Posted on 12/29/2005 11:55:25 PM PST by Notwithstanding
Wikipedia is a liberal "encyclopedia" that anyone can edit. Unfortunately, it is very popular and very "progressive", although its stated goal is to present factual information wit a neitral point of view. A perfect example in the Kwanzaa "article" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwanzaa), as is the "article" on abortion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion), and the article on President Bush (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush).
Any attempt to add balance to these articles is met by severe censoring and shouting down or shutting down editors. I suggest people sign up (free and anonymous) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Userlogin) and start politely editing. Once there, to gain "credibility" I suggest you look around and then for the first few days edit only uncontroversial articles for grammar or choppiness or poor citation - you will then be seen as a neutral editor (everyone is an "editor"). I suggest using a different screen name than you do at FR.
Ok. You misunderstand.
1000 people say that 2+2=5.
This is of course, false.
It is however a fact that:
"1000 people say that 2+2=5, although 2+2=4."
Thus, truth/false values are applied like this:
2+2=4 (true)
"1000 people say that 2+2=5" (true)
2+2=5 (false)
Does that clear it up at all?
"Then why did an administrator recently make a strongly editorialized change to the NAMBLA article to hide the fact that they're a homosexual organization? See http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=North_American_Man%2FBoy_Love_Association&diff=32673254&oldid=32671013
"
Probably the same reason another editor (an administrator I believe) put it back. They had a disagreement whether the catagory "LGBT Organization" applies. I assume that most people think that LGBT organization refers to LGBT activist groups well outside the pedastry zone.
Let me turn this around on you. How do you propose less than ten ArbCom memebers, a 5 member foundation board, less than 1000 adminstrators, all work together to control the same editorial byline over 883000 articles, that ANYONE CAN EDIT?
Add in the fact that several of these adminstrators are from countries other than the United States, makes communicating an effective byline considerably diffrent, as they will naturally care about diffrent news, have diffrent perspectives,etc.
Then, let us somehow assume that the above have amanged to hoodwink the entire community into believing that they are neutral, sensible editors, when in fact they are part of a liberal plot.
I don't have faith in that many people working in such a way to effectivly control an editorial byline. 883 articles per adminstrator under tight 24 hour survialence. If you've got a way to do it, its news to me
Unfortunately, politics is everything to some people.
'There currently exists a group of people who seem to have a goal of destroying wikipedia just because they enjoy mindless destruction. Some of these people come to Freerepublic and attempt to recruit assistance without stating their true purpose.'
I think two of them are posting on this thread.
Simple: they shouldn't.
An elaboration: Sysop types on wikipedia should not be constantly concerning themselves with taking sides in content disputes. Instead they should limit their activities to patrolling for vandalism by people who are clearly editing wikipedia to damage it like putting profanity in articles and spam. Sysop involvement in content disputes should in turn be limited only to articles where they are one of the original disputants/authors of the disputed content. Whenever sysops encounter any dispute that does not fit that category they should either stay clear and let the editors work it out or participate as neutral moderators who help foster a compromise.
Instead most administrators on wikipedia do the exact opposite. Whenever they see a dispute they don't steer clear or seek compromises - they jump in and begin espousing the side closest to their politics. Some admins on your site even go around trolling for disputes to get in the middle of. Administrators are also notorious for the hive mentality - when they themselves get in a content dispute with somebody else they try to solve it in their favor by bringing in other admins to vote with them instead of by reaching a compromise with the other editors already there.
If you truly believe that the function of all the arbitrators and administrators is to "control" every single article on wikipedia then you have completely lost sight of what wikipedia claims to be. "Anyone can edit" means just that - anyone can edit. It does not mean "anyone can edit, but their edits are subject to immediate censorship." It does not mean "anyone can edit so long as their edits meet with the approval of administrators who have veto authority over what they write." It does not mean "anyone can edit, but some editors called administrators are more equal than other regular editors."
I do agree that "anyone can edit" should NOT mean "anyone can vandalize" wikipedia. But administrators should see themselves strictly as rule enforcers on things like vandalism - not content censors who each adopt a couple hundred articles that they guard and control the content on when anybody else who is not one of them makes a change.
You're sidestepping the issue. Look at the full history of the NAMBLA article. That same administrator is a revert warrior who has done the exact same thing dozens of times over the course of months. He also appears to have done similar stuff at dozens upon dozens of articles involving pedophilia and seems to be in the middle of a dispute at every one.
That's also a false argument. You know plain and well that the majority of articles on wikipedia are not extensively developed. Most of them are stubs or a few paragraphs on obscure subjects at best, and most of them don't get but an edit or two every couple of months.
The real problem is with high profile political articles and that's where the bias almost always exists. George W. Bush is going to get far more attention in his article than an article on a city councilman in Peoria. So what we're dealing with here is in fact NOT the 880000-whatever articles total on wikipedia, but a couple thousand high profile political articles on major high profile political subjects like Bush, US senators, governors, issues like abortion, and stuff like that. There's only 1 president, 100 senators, 50 governors, 435 congressmen, 2 major political parties, a little over a dozen cabinet secretaries, a couple hundred well known national political pundits and other political non-officeholding figures, some 200 or so foreign heads of state...you get the picture. In short, wikipedia's articles on major political topics cannot amount to more than a few thousand out of the 883,000-whatever articles on wikipedia in total. And a few thousand is certainly within the range of administrator control and censorship.
