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Classification of whiteblacklisted media outlet Smashing Interviews Magazine as a reliable source

Hello,

I was referred to this page by David Fuchs. I'm the publisher of Smashing Interviews Magazine (smashinginterviews.com), which is highly cited by worldwide mainstream media and is a notable media outlet that conducts 1-1 interviews with high profile people of all genres. We have been established for over a decade. We have been whitelisted for "spamming" for the best part of our existence and considered an "unreliable source" by Wikipedia, which has led to embarrassment, when others attempted to cite our articles and inuired about our being classified as "unreliable." We have been ongoing targets of hacking, which likely led to the original spamming whitelisting and the classification as an "unreliable source." My mission is thusly twofold: (a) to be reclassified as a reliable source. (b) to be removed from the whitelist.

Here are examples of our Smashing Interviews Magazine (smashinginterviews.com) articles being cited by major press outlets:

Source: Adweek

Article: https://www.adweek.com/tv-video/ed-asner-mary-tyler-moore-show-lou-grant/

Source: The New York Times

Article: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/movies/candida-royalle-maker-of-x-rated-films-dies-at-64.html

Source: The Washington Post

Article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/george-kennedy-oscar-winning-character-actor-of-cool-hand-luke-dies-at-91/2016/02/29/f4451a92-df2f-11e5-8d98-4b3d9215ade1_story.html

Source: People magazine

Article: https://people.com/movies/kelly-mcgillis-returns-to-acting-on-her-own-terms/

Source: ABC News

Article: https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/things-knew-princess-bride/story?id=25248519

Also, here is an interview by the Reynolds School of Journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno, NPR radio/podcast "Open Room Media."

Source: Open Room Media

Article: https://openroommedia.com/2017/04/004-smashing-interviews-a-smart-pivot/

Open Room Media about page: https://openroommedia.com/about-2/

Thank you for your consideration,

Marc Parker Publisher Smashing Interviews Magazine— Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

Note (which has not necessarily anything to do with reliability, though may give context to above claims): this was blacklisted (not whitelisted) by user:Ckatz back in 2010 after spamming by site owners. In 2013 someone with a conflict of interest asked for delisting. I am checking for continued attempts to spam now. --Dirk Beetstra T C 13:36, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Just adding to this that the original reason for the blacklisting by Ckatz was 'history of self-promotion, IPs adding links', not a judgement of the site's reliability. Jr8825 • Talk 13:43, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
@Jr8825: I agree, I cannot find any judgement regarding reliability, though showing that one is a reliable source does increase your chances at whitelisting / de-blacklisting (though, we generally do not grant that when site-owners request that).
@all: IP claims here that the spamming was due to being hacked (in other words, a kind of a
Joe Job?). --Dirk Beetstra T C
14:06, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

Dirk Beetstra is correct. This all happened early on in the publications existence, 10 years ago. The magazine is one-on-one interviews only. The interviews are the primary sources for numerous articles by major media outlets, a sample of which I provided links to above. A rep for one of our interviewees attempted to add an interview link to a Wikipedia page and was told they couldn't because we're an unreliable source, which we obviously are not. No one from our outlet has ever added links to any page, nor have we self-promoted. This situation is an ongoing source of contention and embarrassment, which is amplified by the fact that we are dealing with high-profile people.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk)

We don't want a rep for an interviewee adding it to their client's Wikipedia page - they have a conflict of interest as well. That sort of thing is part of the reason your site ended up blacklisted in the first place. --Aquillion (talk) 09:39, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Three things: I don't have any control over the actions of a famous person's rep. Why should that get my org banned from Wikipedia? Also, that's not the point. I only mentioned that story due to the fact that it was that particular situation which brought it to my attention that we were not considered a reliable source. lastly, if we weren't a reliable source, why would a famous person's rep want to deal with us in the first place?— Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

If interviews (which are the backbone of journalism) are considered to be very low down on the list of sources Wikipedia accepts, why then does Interview magazine (Andy Warhol's publication) have a Wikipedia entry and not us? Why are we being held responsible for something hackers did to sabotage our publication's reputation 10 years ago? We have many questions, but no real answers. How can we rectify this ridiculous situation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

By walking away, because it's not actually ridiculous. Wikipedia uses reliable independent secondary sources, your magazine is not one of those, your only proposed use case is a violation of our policies as well, and no Wikipedian in good standing has made any request for a link. Case closed. Guy (help! - typo?) 21:06, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it is ridiculous, and case is not closed. Hackers sabotaged our site 10 years ago. They have not done anything since then to sabotage the site. No one has. We certainly have not. There is nothing there to warrant a lifetime ban. You have absolutely no proof that we are an unreliable source. We are cited by major media outlets around the world, in textbooks, in academic papers and magazines. We are a primary source for secondary sources as shown to you in several links. Your argument holds no merit, so this appears to be a personal vendetta you have against us personally. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

To get your publication removed from the blacklist you need to post to MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#Proposed removals. The blacklist for spam was 10 years ago. I think enough time has passed that whatever problem it was meant to address is no longer an issue.
The source is not mentioned at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources, so there is no determination of reliability. There is a distinction between reliability of a publisher and those of people interviewed. What we expect from a publisher is that their published interviews accurately reflect what the person said. Rarely would we consider statements made in interviews to be reliable. Journalists however have the expertise to determine what is or is not reliable and we accept their judgment, but use their articles as sources rather than the original interview.
TFD (talk) 04:51, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Disagree with TFD's "I think enough time has passed that whatever problem it was meant to address is no longer an issue" – A
    WP:RSN discussion in that request, I suppose a chance for the site being whitelisted would be rather low. And it is, of course, of little use to discuss the reliability issue (which is indeed a separate & undecided issue) in the appropriate place, i.e. here, as long as the site is blacklisted. --Francis Schonken (talk
    ) 05:42, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

First of all, we were blacklisted 10 years ago due to hacking/spoofing sabotage, not because we were deemed unreliable. We were told it was because of "spamming" and that the ban would never be lifted. After that initial sabotage by hackers, nothing else has occurred over a 10-year span. So why should we continue to be blacklisted for that? We should not be. As far as being a reliable source, our interviews absolutely accurately reflect what the person said. Each person is recorded on the phone or in person. We have their exact words when we transcribe each interview and have never been told "I never said that" or anything like that. Also given to you here were many links to mentions and citations from major news outlets that absolutely would not use us as a source if we were not reliable. Colleges would not use our interviews in their curriculum of study, textbooks would not use us as a source if we were not reliable. Example: From the "Life" book titled "Fleetwood Mac" using our interview with the band's producer Ken Caillat - "Who's this? Oh yeah, you're the guy from 20 years ago, Caillat told journalist Melissa Parker on Smashinginterviews.com in 2012." The editors of Life magazine are the authors of the book. Link - https://books.google.com/books?id=RF7UDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT103&lpg=PT103&dq=%22journalist%20melissa%20parker%22&source=bl&ots=ouNdUi1CWI&sig=ACfU3U2aKxYQ3Z45sx9GUHnuAhuse3xMaw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjK1dzSnqfrAhWSiK0KHbS2BakQ6AEwC3oECAEQAQ&fbclid=IwAR3euchJGplv4E9qK81-bjPsPH9yHSk8zKF5-ijw3Zgy1qrrl484peW5YNg#v=onepage&q=%22journalist%20melissa%20parker%22&f=false Publisher and journalist Marc Parker's Google knowledge panel - g.co/kgs/aU8ENz Marc Parker, Publisher, Editor-in-Chief, Journalist verified at Muckrack - https://muckrack.com/marc-parker Smashing Interviews Magazine - verified at Muckrack - https://muckrack.com/media-outlet/smashinginterviews Melissa Parker, founder - https://muckrack.com/melissaparker Muckrack is a peer-reviewed journalistic database that requires its entrants to be verified by other journalists. Smashing Interviews Magazine is and always has been a reliable source and unequivocally deserves a Wiki entry as do the founders, Marc Parker and Melissa Parker (credentialed journalists, current publishers of Smashing Interviews Magazine, former publishers of a news magazine and authors of a book published by The History Press/Arcadia, a biography on famed industrialist Daniel Pratt and the city he founded, which is an installation of a series of American books called the "brief history series.") Link to the book - g.co/kgs/zZGqkf -- Melissa Parker— Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

  • As user:Francis Schonken, and out of experience, I also disagree with user:TfD's assessment that they 'think enough time has passed'. We have cases of 10 years on our list. Spam/COI editing/promotional editing/paid editing does not just go away after a bit of time. Having yourself positively expressed on Wikipedia pays your bills, some of these 'spammers' (to put them under one flag) come back every (other) year asking to be delisted, or they find workarounds and/or use other domains. For other sites it is not the company itself that is necessarily responsible, but people who 'use' the site (compare it to petition sites and porn sites, I am not aware of cases where owners/representatives spamming porn sites, but the sites get heavily abused).
The above discussion suggests that this site has limited use as a reliable source. I would therefore suggest editors who want to use this to ask on the whitelist for their specific case.  IF we have consensus that this site is of general use (as a reliable source), or we get overwhelmed with whitelist requests that get granted we can revisit the blacklisting. Until then:  Defer to Whitelist. --Dirk Beetstra T C 13:35, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Again, the website is NOT a spam site, and it is NOT used as such. It has NEVER been used as such. The reason for creating the site was as a pivot from the news magazine we were running which was well established. This pivot is detailed in the link above regarding an interview that was done on us by the Univ. of Nevada Las Vegas Reynolds School of Journalism on us being journalistic media entrepreneurs. Again, the publication would also not be used as a reliable source for major media outlets, etc., if it was a spam site. It was founded as an interview magazine, and shortly after we started the magazine, we became aware that hackers or competition of ours posted a couple of links on interviewee's pages to sabotage the publication. That was 10 years ago. They have not sabotaged us since, and publishers Marc Parker and Melissa Parker are not spammers. Thus, there is no reason for the blacklist. And why would you say that the site has a limited use as a reliable source? Should we post here NUMEROUS links to mentions and citations? Do you not see Muckrack as a reliable source? What other proof do you need? Please give us answers to these questions. -- Melissa Parker— Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.35.185 (talk • contribs)

If the website is blacklisted, why is it used a source for a few Wikipedia articles? I performed a search for "Smashing Interviews". It is cited in the articles James Maslow, Laura Harring, Rebecca Da Costa, Footprint (album), It's a SpongeBob Christmas!, Lexi Thompson, The Happys, Gary Wright, Carol M. Highsmith, If You Believe (George Harrison song), and The Answer's at the End. With Melissa Parker cited as the writer/interviewer in most cases. Dimadick (talk) 18:20, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

I notified the original blocking administrator of this discussion.[1] TFD (talk) 18:41, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Did you check their edit history? User:Ckatz was last active on 20 April, 2020. Dimadick (talk) 19:00, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Exactly, Dimadick. The magazine is a source for several Wikipedia articles, but we were told there wouldn't be any hot links to our publication because we were blacklisted in 2010. For example, here's the article on James Maslow - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Maslow - Under reference #6, you will see my name and Smashing Interviews Magazine, but then it says missing or empty url. We've had several interviewees say they tried to put a hot link on Wikipedia to their interview and was unable to do so. If the publication is not a reliable source, why were they trying to post the link from their interview in our magazine to their own Wikipedia article? We should not be blacklisted. Smashing Interviews Magazine is a reliable source. We truly need this issue resolved as soon as possible.-- Melissa Parker
From reading your comment, it sounds like your main issue is your website not being directly linked from Wikipedia, which leads me to wonder whether your concern may be partly about SEO or generating hits. Wikipedia is a volunteer project and not a space for promoting or showcasing your publication - see
conflict of interest from adding content, as has already been said above. You are welcome to tell your interviewees this, and that your blacklisting is not a judgement of the reliability of your publication. Jr8825 • Talk
21:33, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
No, thanks. I won't be telling my interviewees anything of the sort. They already know our magazine is reliable, or they wouldn't be interviewing with us. If they happen to ask us why they can't share their own interview on their own Wikipedia article with a hot link, I will tell them the truth, that we were blacklisted 10 years ago because hackers sabotaged us, there's been no sabotage since, yet we're still paying the price of being blacklisted 10 years later, which is totally unfair. That doesn't say anything negative about our publication. And if my defense of our publication, and only wanting to be treated fairly as everyone else, appears to you as wanting to "showcase," then I ask you, do you tell everyone else (millions) when they write Wiki pages or when they post links that they only want to "promote" or "showcase"? We're really starting to believe we are being singled out due to some personal issues you may have with us. I certainly hope I'm wrong. But we are being treated unfairly here.-- Melissa Parker
Coverage on Wikpedia isn't the be all and end all, ultimately your twitter account only has less than 4K followers and most of your tweets recieve 0 engagement, something I don't think wikipedia links will fix. Breitbart is also blacklisted but that doesn't have any impact on their popularity. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:56, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Melissa, I am a little bit unsure of your motivation here. You seem to be conflating three distinct goals: 1- Getting your site deemed reliable (which allows it to be CITED in an article) 2-getting it off the blacklist (Which allows it to be LINKED to in a citation), 3- Having an article about your website on Wikipedia. Each of these three goals are separate judgements and governed by different policies. Achieving one does not guarantee the others. It is quite possible for a blacklisted website to be deemed reliable (it can be cited without including a link to it), it is possible for it to be whitelisted, and yet not be deemed notable enough for us to have an article about it (or vise versa). Please read our policies on WP:Reliable sources and WP:Notability. You already know where to go to appeal your blacklist. Blueboar (talk) 00:36, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
My motivation, as I have stated many times, is to be treated fairly, just as everyone else wishes and to correct your defamatory label of "unreliability." There is no reason for our magazine to continue to be blacklisted after 10 years because of sabotage perpetrated by hackers at the very start of the magazine. There have been no further incidents since that happened 10 years ago. So why are we still blacklisted? At the time of blacklisting, there was absolutely no talk about the magazine being unreliable, yet when an interviewee tried to post a link on her own Wiki page, admins told her the site was unreliable. It us not. I've asked you over and over how the magazine is unreliable and have received no answers. NO media outlet likes to be called unreliable when they are not. Marc Parker and I have given you the case of reliability. I have asked, what other proof do you need? And I've received no answers. Our magazine has received in the multiple millions of unique views over its lifetime, so we're not looking for any kind of a "fix," as you call it. The magazine is extremely popular, especially as a primary source for news gathering purposes. Many articles are built around our interviews. As I said, it is and always has been a very credible and reliable source. It's quite befuddling that you talk like it's odd that we'd want Wiki pages (just like others do), so not understanding where you're coming from there. Why wouldn't we? Do you question others why they'd want Wiki pages, or tell them that Wikipedia "isn't the be all and end all"? Just curious. And under those guidelines you've noted, both Marc Parker and I (who are also published authors) and our magazine would be eligible for entry into the encyclopedia.-- Melissa Parker
You're conflating different things. You say that your magazine is a reliable source for interviews and cite several reliable sources that cite your magazine. Fine. That doesn't mean Wikipedia needs to cite it, because on Wikipedia, interviews are considered primary sources, and we prefer to cite secondary sources. That means that Wikipedia would cite those sources that cite your magazine for any statements made by your interview subjects, because we trust the journalists in the secondary sources to make judgments about what is appropriate to reference. If a good secondary source is available, we defer to that rather than cite a primary source.
This isn't the venue for discussing blacklist removal. The correct place is MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#Proposed removals. But don't waste your or our time doing that. Removal requests are seriously considered only if they come from a trusted high-volume contributor, not someone with a conflict of interest. And, as someone who helps manage that blacklist pointed out above, any request for removal would be closed as  Defer to Whitelist, which means, a request to poke a hole in the blacklist to whitelist a specific link must be made on MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist.
Nothing stands in the way of a Wikipedia article being written about you or your magazine, if it meets
WP:AFC
and submitting a draft for review. The draft would be reviewed by another editor before deciding to publish it in main article space or not. If not, you can still revise and improve the draft.
You stated above "A rep for one of our interviewees attempted to add an interview link to a Wikipedia page and was told they couldn't because we're an unreliable source." So, a rep for one of your interviewees tried to violate Wikipedia's conflict-of-interest guidelines and was prevented from doing so. That sounds to me like the blacklist is working as intended, and an excellent reason to keep it blacklisted, to prevent further attempts to violate our guidelines.
If you're hung up about reliability, sure, I have no problems agreeing the magazine is reliable given the citations provided above. But that has nothing to do with blacklisting. The blacklist includes other reliable sources. If one of the interviews you publish has something in it worthy of mentioning in a Wikipedia article, then it would be picked up by a secondary source and we'd cite that; no need to cite the primary source, so there should be no concern whatsoever about being blacklisted. If a trusted, high-volume contributor requests blacklist removal, we'll consider it then, but not before. ~Anachronist (talk) 06:20, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Marc, Melissa, since you both use the same IP, and don't always mention your name, it might be a good idea that at least one of you takes a user name (see
WP:SIG). --Francis Schonken (talk
) 06:35, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Strongly disagree with Blueboar that looking into an editor's motivation would be germane on this page. This page is about the reliability of sources: a source is reliable or not, and that has nothing to do with a co-editor's motivation. Marc and Melissa disclosed their COI, and that should suffice. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:35, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
@Francis Schonken: While motivations aren't germane to this page, they are absolutely germane to the topic of blacklisting, which unfortunately seems to be an underlying reason for this discussion here. Marc/Melissa has stated twice already that their interview subjects tried to insert links to their pages in violation of our COI guidelines. Those attempts failed due to the blacklist, but the subjects were apparently confused when someone told them the site wasn't reliable. I have no problem agreeing it's a reliable primary source for what subjects say about themselves. The reliability of a source is irrelevant to the blacklist, it is the intent of the links added that matter, and so far, there hasn't been one single bit of evidence offered that the intent of any link to this magazine is for any purpose other than serving a COI. Until we have such evidence (like a request from a trusted contributor to add such a link), then there is no reason to remove the site from the blacklist. ~Anachronist (talk) 14:03, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
As said in nearly all replies to the site executives, the blacklisting is not a topic for this page. This page, WP:RSN, is not about intentions. This page is not about motivations. For COI issues there's a separate noticeboard,
WP:COIN, which can include motivations in its assessment. But that is not here either. Nor do I see a need to go to COIN: the COI is declared without a shadow of doubt, so there's nothing to investigate in that respect afaics. So, about the motivation topic I propose to get off the site executives' backs, at least on this page. --Francis Schonken (talk
) 14:35, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
My error here... I used the wrong word when I asked about “motivation”... I should have said “goal”. The website executives seemed to have multiple goals, and they seem to think that all of them hinge on being de-blacklisted. I wanted them to understand that the three motives/goals/whatever were NOT interconnected.
Being blacklisted has nothing to do with whether a website is considered reliable/unreliable (a reliable source can be blacklisted if misused)... and being blacklisted has nothing to do with whether a website is notable enough for Wikipedia to have an article about it (a notable website can be blacklisted if mis-used). Blacklisting, reliability, and notability are separate determinations, governed by different policies and guidelines. Blueboar (talk) 14:59, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Fair enough. I think that something that can be assessed on this page is the use that has been made of the Smashing Interviews Magazine as a source on the pages listed above by Dimadick (to wit: James Maslow, Laura Harring, Rebecca Da Costa, Footprint (album), It's a SpongeBob Christmas!, Lexi Thompson, The Happys, Gary Wright, Carol M. Highsmith, If You Believe (George Harrison song), and The Answer's at the End). So far I checked only the first of these, for which I have two remarks (that is: preliminary remarks, before even looking at the source):
  • For both of the instances where the Smashing Interviews Magazine is used on that page, it is not indispensable (there's a second reference in each case).
  • For the first instance where the reference is used, it is for things the celebrity said in an interview about his own youth (also the second reference for that sentence is a self-declaration in an interview). Not seeing any particular reason to doubt the celebrity's self-declaration, it is however a fact that far bigger celebrities (e.g. Jim Morrison comes to mind) have been known to fib about their youth, so the statement should better not be in Wikipedia's voice (rather: "Maslow said that ..." or something to that effect) – until there's a reliable secondary source for these assertions (on the other hand, if no secondary source gives any bandwidth to these recollections about the subject's youth, they may not be really encyclopedic content either). The other sentence using the Smashing Interviews Magazine source is OK from the in-text attribution perspective: it starts "He has described himself ...".
Any candidates for looking at the use made of the source in the 10 other listed articles? --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:55, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

