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Commonly cited problems are the lack of neutrality, which is well reflected by how different the political tone of different language versions is. — the Russian

Commonly cited problems are the lack of neutrality, which is well reflected by how different the political tone of different language versions is. — the Russian article on Vladimir Putin is quite a bit less critical than the English article, and in reverse, the English article on Barack Obama is quite a bit more lauding than how other languages treat him. But that is unavoidable for articles written by men, rather than some truly neutral artificial intelligence. My gripe is that I find that Wikipedia does not acknowledge the issues enough, and seems to mostly assert that it is fairly neutral.

blueblisters 6y ago
I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama, even while criticizing him, because of the political significance of his presidency. This is likely exacerbated by the fact that there are very few "reputable" right-wing English language sources that can be cited on Wikipedia. Similarly, sources from the Middle-East or Russia, which are less likely to be cited, would probably take a less charitable view as well.
- Blikkentrekker 6y ago
  Well that would be the problem with the U.S.A. culture war: — there are two sides, and both consider themselves “fair and balanced” and the other unreliable, and from where I'm standing as a European, both are unreliable, because politics is not about reliability, and truth is not a weapon in politics and never has been. English language Wikipedia of course has a disproportional number of editors from the U.S.A. and most of them have a particular side in this culture war. But it touches upon another issue of All voices must be repræsented, proportional to their weight.. — does this mean all voices currently on the planet? all voices that have ever been on the planet? or only English voices on the English-language Wikipedia? In particular, I find it somewhat odd that, for instance, English-language Wikipedia will speak of the “critical consensus” surrounding a Japanese work of fiction, using only English-language reviews thereof, while there are probably more Japanese-language reviews and fans of the work, and the critical perception is often very different in different cultures, but English-language Wikipedia very often speaks of “critical consensus” for what should be called “Anglo-Saxon critical consensus”, and dare I say that it is often not even that, but chiefly a U.S.A. consensus.
- tryonenow 6y ago
  >I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama It's much worse than that. The vast majority of sources that would potentially provide alternative [and valid, but right leaning] perspectives on basically any subject are effectively blacklisted as unreliable by somewhat of a cabal of heavily left leaning regular editors. Go to any talk page on any politically controversial subject and you'll see how the seasoned editors are almost all extremely left leaning and easily overwhelm anyone asking for a more neutral representation of facts. And let's not pretend that this has anything to do with "quality" or "factual reporting" when you'll find sources like Vox and Salon on some of these pages. It's self reinforcing, in that such heavy editorial bias discourages neutral and right leaning people from making edits that they then have to defend publicly against virtual extremists. It's pure cultural warfare. And in typical subversive fashion, they all play dumb and dance around the fact that the only approved sources are extremely biased towards their side.
  - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
    And therein lies the problem yet again of “neutral point of view”, — with respect to what? the U.S.A. only? In most of the world, “liberal” does not mean “left”; it means capitalism. It is a common sentiment of the European that both what the U.S.A. calls “left” and “right” is rather “right” in his eyes, with both he Democratic, and Republican Parties espousing more right wing fiscal policies than many of the most right wing European parties would dream to tender. The U.S.A.-man might look at it from a perspective of what he calls “right” vs. “left” in terms of neutrality, but from where I stand it is mostly an issue of “U.S.A. culture” vs. “global perspective”, as even articles that pertain to events in specific countries on English-Language Wikipeia seem to very often be analysed from what is clearly a U.S.A. cultural perspective.
    - zpeti 6y ago
      Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else. Maybe if you say libertarian it still does. I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left. Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.

blueblisters 6y ago

I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama, even while criticizing him, because of the political significance of his presidency. This is likely exacerbated by the fact that there are very few "reputable" right-wing English language sources that can be cited on Wikipedia. Similarly, sources from the Middle-East or Russia, which are less likely to be cited, would probably take a less charitable view as well.

Blikkentrekker 6y ago
Well that would be the problem with the U.S.A. culture war: — there are two sides, and both consider themselves “fair and balanced” and the other unreliable, and from where I'm standing as a European, both are unreliable, because politics is not about reliability, and truth is not a weapon in politics and never has been. English language Wikipedia of course has a disproportional number of editors from the U.S.A. and most of them have a particular side in this culture war. But it touches upon another issue of All voices must be repræsented, proportional to their weight.. — does this mean all voices currently on the planet? all voices that have ever been on the planet? or only English voices on the English-language Wikipedia? In particular, I find it somewhat odd that, for instance, English-language Wikipedia will speak of the “critical consensus” surrounding a Japanese work of fiction, using only English-language reviews thereof, while there are probably more Japanese-language reviews and fans of the work, and the critical perception is often very different in different cultures, but English-language Wikipedia very often speaks of “critical consensus” for what should be called “Anglo-Saxon critical consensus”, and dare I say that it is often not even that, but chiefly a U.S.A. consensus.
tryonenow 6y ago
>I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama It's much worse than that. The vast majority of sources that would potentially provide alternative [and valid, but right leaning] perspectives on basically any subject are effectively blacklisted as unreliable by somewhat of a cabal of heavily left leaning regular editors. Go to any talk page on any politically controversial subject and you'll see how the seasoned editors are almost all extremely left leaning and easily overwhelm anyone asking for a more neutral representation of facts. And let's not pretend that this has anything to do with "quality" or "factual reporting" when you'll find sources like Vox and Salon on some of these pages. It's self reinforcing, in that such heavy editorial bias discourages neutral and right leaning people from making edits that they then have to defend publicly against virtual extremists. It's pure cultural warfare. And in typical subversive fashion, they all play dumb and dance around the fact that the only approved sources are extremely biased towards their side.
- Blikkentrekker 6y ago
  And therein lies the problem yet again of “neutral point of view”, — with respect to what? the U.S.A. only? In most of the world, “liberal” does not mean “left”; it means capitalism. It is a common sentiment of the European that both what the U.S.A. calls “left” and “right” is rather “right” in his eyes, with both he Democratic, and Republican Parties espousing more right wing fiscal policies than many of the most right wing European parties would dream to tender. The U.S.A.-man might look at it from a perspective of what he calls “right” vs. “left” in terms of neutrality, but from where I stand it is mostly an issue of “U.S.A. culture” vs. “global perspective”, as even articles that pertain to events in specific countries on English-Language Wikipeia seem to very often be analysed from what is clearly a U.S.A. cultural perspective.
  - zpeti 6y ago
    Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else. Maybe if you say libertarian it still does. I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left. Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.