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If you want the article summed up, read no further than this line; >But those users didn’t find much information about mass shootings or political efforts. In
by seabird 9y ago
If you want the article summed up, read no further than this line;
>But those users didn’t find much information about mass shootings or political efforts. In fact, the Colt AR-15 page made no mention of gun control at all, instead spending over a thousand words describing the technical details of the gun’s various parts.
The Wikipedia userbase is anal across the board when it comes to information being in the relevant location. There are entire pages dedicated to the politics of gun control, and the author of this article seems to think that an article that has always been a technical description of an influential design would be the perfect political soapbox. Although the author's complaints about the NRA article on Wikipedia have a lot more weight, I am still under the impression that he may be misinterpreting what was being said or done, because he obviously seems to have some trouble understanding Wikipedia's (sometimes absurdly) strict scope policies.
It's also worth noting that the author seems to claim that Wikipedia and its user groups are a fairly neutral source in important political conversations. Powerful (in the sense of editorship) far-left user groups have publicly and genuinely suggested withholding information out of concern for the political stance of articles shifting out of their favor. Wikipedia is not "balanced, but only when I agree with it." It is human, and not infallible.
- OceanKing 9y agoExactly. In the same way that a user coming to read the page on hamburgers should not see a discussion of McDonalds’ production policies, if a user views the Wikipedia article on AR-15s, he should see information about the gun, not the politics of gun control. That topic has its own dedicated page, and it should stay there.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- smacktoward 9y agoA controversy over the suitability of the AR-15's design to the role of "modern sporting rifle" exists. This controversy has grown to become a significant element in contemporary American politics. Noting the existence of this controversy doesn't seem like an inappropriate thing for the Wikipedia page on the AR-15 to do. If anything, keeping it out feels like an attempt to bias the discussion by deliberately omitting a significant fact. It's like the Wikipedia page about Bill Cosby not mentioning the sexual assault charges against him. It shouldn't take a position on that subject, but pretending it doesn't exist is a deliberate step away from a neutral point of view.