Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countering systemic bias/Archive 9

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Globalize/USA

Recently the template {{Globalize/USA}} was added to the project page. On its talk page I place the following message. I'm crossposting here to make others aware of the discussion.

I can see nothing in the template {{Globalize/USA}} that is not covered by the more general {{globalize}}. While this template may apply sometimes, I think it also invites the straw man argument that WP:CSB is somehow Anti-American; we've often had to deal with this straw man in the past, so I'd rather not resurrect it. — mark ✎ 12:48, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, another geographic bias is probably as common: that of 'the Western world' as opposed to 'the rest of the world'. I think it is not a good idea to creat yet another template for that type of bias; it is, just like the one aimed at by the newly introduced template above, a special case of geographic bias. So simplicity is another reason to stick to {{globalize}}. — mark ✎ 13:34, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I asked for this template, so I guess I should answer this one. Having more detailed templates allows bigots/patriots/enthusiasts and counter-bigots/patriots/enthusiasts to balance each other. I could easily imagine some European or Canadian who has more of a motivation to fix the globalize/USA cases, and so would actually get off their back side and fix it. If we also have a globalize/Industrial then that might make it easier for our friends in India, for example, to work specifically on that.

Samfreed 18:47, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I think the existence of {{Globalize/USA}} is actually an argument against the "WP:CSB is anti-American" straw man, by highlighting that U.S.-centricity is just one kind of systemic bias, albeit a particularly common one here. The existence of {{Globalize/UK}} and {{Globalize/Australia}} (which didn't exist when you wrote your comment, but now do) drive this point home. There really should be a {{Globalize/Industrial}} as well, though. Ruakh 01:32, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Islam topics

I'd like to add a section to the bias list.

Various articles concerning Islam are written by non-Muslims, who have a negative attitude towards that religion. Quality could be raised, if Muslims write the main part and the critical views go to sections called "Criticism".

If you want to see the negative attitude towards muslims you can go to Talk:Islamophobia. People are honestly saying things like: "That two Molotov cocktails were thrown at a mosque alone doesn't imply the motivation was islamophobic."

Actually the negative attitude doesn't surprise me, if you think about the current political events. Nevertheless do I think, that a NPOV on many articles would require less hatred and more respect. Otherwise muslim Wikipedians will go away and stop contributing. Raphael1 06:36, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. Articles should be written from a neutral point of view and reflect the views of published scholarly sources. They should not consist of biased pro and contra sections, where muslims have some kind of monopoly on contributing the first part. The religion of individual writers is actually utterly irrelevant, and can't even be known for certain in any case. up+l+and 09:28, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree, that it would be better to have NPOV articles without Pro- and Contra-sections. On the other hand is an article with Pro and Contra-sections better than a biased POV article. Currently the majority of editors have a negativ bias, which makes it hard, if not impossible, for muslim editors to even insert the views of published scholarly sources, because the consensus of the majority often opposes that. Raphael1 20:32, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty much done with contributing to Wikipedia until I start seeing more Muslim editors in charge of Muslim articles. The negative biases here are silly and I've taken a few users to task here on Talk pages but most don't both addressing the hard questions I ask. Much like Stephen Colbert says, they ignore the facts and go with what feels right. By all means, I'd love to come back when Wikipedia address this nonsense. 24.7.141.159 10:15, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

A funny point: even in the complaint above Raphael1 talks about the "current political events". Where? In the USA of course. That is a clear case of USA-centrism - Keeping balance is not easy. Also, when one makes a complaint about a bias, one should have at least 5 examples. However, as I mentioned in the globalize/USA discussion, I think we should have specific templates for all types of bias. Samfreed 10:09, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand you funny point. I am talking about bias and one of the origins of bias is that the english Wikipedia is dominated by editors who grew up in anglophone countries. Anglophone countries are fighting wars against muslim countries, therefore political propaganda and hatered against Muslims is quite widespread. Raphael1 20:32, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Raphael, could you provide some examples of "the consensus of the majority" opposing the insertion of material based on published scholarly sources? — mark ✎ 06:49, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