TakePart

Is TakePart reliable? (It apparently no longer exists, per [2]). For background, I'm trying to decide if Center for Council is notable, and I came across [3], a feature on the organization. AleatoryPonderings (talk) 16:15, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Does the author of the article, Kenneth Miller, carry any reputation to help with reliability issues? --Jayron32 17:11, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Eh, maybe? He's a freelancer (portfolio here). Published in a bunch of places that I trust, but not sure I'm going to trust him on his word--no Bob Woodward, for sure. AleatoryPonderings (talk) 17:17, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Rugby League Project

The Rugby League Project is pretty honest about where it's coming from. It's run by volunteers and I don't have much doubt about its reliability in terms of - for example - match results, which are reasonably easily double-checked from books. However, I'm doubtful about it as a source of birthdates for living players, for which it is being increasingly used on DOTY pages. (August 19 alone has had seven rugby league players recently added with nothing but RLP as a source for their dates of birth.) I can't find any discussion of this source anywhere in the Wikipedia pages and would like to know whether others think it's adequate. Deb (talk) 13:21, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

I know this is RSN, but for any situation where
WP:CITOGENESIS. I mean even a lot of more main stream sources publish crap because it was on Wikipedia even if it lacked any sources. I find it likely finding the date on Wikipedia and no contrary information is enough for publication on RLP. (Not to mention 'my mate went to the same school and has them as a Facebook friend and they say this is the date' and other poor practices.) BTW to be clear, while use of high quality reliable sources known for their accuracy etc is an important part of BLP, the specific DOB concerns of BLP don't concern themselves with reliability. Even if it's well accepted a source is incredibly accurate and only publishes DOBs after carefully checking birth records and other sources, you still need that DOB to either by widely published or from a source linked to the subject. Nil Einne (talk
) 20:14, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Professor's blog posts

This is not a RS question (the RS issues are well delineated below). It is a question of
WP:UNDUE. In my view, any contentious self-published source even by an expert should be excluded unless commented on by reliable secondary sources - there is no global shortage of motivated opinions, such that we need to include them from primary sources. Closing before the fight gets to the point of causing itchy block fingers. Guy (help! - typo?
) 22:39, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion 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.


Jonathan Brown (Feb 16, 2017). "Apology without apologetics"
. Muslim Matters. Retrieved July 31, 2017.

Is this in-universe blog post by Jonathan A. C. Brown a reliable source for use on the article Rape in Islamic law? A professing Muslim, the professor has courted controversy on his idiosyncratic (let's call it that) view of slavery, which has ramifications for the content of his blog post(s). Since Brown's views on (sexual) slavery and concubinage in Islamic law have drawn significant ire, is his apologetic blog post a worthy source for statements of fact? GPinkerton (talk) 21:08, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

peer-reviewed academic journals. And I don't see what "professing Muslim" has to do with it. Are you suggesting that we consider him unreliable because of his religious beliefs?VR talk
21:51, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Even where an academic may pass WP:SPS, it's preferable to cite their peer-reviewed output. Reason: in a peer reviewed paper, they can only write things that will pass peer review. On their personal blog, they can write anything they want, even if it does not have the purpose of educating but instead promoting a particular religion or viewpoint. (t · c) buidhe 22:08, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
"Apologetics" is actually traditional scholarship in religion, at least in western culture.[4] What statement of fact are you talking about? I read what he wrote, he says rape is prohibited in Islam, is that what you are calling a fact? Why? Are you disagreeing that it is prohibited, if so based on what? -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:21, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
This is the content which is cited to Professor Brown's blog post:

According to Georgetown University professor Jonathan A.C. Brown, Islamic law has historically handled marital rape differently from modern laws, which originated in the 1970s, but the effect is similar i.e protection. Sexual abuse within marriage was conceptualized as harm inflicted on the wife rather than violation of consent. He states that the historical record shows that women were able to go to court and force their husbands to desist and pay damages in such cases.

VR talk 22:29, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Well, he does say those things and it does appear to be in his expert wheelhouse, are there RS that dispute those propositions he lays out? Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:34, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
@Alanscottwalker: Yes. He has a history of making dubious (at best) claims in this area. The blog post is an (non-apology-)apology ("without apologetics") for his crass dilations on the moral superiority of the slave-owner Muhammad, for which much criticism was directed at him. You can read about it here. More fringe remarks included: "He [Muhammad] had slaves, there is no denying that. Are you more morally mature than the prophet of God?" No, you’re not." and his piece de resistance:

"Slavery cannot just be treated as a moral evil in and of itself because slavery doesn’t mean anything. The moral evil is extreme forms of deprivation of rights and extreme forms of control and extreme forms of exploitation. I don’t think it’s morally evil to own somebody because we own lots of people all around us and were owned by people and this obsession about thinking of slavery as property … it’s just inconceivable sin. I think that’s actually a really odd and unhelpful way to think about slavery. It kind of gets you locked in this way of thinking that if you talk about ownership and people that you’ve already transgressed some moral boundary that you can’t come back from. I don’t think that’s true at all."

More pertinently, he claims:

For most of human history, human beings have not thought of consent as the essential feature of morally correct sexual activity. And second, we fetishize the idea of autonomy to where we forget, who is really free? … What does autonomy mean?

The Washington Post points out that Some critics noted that the Georgetown center where Brown is a director — the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding — is funded with money from Saudi Arabia, where women have few rights. There is good reason to suspect whitewashing. Both Ayesha S. Chaudhry (Harvard, British Columbia) and Sadaf Jaffer (Princeton) are quoted by the Washington Post as disagreeing with him and criticizing his comments. Said Jaffer: "I was frankly appalled by Professor Brown’s comments that minimized the severity of the institution of slavery as well as the importance of consent in sexual relationships ... My reaction was shared by many of my (liberal) peers in Islamic studies circles. As scholars, it is important that we teach Islam as a human and historical phenomenon. It is not acceptable to simply relativize the concepts of slavery, human autonomy, and consent to the point where they have no meaning. We have to think about the impact of our comments on our students and the university community", and Chaudry reportedly said "that there is a legitimate question about how scholars should try to address what Islam says about issues such as slavery, the marriage of minors, consent and sex".
WP:CHERRY-PICKING. The article notes he said,

Islam as a faith and I as a person condemn slavery, rape and concubinage.

And if there are dissenting academic views, they should be included.VR talk
23:35, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
I am not cherry-picking, that's absurd. Brown is the dissenting academic view. This thread is inteded to discuss the reliablity of his opinions. He does not speak for Islam. GPinkerton (talk) 23:43, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
I definitely agree that this is Professor Brown's area of expertise. There are some RS that state that marital rape isn't penalized in Islam, while other sources (e.g. "Rape: A Problem of Crime Classification in Islamic Law". Arab Law Quarterly. 24 (4): 429.) state that it is. As Brown notes, marital rape was not criminalized in most of the world until relatively recently (UK only did so in 1991). I think all these views should be considered in the article.VR talk 22:42, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
So, it's his understanding based on scholarship (and he's "Chair of Islamic Civilization in the
WP:DUE. And that would depend on how widely the things he wrote are cooberated by other RS. Alanscottwalker (talk
) 22:55, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
As I have explained at length elsewhere, marital rape was fully illegal in England and Wales long before 1991, as the 1991 R v R case proves. If Brown claims to the contrary, that is his error and we need not repeat it; Brown does not however, make any such claim in the blog post cited. GPinkerton (talk) 23:23, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
It should also be made clear that VR's reference to "UK only did so" is false. Some 19th-century commentators opined that a 17th-century opinion might be valid in relation to marital exemption to rape, but only in English law. Scots law has never had any such exemption, and the 1991 case proves that any exemption in English law was never operational in fact. But this is irrelevant, since no part of the UK is a theocracy and comparisons of this kind are exactly the sort of thing for which Brown has got his fingers burnt. GPinkerton (talk) 23:30, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
The point is not to put the man on trial for everything he has said or written, the point is in the issue of 'has Islam treated sexual abuse in marriage as a crime' a position held by scholars? Do you dispute that is a position held by scholars of Islam or Islamic civilization? Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:38, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
@Alanscottwalker: It's not clear what you're asking. GPinkerton (talk) 23:43, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
You apparently asked about a single statement of his, where he expresses the view that marital sexual abuse was punishable in Islamic courts, as a harm to the wife. Do you contend that is not true? (as a side issue, perhaps read Marital rape in the United States for what changes have occurred there). Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:50, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
I have no opinion on whether it is true; it's beside the point. If it were true, why can't we cite it to a reliable source, with a publisher and footnotes, rather than a POV blog on a advocacy website. Again, relativizing the issue by comparison to non-theological legal codes is unhelpful. GPinkerton (talk) 00:03, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Because, what he wrote is a reliable source under SPS. All academics have a pov, that's what they are paid to have. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:11, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
To be reductionist, the academic in question has a POV and is paid by an actual theocracy to promote it and to say nice things about Islam. This is why I am wondering why a blog post (not peer-reviewed, not footnoted, not published in a reputable anything) is really due for inclusion here, especially when it has been written to absolve himself from criticism from other academics in the field for his fringe opinions on this very issue. GPinkerton (talk) 00:23, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
You have not produced anything from any academic that contradicts him with respect to his contentions that rape is prohibited in Islam, and that in marriage it was punished as sexual abuse harm. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:28, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Are you telling you haven't read the Washington Post article or that Brown's blog is a reliable source but the Washington Post isn't? GPinkerton (talk) 00:41, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
No. I've read both. The Washington Post says nowhere that any other academic disputes that rape is prohibited in Islam, nor does it say that any other academic says rape in marriage was not punishable in Islam. So, there is no contradiction in the Post article and what Brown wrote in the single statement he is being used for. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:56, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

@Alanscottwalker: That's not the point. It's well-known rape is a crime in Islam. However, marital rape is, more often than not, not a crime in Islam, because marital rape is not rape in Islam. See for instance:

Within the Iranian legal system, rape within marriage or intimate relationships is not recognised; in fact, rape within marriage is sanctioned within the legal system. MirHosseini (2000) and Tizro (2012) have critically explored the principles of Islamic marriage as a legal institution that is based on a contract between two parties, the woman and the man. They explain that the best way to understand any contract is to find out each side’s rights and obligations. As soon as the marriage sermon is read, the wife is placed under the husband’s authority, control and protection. As a result, men legally become responsible to provide maintenance, nafaghe, as soon as they get married. This is regardless of the wife’s income or whether the husband has the means to pay it or not. Providing maintenance includes food, lodging and clothing. As MirHosseini puts it, ‘This right is absolute: it can neither be waived by agreement nor delegated’ (Mir-Hosseini, 2000: 46). In return, to qualify for such rights, the woman must be obedient. Therefore, if the wife rebels against the husband’s will, nushuz, it means that she loses her right to maintenance. This doesn’t mean that if the wife is financially independent she doesn’t have to obey her husband – full submission to the husband’s will is in order as soon as the marriage sermon is read. This full submission and obedience to the husband, tamkin, has two dimensions: tamkin khaas, not objecting to sexual contact when desired by the husband, and tamkin aam, not leaving the household without his permission. ... The term tamkin khaas, which means full sexual submission, legally endows men with the right to have sex with their wives on demand.
Aghtaie, Nadia (2017-07-14). "Rape within heterosexual intimate relationships in Iran: legal frameworks, cultural and structural violence". Families, Relationships and Societies. 6 (2): 167–183.

