Talk:Emily St. John Mandel

Wikipedia controversy

This person is barely notable. However, she became famous when Wikipedia refused to change the article to reflect her divorced status even though she tried. For this reason, a separate subsection is a good idea. That topic is more notable than Mandel. Denmarkforever (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Heck no. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:40, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

It is properly sourced and a big article by the BBC solely on the Wikipedia controversy with her. I agree that the Wikipedia public relations department may want this censored. Denmarkforever (talk) 10:44, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

That is of course the reasonable conclusion. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:46, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I take issue the characterization of Mandel as being "barely notable" here and elsewhere in the discussion. She has written several best selling books (according to the New York Times). She was a finalist for the National Book Award and won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for best science fiction. One of her books was made into a HBO series. Just because you don't read science fiction or literary fiction or hang out in libraries and bookstores doesn't mean she isn't notable. That is like saying a pro player isn't notable because I don't watch football. As to this current pop culture moment, there is certainly a difference between a divorce decree or a judge's ruling and the transcript of a trial. The latter is opinion that is yet to be analyzed for its veracity. Whereas, a decree issued by a judge is fact. However, the court documents are primary sources==which we are not suppose to use in Wikipedia. However, this type of information is usually published as a list in a newspaper, a secondary source that would a usable. Of course, her mentioning of this information in a interview is also a questionable source (interviews can be primary sources as, again, there is no test of veracity). However, the other articles about the interview are allowable without any issue. Yes, it seems silly at times, but the primary source rule is there as part of the restriction on original research. In terms of what to do with it--I say add this incident to her article and nominate it In the News or Did You Know? Because it is funny!!! Rublamb (talk) 19:54, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

References

Surely this should have been covered by Wikipedia:Verifiability#Self-published sources? Marital status is not an exceptional claim, and there was never any "reasonable doubt as to its authenticity".--Pharos (talk) 00:21, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

I really hope that this is used in the future so that the more anal Wikipedians understand that rules need to be considered in concert with common sense, and clearly, no sense was applied in this case. - Whadup, it's ya girl, Dusa (talk) 02:59, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Was there a SPS that could have been used? I looked at her website, I didn't see anything. But yes, a tweet from [1], which has the old kind of blue check mark, would have been fine. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:07, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

A verified tweet from Mandel, a valid SPS, certainly would be an acceptable source; obviously the claim that an interview was required is incorrect. In any case, an anonymous IP editor posting that they checked court records, which was the claimed source, is not. TJRC (talk) 19:00, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

@TJRC: Regarding "Basically, Wikipedia should not be the place of first publication of any information that has not already been published elsewhere, particularly in WP:BLP articles." – The Publishers Weekly article only confirmed that she was married in March 2012. Lacking any reliable source stating that she is still married in December 2022, it's "original research" at best to state that she is still currently married, and an incorrect assumption at worst. Could say {{as of|lc=y|March 2012}}: Spouse Kevin Mandel (as of March 2012) – wbm1058 (talk) 19:25, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I agree: an "As of" edit would have been fine. A mention of a divorce supported only by an IP citation of court records would not. TJRC (talk) 19:34, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

The correct answer, presuming you did not want the edit to stay, would have been to remove the offending content - that is, the spouse entry, as clearly the divorce as not covered and thus the entire marriage isn't notable.

WP:BLPEDIT indicates that attempts to resolve the conflict should have been used, and instead we have pedantic adherence to policy that's meant to prevent stalking used to deny a simple change of fact. Pharniel (talk) 02:58, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

The edit request did not include any request to include mention of a divorce, only the removal of provably untrue information. Denying on NOR grounds was inappropriate. - 24.0.167.5 (talk) 05:35, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Indeed. In this case we're talking about primary sources that are a literal authority on the truth. If we know for a fact that something in an article is false as written, it's not original research to remove it entirely. Someguy1221 (talk) 04:49, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Though it is, as the policy is written, a gross violation of WP:BLPPRIMARY: "Do not use trial transcripts and other court records, or other public documents, to support assertions about a living person."