While it is impossible for 1000 administrators to control 883 articles a piece it is very possible for them to control, say, 30 articles a piece. 30 times 1000 is 30,000 articles. I'll guesstimate liberally that wikipedia has roughly 10,000 articles on high profile political subjects, which means each admin can easily control at least three times that many. And if you look at the edit history of virtually any major political article you will see evidence that they do and that it almost always leans liberal.
This argument is a tad disingenuous. There are likely less than 1000 highly controversial topics. 1000/1000=1 article per administrator.
What is the diversification and range of experience of the Foundation Board?
I havn't the foggiest. Ask Jimmy Wales, he elected himself (it was his baby) two of his buisness aquantinces, see above, and two user representatives who were chosen for sheer inane dedication to the project
"This argument is a tad disingenuous. There are likely less than 1000 highly controversial topics. 1000/1000=1 article per administrator."
Aha. Very diffrent, and likley very true.
Contaversial articles of course attract greater adminstrative oversight, being as they attract greater attention in general, and thus greater problems (law of averages)
My point then, would have to be clarified thus:
There are 883000 articles. Adminstrators would have to completly not care about those others, and instead be concerned only with controling the contraversial ones, or be concerned highly with the contraversial ones, to the expensive of the others.
I would suggest two things. The first being its unlikley that a widespread american liberal bias exist through the efforts, or even the accidents of adminstrators, as the majority of edits are done by non admin editors. The only ability an admin has to permently set down something in stone is to lock the article. Articles locked for POV reasons are found quickly, and the admin earns a rather quick a swift reprimand, and the article becomes very quickly unlocked either way!.
The second is that if we have admins unbalncing with liberal points of view on contraversial articles, the exact WRONG solution is to counter balance them. This leads to escalation, and inevitably forces a disasterous shift away from encylopedia writing, and to political jockeying.
Occams and Hanlon's razors suggest that the most obvious explanation is some topics collocate heavy liberal bias by their subject matter, and some topics collocate heavy conservative, libertarian, centrist, etc etc etc baises by their subject matter. The abortion article is probably a reasonable example of this. The use of medical terms systemically swings it to the left, but the detailed description of intact D&C/partial birth abortion leaves one rather nasuated, swinging it to the right.
So, Its hard to defend against a bias I don't believe exists, especially within hostile territory (where people clearly aren't willing to take me at my word). I would instead say go look around ALL of Wikipedia. Broaden your intrests, keep a running tally, call up buddies at your favorite right swinging newspaper (Wall street journal perhaps? I think they count) ask them to ee how bad it is, and improve it!
Just do it inline with our policies. Make your arguments calmly and rationally. The side with the better research tends the win the day.
If you want to stay here and try to convince me, or wait for me to convince you about a bias problem, we're going to be here a long time. I take it on both experiance and faith that any bais that does exist is systemic to academic thinking, and very minor at that.
Adminstrators are chosen on their ability to navigate the whole of wikipedia, not politically charged articles. Dispute resolution includes keeping your head in political articles, true, but also handling some sheer inanities take a look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:LAME for some all time greatest hits of editor stupidity.
I'm certainly not going to claim every wiki adminstrator is level headed. Thats an ideal. Just like every congressman should be a patriot. Excuse me while I chortle. Wikipedia adminstrators are typically chosen for their dedication to the project and its ideals. Admins who focus exclusivly on contraversial articles with political leanings are frequently lambasted to diversify. Take a look at the extensive archives http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Unsuccessful_adminship_candidacies http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Recently_created_admins#Links_to_earlier_successful_nominations
and draw your own conclusions
Focusing on political articles is a waste of time, especially the US ones in the offseason (non ellection years) When congressional elections roll around I expect to see a lot of vandalism on both sides, and GWB, a half dozen congressmen, political pundits, Orielly move on my protect page, and that of many others. Typically protection from vandals. We barley have time to field real content disputes at that point.
Side note, Wikipedia-en is not just United States of America, it attracts editors from Canada, UK, and other english speakers.
And having read these self same articles myself, I'd suggest they lean unfriendly, not liberal. Take your favorite liberal figure and you'll find a collection of potshots.
My answer was "they can't" which sidestesp should and shouldn't rather quickly
The whole "anyone can edit" bit kinda prevents large scale censorship. Especially when you see adminstrators on opposite sides of arguments.
As for your admins are notorious thing... I'm really going to have to ask. Is this personal experiance, collection of stuff from Wikipedia Watch like sites, or just something you're making up? I'm gonna have to ask for a source as Occam's razor suggests that taking this on faith is silly.
You're rather familiar with Wikipedia terminolgoy. This puts to slight doubt your earlier nattering about not being on Wikipedia. Anyway, I think its fair to say that a LGBT group catagory is a freaking minor issue in the grand scheme of things, likley having to do with differing views on what that catagory means. See above.
FYI, linking images like this straight from their webpage is gonna put a strain on their bandwidth
Bingo.
LOL
----
Americans are far fatter than the British. It certainly isn't news to me that one of the fat broads died. I think their show was so popular in America because they were the only British people that the folks in the trailer heartlands could identify with.
Now, if you aren't too busy attacking Wikipedia, may I suggest some light reading for you?
I didn't misunderstand. Using the words verified fact in
the same statement with an opinion, such as "Lincoln was
Gay", is an intentional equivocation meant to mislead
and deceive.
n 1: a statement that is not literally false but that cleverly avoids an unpleasant truth [syn: evasion] 2: intentionally vague or ambiguous
[syn: prevarication, evasiveness] 3: falsification by means of vague or ambiguous language [syn: tergiversation
] Source: WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University
I see nothing inaccurate or demeaning in this statement.
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