ISSN 2046-7435
.

or again

Considering marital rape as within the remit of legality exemplifies the assumption that men have inherent vulnerability to women’s naked bodies. In rape cases where perpetrators are sentenced to death, they are punished not because they have violated a woman’s sexual rights, but because they have threatened another man’s property. ...
Men’s legal right to rape their wives is known, in religious terms, as tamkin khaas, which means full submission. According to Shahidian (2002, p 179), ‘heteromarital intercourse – "marital relationship" – is thus defined as the only appropriate sexuality in which the man has virtually unlimited claims on a woman’s sexuality’. Women are supposed to submit to their husbands’ sexual desires any time that he wishes and in return husbands have to financially support their wives. This means if a woman refuses to have sex with her husband, he does not have to pay his wife nafaqeh (maintenance), money for food, clothing and lodging. This is a law that clearly illustrates women’s blatant subjugation to men’s pleasure, and, in other words, legalises rape within marriage.
Orthodox jurists have supported this claim by citing verses of the Quran that talk about women’s and men’s duties within marriage, for example, ‘Women are your fields: go, then, into your fields as you please’ (Quran 2:223 ). Khomeini sustains this by stating in his thesis: ‘A woman must surrender to her husband for any pleasure’ (Khomeini, n.d., p 386).
Aghtaie, Nadia (2011), Westmarland, Nicole; Gangoli, Geetanjali (eds.), "Breaking the silence: rape law in Iran and controlling women's sexuality", International Approaches to Rape (1st ed.), Bristol University Press, pp. 121–146, retrieved 2020-08-21

This is without delving into the laws of more than one Islamic state; others examples can be provided at will. As I say, I question whether the blog posts of a much-criticized advocate for Islam are reliable for objective coverage of the issue. GPinkerton (talk) 01:24, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

But none of that contradicts Brown's contention that acts of rape in marriage, are and have been punishable in Islam under the rubric of physical harm to the wife (whether anyone says it's rape or not). -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 01:41, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
It's missing the important detail that marital rape is not considered "harm" if the victim cannot prove that she was "harmed" according to sharia law. So that is only outlawing a (small?) subset of rapes. (t · c) buidhe 05:00, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

There is also:

While non-consensual relations between persons of the same sex was criminalized in classical Islamic juristic discourse, classical Islamic discourse always assumed the sexual right of a husband over a wife, and as a result, the notion of "marital rape" did not arise. While American law has moved in recent decades to defining rape without reference to either gender or partner relationship, Muslim criminal codes generally continue to recognize the sexual right of a husband over a wife without regard to her situational consent, and therefore generally define rape as forcible or non-consensual sex outside of marriage only.
... Furthermore, we do not see in either formative-era reports or the texts of the later, classical juristic tradition the notion of what we would call "marital rape": Because a sex act had to be illicit—that is, zinâ—for its perpetrator to be held liable for rape, punishable coercion within the conjugal bond lay outside the juristic imagination.
Azam, Hina (2012). "Rape as a variant of fornication (Zinā) in Islamic law: an examination of the early legal reports". Journal of Law and Religion. 28 (2): 441–466.

ISSN 0748-0814
.

GPinkerton (talk) 01:43, 21 August 2020 (UTC) This most certainly contradicts the defensive musings of Brown. GPinkerton (talk) 01:46, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

So, you dislike this professor and his Chair at this Catholic university, and your earlier attempt to argue wrong in one thing wrong in all was very unconvincing, but as I have said, we look to other sources to see if what he says is DUE or needed for NPOV, so thanks for going to sources, and I would say the burden now shifts to Vice regent to find published academic monographs, etc. (At least with your last source we now know that Brown's drawing comparisons to old and modern common law and American statute law is well within academic discourse.) Alanscottwalker (talk) 02:09, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@Alanscottwalker: Where have I said anything of the kind? Firstly, Brown makes no such comparison with American statue law, despite VR's claim. The only thing I have said is wrong is the use of a blog to override more suitable, and contradictory, sources. I was not aware his was a Catholic university; I don't usually make assumptions like that. Where I come from tertiary education is not controlled by sects. From what appear to be your assumptions, you might be surprised to know my own postgraduate degree in Islamic studies was in part connected with yet another Alwaleed organization, at an older university than either mentioned so far. GPinkerton (talk) 03:02, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
GPinkerton you said the academic in question has a POV and is paid by an actual theocracy to promote it and to say nice things about Islam. That's ridiculous.
You may imagine so, but above I have quoted RS on the matter. Ultimately whether you think it's ridiculous is by-the-by. The criticism exists and is not prima facie groundless or extraordinary. GPinkerton (talk) 03:25, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
No one said that Brown should "override" other sources. Only that we present all POVs per
WP:NPOV. And I don't agree with your claim that the other sources necessarily contradict Brown (see below).VR talk
03:15, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
That policy states that "all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources" should be given due weight. Where is the evidence Brown's self-exculpatory polemic is significant? What other scholars have cited it in their published and peer-reviewed work (since Brown's blog is neither)? GPinkerton (talk) 03:29, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
There are at least two sources that state that any injury arising from marital rape is penalized: Delfina Serrano. "Rape in Maliki Legal Doctrine and Practice (8th–15th Centuries C.E.)". Hawwa.
BRILL. and Hina Azam. Sexual Violation in Islamic Law: Substance, Evidence, and Procedure. Cambridge University Press
. p. 19.. There's also the source that seems to criminalize marital rape without conditioning it on injury:

Marital rape in Islamic law is similar to other acts of aggression against a wife where she has the right to ask for divorce and prosecutions. As such, the punishment for marital rape is not similar with severe punishment for ordinary rape.
— Noor, Azman Mohd (2010). "Rape: A Problem of Crime Classification in Islamic Law". Arab Law Quarterly. 24 (4): 417–438.

doi:10.1163/157302510X526724.

. As I said, there are sources that give both perspectives and both perspectives should be reflected.VR talk
02:12, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Also what GPinkerton wrote above affirms Brown's view, it doesn't contradict it. The source GPinkerton cited above says Muslim criminal codes generally continue to recognize the sexual right of a husband over a wife without regard to her situational consent. Brown says But the operating element to punish marital rape fell under the concept of harm, not non-consent. Both are in agreement that historical Muslim codes did not punish non-consensual sex in marriage. VR talk 02:17, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@Vice regent: You would be right, if it were conceivable to treat "non-consensual sex" as somehow different to "rape". In English, these ideas are the same, and this is English Wikipedia. GPinkerton (talk) 02:26, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
I fully agree that all non-consensual sex is rape. But unfortunately the legal definition of rape has often excluded marital rape:

Rape within marriage in most of the world until very recently was oxymoronic: it did not exist by definition...So a married woman by definition could not be raped by her husband.
— Research Handbook on Feminist Jurisprudence. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 68.

But even today, in most states, the law states that the husband, by definition, cannot rape his wife...
— The Victim of Rape. Routledge. p. xxii.

VR talk 02:49, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
The "even today" referenced above refers to the publication date of the book: 1978. This is hardly recent material. The "most states" refers to states of the USA, not "most states" per se. GPinkerton (talk) 03:11, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Here's an analogy if it helps:
Lets say that there's an isolated tribe that lives communally and has no concept of property. For such a tribe the concept of "Private Property" does not exist. Hence, the concept of "theft" does not exist either since theft requires the notion of private property. For such a community the notion of "theft" would be an oxymoron and it would be "uncriminilizable" as well. However, does this mean that theft would be "legal" or permissible in this society? Not exactly. While it would be impossible to me to "steal" something, if I took away some guy's shirt or socks which he's wearing, while sleeping, he'd have various ways to object, just not in terms of "theft". He could possibly claim a betrayal of trust or some other notion that the tribe may have evolved to prevent such disputes.
Likewise, while consent is not a concept in Islamic law at all, the issue of harm is. At this point the issue starts to become rather technical and legalese. It's not something that can be presented in a line about X being allowed or disallowed. Generally, marital r.ape may not be criminalized "as such" but it's done so or at least discouraged in other ways. There are a number of sources (mostly modern, since the entire notion is modern) that directly say that it is impermissible while the sources that say the opposite (other than Islamists) mostly focus on its uncriminizability, difficulty in prosecution and the issue of its punishment being "not as severe" (Noor, Azman Mohd cite you gave) which are different things.
This issue is similar to the issue of honor killings [5] (Brown's quoted there too as are others). While honor killings occur, Islamic law's position is quite complicated and can not be reduced to "it is allowed in Islam to r.ape and kill his wife and slaves". I'm stating this keeping in mind the statement about sexual slavery that I removed and not in reference to you.
As for Brown, Defending against r.ape and d.eath threats (with a few arguments and V.I.concerns mixed in) from the alt-right doesn't make anyone controversial. These are gamergate-esque arguments. Brown's a subject matter expert so he can be used even if the blogsite isn't considered reliable. Hina Azem's claim is already noted in the article, so what's the issue? Even she notes that harm within marriage was criminalized so I'm not sure if she contradicts Brown. Even if she did, there's no rationale for excluding Brown's views.
P.S What does in-universe mean? Should aliens be commenting on this stuff? (Sorry for long post, it could be longer) 119.152.128.94 (talk) 03:38, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
To dismiss the serious academic criticism from Sadaf Jaffer (Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies), who has since then become an elected mayor for the US Democratic Party as "r.ape and d.eath threats ... from the alt-right" and "gamergate-esque arguments" is an utter strawman fallacy which does not need to be addressed further. Other than that your contribution seems to be mostly an apology for moral relativism, or an apology for Islamic law under the banner of moral relativism. Both Noor and Brown are in-universe sources in that they are true-believers, outside the mainstream of non-Islamic majority of human thought, and have a vested interest in trying to make their respective ideologies coherent and internally consistent. GPinkerton (talk) 03:54, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
There's quite clearly a world of difference between Sadaf's criticism and the criticism Brown feels obliged to respond to, which was what resulted in the controversy above (There's legitimate criticism of feminism too). Do you have any materiel where Sadaf contradicts Brown, to the effect of saying marital r.ape is allowed in Islam? I doubt she'd forward such a claim and this seems to be a bait and switch tactic (with Sadaf's measured criticism being bait and the claim that marital r.ape is allowed in Islam, being the switch). (Same IP)39.37.188.19 (talk) 13:40, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
You can scroll up for multiple reliable sources saying precisely that. As for Sadaf, she writes that Brown's "Dismissals of the importance of consent are particularly damaging to the ongoing efforts to combat sexual assault on campus and of course for survivors of sexual assault themselves." and "Brown attempted an apology for his statements in his article “Apology without Apologetics," but, despite the glib title, he continues to engage in apologetics to support his broader argument about slavery and sex slavery in Islamic history. For example, he walks back his earlier questioning of whether Muslim wives have recourse to the idea of sexual consent in their relationships with their husbands, but does not address the issue of a concubine’s lack of legal consent throughout much of Islamic history. So there we have it. GPinkerton (talk) 18:15, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
It looks like Jaffer wrote that on a blog. So you do agree that a blog of an academic can be reliable source? The fact that you just used a blog as a source indicates you do. What was the whole point of this discussion? You spent so long arguing that blog posts of professors aren't reliable and then did the very thing you argued against.VR talk 18:41, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
The point was to illustrate that Brown's comments should not be left unchallenged in the article because they have not been left unchallenged in the academic field. If you're now suddenly against the idea of including blog posts, lets remove the both of them. GPinkerton (talk) 19:31, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
So now the issue is that of a concubines consent rather than a wife's? Sadaf seems to be concentrating on slavery. She says nothing about marital r.ape and does not contradict Brown on Islam's position "on whether Muslim wives have recourse to the idea of sexual consent in their relationships with their husbands". She criticizes him for omitting the discussion on a concubines legal consent instead. What do we have here indeed...? it's nothing 39.37.165.118 (talk) 19:01, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
We have it in black and white. Brown's non-peer-reviewed polemical opinions on consent and marital rape (and concubinage and Islam) are not to be taken as fact or presented as such. And no, you haven't understood. Brown claimed consent was not important in traditional Islamic law we fetishize the idea of [sexual] autonomy to the extent that we forget, again, who is really free?ff., absorbed much criticism, and only then began his face-saving allegation that after all martial rape could be perhaps be prosecuted historically (without citing any evidence and without actually denying that consent is taken to be permanent and implicit in the act of marriage, as numerous more reliable sources attest). Your claim She says nothing about marital r.ape is simply untrue, please read the article more carefully. As for your remark "There's legitimate criticism of feminism too" as irrelevant and seemingly partisan whataboutism that contributes nothing to your arguments. GPinkerton (talk) 19:31, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@GPinkerton: That you consider Brown's opinions to be "polemical" has no impact on whether his blog is a RS per WP's conditions for the claims it's being used as a citation for. No one is suggesting that his statements "be taken as fact or presented as such." That's why the text in the article only presents it as his opinion, not in WP's voice. That could be improved a bit (e.g., by editing "Sexual abuse within marriage ..." to something like "Brown argues that sexual abuse within marriage ..."). You asked whether his blog is a RS for the claims that are in the article, and you seem to be arguing about other things now because you don't like the responses you've gotten. Doesn't this part of the discussion really belong on the article's talk page? -- FactOrOpinion (talk) 20:04, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@
WP:UNDUE weight without balance from other scholars, as I have now done. The talkpage needs greater participation from a wider pool of editors. GPinkerton (talk
) 20:43, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@GPinkerton: - Re: "[A and B] appear to be mutually irreconcilable," no, it's quite easy to reconcile them: all 3 sentences are intended to be read in Brown's voice, and the first and third sentences make that explicit, and the second sentence doesn't, but it's easily inferred when reading all three; instead of leaving it as is, it can be made explicit. Nothing is stopping you from doing that. -- FactOrOpinion (talk) 21:17, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@FactOrOpinion: Are you looking at the article before or after I changed the section significantly? In any case, the article is fully protected for a week because of another controversy. GPinkerton (talk) 21:20, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@
strawman argument. GPinkerton (talk
) 01:24, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
I have done neither of these things and your accusations are becoming uncivil and your aspersions are unbecoming. I have never expressed anything like your claim "a Muslim academic can't be a reliable source". That's your invention purely. It's their neutrality I question, and the reliability of aggrieved blog posts in preference to peer-reviewed papers which are available in abundance. GPinkerton (talk) 04:26, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Again,
WP:BIASED says "Wikipedia articles are required to present a neutral point of view. However, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject." Brown's non-neutrality per se is not a reason to reject his blog in this context. -- FactOrOpinion (talk
) 12:16, 21 August 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.