In this case producing a result that the BBC referred to as "Kafkaesque" - And while the subject was on a book tour with easy access to journalists to correct this, it has to be asked how many people do not have easy access to wiki approved sources - especially now that Twitter's 'verification' program has become pay to play - and must than rely court orders, vital records or other government documents specifically banned by wiki policy to correct articles about themselves. Pharniel (talk) 04:59, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

@Pharniel: None of what you said is the case if the goal is, as I said, remove it entirely. I'm not talking about the addition of information from primary sources, but the exclusion of information from outdated and unreliable sources. This is not and should not be a controversial issue. There will always be circumstances in which a facially reliable source is known to be mistaken or out of date, and in that case it should cease to be used, and information sourced from it should be deleted. I can't think of better invocation of IAR than to say that if the rules seem to prohibit deleting inaccurate information, then the rules have been interpreted incorrectly. Someguy1221 (talk) 12:39, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

For the time being, it is possible to tell the difference between old and new blue checkmarks, though. If one knows where to look. She could also have written on her official webpage, which probably would be accepted per "there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity" (WP:ABOUTSELF). Maybe WP:OTRS would have worked too in the "I am no longer married like the WP:RS said" situation. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:01, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Off topic, but I read the current Personal life section, and was reminded of this WaPo article: "Author Hannah Moskowitz was browsing Wikipedia last summer when she fired off a tweet: "me, yelling at the 'personal life' section of Wikipedia: JUST TELL ME IF THEY'RE GAY." It racked up nearly 6,000 retweets and 36,000 likes. Moskowitz still isn’t sure why that particular tweet struck such a nerve — but it’s a long-running joke in the LGBT community that if you want to find out if a famous person is gay, you go right to Wiki’s “personal life.”" Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:08, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I question the claim WP:BLPSPS is acceptable for a divorce. By definition divorce involves a claim about a third party. I do agree with Someguy1221 that a lot of the the best solution is simply to remove the material even if there are nominal RS. Note however the truth is we have no solution which will work in all circumstances. Sometimes we just have to accept our articles will be out of date. Anyone who's spent a lot of time at BLPN will know that by no means are divorces or relationship breakdowns the only thing we have to deal with. Some people do want their marriages to be mentioned and aren't happy with just removing any previous marriages etc, there's often no solution to this if it isn't mention in RS. Sometimes the relationship or marriage was significant enough that some aspect of it is covered in enough detail int he article that it's something we cannot simply remove. Some people want their number of children to be updated and while they will sometimes be happy with simply removing the number of children, it's unlikely this is always the case, and as with the divorce/relationship breakdown sometime swe cannot reasonably remove the info since it's significant enough that this wouldn't work. One of the most common requests we simply can't deal with until sources become available and sometimes it's a matter of if they became available, is when people want a subject's passing to be noted but there are no RS. Nil Einne (talk) 11:21, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I see your point on BLPSPS, though I still think it could be acceptable depending on situation. "In December 2022, X stated xhe had divorced" may be a hypothetical option. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:45, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Come to think of it, with that reasoning, doesn't the current "problem" remain? All we have are interviews where she says she's divorced? No it doesn't remain! The BBC actually says "The online, user-edited encyclopaedia said she was married, but in fact, she is not: her divorce from her husband was finalised in November." so we're good on that. But if we only had Slate, it could be a point. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:18, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I made some changes to my earlier comment so have struck it out but will leave this reply here, but feel free to move this whole part to below my new comment if that's fine. Anyway I would be very uncomfortable about simply saying the subject said they were divorced from a tweet. If we get back to what TJRC mentioned before, the issue is that no other sources have seen this particular factoid about two people is significant enough to mentioned nor have they assessed its veracity. If the claim is accurate and truthful then it's generally fairly inconsequential although not always the case even then. For example, if the divorce is still not known to some family or friends or even just colleagues or acquaintances of the other spouse, effectively we're involved in spreading something about this subject (the other spouse) that other sources have not seen fit to mention. While often the spouse of subject tweeting may be something family and friends are more likely to notice, I don't think we can assume this is always the case and even more for colleagues and acquaintances. I think certain communities may consider even civil divorce unacceptable even considering in a lot of jurisdictions there is ultimately nothing you can do if one spouse wants a divorce, so we might be exposing the other spouse to real word consequences again despite a lack of sources feeling this is acceptable. And as for the case when the subject is joking, stretching the truth or flat out lying, we're getting into a minefield we're were spreading a wrong claim about some other living person (that they're divorced) based solely on what someone else said. I don't see how that's acceptable, it's actually one of the things BLPSPS is supposed to avoid. While it may be true that with this sort of stuff secondary sources often do little or no fact checking, in that case at least we are simply doing what unfortunately we always risk doing, spread something wrong because secondary sources did not do a very good job. We also have to hope that secondary sources do do some assessment of whether they should check the detail based on stuff like their track record which isn't something we consider with BLPSPS. I wrote this before your interview point but my view remains the same. Our assumption is that secondary sources will assess whether anything said in the interview can be published as is, needs an editorial note, or isn't something they're willing to publish. Our hope is they will properly consider the possible consequences of this, including mentioning a divorce which may not be widely known even to people who know one or both subjects; but also will consider whether it's something they should fact-check. I don't think we're always wrong with this. Despite freedom of the press, sources cannot simply repeat lies someone else told about a person and escape all possible consequences by simply saying it's what the person said although it is true the legal risk can vary quite significantly from the US to jurisdictions with stricter libel laws. (It can be true that something being on Wikipedia actually far more significant than some random tweet and subjects don't actually expect their tweet to have the effect it does. But at least it was still their decision, and Wikipedia aside, anyone tweeting nowadays should hopefully know there is always a risk it can randomly go viral.) P.S. Forgot to mention I'm assuming the spouse is named since while WP:BLPNAME isn't totally clear on this, we do often name even non-notable spouses unlike with children. If the spouse isn't even named then my concerns would be significantly reduced although in that case I even more question why we don't simply remove this marriage. Nil Einne (talk) 12:35, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I question the claim WP:BLPSPS is acceptable for a divorce. By definition divorce involves a claim about a third party. As much as I dislike using court transcripts, I'd actually prefer them than relying solely on BLPSPS to make claims about a divorce. I do agree with Someguy1221 that a lot of times, the the best solution is simply to remove the material if it's out of date or otherwise has concerns we cannot address even if there are nominal RS.