There are quite a view. But they are not easy to document for you. For example these changes from Nickbee on the Deen (Arabic term) page got reverted many times until Nickbee finally gave up. You can read about that case here. Likewise changes [1] [2] to the Dhimmi page have been simply reverted not incorporated, because they added some positiv bias (with scholarly references). Raphael1 11:53, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Great addition Raphael1. I'm glad you were able to find the article. You know the problem with the English Wikipedia in general is that most of the people here have very strong anti-Islam biases which are lodged in paradigms. For many people, these paradigms have established foundations on which they rest their political, religious, national, and personal beliefs. If you question these paradigms, then these people have their house of cards fall on top of them. Quite frankly, I could argue with many of these editors until my face turns blue but it doesn't achieve much. I commend you on trying but I don't think many of us see Wikipedia being a reliable source of anything related to Islam. As it stands, I've asked various Islamic history professors both in the United States and across the globe to evaluate articles on Islam or Islam-related topics in an off-the-record basis. The results are very poor so far. One particular professor from an ivy league school slammed the articles in question as reading like many historical pieces prior to Edward Said's exposure of the orientalist bias. As long as the editors of Wikipedia keep allowing their encyclopedia to be used as a platform for propoganda and political objectives then nothing will change. For reference, look at my "Talk" contributions to see the Islam-related articles I've commented on. 24.7.141.159 10:11, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Re : Various articles concerning Islam are written by non-Muslims, who have a negative attitude towards that religion That's a sweeping statement - I don't have a negative attitude towards it. --PopUpPirate 15:46, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Well I can formulate it less sweeping: Various articles concerning Islam are mostly written by non-Muslims, who have a negative attitude towards that religion. We are talking about bias after all. Raphael1 17:26, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, that's not that much better. How do you feel about "Various articles concerning X are mostly written by Muslims, who have a negative attitude towards Christianity, Hinduism, Atheism, and Judaism"? Rather than Wikipedia: Assume good faith you seem to be assuming bias. Yes, bias exists. But admitting that is not the same as assuming it everywhere out of hand. I am also against the "You must be a Muslim to edit everything but a small section of an article about Islam" test that you seem to be proposing. GRuban 19:31, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

How I would feel, if I were Muslim and the article on Judaism were mostly written by anti-semitic Muslims? Well, I'd try to work against that negativ bias and tell my Muslim colleges to work on the Islam article instead. I don't assume that bias is everywhere out of hand, but bias on Islam topics seems systemic. You are right, that we can't test the editors faith in any way and it doesn't actually matter, as long as the editor has a balanced/neutral view on the topic. Mainly islamophobic editors on Islam topics is just as bad as mainly anti-semitic editors on articles about Judaism. Don't you think so? Raphael1 08:20, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

The bias Raphael mentions exists. But I don't think any definition of the CSB project should dwell too heavily on specific subjects,. - Xed 23:17, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Do you honestly mean, that the difference in length of Jennifer Wilbanks and Bernard Makuza is more important, than negativ bias on a world religion (>1 bill. Muslims)? Raphael1 08:20, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

You could make the same argument against any wikiproject (bar wikiproject Islam) and it wouldn't be any more valid than it is here.--Cherry blossom tree 13:20, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Im a Muslim editor, and i dont even bother to go to certain Islamic article, there is simply no point, they are "owned". They got their corner, i got mine, i keep on the Sahaba, lists and Fiqh related issues, they can have the "critisim", "jihad", "dhimmi" and such... i dont even bother. --Striver 13:09, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Various articles concerning Islam are written by non-Muslims, who have a negative attitude towards that religion. Quality could be raised, if Muslims write the main part and the critical views go to sections called "Criticism".

NPOV cannot be achieved by splitting every article into two polemics, one arguing from each side. The problem you describe may well exist, but this would be a terrible way of fixing it. Also, this project focuses on adding material not well covered in Wikipedia rather than diving into every NPOV dispute going, so adding it here probably wouldn't achieve much.--Cherry blossom tree 13:34, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

What ever happened to "assume good faith?" It is foolishness to assume that only Muslims can write about Islam. Talk about systemic bias! What you suggest demands we systemically bow to a single POV, I reject that wholeheartedly. Kyaa the Catlord 09:07, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

That's a fairly ironic statement; you ask about assuming good faith and then assume the worst. Nobody is suggesting that only Muslims should edit articles pertaining to Muslims or Islam. What's being noted is the serious anti-Muslim POV being pushed in some articles. Entire articles are being framed in a way that only one perspective is shown. Take the Dhimmi article for example. Almost the entire article is based on two sources: Bat Ye'or and Bernard Lewis. The latter is controversial at best (the perfect orientalist in some views),while the former is a devout and committed islamophobe. The entire article showcases one point of view: decidedly anti-Muslim/anti-Islamic. And it's not just what is added, it's what's deleted as well. Cited and sourced text often gets removed when the text contradicts the rhetoric that the editors want to push. Amibidhrohi 20:02, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Assuming good faith does not necessarily mean, that all editors are actually editing in good faith. You cannot deny, that most editors grew up in anglophone countries. That's where systemic bias comes from. That's why there are more people who doubt, that Islamophobia actually exists, deny even the possibility that The Crusades, the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons, the French headscarf ban or violent attacks on Sikhs, who were mistaken for Muslims, are based on Islamophobia. Raphael1 10:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Have you checked the demographics of those editors? --PopUpPirate 11:13, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

The links I listed in my previous post are changes done by Kyaa the Catlord. Raphael1 12:29, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