Book published by Amazon

Is Dexter, Ray (2013). Doctor Who Episode by Episode Volume 2 Patrick Troughton. Amazon media an RS for any claims about Doctor who? Is it an SPS?Slatersteven (talk) 13:08, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

How extraordinary is the claim in question? I suspect even a traditional publisher isn't likely to carefully fact check a Dr Who book. Short of a statement that was clearly controversial to a reader who knew nothing of Dr Who I can't imagine much difference between published by Amazon and published by Random House other than RH is likely to avoid publishing something that won't sell in larger volumes. I don't think it would be self published though that definition is being debated as we type. Springee (talk) 13:11, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Its a claim the character called the War Chief is also another character called the Master. Its a common enough fan theory (one I subscribe to in fact), not officially endorsed by the BBC.Slatersteven (talk) 13:15, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
That's a hard question. If this is published under the Kindle_Direct_Publishing program I would say it's little more than self published. However, even if it were published by, for example, RH, I can't imagine they would have checked such claims. Does the author have any standings in this or related areas? This is one of the areas of RS that I find difficult. I gave an example regarding Formula Ford race cars recently. There just aren't many good secondary sources on the subject yet if Wikipedia is meant to be a repository of knowledge it would be a shame for good information to be missing simply because it had to be sourced to, for example, the actual designer of the car's comments on a web forum vs a third party source. /rant. In this case I might go with an IAR approach. If the claim is widely accepted by discussion groups as generally good then perhaps include it as an attributed claim and perhaps note the BBC has not released a statement on the topic. I understand this is far different than my strict stance on WP:V that I was espousing just earlier today but I think a big difference is this is "entertainment" vs "politics". Springee (talk) 13:42, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
As far as In can tell the authors has zero standing, and is just "an educator".Slatersteven (talk) 13:44, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
If they don't have standing among the fan community I would really hesitate. I won't go as far as claiming it would be wrong to include per IAR and to a lesser extent a balance between the quality of the source vs the nature of the claim. Still, if the author seems to have zero standing even among the online community then I think this is probably just too weak a source. In thinking about RH vs Amazon as publisher I guess the one difference is that Amazon really only cares if the book contains politically controversial information that could come back to haunt Amazon. The nature of on line distribution means the marginal cost to Amazon if the work is complete crap is just a little bit of hard drive space. For traditional publishing there is the wish to actually make some money on the up front cost of printing the book. It at least means RH (or others) would think the author has enough standing in the interested community to get people to buy the book based on who the author is. I think I would lean away from inclusion but, were I involved, wouldn't remove if the claim were attributed. Springee (talk) 13:55, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Are you suggesting using it to state that theory as fact, or to state that it's a theory some fans hold? It definitely can't be used to state it as fact. It could maybe be used to state that the theory is one that some fans hold, but using it like that seems
WP:UNDUE and (depending on the wording in the source) it probably only really serves to cite the fact that that author in particular holds that theory, which is definitely undue. --Aquillion (talk
) 14:56, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
I am not using it, I am challenging its use, see [[6]].Slatersteven (talk) 15:04, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Ah, yeah. Worded like that, it's a source for the fact that Ray Dexter thinks this, but it seems
WP:UNDUE - why is the fact that he thinks that significant enough to include? --Aquillion (talk
) 13:37, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
As far as I can tell...because everyone knows its true, so any old crap will do.Slatersteven (talk) 13:41, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Anything published by "Amazon.com Services LLC" (as this is) is really self published. -
MrOllie (talk
) 13:46, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • As USED, it reliably supports the statement (an in-text attributed statement as to the author’s opinion).
IF the author is an acknowledged “expert” on Dr. Who, I would say it is allowable under the “expert exemption” of SPS. IF the author does not qualify as an “expert”, then I agree that we should omit the opinion of the author as UNDUE. Blueboar (talk) 16:48, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
  • It appears to be self-published. Who is Ray Dexter? Guy (help! - typo?) 22:52, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

"That Russia collusion"

During the Fox News discussions some editors claimed that mainstream outlets like CNN and MSNBC were promoting hoaxes and/or conspiracy theories re:

Senate Intelligence Committee
released a new report; everyone writing on the subject should take a look:

François Robere (talk) 11:46, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Is there a question here about the reliability of The Guardian or WaPo? AFAIK, they are sources of the highest reliability, and pursuant to the normal precautions about using breaking news as a source from anywhere, are not generally thought to be a problem. For the record, CNN and MSNBC as news sources are both fine. Their editorial and opinion content may swing to the left, but there's been no credible problem with their news reporting divisions. No one should cite talk shows, opinion pieces, and editorials anyways, from any source, because those are not the news. --Jayron32 17:41, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Nope. It's just for informational purposes (and also because I didn't see any mention of it in a couple of related articles). I doubt it's the last time claims of this kind are made on the Boards. François Robere (talk) 08:34, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for sharing? I guess? --Jayron32 16:57, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
The Senate Intelligence Committee report is discussed here: [7]. I'd wondered whether
Special Counsel investigation (2017–2019), should instead be a disambiguation page with links to both the latter and the SSCI report, except that IIRR, disambiguation pages aren't supposed to point to sections of pages. So it may instead be that a note should be added to the top of the SCO investigation page that the SSCI also carried out an investigation of Russian interference. -- FactOrOpinion (talk
) 17:05, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
François Robere, we already know that Fox is not reliable for politics, so what does this add? Guy (help! - typo?) 22:53, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@JzG: As I said, the point was to bring wider attention to the report, since a) some editors who have repeatedly claimed this is a "hoax" are still involved in AMPOL, and we should really be "on the same page" on this; and b) our coverage of the report was seriously lacking at the time; about an hour after I posted here Senate Intelligence Committee report on Russian interference in the 2016 United States presidential election was created. François Robere (talk) 11:41, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

RfC : Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music

Is Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music a reliable source for Electronic music genres.

  • Option 1 - Yes, Ishkur's descriptions are generally reliable as the website is well researched and has had a few help from other people.
  • Option 2 - Questionable, Ishkur's use of satire in lot of descriptions kind of downplays the reliability, but the source can be used sparingly.
  • Option 3 - No, Ishkur's website is self-published and Ishkur is not a known music expert. A lot of the descriptions use satire, some of the genres are made up, and Ishkur only lists Discogs, and sometimes Wikipedia, as his used online source. (Ishkur claims he mostly uses offline sources, but he doesn't cite them.)
  • Option 4 - Other, My opinion doesn't apply to the above options.

I'd personally say Option 3. What do you guys think.

  • Option 3, i.e., not reliable. Cites very few sources for the claims made, and often none at all. Appears to be an impressive set of speculations by an enthusiast. At a quick glance, it appears to describe grime music as a subgenre of UK garage, which is at least contentious; Wiley (musician) made a whole song about how grime isn't garage. AleatoryPonderings (talk) 16:59, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 3. This is just some Randy from Boise and his personal webpage. It means nothing. Even in his "about" page he says he's not even trying to be accurate, and his analyses represent mostly his own peculiar opinions. No way that's a reliable source. --Jayron32 17:07, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2. Ishkur is cited by a few musicologists who might hold him at arm's length. The cites show that he is not Randy from Boise. The treatment he gets shows that his classification scheme is generally respected, with some reservation about particulars. The Springer Science book Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries cites Ishkur on page 37 as one of several examples of an "Expert" making a tree chart in music genres, which is a common scheme. The authors, however, go on to argue against tree charts. Musicologist David Brackett approves of Ishkur in his book Categorizing Sound, observing Ishkur's "irreverent" tone while validating the taxonomy scheme. Way back in 2001, CMJ New Music Monthly pointed readers to Ishkur's website, praising its flowchart style while noting that "Ishkur" is only 22 years old. In Keyboard magazine in 2004, Ishkur was discussed, with a reader challenging his scheme on some points. A search on Google Scholar returned these three[8][9][10] papers that cite Ishkur. Binksternet (talk) 19:09, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
    Being noticed off-hand by a few legitimate music journalists does not really make him on par with actual respected professionals in the field. If someone has to work as hard as you have to find even those particular sources, it's not really that great of a look. There's also not a dearth of good academic sources on the subject of electronic music, and there's nothing he says that's particularly relevant that couldn't be found in a better source. The whole "taxonomy of music genres" is fairly widespread, but unlike Sam Dunn, who is famous for his similar taxonomy of heavy metal music, Ishkur does not seem to have yet done much beyond create this taxonomy and get noticed for it in a few places. --Jayron32 13:04, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 3 From "About Me" "Most of my research is offline -- magazines, books, documentaries, record collections, and personal experience. For online resources I loosely followed three laws: 1) Lord Discogs knows all, except when I know more. 2) Wikipedia knows some, but never as much as me. [...]" Says it all... ili (talk) 09:37, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 3 No reputation for fact-checking, no editorial policies other than what he feels is right, no real citations to sources. Also the use of Wikipedia as a source should invoke the policy on Wikipedia and sources that mirror or use it: "... do not use websites that mirror Wikipedia content or publications that rely on material from Wikipedia as sources. Content from a Wikipedia article is not considered reliable unless it is backed up by citing reliable sources. Confirm that these sources support the content, then use them directly. (There is also a risk of circular reference/circular reporting when using a Wikipedia article or derivative work as a source.)" Dimadick (talk) 15:17, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Street Roots

This source is used in [articles] For example http://news.streetroots.org/2012/01/18/candidate-interview-mark-white in

2020 Portland, Oregon mayoral election

The mission statement is "Street Roots creates income opportunities for people experiencing homelessness and poverty by producing a newspaper and other media that are catalysts for individual and social change."

The newspaper is described as "Filled with quality local journalism focused on social justice issues, each edition also features poetry written by vendors during weekly creative writing workshops."

This organization is an advocacy group that publishes a weekly street newspaper sold by "the homeless community", but in addition to selling papers, they're a political activist group and are regularly involved in all sorts of local politics involving poverty and vagrancy and has a homeless advocacy editorial slant.

Is the source reliable on matters that pertain to anything poverty/homeless given the express advocacy POV? What about in general?

Is this an appropriate source?

Options

  1. Reliable source in most respect.
  2. Should only be used sparing on things that do not involve opinion and only when other sources are unavailable.
  3. Only on issues about itself.
  4. Unreliable and biased POV source and should not be used.

Graywalls (talk) 00:23, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

  • Comment Can we use the regular levels? These seem pointed and a bit leading, its not even possible to vote for generally reliable (not that I'm suggesting anyone would) as the highest category is "Reliable source in most respect" nor is the traditional option for deprecation given.
    Horse Eye Jack (talk
    ) 00:46, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
More generally, this seems framed in an RfC format, which the recent RfC on RfCs says is probably not appropriate given the lack of previous discussions on RSN. Might be worth just cutting that section to allow free-er flow of conversation on this. Jlevi (talk) 01:11, 19 August 2020 (UTC)


I'm not familiar enough with this source to give a strong statement, but a quick look at its use in outside sources, at its staff page, and at how it is used on WP seems to demonstrate that it is a quite reasonable source in a lot of cases. I see that sources such as

WP:UBO outlook. The site itself says that it has some standard editors and a number of regular writers, which is a good sign. And uses on Wikipedia all seem pretty reasonable, with the source adding highly local details in most cases and including attribution in all I see that are even slightly contentious. Unless there are any specific use cases that you have to bring up, this source seems 1) almost always reasonable with attribution, 2) quite useful for local matters, and 3) used pretty reasonable here as far as I can see. Jlevi (talk
) 01:19, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

My main issue would be significant editorial bias. They're not just a paper publisher, but they're active as an advocacy group. (https://www.wweek.com/news/city/2019/11/19/emails-show-portland-businesses-wanted-homeless-meal-service-gone-from-a-downtown-park/) and their mews paper stories focus on issues of social justice/vagrancy and matters where I would expect them to have the most editorial bias. So perhaps not in the specific example I have included. https://www.streetroots.org/advocacy

https://www.streetroots.org/about see the "advocacy" section. Here another news source discusses them for the position the advocacy group Street Roots is taking on a social issue in Portland. https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/homeless/amid-spike-in-911-calls-tied-to-homelessness-street-roots-pitches-response-teams/283-cb0ee8bc-f0e1-4c22-984e-f1c0244e9a7a I can't expect their stories to maintain NPOV on issues relating those matters. Graywalls (talk) 00:13, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

For what its worth the Advocacy section ends "Street Roots values the importance of an independent press, so there is a separation between our advocacy efforts and the reporting our editorial team pursues." and in general I believe them. We don't require sources to abide by NPOV, thats for us not them. I live in their reporting area and am familiar with their work even though I share little of their politics, in general its solid journalism but unquestionably local in scope. I would consider them a reliable source for Portland issues with the normal considerations about exceptional claims concerning BLPs, I would consider them to become less reliable the further the topic gets from Portland and for national issues theres honestly no reason to be using them. On a normal scale I would say they're additional considerations apply.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 15:33, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

The Australian

Clear consensus that the Australian is reliable. Will be added to
talk
) 01:01, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion 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.

Australian media tends to not recieve much coverage on this noticeboard, the only one I can recall being the Quadrant RfC. The Australian is a major national newspaper and has been cited over 8,500 times per theaustralian.com.au HTTPS links HTTP links. I wouldn't bring up a national newspaper like this unless I had concerns about its reliability. These two opinion pieces [15] [16] from 2014-2015 describe The Australian as a deeply partisan publication, essentially in lockstep with the Liberal Party of Australia. Is this an accurate depiction? Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:57, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

@Tadyatha: Obligatory comment that MBFC is just some guy's blog, and shouldn't be used to determine reliability. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:19, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
@Hemiauchenia: Noted. Thanks for pointing that out. My ignorance. Tadyatha (talk) 18:27, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Notified: Wikipedia:Australian Wikipedians' notice board. — Newslinger talk 19:07, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable for news more so than many other newspapers. It should also be reliable for computing / tech topics as it has had reporting on that for more than 40 years.—Graeme Bartlett (talk • contribs) 23:14, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Generally Reliable - reputation for fact checking. As Buidhe notes their partisan views does not appear to have affected its factual accuracy. --Find bruce (talk) 01:03, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable - Australia's only national newspaper. Has published for many years. The controversial articles are generally the opinion pieces. Deus et lex (talk) 12:33, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable generally, but the opinion pieces tend to be slanted more to the right than the left and should be used as per
    WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV Kerry (talk
    ) 08:37, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Generally Reliable Although it is a partisan source, it is about as reliable as the Daily Telegraph and The New York Times. They seem to have a good fact-checking process. The opinion pieces should be cited with caution though. This is the case for a lot of reputable news sources.
    talk
    ) 19:46, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable, opinion pieces may slant to the right, but no more than opinion pieces in the Guardian Australia and The Age / The Sydney Morning Herald tend towards the left. Cavalryman (talk) 13:15, 8 August 2020 (UTC).
  • Reliable I loathe the Australian, but their news reportage is reliable. Their opinion pieces are where generally the dragons and devils lurk.
    talk
    ) 23:21, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
  • GR - but exercise caution as with all news sources in today's clickbait environment. Atsme Talk 📧 12:16, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable for straight news stories, opinions (when notable) should be attributed. Jayjg (talk) 17:12, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable I look on The Australian as the counterweight to The Guardian. Both cover stories with a slightly different slant, but both are good at their journalism and may be relied on for accuracy. Opinion pieces in both lean further right and left respectively. --Pete (talk) 22:40, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Not reliable This paper uses deceptive language to write what appears to be negative facts about people from the left of politics, without actually stating them absolutely, and without themselves actually having reliable sources for their apparent claims. It is also very selective in avoiding writing anything true but negative about the right side of politics in Australia, or true but positive about the left side of politics. As one of many outlets from the company in Australia, they clearly play a role as part of the NewsCorp broader campaign of discrediting the left side of politics. I have seen editors on Wikipedia claim something MUST be true because they saw it reported in both The Australian, and on Sky News, another NewsCorp outlet, or one of NewsCorp's tabloids, thinking they were independent. HiLo48 (talk) 08:36, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment I submit that we need to be very careful about trying to read representative consensus into the collected comments of editors on a journal that is, like most of Murdoch's outlets, hidden behind a paywall. It is pretty much universally agreed that at least parts of the paper are right wing (outrageously so for some opinion pieces), and in no way can it ever be described as left wing. To read the content, most people would have to pay a subscription to NewsCorp. Now that's something far more likely to be done by people with a right wing slant to their political stance to begin with, and unlikely to be done at all by anyone with views on the other side of the fence. It means that we can hardly read the comments above as generally reflecting those of people with views from right across the political spectrum. HiLo48 (talk) 01:43, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Hey HiLo. I hate the Australian, its opinions columns are full of extremist lunacy, has published racist cartoons and opinions on more than one occasion. But their news reporting is pretty straight. Keep in mind Murdoch's monopoly here in Australia, if you are a journalist here you simply cannot rule out working for a Murdoch outlet, they own 70% of the media here. I personally count among my friend and family a number of excellent journalists including one who once worked at The Australian and one who currently works for the Herald Sun, they are both left and often take serious issue with the papers they work for, but there's not a whole lot of options work wise in Australian media. The Australian employs many journalists of a high caliber. Many at the ABC and Nine (formerly Fairfax) have worked at The Australian and vice versa. Its opinion columns are vile, but the news reportage is generally straight news reporting with editorial oversight etc. it has a conservative slant, but all outlets have a slant.
talk
) 23:14, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment Editors may be interested in seeing what the Australian populace thinks of The Australian. This year’s Digital News Report conducted by YouGov on behalf of the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism says that 56% of Australians trust The Australian and 17% don’t trust it. This is around the middle of trust range for the sources which were surveyed.[1] Burrobert (talk) 16:35, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
    • This is, in fact, the highest trust for any named newspaper in Australia, ahead of The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, and The Guardian.[17] --Pete (talk) 19:53, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
      • Yes, it seems that the public doesn't view newspapers very favourably in comparison with television news. Regional and local newspapers are also trusted more than other newspapers such as the Murdoch paper. Burrobert (talk) 20:03, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
        • My take is that people assign trust based on how they compare what they read/view with what they can check. Looking at footage of something that's right there in rweal life, well, that works better than something that's just words on a page. On a more immediate, visceral level. And if it's a local paper, chances are that the reader has a very good knowledge of the subject already. The figures in the survey are a good start, but for reliable sourcing, we have to go on a higher standard than "what most people think". We're righting an encyclopaedia, after all. We, as editors, can check the facts, and look at journalistic standards, and give examples to each other. This noticeboard is particularly useful, because we get a dialogue going, and can look at specific cases and so on. --Pete (talk) 22:38, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2020" (PDF). Reuters Institute. Retrieved 17 August 2020.
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.