Note however the truth is we have no solution which will work in all circumstances. Sometimes we just have to accept our articles will be out of date. Anyone who's spent a lot of time at BLPN will know that by no means are divorces or relationship breakdowns the only thing we have to deal with. Some people do want their marriages to be mentioned and aren't happy with just removing any previous marriages etc, there's often no solution to this if it isn't mention in RS. Sometimes the relationship or marriage was significant enough that some aspect of it is covered in enough detail in the article that it's something we cannot simply remove.

(An almost example of this which recently came up is Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard/Archive343#Gabrielle Wolohojian/Talk:Gabrielle Wolohojian. AFAIK we have removed any mention of a relationship in our articles including from Maura Healey which IMO is probably for the best. However for a number of reasons there is reasonably commentary on this relationship in sources especially as it relates to Healey, as an editor mentioned. IMO it's not enough to keep the info but other editors may disagree and in any case with more coverage even I would question whether we really should be removing it all. This example also reminds me a bit of my earlier point. While there's no indication this is the case here, the requests for removal have come from one subject in the relationship and it's always possible one subject may want the information removed, the other wants it mentioned.)

Some people want their number of children to be updated and while they will sometimes be happy with simply removing the number of children, it's unlikely this is always the case, and as with the divorce/relationship breakdown sometime we cannot reasonably remove the info since it's significant enough that this wouldn't work.

One of the most common requests we simply can't deal with until sources become available and sometimes it's a matter of if they became available, is when people want a subject's passing to be noted but there are no RS. (These requests don't come from a subject but they sometimes come from family and friends.)

And one of the most consequential issues is what we do when there was a lot of coverage of some earlier court verdict such that it's not something we can exclude, but a later court verdict has changed things enough that it's something we should mention except there's nothing besides court transcripts covering the later court verdict. IMO this is one of the only cases (definitely not divorces) where it might be acceptable to add information based solely on court transcripts albeit being very very careful not to intepret them in any way.

P.S. Nicholas Alahverdian is another sort of example, this time of why we have to be very careful about relying stuff subjects or their 'families' say. While in the particular case the subject managed to get RS onto it, if you look back into the history you'll also find there was a fair amount of questionable stuff going on directly on Wikipedia.