It's an issue with one person then, rather than systemic bias. A request for mediation would therefore be more apt. --PopUpPirate 20:48, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Please read my previous posts. There are many people like Kyaa the Catlord with anti-islam bias. That's why it's a systemic bias. Raphael1 20:57, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

It isnt just Islam thats getting the shaft on wikipedia. Many Scientology-related articles seem to read like an indictment on Scientology more than anything else. At least thats how they come off to me (a neutral reader)-Teccen 03:33, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

I can't help but chime in on this one - have you ever considered the possibility that maybe you, Raphael1, have a pro-Islamic or Islmamophilic bias? I'd have to say, I'm one of those evil people who find the whole concept of "Islamophobia" to be deeply problematic. I have no doubt that Moslems are often the target of racism, however, that this kind of racism exists as a special category, "Islamophobia", I find doubtful. Also, the charge of Islamophobia is thrown around so promiscuously that its simply impossible to assume the good faith of those who level this charge. Quite simply, any and all criticisms of Islam or Islamism are instantly met with accusations of "Islamophobia". This includes individuals like Irshad Manji, Ayan Hirsi Ali, and Salman Rushdie who from an Islamic background, but have dissented or broken with their communities of origin. If this is Raphael1's view of what constitutes "Islamophobia", then the only possible article that would not have anti-Islamic bias would be one that is entirely supportive of Islam and Islamists. And obviously, such an article would not remotely be NPOV by Wikipedia standards. Peter G Werner 18:49, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Can't suggest a solution, alas, but I do agree that there is systemic pro-Christian (in Britain, often pro-Protestant) bias in many articles. Some of this is doubtless legacy from our sources (1911 EB, anyone?). But as mentioned above, a lot of editors are working within a Christian paradigm: it's very difficult for them to see a problem with this. Having hit systemic bias in other areas, I know it's extremely wearing to continually push uphill against these otherwise worthy folks. I'm sure there are frothing Islamic radicals on WP just as there are Christians, etc, of this stamp – but that doesn't mean anti-Islamicism not also a genuine problem.

Peter Werner, what's the problem if Raphael is pro-Islamic? Aren't you pro-something? It's how you handle it that matters. So I don't think specifying who can contribute to an article works, but supporting each other in applying all the Wiki guides – Good Faith, Civil, NPOV, Verifiability, No Attack Pages, etc – even on articles we're not personally interested in, would go a long way.

As for a statement, how about: "Articles concerning religion may suffer from two major forms of bias. Articles may be written by editors who have fervent views for or against a particular religion, in which case the most energetic and highly represented group may try to enforce its version. [Raphael, insert appropriate eg]. Or articles may be written by editors unaware that they and their sources are propagating views specific to their own religion's paradigms: eg Praemunire." JackyR 23:17, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

What I'm saying is that Rafael's accusation of systemic bias against Islam in Islamic topics is likely clouded by his personal bias toward Islam, as evidenced by his throwing around loaded terms like "Islamophobia". (IMO, its a term that's at least as loaded as "terrorism".) You make a good point about all editors having a point of view (which in my case, is probably highly opposed to Rafael1 and people like him), and the importance of trying to put aside your own POV when writing/editing articles, and I'm not suggesting that highly biased individuals like Raphael1 can't make valuable contributions. What I am calling into question is his judgment of anti-Islamic bias and what constitutes NPOV on these topics. I'm saying that he seems to be coming from a religious/political tendency that sees any and all criticism or questioning of Islamic norms as a racist attack, hence I think he's a poor judge of the neutrality of the articles in question. He also seems to be demanding, in article's about Islamic topics, deference toward Wikipedia authors who happen to be Muslims.Peter G Werner 00:47, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I am sorry, that you are highly opposing me, but I hope that I will convince you of being able to make valuable contributions in the future. You are probably right in that I'm a little too sensitive regarding anti-islamic bias. But that's probably a result of so much negativ bias towards Islam, which I try to compensate (to no avail). Yes, there is legitimate critizism on various Muslim practices around the world, and I've got no problem to say so. But in this current state it seems way more important to me to show respect towards all Wikipedia authors (Muslims and non-Muslims). Raphael1 02:59, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Okay, let's try and cool down a little... Perhaps most of us can agree with Raphael that there's likely to be a problem with POV on Islam-related articles, without endorsing Raphael's proposed solution, that Muslims write the main part and the critical views go to sections called "Criticism".

The preferred solution, then, is a combination of the following:

1. Some of us may choose to monitor those pages;
2. We at CSB should listen to calls for help with articles suffering from this kind of bias, but we when we respond, we shouldn't do so to support one POV over another;
3. When we look at these articles (and their talk pages and history) we try to ensure that certain editors don't take charge of the articles and continually revert changes they don't like without explanation.
4. We assess edits based on Wikipedia standards of verifiability, NPOV etc; not on the religion or even the known POV of the particular editor (we all have our own POV, we just shouldn't push it in the articles).
5. When somone reports bias, it's important that they refer to specific edits as examples. This is easy to do by using the "Compare selected versions" button on the history page, and then including the url when making the report.