The Daily Telegraph

Analysis of health stories in daily newspapers in the UK[1]

Table 1: Summary of the descriptive analysis, by newspaper.

Newspaper Number of articles published Column inches
No author listed Quality assessment instrument score
Mean SD Mean SD
The Sun 12 8.13 10.95 6 1.5 4.99
The Daily Mirror 9 15.06 13.70 2 2.7 3.03
The Daily Telegraph 32 9.61 9.01 15 4.52 4.70
The Daily Mail 53 12.56 8.23 19 5.87 4.14
The Daily Express 24 20.88 13.93 6 6.13 3.91
The Guardian 6 12.75 7.22 0 7.08 4.48
The Independent 13 16.65 9.91 0 7.58 3.42
The Times 12 22.16 18.04 1 8.67 4.00
Total 161 49

References

  1. PMID 23219265
    .

I have been looking into the quality and accuracy of the newspapers in the UK market. This research paper, which is quite rigorous and a first of its kind, indicates that the Daily Telegraph's reporting is concerningly subpar. The analysis of the newspaper articles was done by a group of experts in the field. Should all medical and science reporting by the Daily Telegraph be barred as a usable source and a note be made on the Perennial sources list? --Guest2625 (talk) 08:14, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

I would want to see more then one research paper by one (what are they, media studies student?).Slatersteven (talk) 10:11, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Why do you ask if they are media studies students? Professor Martin McKee who led the team is one of the world leaders in public health. Here is his Professor of European Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine website --Guest2625 (talk) 14:06, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Because a paper written by "the worlds foremost expert" carries more weight then"some professor" which carries ore weight the "just another student". But I now see the point, its not the telegraph in general just medical matters specifically. Well as pointed out below, we already would rather not use the press for medical claims if possible.Slatersteven (talk) 14:18, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
This is what we already have
WP:MEDRS for. Anyway, the paper's analysis is rather more cautious than the table suggests: "Among the broadsheets, The Daily Telegraph was more prolific, publishing three times as many articles as The Times or The Independent, but many of these were short, anonymous articles that seemed to have been taken from the newswires." --RaiderAspect (talk
) 11:16, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Like you, I also found the information about anonymous authors very interesting. The difference in quality of articles that had a byline and those that didn't was drastic.
"Articles with a named reporter attained a significantly higher score (mean 5.54, SD 4.45) than anonymous articles (mean 0.75, SD 0.46) "
I think it is important that we address the issue of byline or no byline here on the reliable source noticeboard. Should there be different weight of reliability given to articles that have bylines and those that do not? --Guest2625 (talk) 09:33, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
That's pretty well covered in
WP:RS. Long sources by a identifiable author will (almost) always be more reliable than short, anonymous ones. Any idea what the articles in question actually looked like? I'm guessing they were something like "A study by scientists from $UniversityX found that $VariableY resulted in $OutcomeZ", but I could be totally off the mark. --RaiderAspect (talk
) 05:53, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
Yes. I agree that "Long sources by a identifiable author will (almost) always be more reliable than short, anonymous ones." It is not specifically stated in
WP:RS, but perhaps it is just self-evident. My interest in bylines concerns general news articles that say they were written by a "staff reporter" versus articles that give a reporter's specific name. Once again I think as you state it should be the default if there is a reporter's name you should be comfortable with the source, but a bit wary if it only says by staff reporter. They didn't provide the list of articles that they rated, so it's not possible to see what the "no author" articles looked like. However, they did state "For 20 weekdays over a 2-month period (6 December 2010–17 January 2011), print editions of the newspapers were collected. ... The print edition of each newspaper was scanned by a single author from cover to cover, and each article pertaining to human health and medicine that reported newly emerging results was included. So, the 161 articles could be extracted out if really interested. --Guest2625 (talk
) 08:08, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
My concern with the Daily Telegraph was in regards to its extremely poor showing in regards to the other UK newspaper sources that we consider reliable and have labeled green on the perennial source list. A warning to other editors is warranted in regards to their poor medical and science reporting. --Guest2625 (talk) 09:33, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Still only based on one student paper, we need ore then that for such a major RS change.Slatersteven (talk) 09:37, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
The need for more data sets is always useful. And we should all be looking for more data sets of newspaper articles that have been reviewed by field experts. Also, to repeat the article is by researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Quoting the wikipedia article: Since its foundation it has become one of the most highly placed institutions in global rankings in the fields of public health and infectious diseases. The leader of the team was researcher Martin McKee a world leader in public health see his website. We here at Wikipedia should start thinking about implementing such a rigorous data driven approach to analyzing the reliability of our sources on the perennial source list. We have the capability to do this, if we have a reliable source wiki project page. --Guest2625 (talk) 13:05, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Writing a student thesis does not make you a field expert. When 5 professors come forward and say it we can say" experts in the field".Slatersteven (talk) 13:12, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
I don't think you understand how research works in the university setting. Your usage of the word student for researchers from a top caliber university is confusing. I agree that more data sets as always will help to clarify the situation as in regards to the Daily Telegraph. However, I do have another source, which gives 14 examples of poor medical reporting by the Daily Telegraph. My advise to my fellow editors is caution and to further investigate the caliber of the Daily Telegraph's medical and science reporting. --Guest2625 (talk) 22:16, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
  • More relevant to the underlying newswires (AP, Reuters,...) + study isn't about accuracy. Most the Daily Telegraph content wasn't original by wire reprints: "The Daily Telegraph was more prolific, publishing three times as many articles as The Times or The Independent, but many of these were short, anonymous articles that seemed to have been taken from the newswires". The quality metrics in the study were also biased towards long comprehensive articles, which is true for quality, but not for accuracy. A short article such as "Pfizer releases new drug..." scores very low in the metric in the study, even if completely accurate.--Bob not snob (talk) 06:40, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Andrey Fomich Novatski

What is the reliability of the aforementioned report. This is used in the context of [[18]]. Andrey Fomich Novatski is a prosecutor of the Ganja District Court of Azerbaijan. He was commissioned to create this historical report by the Azerbaijani Government under the Foriegn ministry (http://www.milliarxiv.gov.az/en/fovqelade-tehqiqat-komissiyasi), which broadly hoped to raise awareness of Armenian violence. This is within the context of the ongoing Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict and territorial claims (Nagorno-Karabakh_conflict, or specifically the speech at Guba Anti-Armenian_sentiment_in_Azerbaijan#Statements_by_President_Ilham_Aliyev). The source is http://files.preslib.az/site/soyqirim/31mart_az.pdf p116. Maidyouneed (talk) 21:47, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

  • I removed the RFC tags, this is unnecessary and not a properly formatted RfC. (t · c) buidhe 08:57, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Chabad.org

The website chabad.org should be treated as:

  1. A reliable general reference on Judaism;
  2. A self-published / affiliated source in respect of the Chabad-Lubavich movement, used as
    attribution
    ;
  3. Deprecated as a source.

See background for further details. Guy (help! - typo?) 10:48, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

Background

See

Hasidic movement". The issue here is that while the site is used as freely as, say, the Catholic Encyclopedia, the Lubavicher perspective is a minority within a minority within a minority: a subset of hasids, which are in turn a subset of orthodox Jews. Chabad is on the fringes of orthodox Judaism; there are "profound ideological differences" between the Chabad movement and the rest of Judaism. It seems to me that the popularity and well-crafted nature of the site obscures its status as advocating a distinctly fringe position. Much of its content rests on interpretations of the law that are stated in absolutist terms but may and often do represent extremely idiosyncratic views. Guy (help! - typo?
) 10:48, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