Nil Einne (talk) 12:30, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Comment Per WP:PROPORTION, WP:NOTNEWS etc, there is atm no good reason to mention her WP-adventure in the article, though the source is WP:RS for the fact. "This article has been mentioned by a media organization" template on this talkpage is good enough. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:59, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Btw, per WP:BLPNAME we could remove the name Kevin Mandel, it doesn't add much. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:06, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

I disagree. His name is important. It adds value to the article. Most of the article, in contrast, doesn't add much. This is a not very famous author whose claim to fame is fighting with Wikipedia, not her books. Denmarkforever (talk) 10:38, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I see we've moved onto the "Woman who made wiki look bad again isn't that notable" phase of justification for wiki's policies producing predictably embarrassingly results.

Seriously though, Kevin Mandel does not have an article about himself indicating that he's not notable in an of himself and only exists as a (former) family member mentioned in one interview. Removing him as a spouse would have been entirely inline with WP:BLPNAME & WP:NOTPUBLICFIGURE - His notability was that he was married to the subject of the article, he's no longer married to the subject and his only RS inclusion was being married to the subject, thus no longer notable and safe to remove. Pharniel (talk) 13:37, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

But removing his name would be ridiculous as notability is not a requirement for mention in an article, only for the creation of an article about him. He's an adult, so there is zero reason to remove his name. In fact, our goal is to document the "sum total of all human knowledge" that is mentioned in reliable sources, and barring some very specific reason for excluding his name (there is none), our automatic response should always be "Of course we will also document this bit of human knowledge by including his name." We should be inclusionist as much as possible. "If I go looking for info, and Wikipedia doesn't have it, then Wikipedia has failed." Baseball Bugs[2]. As much as possible, there should be (almost) zero holes in our coverage of that "all human knowledge." Really, that should be the attitude of all Wikipedians. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:13, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Your sentiments are nice, but directly contradict WP:BLPNAME - as noted in my first post -

"The presumption in favor of privacy is strong in the case of family members of articles' subjects and other loosely involved, otherwise low-profile persons. The names of any immediate, former, or significant family members or any significant relationship of the subject of a BLP may be part of an article, if reliably sourced, subject to editorial discretion that such information is relevant to a reader's complete understanding of the subject."

and

"This is generally interpreted by the community to include the removal of names of non-notable minors from articles about their notable family members, such as when a notable individual births or sires a non-notable minor. Notability is not presumed or inherited with extremely limited exception (such as heir to a throne or similar)."

You could, theoretically, make an argument that his name is important now that there's more coverage, but the husband's name is not included in in either the Slate, Business Insider, or BBC article making removing his name perfectly in line. Pharniel (talk) 20:10, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Additionally, if the actual goal is to cover "all human knowledge" wikipedia has failed constantly, and will continue to fail as the polices it has are directly orthogonal to this goal, and indicates that the purpose of the organization is not to have "all human knowledge" - the massive swaths of deleted articles and the very concept of a non-notable person or event is clear that Wikipedia's goal is not, in fact, to be all human knowledge. Pharniel (talk) 20:12, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Are you not aware of normal practice here, in line with policy? This is not a child. We normally include the names of spouses and partners, including ex-partners. We treat minors differently. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:51, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

He's named once in passing in a 2012 article, and has his name has not been notable since.

He's literally only relevant to the fact that the subject was, at one point, married to him.

Current mainstream articles do not even give his name, only referring to him obliquely as the ex-husband.

"Normal Practice" is how you wind up in international news articles highlighting the absurdity of how editors' day to day practices resulted in a blanket denial with no notes on how to escalate or any offers of any assistance at all in direct contrivance of WP:BLPKIND, WP:NOTPUBLICFIGURE "Many Wikipedia articles contain material on people who are not well known, even if they are notable enough for their own article. In such cases, exercise restraint and include only material relevant to the person's notability, focusing on high-quality secondary sources." - the only secondary source we have is a single ten year old article and 0 notability in any other case, and the instructions in Wikipedia:FAQ/Article subjects and the Wikimedia Foundations 2009/2013 resolution requesting "Treating any person who has a complaint about how they are portrayed in our projects with patience, kindness, and respect, and encouraging others to do the same."

Combined, it is perfectly reasonable and in line with WP:BLP policies, as Gråbergs Gråa Sång noted, that we simply remove his name and refer to him as the subject's ex-husband.