How does that sound?--Singkong2005 ^{(t - c - WPID)} 02:35, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

It sounds quite reasonable to me. I might suggest someone monitor the Yvonne Ridley article. I've been involved in several revert wars over what I felt was overtly POV language being injected into the article, but the article itself may have more subtle bias problems. I wouldn't mind having another set of eyes on it. Peter G Werner 08:29, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Richard Branson "getting Wikipedia to create an education site for Africa"

I expect this story is false. Quote:

There are other projects in the pipeline, says Sir Richard. A few weeks ago he held a meeting in California to plan an African version of the Wikipedia online encyclopaedia. "We're getting Wikipedia to create an education site for Africa - we want to create free education on the internet. An African living in South Africa might know nothing about Ethiopia or Nigeria."

It sounds like the sort of thing Jimbo would vaguely talk about when it's fund-raising time, but not get around to doing.

- Xed 10:44, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Ditto --Jay(Reply) 15:47, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Who do we really need more of on Wikipedia?

This suggestion from the article is way off the mark: Change the demographic of Wikipedia. Encourage friends and acquaintances that you know have interests that are not well-represented on Wikipedia to edit. If you are at a university, contact a professor in minority or women's studies, explain the problem, and ask if they would be willing to encourage students to write for Wikipedia. Contact minority or immigrant groups in your area to see if they would be interested in encouraging their members to contribute. The worst they could say is, "No". But keep in mind that immigrant groups often have a vastly different point of view than the majority of people in the countries they immigrated from, which introduces its own systemic bias.

It seems to me that one systemic bias problem is too many people from academia editing, and too few ordinary folks. We don't need more professors in minority or women's studies or their students, because the systemic bias on Wikipedia is already heavy biased toward the obscure academic theories which came out of those so-called "studies" programs, theories which are mostly relevant only to guilty white middle-class academics, not to actual minorities. What we need is more women and minorities themselves (which is not the same thing at all as students in "womens studies" and "minority studies" programs - who tend to be intellectual, middle-class, and white). We also need a lot more blue collar people, and people with no obvious axes to grind - often they're the same thing. We have very few auto mechanics, steelworkers, miners, electricians, plumbers, firefighters, loggers, truck drivers, linemen, or family farmers editing Wikipedia. Too many academics, too many techies, too many students, and too many political and religious true believers. 70.108.84.22 00:35, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

This needs to be substantiated of course, but I disagree that the systemic bias is due to academics per sé. To raise above the level of a giant trivia database, Wikipedia needs the people who know how to write and how to cite sources. I do not disagree that we do need the other groups you're mentioning too. You're absolutely right in that. — mark ✎ 07:06, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

To be clear, I'm specifically taking issue with your contention that academics here only (or mostly) contribute 'obscure academic theories'. There is a lot of real world knowledge to be found in academic sources, and academics, as the people reading this stuff and writing up articles on the basis of it, are people Wikipedia can use. I'm not talking theories here, I'm just talking about those sources which make articles like Defaka, Qala'un Mosque, Bono Manso, Yaaku, Dorobo, Nobiin language, Nafaanra language, etc., etc., possible and verifiable in the first place. I think you agree that these articles counter systemic bias in their own way. Again, that is not to say that we don't need the people you are mentioning. We absolutely do. So how would you suggest we get them editing here? — mark ✎ 08:25, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Of the changes made by 70.108.84.22, the additions had merit but I think the text removed should be restored. up+l+and 08:38, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. You are all correct that there are many areas such as some languages where those in academia help counter systemic bias. I'll also restore the language. However, my point was, I'm looking around Wikipedia and I see a lot of long and heavily edited articles on very silly subjects like meme, chaos theory, whiteness studies, neurodiversity, producerism, and at the absurdist extreme, anti-racist mathematics. That these are even getting a lot of interest and coverage here is a sign of systemic bias resulting from some intellectuals who take their obscure theories a bit too seriously, and worse, other editors who let them stand as sources because they're academic in origin and "peer-reviewed". It's a function of who self-selects to edit a project like this. As for why more common folks (non-intellectuals) don't edit, many don't have the same writing skills as your average intellectual. It's a sad commentary on our society that children who do show talent at writing are shunted by the educational establishment into "college prep" classes and the humanities, resulting in working class folks who are also talented writers being a rarity. Well, there was Eric Hoffer, and Jack London, and some obscure ones I can think of. But that's a subject for a blog and not here. 70.108.69.40 22:02, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Its also sad that at least in the United Kingdom, kids with an "intellectual" bent are often victimised at school for it, causing them to be more detached and more susceptable to being "shunted" into fluffy subjects. Anti-intellectualism, if there isn't an article for that I'd be surprised ;) is part of the problem. - FrancisTyers 23:26, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Is there any actual basis for the claim that "Wikipedians also tend to self-select more heavily among adherents of political ideologies or religious beliefs, as well as among those opposed to one or more beliefs"? I suspect that this is just an indicator of someone's own bias in what articles they are looking at.