Opinions (chabad)
@JzG: (Guy), when you state that "This website (Chabad.org) is used as a source in 1,346 articles" could you please break down the numbers: Such as, (1) how many articles about the Chabad movement and ideology does Chabad.org on WP link to? (2) How many times is Chabad.org listed in WP:External links in articles, usually about Judaism or Jewish holidays? (3) how many times is Chabad.org actually given as a reference within articles about Judaism in general? Outside of these three areas on WP I can't think of any way that Chabad.org would be used as a reference point on WP. In light of this research you may even consider withdrawing your proposal as unnecessary. I think you will find that your concerns are unwarranted and that the need for limiting the site as a reference point is overblown.IZAK (talk) 20:41, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2, reliable for about self and thats pretty much it. About self extends only to the Chabad-Lubavitcher movement and they are not a reliable authority on orthodox Judaism or Judaism in general. We must be especially wary of using anything the Lubavitcher have published on history as they have a long record of distortions and outright lies in that field. In general I think we should treat them like any other extremist religious organization, they’re much closer to something like
    Horse Eye Jack (talk
    ) 16:17, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
We really shouldn't be using the term "extremist" here. The word extremist is loaded with negative connotations to terrorism, and insulting religions onwiki isn't conducive to a good editing environment. There's also no need to call out Falun Gong as an "extremist" organization either. There's no need to insult people's religions in this discussion.
ping
|Chess}} on reply) 06:04, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
You are welcome to engage in whatever level of political correctness and personal censorship you wish to engage in, I will continue to
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 16:51, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
But why call a hammer spade? There are criteria in the social sciences for "extremist group" and Chabad is not an extremist group. So please, keep your language neutral. Debresser (talk) 23:37, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Ah Debresser! I do love debating you but don’t you have a COI to disclose before participating further in this discussion? I don’t see any note about it in your vote explanation.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 00:27, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Horse Eye Jack—you say "they have a long record of distortions and outright lies in that field". What makes you think they have a "long record of distortions and outright lies in that field"? Can you for instance link to anything or cite any source making such a claim? Bus stop (talk
) 17:25, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
Any sect of Chasidim is small and idiosyncratic. Most Jews aren't even Orthodox. I never called them fringe but wouldn't object to that description since they're a minority of a minority within Judaism. Loki (talk) 18:28, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Loki—what are you trying to say when you say "Most Jews aren't even Orthodox"? This being an encyclopedia, of course we want to give a detailed explanation of the beliefs and practices of observant Jews. Bus stop (talk) 19:14, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2 That being said, I think that the presentation of the evidence against Chabad/Lubavitch overstates their fringe status within Judaism. They are a highly influential and widely respected and well organized and effective minority voice for highly observant Judaism. Yes, the messianic teachings of some of their adherents are controversial, but they remain a powerful and respected voice in Orthodox Jewish communities worldwide. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 05:54, 8 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2 Seems to be a minority viewpoint in Judaisim. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:29, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
There is no viewpoint in Judaism that is a majority viewpoint. Editors here should take into account that the outcome of this discussion will be applied to any and all Jewish resources, including OU.org and Aish.org. Debresser (talk) 22:46, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Fair enough, but Chabad represents around 13% of Hasidic Jews and Hasidic Jews represent around 5% of the total Jewish population, meaning that Chabad counts for less than 1% of the world's total Jewish population. That's very different from just being a minority viewpoint. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:56, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Hemiauchenia, just to argue, if we are going on numbers and percentages, what percentage of Jews perform, or even know about Shiluach_haken? Do you think it makes sense that in this case Chabad.org might be a source? (I haven't checked, but assume it might be a reference or two.) It's on these types of articles that this RFC is proposing that we take out Chabad (and then in the future, the OU and other religious sources). I don't think that's a good idea. Sir Joseph (talk) 22:03, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Hemiauchenia That is actually a stupid argument. I mean, scholars are less than 1% of the population, and still it is precisely the publlications of that less than 1% that are considered the best sources for Wikipedia. Debresser (talk) 22:27, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Scholarly sources should be preferred over sites like Chabad.org and
WP:INTEXT attributed. Hemiauchenia (talk
) 22:18, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Rosguill, to be fair, that could be because they are more vocal and they, as you say, do more outreach and they engage and are very proficient with media, etc. I do agree with you though that the RFC isn't written correctly, especially when Guy writes that Chabad is "fringe." Chabad is many things, but it's not fringe. Sir Joseph (talk) 18:28, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
  • For "non-extraordinary claims" there will always be many sources without getting into talk page discussions each time about whether attribution is needed or whether the claim is extraordinary. Pardon the comparison, but it's similar to why we shouldn't get used to citing Fox News. The easy stuff can be sourced far and wide. The rest will tie up talk pages and destabilize article text with unnecessary good faith disagreements. SPECIFICO talk 19:09, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2 As per my own previous comments on the RS Noticeboard before this RfC was started. Also, agreeing with all the caveats explained by Cullen328 and Rosguill above. warshy (¥¥) 21:50, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Judaism-related deletion discussions. 21:18, 9 August 2020 (UTC) IZAK (talk) 21:18, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
@
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 22:37, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Hi Horse Eye Jack, I mainly notified the
WP:JUDAISM talk page at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism#Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#RfC: Chabad.org and then also placed a notification at the Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism#Miscellaneous for the same effort to inform Judaic editors. IZAK (talk
) 19:06, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
As I said above, the outcome of this discussion will have wide-reaching repercussions for all online resources about Judaism, including OU.org and Aish,org, which are just as much not representative of Judaism as Chabad.org (even more so, since e.g. OU.org is a US organization, while Chabad is at least a worldwide organization). Debresser (talk) 22:49, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Have a look at our Chabad.org article: "Chabad.org has a comprehensive Jewish knowledge base which includes over 100,000 articles of information ranging from basic Judaism to Hasidic philosophy taught from the Chabad point of view." and "Chabad.org and its affiliated sites claim over 43 million visitors per year, and over 365,000 email subscribers." I mean, is this really a smart proposal...? Debresser (talk) 22:53, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
  • 1 Chabad.org is an impeccable source on all things relating to Judaism. Ari L. Goldman is quoted in the New York Times, commenting on Chabad: "Obviously, it’s a house organ to some extent," said Ari Goldman, a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a self-described fan who receives regular RSS feeds of stories from Chabad.org News. "But I also think it’s a reliable source of information."[19] Bus stop (talk) 22:55, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
  • 2 Chabad has its own agenda and shouldn't be cited for general knowledge on Judaism, any more than I would support using Jehovah's Witnesses or Campus Crusade for Christ's websites for general information on Christianity. It's surely reliable for itself though.--Ermenrich (talk) 23:19, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Chabad.org's agenda includes foremost informing people about Judaism. Why would it not be a reliable website for precisely that? I really fail to understand all of you guys here. Debresser (talk) 23:31, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Ermenrich—the comparison is not apt because Christianity engages in proselytization and Judaism does not. The only "agenda" found at Chabad.org is informational. You are saying "Chabad has its own agenda". Can you tell me what that "agenda" might be? Bus stop (talk) 23:36, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
According to
Chabad outreach Chabad Hasidic outreach is a Kiruv phenomena, whereby Chabad Chasidim attempt to encourage Jews to adopt Orthodox Jewish observance. It's already been pointed out that Chabad follows a different theology than many other Jewish groups. I'm not saying that's bad, it just affects how we should use them.--Ermenrich (talk
) 23:45, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Every group has its own opinions. But the information on the website is mostly general, unless it is specifically about Chabad subjects, of course. I get the feeling you are speaking from some kind of theoretical point of view, without any knowledge of the group or its website. Debresser (talk) 00:37, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Chabad outreach. None of its activities involve attempts to convert anyone to Judaism. And this is hardly unique to Chabad. See Orthodox Judaism outreach. Bus stop (talk
) 14:03, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
They're trying to convert other Jews to Orthodox Judaism. I realize Orthodox Jews might not see that as proselytism because all the people who convert are ethnically Jewish, but it is as much conversion as changing from being a
Roman Catholic, which is generally called conversion even though both are (religiously) Christian. Anyway, Chabad.org contains articles arguing for the literal truth of the Bible, for instance, which is in fact a substantive difference from Reform or Conservative Judaism. Orthodox Judaism is not the only Judaism, anymore than Evangelicalism is the only Christianity. Taking descriptions of Jewish practice by any partisan Orthodox source (i.e. a source that is encouraging others to see their version of the faith as the only correct one) and saying they're applicable as general knowledge about all Jews is akin to taking a partisan Orthodox Christian description of practice and saying it's generally applicable to all Christians. It's also been pointed out that Chabad is probably not entirely reliable for its descriptions of the Lubavitcher movement.--Ermenrich (talk
) 14:35, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
Ermenrich—it's hard to understand how you fail to make a distinction between that which is interreligious and that which is intrareligious. Bus stop (talk) 16:38, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Procedural objection – while the options presented here are not the standard 4-option survey that RSN regulars are familiar with, the responses nevertheless look very similar to that format, which could cause confusion among participants that didn't read the prompt carefully. The wording of the option presented here as #2 is closer to the deep end of #3 in the standard prompt. I wouldn't go as far as to say that that we need to throw everything out and start over as there's been useful discussion, but I think that the framing was less than ideal and would thus suggest caution when closing or otherwise evaluating the outcome of this discussion. signed, Rosguill talk 00:13, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Then perhaps this discussion should be closed and re-opened as a standard 4-option one. I for one also object to not having been informed at
WT:JUDAISM till after 4 whole days of discussion here, which I consider an outrage. Debresser (talk
) 00:39, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
off-topic bickering
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Also, in the same New York Times article by Alan Feuer: “Obviously, it’s a house organ to some extent,” said Ari Goldman, a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a self-described fan who receives regular RSS feeds of stories from Chabad.org News. “But I also think it’s a reliable source of information.” Bus stop (talk) 04:46, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
Note that “scholarly” articles are not always reliable in their depiction of Judaism either. The academic perspective is sometimes at odds with traditional Jewish scholarship. I would turn to academic articles for a critical perspective on ancient Jewish history, while I would favour Chabad.org for an understanding of normative Jewish views on Midrash, personal ethics, and divinity.
Even if it has some small idiosyncrasies as a “house organ” as per Ari Goldman, Chabad.org today serves as a mainstream source within Judaism, with a lot of valuable general Jewish information, representing traditional Jewish practices and perspectives. Cohengulko (talk) 13 August 2020 (UTC)— Cohengulko (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
Chabad, like all Hasidic groups, are also at odds with traditional Jewish scholarship by definition. They aren’t a traditional Jewish group and never have been, their views are not normative Jewish views nor are their practices and perspectives representative of traditional Jewish practices and perspectives.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 15:37, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
The idea that Hasidic groups are at odds with traditional Jewish scholarship seems, how do I put this nicely, erroneous? They obviously make up a sizable percentage of practicing Jews and while there may be differences of opinions, I find it hard to believe that someone can in good faith can argue that "their practices and perspectives representative of traditional Jewish practices and perspectives". Is there a perfect model Jew that we can get the true answers from instead? | MK17b | (talk) 00:58, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
The Chasidim only came into being in the early modern era, if they accepted traditional Jewish scholarship they would cease to exist as a sect.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 15:54, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
@Horse Eye Jack Your point of view is, thank G-d, not accepted in the Jewish world of today. I don't know why you are so fervently opposed to Hassidism, but your attitude is, and I repeat myself, thank G-d, not representative of the attitude of other groups in Judaism towards Hassidism or Chabad, including the so-called Misnagdim. Please leave your personal issues out of this. Debresser (talk) 15:36, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
@
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 15:54, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
Horse Eye Jack—a person can be a "Lubavitcher Rabbi" and still be "a neutral voice". I think there would naturally be a burden on a person such as yourself to articulate specifically where a presumably un-neutral voice is seen. Could you please to do that, Horse Eye Jack? Please try to articulate specifically where Debresser's input shows what might be called signs of biased input to this discussion. Even if they are a "Lubavitcher Rabbi", and I could say I'm a goose from Spain, that would not disqualify them from participating in this discussion, unless of course you can be a little bit more specific in what it is you are saying. Speaking of what you are saying, you say "they are not a reliable authority on orthodox Judaism". I completely disagree. Chabad.org is "a reliable authority on orthodox Judaism". But I would be interested to hear how you arrive at your conclusion. You say "they have a long record of distortions and outright lies in that field". Can you explain any of this? Bus stop (talk
) 13:51, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
The question was addressed to Debresser not Bus stop.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 16:47, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
That has been my experience and it is my impression of the outlet when it comes to their coverage of history. It would be nice to have links or something saved away with their direct rebuttals in mainstream academics also saved but I don’t have them. What I find interesting is you demanding detailed explanations and arguments when you own "Chabad.org is an impeccable source on all things relating to Judaism.” is but a sentence and provides no reasoning *at all.* Nothing so far has suggested that Chabad.org satisfies
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 17:28, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
@
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 17:28, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
Horse Eye Jack—I've updated my "vote". I added an evaluation of the Chabad website provided by Ari L. Goldman. Bus stop (talk
) 18:05, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
I hadn't noticed your question previously. This information has been visible for all on my userpage for about a decade, so I don't see why the sudden need for "disclosing". If you are insinuating a COI, I have to disappoint you, I am not working for or receiving any payment from any Chabad organization, and my opinion is my own. Now would you please disclose what movement in Judaism you are affiliated with, since I feel that will shed light on your overly zealous opposition here. Debresser (talk) 18:43, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
You don’t feel like being a leading member of the organization under discussion on this noticeboard was important to note when participating in a discussion about that origination? Just FYI COI is about more than payment or work, have you checked out
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 19:10, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
A rabbi is a teacher, not a "leading member of the organization". Would Alex Honnold not be allowed to edit about rock climbing? Bus stop (talk) 20:32, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
Precisely. I am a rabbi, and I am also an adherent of Chabad. Both these pieces of information are available on my talkpage, and neither constitutes a COI.
Now please disclose your affiliation, as requested above. Debresser (talk) 20:56, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
The question is about the reliability of the source, not what we think of certain sects and who is or isn't a rabbi. The above debate about sects and rabbis is a forum discussion and totally inappropriate here. Take the sectarian bickering to Facebook or some other forum, it does not belong here.
talk
) 02:27, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option "1.5", per Rosguill. François Robere (talk) 22:15, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 2. Personal website with no reputation for fact-checking or accuracy (and no reason to think it particularly performs them; I couldn't find any claims of an editorial board when skimming the site, say.) None of the comments arguing for using it as a source are actually addressing the
    WP:RS argument. "Some people like it" isn't an RS argument. If you want to make general claims about Judaism, go to a source that actually fact-checks what it says. --Aquillion (talk
    ) 13:27, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
I think that the The Chabad.org Team page is in fact showing the editorial board, even if not called so explicitly. Debresser (talk) 11:04, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
Not seeing why you'd think that. They seem to just be the people who maintain and write for it. Look at their mission statement: Utilize internet technology to unite Jews worldwide, empower them with knowledge of their 3,300 year-old tradition, and foster within them a deeper connection to Judaism’s rituals and faith and "Everything in this world was created for a divine purpose. All forms of modern technology can and should be harnessed to make the world a better place and, in the case of Jews, to spread Judaism in the widest possible manner." Nothing about reporting, fact-checking, accuracy, or any of that nature - it's effectively comparable to a personal website the like. I'm just not seeing anything indicating that they are even attempting to be the sort of thing that we would consider a
WP:RS; their goal is to spread Judaism and unite Jews (with their interpretation of Judaism), not to publish carefully-vetted factual material. --Aquillion (talk
) 11:27, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
In the sentence "empower them with knowledge of their 3,300 year-old tradition" the word "knowledge" implies factual information, propaganda or blogs. But I agree it is not stressed clearly enough. Debresser (talk) 14:33, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Discussion (chabad)

2010 ArbCom Chabad movement case, including Chabad.org

This subject was dealt with by the ArbCom about ten years ago, and they decided on no action. For more information please see:

Thanks, IZAK (talk) 20:16, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

That ARBCOM case didn't address the question of Chabad as a
wp:COI for some users and Chabad - or am I missing something?--Ermenrich (talk
) 20:28, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
It was a very long case that included my own complaints that Chabad.org was being over-used by pro-Chabad editors, you'll have to go through the whole case to pick up all its points, but the ArbCom decided to pass the buck, and required no sanctions, just some cautionary warnings to the pro-Chabad editors, as they (the ArbCom) glossed over anything the pro-Chabad editors were doing be it COI or using Chabad.org as a RS. You'll have to wade through all of this at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/User:Yehoishophot Oliver to find out how Chabad.org is involved in the complaints and case. IZAK (talk) 20:46, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Ermenrich is correct, and that case was not about the resource, but about editors. And it remains in my opinion a repetition of the witch-hunt of the Hassidim by the Misnagdim and one of the poorer moves of IZAK, not to mention a chillul shem HaShem. Debresser (talk) 22:42, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
Debresser, don't get melodramatic. There were very good reasons for the original case, and Chabad.org was part of the original COI discussion. When pro-Chabad editors decide they
WP:OWN an article, no one can get a word in edgewise, as is well-known, but this is not the subject right now in any case. IZAK (talk
) 19:00, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Whether it is chilly or not is besides the point. It is a reliable and easily accessible source on almost everything pertaining to observant Judaism. Bus stop (talk) 00:59, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

Belated notification

Why in the world was

WT:JUDAISM not informed right away?! 4 days?! Debresser (talk
) 22:43, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

I agree! I was the one that did the notification [20] immediately after I belatedly came across this discussion. IZAK (talk) 20:50, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

conandaily.com

I've nominated Francis Baraan IV for deletion. I am currently working on a sources analysis. The author has relied on the conandaily.com site for several references. This appears to me to be the Wordpress blog of Conan Altatis, an advertising-supported news aggregator. The author believes the site to be a reliable source. It would be good to get some expert views. Curb Safe Charmer (talk) 14:13, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Clearly not a reliable source.
Related: The editor in chief, Conan Altatis[21][22][23] appears to be
WP:GNG --Guy Macon (talk
) 14:40, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

fastcasual.com

I just want to get a consensus on the reliability of fastcasual.com. At first blush, I'm ambivalent towards it and would allow it, but I'd prefer to hear from the community since we don't have an article on it not its parent company. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 18:06, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

No comment on reliability but on their about us page they openly call for press releases. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:09, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you mean with that. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 17:24, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

South China Morning Post (and Lin Nguyen, a fabricated writer)

I notice Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources does not yet mention South China Morning Post (SCMP).

I know there have been ownership changes and the recent

Hong Kong National Security Law
(effective July 1, 2020) may impact reporting at the SCMP (and the same law could impact every publication in Hong Kong SAR).

I found at least one previous discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_285#Straits_Times_and_the_South_China_Morning_Post

At the very minimum Perennial sources should tell people not to use articles from "Lin Nguyen" who turned out to be a fabricated persona. The SCMP withdrew all articles by this persona. WhisperToMe (talk) 17:55, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Definitely anything published after the new national security law should have just as much reliability as The Onion. Articles during the period between the British handover and that law I'm not sure about. Adoring nanny (talk) 18:05, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
I'm thinking that Xinhua (RSP entry) is a better starting point of comparison than The Onion. signed, Rosguill talk 18:14, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
That RSP entry is far too generous to Xinhua. [24][25]. Adoring nanny (talk) 19:29, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
I wrote the entry based off the opinions present in the 2 discussions, and I think it is a reasonable reflection of them. If you think it's too generous then that's down to the responders, not me. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:37, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

BTW The Atlantic here published: "A Newsroom at the Edge of Autocracy" (August 1, 2020). WhisperToMe (talk) 18:15, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

SCMP has been owned by Alibaba Group since 2016, when it closed its non english language editions and subsidiary publications like HK Magazine it also retracted an article criticising Li Zhanshu in 2017, so I don't think that the national security law is going to have a significant impact, as these changes have already been happening to the SCMP since 2016. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:42, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
The allegations presented in The Atlantic are concerning, particularly the censoring of reporters coverage of the Hong Kong protests by editors to give a strongly pro-goverment slant, and the publication of an interview with Gui Minhai, who was detained by the Chinese government at the time, effectively akin to a forced confession. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:37, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment The Lin Nguyen articles were all opinion pieces; they didn’t affect the SCMP's usual news reporting.
    To my knowledge, the SCMP has been generally regarded as one of the most (if not the most) reliable news outlets in HK. Regarding bias, they've usually been more critical of the mainland Chinese government than friendly towards it, even since 2016. — MarkH21talk 18:48, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment Newspaper of record#cite_note-51 says "The clippings are from the South China Morning Post, the paper of record in Hong Kong". --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:56, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I've encountered the SCMP on a few occasions and just read the Atlantic piece, which I think should be considered a reliable look into the state of the newspaper. The SCMP is clearly a
    WP:BIASED). Regardless, I'm glad to see this discussion happening, since the SCMP is a very notable omission to the RSP list. {{u|Sdkb}} talk
    22:24, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

I'm pinging participants from Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_285#South China Morning Post reliability: @Skyring: @-Ni3Xposite: @Ckfasdf: @Feminist: @Slatersteven: @The Drover's Wife: @DreamLinker: @Burrobert: (Adoring nanny is already here) WhisperToMe (talk) 23:10, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

@WhisperToMe: do you want me to format a formal RfC? Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:13, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
@Hemiauchenia: I would love that. Thank you! WhisperToMe (talk) 23:14, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
@WhisperToMe: Done. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:55, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
Also @Buidhe: and @Darouet: from the first discussion WhisperToMe (talk) 23:14, 2 August 2020 (UTC)


Are government publications to be considered self-published sources?

US State Department etc. In my opinion, StatCan reports have a similar quality to those published by Pew Research Center (considered reliable at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources
). Both collect their own raw data and have internal experts analyze and interpret it and then publish the reports on their website. Both Pew and StatCan have their own internal mechanisms to ensure accuracy. And given the strong reputation both have, those mechanisms clearly work. So StatCan doesn't seem any more self-published than Pew.

