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A couple years ago, I tried to edit a page about the economist Deidre McCloskey to add some information about a campaign McCloskey had helped organize in the ea

A couple years ago, I tried to edit a page about the economist Deidre McCloskey to add some information about a campaign McCloskey had helped organize in the early aughts to attack & discredit the sex researcher Michael Bailey. McCloskey has tried to cultivate a pro-free speech libertarian image, so I was particularly alarmed when I read a thorough accounting of the Bailey affair in a journal article by Alice Dreger.[0] In fact, I had met McCloskey after the Bailey incident, and knew nothing about it based on the excessively mild portrayal in the Wikipedia article. I tried to edit the page with a more accurate description: namely, that McCloskey attempted to have Bailey fired from Northwestern for violating "research ethics" and tried to have his license to practice psychology revoked in Illinois. Those facts seemed relevant to me, especially about someone who claims to be libertarian or "Classical Liberal." Wikipedia editors did not think so. The change was reverted almost immediately, even despite my citation of a high-quality source - much higher quality than the journalism garbage backing up many of the claims made on Wikipedia, yada yada. I eventually gave up after realizing one of the editors was on a moral crusade to suppress this piece of information, and none of the other editors were going to question her bias. I imagine the same thing happens on thousands of other politically sensitive pages. [0]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3170124/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3170124/

whimsicalism 3y ago
This example probably goes against the hypothesis that there is an increasingly illiberal turn, however, as I can find discussions/arguments about this issue in the talk page dating from 2007. Looking at your edit, I can see why your initial edit was removed (did not really seem npov) but your corrected edit seems fine to me and I do not understand why it was reverted. The current page is net worse in that none of this controversy is even discussed.
Kim_Bruning 3y ago
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Deirdre_McCloskey#Bailey_Incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Deirdre_McCloskey#Bailey_... You gave up pretty quickly! The last response you got was basically: "I agree that the Bailey incident can be expanded and her signature on the Harper letter is worth mentioning, but this has to be written in a neutral way.[...]" Which is as close to "just tidy it up and you're good" as you're going to get, to be frank. Especially seeing earlier contention on the same topic. I wonder which editor you thought was on a moral crusade. The last times the topic was touched were in 2007 and 2017, and your edit was in 2020. It's somewhat unlikely that you'd encounter the same editors as back then to begin with, and as far as I can tell the only interaction you had on-wiki was one response to you, which you didn't reply to. Am I missing something?
- whimsicalism 3y ago
  If I'm seeing correctly, they did tidy it up and resubmit it - where it was then removed (I don't quite understand why - perhaps because they didn't reply to the talk saying so?).
  - Kim_Bruning 3y ago
    The talk page was later. The text still needed a bunch of tidying. Could have asked the other editor to help out! That said, that looks like quite the controversy. Adding that kind of thing to wikipedia is tricky because it can be hard to represent in a neutral way. Same sequence of events could have happened to me, or anyone else. Fortunately other editors are there to help, but you do need to talk with them. (edit) Basically Baryphonic started out fine. Discussing on the talk page was the next logical step, after which you can edit the text to fix the issues. Often this kind of change takes several iterations to iron out the problems.
    - whimsicalism 3y ago
      Ah good catch, I missed that. I agree that they probably could have gone through WP:BRD and gotten this into the article. The article I linked in my original comment is different though and the user Valjean maintains a number of pages that they revert edits from and don't really engage in BRD in good faith.
      - Kim_Bruning 3y ago
        Would you like to look at a particular situation in detail with me?
        Dan_Sylveste 3y ago
        Without knowing which 'particular situation' you're talking about, I can just save your confusion. There are articles in Wikipedia which will _always_ convey a certain perspective. Edits to them will always be reverted. The reverters will not engage with the audit process. The senior staff will not challenge those reverters. The procedure to handle this situation will not work. Arguments will be made that make literally no sense and will yet be accepted. If you persist in trying to make those changes your account will be banned on spurious grounds.
notrono 3y ago
This happens on every article related to these type of people. There is a clique of editors and administrators who go out of their way to keep any such uncomfortable information off Wikipedia, and maintain bias towards their cause on various pages, particularly on those of people critical of their activist movement. You can see similar on HN, with comments and stories most often being flagged to oblivion if they say anything against this activism and the people involved. I'm even being oblique with my words now because they search for comments that don't toe the line. This comment will probably get flagged too.

whimsicalism 3y ago

This example probably goes against the hypothesis that there is an increasingly illiberal turn, however, as I can find discussions/arguments about this issue in the talk page dating from 2007. Looking at your edit, I can see why your initial edit was removed (did not really seem npov) but your corrected edit seems fine to me and I do not understand why it was reverted. The current page is net worse in that none of this controversy is even discussed.

Kim_Bruning 3y ago

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Deirdre_McCloskey#Bailey_Incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Deirdre_McCloskey#Bailey_... You gave up pretty quickly! The last response you got was basically: "I agree that the Bailey incident can be expanded and her signature on the Harper letter is worth mentioning, but this has to be written in a neutral way.[...]" Which is as close to "just tidy it up and you're good" as you're going to get, to be frank. Especially seeing earlier contention on the same topic. I wonder which editor you thought was on a moral crusade. The last times the topic was touched were in 2007 and 2017, and your edit was in 2020. It's somewhat unlikely that you'd encounter the same editors as back then to begin with, and as far as I can tell the only interaction you had on-wiki was one response to you, which you didn't reply to. Am I missing something?

whimsicalism 3y ago
If I'm seeing correctly, they did tidy it up and resubmit it - where it was then removed (I don't quite understand why - perhaps because they didn't reply to the talk saying so?).
- Kim_Bruning 3y ago
  The talk page was later. The text still needed a bunch of tidying. Could have asked the other editor to help out! That said, that looks like quite the controversy. Adding that kind of thing to wikipedia is tricky because it can be hard to represent in a neutral way. Same sequence of events could have happened to me, or anyone else. Fortunately other editors are there to help, but you do need to talk with them. (edit) Basically Baryphonic started out fine. Discussing on the talk page was the next logical step, after which you can edit the text to fix the issues. Often this kind of change takes several iterations to iron out the problems.
  - whimsicalism 3y ago
    Ah good catch, I missed that. I agree that they probably could have gone through WP:BRD and gotten this into the article. The article I linked in my original comment is different though and the user Valjean maintains a number of pages that they revert edits from and don't really engage in BRD in good faith.
    - Kim_Bruning 3y ago
      Would you like to look at a particular situation in detail with me?
      - Dan_Sylveste 3y ago
        Without knowing which 'particular situation' you're talking about, I can just save your confusion. There are articles in Wikipedia which will _always_ convey a certain perspective. Edits to them will always be reverted. The reverters will not engage with the audit process. The senior staff will not challenge those reverters. The procedure to handle this situation will not work. Arguments will be made that make literally no sense and will yet be accepted. If you persist in trying to make those changes your account will be banned on spurious grounds.

notrono 3y ago

This happens on every article related to these type of people. There is a clique of editors and administrators who go out of their way to keep any such uncomfortable information off Wikipedia, and maintain bias towards their cause on various pages, particularly on those of people critical of their activist movement. You can see similar on HN, with comments and stories most often being flagged to oblivion if they say anything against this activism and the people involved. I'm even being oblique with my words now because they search for comments that don't toe the line. This comment will probably get flagged too.