Re: "very silly subjects like meme, chaos theory, whiteness studies, neurodiversity, producerism, and at the absurdist extreme, anti-racist mathematics." Chaos theory is certainly an important topic, unless you think an encyclopedia doesn't need to cover physics and mathematics; producerism is a reasonably important political concept, though I'm not impressed with our article on it. I personally think that the "meme" is, at best, an often misleading metaphor; whiteness studies is certainly only of interest to people interested in academia (but, again, surely academia is one of the things an encyclopedia should cover); I don't know bupkiss about neurodiversity or "Anti-racist mathematics", so I won't venture a comment. But surely you didn't just find these topics by hitting "random article"? Which is to say, this is like the person who complains about all of the obscenities in the dictionary: typically, you only find them if you are looking for them. I know we have a bunch of articles on Pokémon, but they don't get in my way because… I don't look them up!

The issue should be what is missing, not what is present in greater profusion than interests you. - Jmabel | Talk 23:30, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Well put, though I think there can be such a thing as overrepresentation of a topic. Ruakh 00:17, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

unexplained changes

Someone has been removing this text:

The average Wikipedian on English Wikipedia (1) is male, (2) is technically-inclined, (3) is formally educated, (4) speaks the English language to an extent, (5) is White, (6) is aged in their twenties, thirties or forties, (7) is from a predominantly Christian country, (8) is from an industrialized nation, and (9) is more inclined toward intellectual pursuits than toward practical skills or physical labor.

It all seems true to me, and as this is a project, not an article, we don't need a source for any of this stuff. I kind of wonder why they're so concerned with removing it, they aren't giving a reason. --W.marsh 19:03, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Please read the talk page, this is discussed immediately above. Why do you suppose these claimed stats to be true? Yes, the average en.wiki editor knows English (duh) and can use a computer (duh) and yes if they can type and use a computer they are probably older than about 5 years old and under 80 years old. But the rest? Whoever wrote that apparently took the U.S. census and a survey of Microsoft Employees and conflated that into who is editing. If the point is to say en.wiki has more editors from the US and the UK than anywhere else, just say so, but don't add on these imagined internet demographics that might have been relevant last century but no longer are. I can actually list more editors that do not fall into this description than those who do. So with nothing to back it up, lets remove it and get on with the biases that we actually know to exist. Justforasecond 19:31, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Eh, it was discussed above and no real consensus was evident to change anything. We can go to any AfD page, most page edit histories, etc. and find (by checking userpages, blogs, etc.) that the large majority of editors turned up are white males age 13-45, mostly from USA/Canada, the UK or Australia. I don't know why you insist on denying that. --W.marsh 19:48, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

There has been data gathered on most of these subjects. Where readers are coming from can be logged, and this table, clearly indicates far more come from developed countries. There have also been numbers gathered about gender. I remember someone once ran through the top 500 contributors and found that only about 20% were female. - SimonP 20:22, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to hazard a guess and say that for every plumber or bricklayer there are at least 10 IT professionals or computer science students. That is if you can find a plumber/bricklayer/binman/carpenter/mechanic on here. This stuff just isn't disputed. - FrancisTyers 20:26, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Francis, are you suggesting deeceevoice is an engineer? reggaedelgado is a high school teacher and reggae dj. school administrators, lawyers, political consultants, real estate agents, congressional aides, former mtv VJs are all here. the stats you've sent are a year old, and all they prove are that, a year ago (a long time in pedia years), the U.S., Germany, and Japan, had the most pageviews. it doesn't say anything about edits, or the ethnicity or career or editors. let's stick to the biases we do know (a lot of simpsons articles, predominance of english literate editors, editors largely from the US etc) about and not impose some imaginary stereotype on wiki users. Justforasecond 01:41, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

That, and SimonP's comment, are what I mean. We're making this more controversial than it really is. It's a common sense thing to know who the average contributers are. I wish things were more diverse, and there are ways we could work towards that (for example, reducing the steep learning curve required for proper editting of articles would encourage non-techies to join in, I think) but things are they way they are, right now. --W.marsh 20:37, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

User:Ideogram, User:Readams, User:Powo, User:Cyde, User:Simetrical, User:Murray Langton, User:DragonHawk, User:Jpbowen, User:Samsara, User:BigDan, User:CoderGnome, User:HorsePunchKid, User:Ian13, User:Marudubshinki, User:NickBall, User:MDonoughe, User:Catamorphism, User:Tyler McHenry, User:Cadr, User:Rschen7754