My question is less motivated by a specific example and more by a desire to better understand what it means to be a "self-published" source and how to determine if a government publication should be considered self-published or not.VR talk 20:04, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Being self-published does not mean a source is unreliable, but we have to consider the authors and the context in which the report is being used. Some government websites clearly state that they do not ensure their reliability and these should not be used. TFD (talk) 23:08, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
Government sources have always been sort of an exception. For example,
WP:GEOLAND states that any populated place that verifiably exists is notable, even if we know absolutely nothing about it other than information provided by the government. In that case it is perfectly acceptable to create an article using only sources created by the same government that willed the populated place into existence. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠
03:06, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I’m beginning to think it would help to divide SPS into two sub-genres: “individually self-published” (ISPS) and “organizationally self-published” (OSPS).
Either of these can be reliable (or unreliable) depending on who the individual or organization is... but with OSPS there is a greater chance that there was some form of fact checking. Blueboar (talk) 14:26, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Blueboar This is probably a dumb question, but what exactly is the difference between OSPS and a website like Pew Research Center? Pew might have their own employees collect raw data, have internal experts analyze and interpret it, have it edited internally, and then publish the report on their website. That sounds like OSPS to me.VR talk 12:39, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
I would classify it as an OSPS. Blueboar (talk) 12:42, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Blueboar Just to be clear, you would classify Pew as OSPS and reliable? And their reliability would be based on the fact that they're reputable and widely cited for the work they do, or a different reason? I'm trying to determine how we would distinguish reliable OSPS from unreliable OSPS.VR talk 14:29, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
Masem, I just looked at it. I like Zero0000's definition of SPS, it makes things clearer. I also like FactOrOpinion's examples, they are helpful.VR talk 17:02, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
FWIW, a while back on the
WP:USINGSPS talk page, I'd tried to start a discussion, Are government publications often SPSs and should this be addressed on the main page? Ultimately, the answer depends on how "self-published" is defined, and hopefully there will eventually be a consensus about that, and if there are still questions about government publications, we can come back to them. More generally, the text on the USINGSPS page should be updated once there's an agreement on a better way to define SPS. -- FactOrOpinion (talk
) 18:49, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I agree with User:GreenMeansGo: it depends. A properly functioning government department should be capable of providing reference-quality material, but to be confident of reliability, we need to have insight into the department function. — Charles Stewart (talk) 21:06, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Dar al-Ifta al Misriyyah / www.dar-alifta.org

Is Dar al-Ifta al Misriyyah a reliable source for Islamic beliefs? (used as a citation in the section above this one).

--Guy Macon (talk) 22:04, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

  • Gave notification of discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Islam#Is_Dar_al-Ifta_a_reliable_source?.VR talk 22:20, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
  • No, this organization functions as a branch of the Egyptian government. There are many different factions of Islam and this only represents one of them. At best, it could be used as a primary source on the beliefs of itself. There are plenty of scholarly sources on Islam and these should be used preferentially. (t · c) buidhe 22:36, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable for opinions of Sunni Islam. Their reliability stems from them being under the purview of Al-Azhar University, probably the most well-known institution of Sunni Islamic learning. This book says Dar al-Ifta "has throughout the 20th century been a central player in the bargaining over the role of Islam in Egyptian society." Their association with the Egyptian government is a double edged sword. On one hand it means they represent "mainstream" views (and Egypt is a large and moderate Muslim-majority country). On the other hand it means they can't say anything against the government, and I would treat any of their political opinions with caution. I would use them with attribution in most cases.VR talk 22:42, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment - If you're trying to find an organization that represents every single creed of a given religion, you won't find it anywhere. You'll find vastly different interpretations of Islam across the world, as well as many nations harbor differing majority views, even if they're all Sunni. For example - you'll find that the majority strains of Sunni Islam in Saudi Arabia diverge significantly from those in Egypt, Kazakhstan or Bosnia. Furthermore, many significant religious institutions are affiliated with or at least funded by the government of the nation in which they operate. I don't believe that either of those should be sufficient grounds to discard a source. Instead, it's best to rely on how much they are mentioned in other sources, the history and influence of the institutions and their perceived credibility with regards to how well their opinions are respected by the worshippers in their respective jurisdictions. Goodposts (talk) 23:52, 12 August 2020 (UTC)
    Yes, which is why scholarly sources are helpful in distinguishing commonalities and differences between Islamic teachings in different countries and/or other variations. I agree that
    WP:DUE, although scholarly sources are preferred). If I were writing an article about Sunni Islam I might start with something like this book. (t · c) buidhe
    05:50, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
    Islamic jurisprudence on contemporary topics. These scholars are rigorously trained in various disciplines of Islamic studies and supervised by their peers. I agree that they are only a reliable source on Islamic jurisprudence (and maybe Islamic theology) and nothing else. For example, I wouldn't use them as a reliable source for history of Egypt. And I would use them with attribution in most cases.VR talk
    14:09, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
    I don't think that they would necessarily meet the WP definition of scholarly source because they're unlikely to publish, say, in mediums that are peer-reviewed by people outside the organization. I mean, maybe the Chabad website is reviewed by Chabad Jewish law scholars but it does not necessarily make it a reliable source for Judaism in general. (t · c) buidhe 21:10, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
    The issue with chabad was that they were at the fringes of orthodox Judaism. By contrast, Al-Azhar is the foremost center of Sunni religious learning.VR talk 22:35, 13 August 2020 (UTC)
    There are about 1.4–1.5 billion Sunni Muslims in the world. The population of Egypt is 98 million. Even if this institute has significant influence beyond Egypt, it hardly speaks for most Sunni Muslims. The purpose of this institute is not to explain what Muslims have believed throughout the world and throughout history, but simply expound the beliefs of a particular school of Islamic thought. Which is why we rely on publications which meet secular academic standards to write about religious topics. (Note that many people of faith publish in secular media, but on the other hand we should rely on independently published sources, rather than Catholic church publications, to tell us about Catholic theology.) (t · c) buidhe 03:17, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
    Both Dar al-Ifta and Al-Azhar cover all four Sunni schools of thought. And we need to distinguish between "teachings of Islamic scholars" and "views of the Muslim masses". Just like we'd distinguish between "teachings of Catholic church" and "what Catholics actually believe". Dar al-Ifta looks at the "teachings of Islamic scholars" throughout history and is a reliable source for that. They are not a reliable source for the opinions of 1.5 billion Sunnis today -
    Al-Azhar university, their Islamic opinions are widely cited in academic literature and media. In fact, medical journals, when discussing Islamic views on a medical topic, cite the opinion of Dar al-Ifta: African Journal of Urology[28], BMC Womens Health[29], The Journal of Sexual Medicine[30] and Journal of Medical Ethics[31].VR talk
    05:42, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
  • No, per Buidhe. We should not be using in-universe material, least of all one part of a state apparatus. Use with attribution only, do not use at all for historical information about Islam. GPinkerton (talk) 17:22, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Reliable, The reliability comes from the fact that it belongs to Al-Azhar University, which is the most reputable Islamic institution among Sunni Muslims that exist today. Most Fataws are issued through consultation with a board of senior scholars. The political views are problematic especially in the past three decades. However, fataws with such views are a very marginal compared to the gigantic database of fataws. Also, the website contains a large volume of historical fataws issues by previous Muftis, which are valuable from scholarship perspectives. Very few in Western academia would challenge the reliability of Dar-al-ifta, but several would disagree with some opinions. But is not this the case with any reliable source? Millions of Muslims in Africa, Asia and even in Eruope still use Dar-al-ifta as a main reference for their day-to-day fataws. It will be very ironic if it is labelled by Wikipedia as unreliable. Nawawi676 (talk) 13:38, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Yes. The fact that the medical journals VR cited above use it as a source is a strong evidence that it meets our standards for reliability and accuracy.Jushyosaha604 (talk) 21:47, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

US Liberal sources vs. US Conservative sources: Cage Fight!

The following discussion 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.


(As usual we are going to pretend that US Libertarian sources and US Green sources do not exist.)

Note that words like "liberal" and "Conservative" mean something else in the UK. This is about the US meaning of those phrases.

You see a lot of complaints claiming that Wikipedia has different standards for liberal and conservative sources. A recent pair of RfCs was flawed because it compared good liberal-leaning sources with a bad conservative-leaning source. So I am going to start by asking some questions. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC) ~

What are the absolute least reliable liberal-leaning and conservative-leaning sources?

  • The difficulty here is in classification. Sure, Infowars and The daily Mail are unreliable, but are they really politically conservative? Would not alt-right be a better pigeonhole to put Infowars in? --Guy Macon (talk) 21:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Infowars is conservative politically, in the American context (which for some reason this discussion is limited to) alt-right is a subset of conservative.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 05:07, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

On the right:

Breitbart News
Daily Mail
Drudge Report
Infowars

On the left:

Redneck Revolt
MoveOn
Palmer Report
Shareblue

Got any better (or in this case worse...) choices? --Guy Macon (talk) 05:03, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't get it, Daily Mail isnt America, Drudge is a news aggregator (their "exclusives" being I believe the exception to this), and the Palmer Report is a blog. Those don't seem to fit at all within this discussion.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 05:12, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Sounds like a good opportunity to suggest some replacements that do fit. As for The Daily Mail, despite being a UK publication, they are a favorite source for americans pushing an alt-right POV. Palmer is no more and no less a blog than InfoWars is. Some of Palmer's pages strongly resemble news reports. [32][33][34] --Guy Macon (talk) 06:23, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Thats interesting, I've never throught of the Daily Mail as alt-right. On the "Palmer is no more and no less a blog than InfoWars is" I believe you are mistaken. InfoWars isnt a blog at all, its a fringe news source with a staff of paid writers which also runs wire stories from RT and if you look at their current homepage Alex Jones isnt credited as the writer of any of the news stories. Lets compare that to Palmer Report where the majority of their stories are credited to Bill Palmer and it feels much more like a group blog.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 16:12, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
You make a good point. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:44, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I get the format of this thread, but this question is kind of "unanswerable" because there really is no bottom when it comes to unreliable sources. I mean, least-reliable conservative source? The Daily Stormer, maybe? It's hard to pick. I'm sure there are "looney left" blogs as well. Maybe a better question would be like, least-reliable left- or right-leaning mainstream media? In which case, on the conservative side I'd have to say OANN and Newsmax, The Washington Times and Examiner, NY Post, Boston Herald, and all those old-school conservative tabloid rags. On the left, well, I think Pew said MSNBC was the most opinionated on TV, but I wouldn't say they're "least reliable" because of it. There isn't a liberal analogue for networks like OANN, I don't think. USA Today is strongly left IMO, but again, not necessarily unreliable because of it. Huffington Post is what come to mind when I think of left-wing unreliable mainstream media. Lev!vich 18:27, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

What are the absolute most reliable liberal-leaning and conservative-leaning sources?

  • "Biased but reliable" is what we are looking for here. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • On the liberal side, I would say the New York Times is the most reliable. Blueboar (talk) 22:25, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • The Wall Street Journal is definitely reliable, but I'm not sure how much of its conservative reputation is due to its editorial page vs. its actual reporting. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 22:31, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • New York Times and Wall Street Journal. - Although I must acknowledge that WSJ news articles are consistently more objective than NYT news articles, despite my love affair with the NYT. The WSJ establishes itself as conservative-leaning more by omission than commision, i.e., they do not cover some important stories that receive detailed coverage in the Times, Washington Post, and other prominent newspapers. Of course, the WSJ editorials and most of their columnists are very conservative, Peggy Noonan being a notable exception.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 22:39, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
    Perhaps, but only from their news coverage alone. WSJ frequently publishes editorials that contradict the scientific consensus on global warming, for example.[35] (t · c) buidhe 03:04, 25 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I'd say NPR, The Atlantic and Vox are among the most reliable on the left. The Young Turks is probably one of the most left-of-center sources in the US, but I think they score particularly high marks for accuracy, transparency and disclosure of conflicts of interest in their reporting. Armadillopteryx 22:41, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • National Review is a conservative publication that is at least somewhat reliable, unless contradicted by facts posted in some other more consistently neutral venue. These days, none of the mainstream major U.S. news sources seem consistently "liberal", not even NPR; since 2016 they've all tried to both-sides everything. Softlavender (talk) 02:36, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • As people have already mentioned NYT/WSJ is the classic matchup, although it might not really do for our purposes becasue they're more center left and center right than fully liberal or conservative (besides for the editorials there isnt much daylight between hem). I think we're looking for something more along the line of
    Horse Eye Jack (talk
    ) 03:58, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • On the left, NPR tends to have a higher degree of willingness to notice other points of view. Adoring nanny (talk) 01:35, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
I just wanted to add a recent example of this. Here Minnesota Public Radio takes notice of the correlation between the "defund the police" that is happening and the Minneapolis Crime Spike.[36]. Other left-leaning sources have had stories that are in the ballpark [37][38], and the CBS story does it almost as well as MPR did, but MPR hit the nail on the head much earlier than anyone else. Adoring nanny (talk) 19:20, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
  • NYT and WaPo on the left. WSJ on the right. Lev!vich 18:23, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Borderline

We should also explore the inner borders. Pick two sources from the SAME team to illustrate where you would draw the line between reliable and unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 21:02, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

I'll probably catch a lot of heat for this, but I don't care. Reliable story on the DOJ moving to dismiss it's charges against Flynn from the BBC.[39] An unreliable story from the NYT[40]. Here is a key excerpt from the BBC's story [the DOJ] also said it could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that Flynn had lied. Now the NYT: Prosecutors said that the case fell short of the legal standard that Mr. Flynn’s lies be “materially” relevant to the matter under investigation. The key difference between the two is that the BBC says the DOJ could said it could not prove that Flynn lied, while the NYT said that the DOJ talked about Flynn's lies. If we go to the actual DOJ filing [41], it does not assert that Flynn lied. The NYT's story is therefore false, and the BBC is correct. Note that the question of whether or not Flynn actually lied is not relevant here. Both stories are talking about what the DOJ asserted in that particular filing, and the filing consistently refers to Flynn's statements, without taking a position on whether or not they were lies. Adoring nanny (talk) 21:12, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
This has nothing to do with liberal-leaning and conservative-leaning equality. It just shows the BBC is more reliable than something like The New York Times. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:24, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
No, it shows that Adoring nanny doesn't have great judgment about sourcing, and that you probably shouldn't take their posts at face value without confirming their assertions for yourself. Specifically, the Times article s/he cites explicitly says: "Mr. Shea also said the government could not prove at any trial that Mr. Flynn lied." Adoring nanny's underlying premise is wrong, and based on misreading the sources. (For clarity, the DOJ claimed both that it could not prove that Flynn lied, and that any lies he may have told were immaterial to the case; the Times article accurately notes both arguments). The Times story is not "false"; it's accurate, and Adoring nanny should probably exercise a bit more due diligence with sources. MastCell Talk 17:03, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
And this illustrates a systemic problem when it comes to how WE (Wikipedians) report what news outlets have said... We sometimes interpret what the sources say to fit our own biases. We focus on the parts of a report that appear to fit our own biases, glossing over the parts of a report that don’t fit our own biases. This is not a reliability issue... it’s a neutrality issue. Blueboar (talk) 17:49, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
No, User:MastCell, reporting the truth at one part of an article does not absolve a source of the obligation to also be truthful at another point in an article. If one were to accept what you said above, then I would be truthful to write "User:MastCell wrote that User:Adoring nanny's posts should be taken at face value. I also can't prove that User:MastCell wrote that User:Adoring nanny's posts can be taken at face value. Precisely analogous. Adoring nanny (talk) 23:08, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
@Adoring nanny: Both the NYT quote, Prosecutors said that the case fell short of the legal standard that Mr. Flynn’s lies be “materially” relevant to the matter under investigation, and the BBC quote, [the DOJ] also said it could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that Flynn had lied, are true. Both quotes are also incomplete with respect to the DOJ's motion to dismiss. As MastCell noted, that motion argued both that it could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt (1) that Flynn made false statements in the interview, and (2) that the statements, if false, were materially false (i.e., impeded the investigation in a material way). Truthfulness and completeness aren't the same thing. As for your earlier claim "If we go to the actual DOJ filing, ... it does not assert that Flynn lied," that's because the law that Flynn was charged with violating -- 18 U.S. Code § 1001(a)(2) -- is worded in terms of "knowingly and willfully ... mak[ing] any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation," not in terms of "lies." So the legal documents likewise refer to materially false statements, not "lies." But knowingly and willfully making a false statement is commonly calling "lying," and newspapers want their readers to understand the issue, so they commonly using "lying/lies" instead of something like "knowing and willful false statements." -- FactOrOpinion (talk) 23:38, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
FactOrOpinion, but the filing doesn't say that Flynn knowingly and willingly made a false statement. It does not even say that Flynn made a false statement, let alone anything about scienter. That's the NYT's opinion, not the filing's. Adoring nanny (talk) 00:18, 22 August 2020 (UTC)
@Adoring nanny: That's because it's the motion to dismiss, and they're not trying to argue that he is guilty of the crime to which he pleaded guilty. But they stated the crime with which he was charged (18 U.S.C. § 1001(a)(2)), they quoted the relevant section, they argued that there was "reasonable doubt as to whether Mr. Flynn knowingly and willingly lied to investigators during the interview," they stated that "the FBI agents expressed uncertainty as to whether Mr. Flynn had lied," etc., all of which makes it quite reasonable for a newspaper to explain the issue in terms of lying and materiality. Moreover, the DOJ had previously filed briefs with the court stating that Flynn was guilty of knowingly and willfully making material false statements, Flynn had previously stated under oath that he was guilty of that, and Sullivan had already accepted Flynn's guilty plea. I don't think there's any reason for a newspaper to be silent about everything that had been previously stated in court and focus solely on the motion that was just filed; the paper's goal is to help their readers accurately understand what's going on, and situating the new motion in the context of what previously occurred is reasonable. What the DOJ was doing was arguing that it could no longer prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Flynn lied or that his statements were materially false. -- FactOrOpinion (talk) 01:27, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

Please suggest pairs of liberal-leaning and conservative-leaning sources of equal reliability.

