their personal opinion on the topic should not show in the article; instead, all claims should be presented in a balanced, well-supported way. I think this is similar to my own definition of bias, since I think bias relates to how subjective people can be. Both Wikipedia and my own definition of unbiased mean an emphasis on objectivity.

good job grade A RJBazell (talk) 18:11, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

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