Ok, theres 20 white male programmers, now you can find me 2 black bricklayers (or plumbers, or mechanics, labourers, electricians, taxi drivers, etc.) who are Wikipedians. Should be pretty easy to do right? Otherwise, find something better to do. - FrancisTyers 02:18, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Remain civil, Francis. How do you know these people are white, male programmers (let alone all the other attributes)? Just a guess, but someone with "Chen" in his username is probably Chinese Justforasecond 04:46, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

I'd ask you the same courtesy. I have said nothing uncivil here. Well, if you want, you can drop Mr. Chen ) and include me in that list and it still stands. Many of them have photographs. All of them speak fluent English. All of them are male. All of them are programmers. How do I know? It says on their userpages. Unless of course you think they're lying. In which case I would encourage you to take it up with them. Still waiting for those bricklayers... (Btw, they don't have to be black. If you can find me two bricklayers of any ethnicity I'll be impressed). - FrancisTyers 10:15, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

This guys brother is a bricklayer: User:Brian017 (Irish though). This guy User:KatoABJV is a bricklayer of unknown ethnicity. I must say I'm amazed, but still my point currently stands, "I'm going to hazard a guess and say that for every plumber or bricklayer there are at least 10 IT professionals or computer science students." - FrancisTyers 10:18, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Again, remain civil Francis. Your comments and tone are not consensus-building. According to their userpages, those people are not all "programmers". The ones I've clicked on do not have photos. If that's the best evidence you have -- a sample of 20 that fail to prove an unrelated claim -- we should reconsider the claim that the "average" wikipedian is white and focus on the biases we do know to exist. Justforasecond 15:53, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Consider reading through the civility guidelines for ways to improve your attitude towards Wikipedia. These guidelines help us make Wikipedia a less confrontational place. I'm sure we can both agree that this is a worthy goal. I'm afraid that I would have to continue to disagree with you, and as you have so far failed to convince anyone else that the average Wikipedian is not White, I'm quite happy for the page to stay as it is at the moment. Thanks. - FrancisTyers 16:06, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm well aware of the civility guidelines -- I regularly point them out to editors who are behaving in an uncivil manner. "Go find something better to do", for instance, is an uncivil statement. As for the uncited and unverifiable stereotypes perpetuated on this project page they are only a detriment to Wikipedia and, should they remain, will ultimately doom the CSB project to irrelevancy. Justforasecond 20:50, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

CSB will be fought with actions not words. - FrancisTyers 00:16, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

The CSB project is trying to fill in areas of Wikipedia that are not well covered due to its systemic bias. I'm curious as to how you think an uncited paragraph in a description of its aims will doom it to irrelevance. --Cherry blossom tree 21:23, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Because rather than taking the straightforward approach of dealing with known biases, the CSB project (or at least its mission statement) uses unfounded premises about the makeup of the wikipedia population and how those lead to theoretical biases. If there's no evidence to say wiki is overwhelmingly white, or male, etc, why claim that it is? Justforasecond 21:41, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

(reindent) I still don't see how that leads to the project becoming irrelevant. The aim of the project is to correct visible areas of neglect that are produced by systemic bias. Compare Conakry and London, for example. I don't see how your problem will affect progress in this field. What actually brings this systemic bias about isn't really all that important (not that I don't disagree with you about it.)--Cherry blossom tree 21:49, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Completely agree. :) - FrancisTyers 00:16, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

My problem with point 9 (i agree with all the others) is that it says 'is more inclined towards'... and it all suggets that intellectual and physical pursuits needs to be different. I would change it to 'are more likely to be employed in'. For example, all of our white male programmers may also be dab hands with various DIY tools and be building an extension as we speak. Perhaps they play football or do taek-won-do. Similarly, why should bricklaying not be an intellecutally stimulating job? And the bricklaying wikipedians may spend the evening writing haikus and playing chess.

My point is that we shouldn't be generalising people's interests from their professions. --Robdurbar 12:07, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Agree completely. I'll change that now. - FrancisTyers 12:14, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Okay sort of strange to find on your what links here... um 2 of those aren't true for me anyway. --Rschen7754 (talk - contribs) 01:44, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Robert McHenry sezs

This should be called "Countering systemic balance". Least that's what I think he said... http://www.opendemocracy.net/media-edemocracy/wikipedia_bias_3621.jsp -- Zanimum 13:25, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure about this - there may be some different connotations in professional editing circles but I think in the context of this project systemic bias refers to bias in topic selection rather than having non-NPOV articles, which is a valid use of the term. Balanced is possibly a better term, but still preserves the same ambiguity - reference to imbalance could mean that an article is one-sided or that one area has too little coverage.--Cherry blossom tree 22:44, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