  • No unfair match-ups like Fox News vs. CNN, MoveOn.org vs. Forbes, etc. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • This diagram, if accurate, can give many such pairings. It seems to match CNN to The Washington Times. VR talk 23:58, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for the pointer.VR talk 02:09, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Could be useful as a list of candidate sources to start your research. For example, I didn't know that Wonkette existed. (I didn't list it as a candidate in the section above above because it shades towards satire/parody.) --Guy Macon (talk) 05:09, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
If we can include satire/parody, then: The Onion vs Babylon Bee. Blueboar (talk) 14:10, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
I think Reductress vs Babylon Bee would be more appropriate, The Onion is pretty down the middle.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 16:15, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Also, the following from The Onion is 100% accurate: Wikipedia Celebrates 750 Years Of American Independence] :) --Guy Macon (talk) 02:10, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  • The Onion and the Babylon Bee unquestionably have equal levels of reliability. Adoring nanny (talk) 01:37, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
    Agree that they are equally unreliable, and the Bee only seems to skewer democrats, but the Onion skewers everybody, and so fails the liberal-leaning test. I am evaluating Reductress [ https://reductress.com/ ] now.
  • NYT and WSJ, WaPo and WSJ, MSNBC and Fox News, Huffington Post and The Daily Caller or Red State maybe. Time and Forbes maybe. Lev!vich 18:22, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
    Nope - can't be done. It's an apples to oranges comparison. MSNBC is off by itself and so is CNN and Fox News Channel; in fact nothing even comes close to Fox News because of their left-right mix which is why they're #1; The NYT and WSJ are close - they're publications not television networks and there's a big difference; WaPo has gone so far left they're opposite is closer to being Breitbart; and to say "unfair match-ups like Fox News vs. CNN" means what? We simply cannot rate entire networks/tv channels and reach a fair & equitable blanket conclusion - it just doesn't work that way - and doing so is noncompliant with our RS guidelines because CONTEXT MATTERS. Atsme Talk 📧 03:51, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Place arguments that Team Blue is superior to Team Red or viva versa here

  • I know that some of you won't be able to resist jumping the gun and claiming that My Team Is Full Of Good And Pure People, Every Source That Leans My Way Is Perfect, And The Other Team Is Full Of Lies And Evil. All such arguments, and anything else that does not address the specific questions asked will be moved here. There is a time and a place... --Guy Macon (talk) 21:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Hell no... my team are a bunch of lying skallywags who will do or say anything to get elected. It’s just that the OTHER team is worse. 😉 Blueboar (talk) 22:30, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Blueboar wins the prize for most humorous and truthful response. Thank you  - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 22:45, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
Blueboar makes a strong case. [42] --Guy Macon (talk) 22:58, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
We do not need to pretend that US Libertarian sources and US Green sources do not exist. Fox News is not a bad conservative-leaning source, just because it does not match some peoples political persuasions. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:39, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
I may have overstated the problems with Fox News, but the obvious "lying by Photoshop" images shown at [43] and the weaselly retraction that failed to acknowledge that they lied by Photoshop made me change my opinion of Fox News from "Use with care" to "Generally unreliable for facts, events, interviews and quotes." If Fox News is willing to mislead me about where a particular person carrying a gun and wearing a green mask was standing, how can I trust anything else they present to me? --Guy Macon (talk) 22:39, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
And therein lies the problem, Guy - one incident of a photo montage created by the art department to garnish the page was all it took to downgrade/distrust an entire network. It's still the most watched, even The NYTimes had to admit it. Unfortunately, their own bias gets in the way of them being able to fully understanding why - they live in a media bubble - NPR explains it to some degree. Fox corrected the mistake and removed the montage, even though it was meant to be artistic using real individual photos to create the montage - the images themselves were not fabricated like what happened to the NYTimes over the course of 4 years that forced them to return a Pulitzer. But none of that seems to matter when we don't want it to matter. We tend to forgive the sources we agree with, and condemn those we don't, especially when they give us a reason not to, even when it's not a legitimate reason. If you get some extra time, read this WaPo article, section title May 2015, Make a correction. Fact-checking and error retractions after the fact are supposed to be evidence of a credible source. There have been multiple errors by CNN, MSNBC, the Big Three etc. - some of them never retracted their errors; rather, they just made the articles disappear. I've already provided quite a few links that support my position, including these. Please keep those links in mind when you're comparing networks and published sources. Atsme Talk 📧 21:09, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
But again, the question I would like to see an answer to in the appropriate section above above is, "however good or bad you think Fox News is, can you name a liberal-leaning source that is just as good or just as bad?" --Guy Macon (talk) 22:58, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

Team Blue has a tendency to railroad innocent criminal defendants in the court of public opinion. There are few positions worse than that of an innocent person charged with a crime that could send them to prison for a long time. Such cases sometimes play out partly in the media. A past example of this was the Duke Lacrosse Rape Hoax. For a past example, why hasn't the NYT retracted this? [44] The key two sentences: But an examination of the entire 1,850 pages of evidence gathered by the prosecution in the four months after the accusation yields a more ambiguous picture. It shows that while there are big weaknesses in Mr. Nifong’s case, there is also a body of evidence to support his decision to take the matter to a jury. There was never any ambiguity; the three are innocent. The NYT didn't want to see it. More recently, we have the case of Daniel Holtzclaw. Long story short: he didn't do it. The sources that have chosen to notice are squarely on Team Red and include sources Wikipedia regards as "not reliable".[45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54] Malkin's work in particular is groundbreaking and, taken as a whole, utterly convincing. What could be more compelling that getting an innocent person out of prison? Team Blue won't touch this with a 10-foot pole. Shame on them. Adoring nanny (talk) 00:51, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

@
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 03:35, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
I didn't know that about Malkin. After that, she deserved to be dropped. Re Holtzclaw, yes convicted in Court. Which is different from "actually did it." Adoring nanny (talk) 08:57, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Convicted in court *and* the conviction was upheld under appeal with the appeals judges being very clear about how meritless they thought the appeal was (and with the Supreme Court rejecting him hes run out of higher courts to appeal to). Thats a lot different from being tried and convicted in the court of public opinion which is what you originally suggested had happened.
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 16:25, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
I'm well aware. The evidence is what it is, and the court decisions are what they are. I've seen it time and again. It is unbelievably difficult for an actually innocent person to get the courts to notice.[56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70] Their appeals were "meritless" too, until they weren't. The point is that one can't know the truth of these things by simply trusting the courts. Adoring nanny (talk) 23:08, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
Yeah... You're just digging the hole deeper. Maybe walk it back a bit and accept that you picked a terrible example and seriously mischaracterized the situation?
Horse Eye Jack (talk
) 20:04, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
Maybe actually take the time to look behind the curtain? Just to pick a random example, in a rape case, why would one not search the house to looked for unwashed underwear that could contain evidence? Adoring nanny (talk) 00:00, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

Place other arguments here

  • I have trouble seeing what sort of positive outcome could result from this discussion. The very idea that we should care about an artificial dichotomy is what distracts from discussions that are about reliability rather than bias. These arguments get pulled in all the time anyway, so why strip out the productive parts to focus on them? Is the idea to isolate them to highlight their tangential (or sometimes parallel) nature? To conclude that there is indeed a correlation between, say, "left-wing" and reliability? These seem unlikely to me, but maybe I misunderstand. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 00:42, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • The topic keeps coming up -- most recently with the MSNBC and CNN RfCs -- and will no doubt keep coming up.
If indeed we have a double standard we need to fix that.
Most of the commenters in previous discussions are clearly rooting for Team Blue, with a minority rooting for Team Red. In my opinion previous discussions have been poisoned by poor choice of sources to compare; picking a high quality source that roots for Team Blue and comparing it with a low quality source that roots for Team Red is common. I thought that I would try to avoid that.
Finally, this may smoke out a few of those sources that are never discussed because they suck so bad, but which have snuck into multiple articles as a source. That alone would make this worth doing. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:14, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I have to agree with Rhododendrites here. The very framing of the discussion seems somewhat premised on the notion of
    WP:FALSEBALANCE. I think an objective outside observer looking at the U.S. media landscape would easily conclude that left-wing sources tend to be far more reliable than right-wing sources. There are plenty of exceptions on both sides, of course, but the fundamental dynamic is what it is, despite the inevitable complaints from those on the right. To channel NYU media scholar Jay Rosen a bit, the idea of the left and the right being two sides of the same coin was never true, but it's especially ludicrous in the Trump era. {{u|Sdkb}} talk
    07:01, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Infowars is politically conservative, just an extreme fringe form that does not care for general reliability. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:40, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
  • End of the day, it's just as likely that all the big-name, slickly produced left-wing and right-wing news outfits are ultimately owned by the same group, and the reason they are directing us towards opposing ideologies has nothing to do with what they actually believe. Instead, it is all to do with draining all of our energy into ridiculous discourse and draining our wallets into their corporate coffers. Hyperbolick (talk) 06:04, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
    • That kind of baseless conspiracy mongering doesn't help. Please stick to arguments backed by RS. If anyone's doing the dividing, it's the Russians, and Trump and GOP congressmen are repeating their disinformation. -- Valjean (talk) 21:15, 17 August 2020 (UTC)
      • Not baseless, just observing. In fact it’s funny how the same two parties have divided power in the same country for over 150 years, acting as if at each other‘s throat all the time, while cooperating to crush or coopt anything threatening that dichotomy. Hyperbolick (talk) 23:31, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
I think this discussion presents a false dichotomy. Following WW2, a consensus emerged in government, academia and the media in foreign and domestic policy. Conservatives reacted by setting up an alternative media, but it was never as large or as professional. Furthermore, it's main focus was on presenting opinions, rather than news reporting. Opinion articles are of course rarely reliable sources wherever they are published.
The left-wing media, which was also opposed to the consensus in foreign and domestic polices, but for different reasons, took a different approach. It concentrated on news reporting of stories they the mainstream ignored. That's why articles in The Nation are more likely to be reliable than those in the National Review. But then they are only really useful for niche topics.
TFD (talk)
  • One problem that stems from our heavy reliance on Team Blue is that on subjects where Team Blue is silent, we end up with nothing. As I note above, such is the case for the overwhelming evidence that Daniel Holtzclaw didn't do it. Team Red has noticed. Team Blue has not noticed. Team Blue has not taken issue with the evidence Team Red discusses in depth; they have simply ignored it. But Team Red is largely "not reliable". You can see the outcome in the article for yourselves. The evidence is knowable, covered by sources, and utterly convincing. But our policies don't allow us to see it. That's on us. Adoring nanny (talk) 18:17, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
    • No, that is on Team Red's sources for being unreliable and deceptive. -- Valjean (talk) 19:32, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
      • I wouldn't put this on "Team Red" any more than I would put "Donald Trump is a KGB spy" on "Team Blue". It's about terrible sources being terrible and a black and white (or red and blue) "cage fight" that provides a ready-made opportunity to make false equivalence arguments by Wikipedians with otherwise policy noncompliant POVs. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 20:05, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
      • In fact Team Blue has covered Michelle Malkin's claim that the evidence points to innocence. Holtzclaw lost in the OK Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of the United States refused to hear his petition. There's no big campaign with top lawyers, the Innocence Project and others calling for his release. Given that, it is reasonable to assume that he is probably guilty and attempts to prove his innocence should receive minimal coverage. Even if he is innocent and subsequently released, it would just be one of numerous cases of wrongful conviction. it is only significant to the Right because it confirms their view that liberals persecute the police. But it occurred in a state that is run by conservatives, and conservative judges have ruled against Holtzclaw. TFD (talk) 20:25, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
  • As Rhododendrites suggests, this thread is one of the worst-conceived ideas I've seen on Wikipedia recently—and that is a high (or low) bar. The framing of this thread enables and perpetuates some of Wikipedians' absolute worst instincts: brain-dead false equivalence; reflexive pigeon-holing of reliable sources into a partisan political battleground framework; the general undermining and weakening of site sourcing policy; and so on. As the WOPR said, the only way to win the game proposed in this thread is not to play. MastCell Talk 18:33, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
    • I'd further argue that inventing two "teams" and inviting people to argue about that false dichotomy in a Fantasy Sources Draft is outside the purpose of this noticeboard. As comments above are making clear, it's just an opportunity to make false equivalence/balance arguments without the usual constraints of this board's focus on reliability, leaving us with a sweltering heat-to-light-ratio. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 18:50, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
      • Seems to me all of the heat is down here in this section complaining about the thread. Editors who think this discussion is a bad idea should feel free to not participate. Lev!vich 18:54, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
        • Framing a discussion of reliable sources explicitly as a partisan "cage fight" is like turning on a porch light in mosquito season. It shows poor judgment, and the results are predictably counterproductive. People like Adoring nanny are using this thread to blame a violent serial rapist's conviction on a "Team Blue" liberal-media conspiracy, so it's just silly to pretend that The Real Problem here is that we're highlighting this perversion of the noticeboard. MastCell Talk 19:49, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I agree with MastCell, this discussion is a clear violation of
    WP:NOTFORUM. These discussions are far less useful than the ones Blueboar proposed, I think Blueboar could have posed better questions regarding CNN and MSNBC, rather than simply asking about the general reliability, to which the answer was obvious. But this discussion has so far been nothing but a tedious circlejerk and its opening was poor judgement on Guy Macon's part. Hemiauchenia (talk
    ) 20:10, 18 August 2020 (UTC)
I asked the questions that I wanted answered (and I got answers to those questions). If you want to ask different questions, do so. What “better questions” would you have asked? Blueboar (talk) 17:54, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
I think asking questions like "Is MSNBC biased in regards to American politics?" or "Can MSNBC talk shows and opinion content be used for statements of fact?" would have gotten more interesting responses. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:52, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I...don't know that I see this as a discussion that is imminently relevant to building an encyclopedia. GMGtalk 20:05, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
    I agree. Call for close. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 07:05, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
  • I'd support a call for close to this. Pointless and quite forum-y honestly. Tayi Arajakate Talk 10:31, 24 August 2020 (UTC)
  • Close and hat this entire discussion immediately.
    WP:FORUM to spout meaningless red-blue platitudes. Please, please kill this and move on to anything else. --Aquillion (talk
    ) 03:32, 25 August 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.
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