He makes some good points. "Imbalance" is perhaps a better word than bias. And the CSB project is just a gnat compared to the huge dumb "group mind" of the rest of Wikipedia. With it's vision-less and largely witless politburo, Wikipedia is unlikely to ever be a serious encyclopedia, since membership of the politburo is dependent on believing in the "hive mind" dogma. I suppose one solution would be to block editing on all articles except CSB ones for a week, to get people to concentrate on them. And repeat the exercise once a year or so, or as often as necessary. - Xed 11:54, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Thats quite a nice idea actually, like a week of countering systematic bias, I'm not sure how well it would work enforced, but it would be nice for a concerted group of editors to get together, co-ordinate via irc, a mailinglist, IM, whatever and consistently work on CSB related articles for a week — with a specific end goal, e.g. 1000 articles created, or 1 FA, 10 good articles and 100 good stubs. This wouldn't work as a WikiProject or anything like that, it would need to have set goals and frequent communication. - FrancisTyers · 12:11, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

That'd be imbalance indeed. The problem with 'bias' has been from the beginning that people think we're the NPOV police (if you read through the statements on the members' list, you'll even come across a few people who signed up because of this). On a related note, I do not think the politburo stuff is directly relevant to the systemic bias/imbalance of Wikipedia. For sure, Wikipedia's power structure has some problems (mainly caused, I think, by the fact that Wikipedia's social and political structures don't scale linearly with the huge influx of newcomers), but the imbalance we are trying to counter in this project does not result from these power structures.

Anyway McHenry surely has a point when he says that planning is important in achieving good coverage. I'm all for giving that CSB-week a try! — mark ✎ 14:31, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Robert McHenry's comments on this Wikiproject

Just wanted to add my own comments about this:

• The real bias in Wikipedia: a response to David Shariatmadari, by Robert McHenry, Open Democracy, June 7, 2006.

The blurb reads: Wikipedia's visionless, self-selected, value-light online encyclopedia is a deformed shadow of what the global public deserves, says former editor-in-chief of Encyclopædia Britannica, Robert McHenry.

Soundbites like that go a long way to explain why Wikipedians love to hate McHenry :-/ But don't rush to dismiss his comments: I think he makes some good points. McHenry has extensive experience producing both on-line and print encyclopedias, and IMO, the Wikipedia community ought to listen carefully to his advice, since many of the issues he mentions are fixable (although given the glacial pace of change at WP, I despair that I will ever see this happen).

Is imbalance in Wikipedia "systemic"? I should rather say that it results inevitably from a lack of system. Given the method by which Wikipedia articles are created, for there to be any semblance of balance in the overall coverage of subject-matter would be miraculous. Balance results from planning.

— Robert McHenry, op. cit

Clearly WP cannot adopt Brittanica's model of a "centrally planned" and professionally written encyclopedia, but that doesn't mean that WP can or should ignore the issues of balance and bias (not the same thing!). In particular, I think the Wikimedia Board urgently needs to refine and clarify the mission statement of this project, and to streamline processes to assist Wikipedians who wish to implement some kind of "decentralized planning" in an attempt to achieve local balance in their own areas of interest. (Since WP depends on volunteer labor, I doubt that WP can hope to achieve global balance, although I gather that the goal of your WikiProject is to ameliorate a real or perceived global imbalance tilted toward "Western culture" in the English language literature!)

No complex project can be expected to yield satisfactory results without a clear vision of what the goal is – and here I mean what a worthy internet encyclopedia actually looks like – and a plan to reach that goal, which will include a careful inventory of the needed skills and knowledge and some meaningful measures of progress. To date, the "hive mind" of Wikipedia's "digital Maoism" (as Jaron Lanier's vigorous critique on edge.org calls it) displays none of these. That vision of the goal must do something that Wikipedia and Wikipedians steadfastly decline to do today, and that is to consider seriously the user, the reader. What is the user meant to take away from the experience of consulting a Wikipedia article? The most candid defenders of the encyclopedia today confess that it cannot be trusted to impart correct information but can serve as a starting-point for research. By this they seem to mean that it supplies some links and some useful search terms to plug into Google. This is not much. It is a great shame that some excellent work – and there is some – is rendered suspect both by the ideologically required openness of the process and by association with much distinctly not excellent work that is accorded equal standing by that same ideology. One simple fact that must be accepted as the basis for any intellectual work is that truth – whatever definition of that word you may subscribe to – is not democratically determined. And another is that talent, whether for soccer or for exposition, is not equally distributed across the population, while a robust confidence is one's own views apparently is. If there is a systemic bias in Wikipedia, it is to have ignored so far these inescapable facts.

— Robert McHenry, op. cit

Amen. I keep saying this, but here goes again: in my view, Wikipedia should be

1. a free on-line general encyclopedia which aims to offer timely, accurate, and unbiased information on all topics of knowledge,
2. a website where editors come to help implement this goal by volunteer labor, providing
   • the technical structure embodied in the wikicode used to prepare and serve up content,
   • a political and social structure (Jimbo recently mentioned a loving environment) which evolves to further this goal,
3. a utopian social experiment in providing something of universal utility at a comparatively modest cost, founded on the core "open source" premise: large numbers of individuals will be willing and even eager to do good work for something other than money.

But in the view I have sadly come to after just over a year of active participation, Wikipedia is

1. an anarchic forum where amateur pseudo-journalists can post more or less anonymous essays (or all too often, semicoherent rants) about controversial topical political and social issues, biased toward the populist political philosophy of leading members of the community,
2. a playground for vandals, hoaxers, guerilla marketeers, and disgruntled fanatics pushing some idiosyncratic (sometimes hateful) point of view and eager to serve up slanted information, misinformation, and disinformation,
3. a social club for anons (if that isn't a contradiction in terms).

Don't get me wrong: I have enjoyed the social aspects of WP and I think this is an essential part of attracting and retaining volunteer labor. The core condraction, as I see it, is that WP cannot be both a project to build an unbiased and accurate encyclopedia, and a forum encouraging free and anonymous expression of minority viewpoints which would be given little if any space in a traditional encyclopedia.

If Wikipedians really believe that the goal of WP is to build an encyclopedia, then I think that editing Wikipedia is a privilege, not a right, and the quality of any users edits must ultimately be evaluated in terms of the question: how well do these edits serve our readers? If so, we must acknowledge that encouraging murky authorship (by allowing IP anon edits and multiple user accounts registered by a given individual) is incompatible with any serious expectation of responsible behavior, since it seems to me that taking responsiblity for what you write is an essential part of any good writing.

If on the other hand, perhaps following the tradition of anonymous printed essays established by the English fathers of civil liberty, Wikipedians conclude that what the world really needs is not another encyclopedia, but rather a global anonymous free speech forum, then Jimbo might be correct in refusing to ban anonymous edits. Here I note that Wikipedia offers many advantages over UseNet, such as being able to serve up figures, images, and generally to present a more pleasant user interface than many newsreaders.

In other words, I think that Wikipedians are confronted with a choice:

1. build a viable alternative to enormously expensive (and bulky!) print encyclopedias,
2. build a viable alternative to anonymous UseNet forums.

I am not saying that the second might not be a laudable goal, I am just saying that these competing goals are mutually exclusive, and the Wikipedia commnity needs to decide which goal to pursue (and how to guide dissenters toward another forum better suited to their purpose).

I came here to work (hard) toward the first goal, and have been left feeling rather undercut by recent comments by Jimbo which I read as an admission that given this choice, he chooses the second of these two alternatives. Whether I have gotten this right or wrong, the same conclusion follows: the Wikimedia Board urgently needs to prepare an unambiguous and self-consistent mission statement enunciating the "official" goal of the Wikipedia.

Oh, yeah, here is what McHenry says about your project:

Shariatmadari's article praises the work of a group calling itself by the unfortunately self-congratulatory label Wikiproject: Countering Systemic Bias and ends with a call for more such efforts to improve the coverage of the encyclopedia. Certainly such work is needed. I would suggest that it needs to begin with a clear distinction between "bias" and "imbalance", terms that Shariatmadari uses interchangeably but that to an editor mean quite different things. The Wikiproject seems to concern itself with topics that are treated in insufficient detail or not at all; to me, this is addressing imbalance. "Bias" denotes a lack of objectivity or fairness in the treatment of topics. Thus, when a writer called Joseph McCabe alleged in a widely distributed pamphlet that certain articles in the Encyclopedia Britannica had been unduly influenced by the Catholic church, he was charging bias. (That was in 1947, and he was quite wrong, by the way.)

— Robert McHenry, op. cit

Ouch. Well, you probably can't change the name, but you can--- and should--- rewrite your mission statement to take account of the distinction between balance and bias, since McHenry is quite correct in asserting that these are not the same things.

OK, don't shoot the messenger, please.---CH 22:52, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Demographics

The project page makes some definitive statements regarding age/ethnicity/culture of Wikipedia contributors. As a committee member who is constantly being asked for statistics regarding the make up of the community, I would really love to know what these statements are based on so I may direct journalists and researchers to the statistics which show this. - Amgine 00:41, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Needs Rewording?

The run-on sentence that ate Clevelan---er Kyoto:

WikiProject Ethnic Groups, which is moribund as of October 2004, but does have good ideas on how
to give comparable treatment to groups that are liable to be actively represented by editors who
are members of those groups and groups that are liable to be written about mainly by outsiders.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by ScarletSpiderDave (talk • contribs) .

The project doesn't look moribund anymore, so I simply removed that explanation. Ruakh 16:27, 27 June 2006 (UTC)