Also, you may think wiki should include everything, other editors in the article - and Wikipedia's own policies - disagree. See Denmarkforever's contributions and of course, the initial edit request rejection from TJRC.

Denmarkforever even posits that the subject, absent the multiple (Business Insider just added an article with comments from Wikipedia) articles about the subject is perhaps not worthy of inclusion via WP:BIO.

In short, editors' "Normal Practice" produced an internationally noted failure and is the only reason we're even having this discussion.

Though as usual editors believe that the process can't fail, it can only be failed, and that since an arguably correct answer was reached - again, only after international media coverage of the failure of Wiki's policies to capture "all human knowledge" or the Foundations Resolution "In our efforts to offer a source of knowledge that is valuable and useful to all, we have a responsibility to uphold these values by also providing accurate information. Participants in Wikimedia projects have created resources of vast size and scope. As we have emphasized for several years, in addition to the quantity of knowledge that is available, its quality is also an essential matter." - that there's nothing wrong with the process and "normal practice" is working perfectly well instead of taking this time to reflect on how normal practice failed Wikipedia's implied & stated mission. Pharniel (talk) 22:07, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Wow, that's a lot of fail. The only possible fail I see on this talkpage regarding mentioning the divorce, is that TJRC on the 16th could have, perhaps, mentioned that a WP:ABOUTSELF could work, maybe, and IMO it's a long stretch to call that a fail. And the day after TJRC responded, Slate was on the case. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 22:20, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure how a single request that could have been quickly and quietly accommodated on a basic fact about a subject trying in good faith to engage with wiki's policies by following instructions hosted on wiki turns into international news about how wiki tacitly admits that notability & process is more important than truth despite multiple statements & resolutions adopted by the foundation saying otherwise isn't a failure.

Especially since the only feedback & correction mechanics has turned once again into "we didn't do any thing wrong, normies should just accept that exceptional resources are required to correct their articles" - in direct contrivance with WP:BLP, the aforementioned resolutions, etc.

Pretty fair to call this entire affair a failure of process & people. Pharniel (talk) 22:28, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Exceptional resources was not asked for, but WP:BLP-good ones. That excludes WP:BLPPRIMARY, per top of page. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 22:32, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Maybe you've personally never heard of her, but she's actually a pretty well-known author. She's published several best-selling novels, won prestigious awards in her field, and even had one of her books adapted into a television series by a major network. That's about as successful an author can be in US without being Brandon Sanderson or Stephen King. Timmyreal1987 (talk) 01:01, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Pharniel, for an WP:SPA with only TWELVE edits, you sure are strongly emotionally worked up about this little matter. Are you related to one of the involved subjects? I'm trying to understand the strong emotional reaction.

Seriously, do you know of some special reason why we should deviate from the normal way we deal with adult spouses, in exactly this situation, who get passing mention in RS? (They don't get their own article, but they are usually mentioned.)

Please tell us the reason, without mentioning policy, and let more experienced editors make the decision without your strange wikilawyering and emotional outbursts. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 22:34, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

To my knowledge I am not involved with the subject, their works, or any employer of theirs.

I'm not sure how I am supposed to argue my point that Wiki policy created a situation that to the rest of the world was described as Kafkaesque, and it is difficult to argue it is not.

And as the spokesperson to Wikipedia says, users are hashing what happened in the talk page now and invited people to engage.

Here is my understanding of the issue - The subject of an article received a divorce. Their wiki page was still showing the husband & subject as married. The desired outcome was to remove the spouse information form their Bio template card.

Here are the facts as I understand them, and appear to be generally agreed:

1. Subject becomes divorced with a divorce decree from a judge.
2. Subject, following instructions under Contact Us->Subject of an article, asks for an edit and provides reference to the divorce decree. To normal people, this is a sufficient level of documentation needed to enact changes - it is the thing you give to your job, or other government agencies to update their records and it is perfectly reasonable for a non-user to not understand Wikipedia's prohibition on specific sources for living people, as it is not included in the Contact Us page or FAQ.
3. An editor rejects the change request explaining that court documents & public records aren't an acceptable reason to edit an article, and specifically says to a non-user subject that if they want the article updated, it will need to be important enough to be covered by other sources, and at that time the information may then be updated, implying that if the coverage is deemed insufficient, the edit requested subject will be rejected again.
4. The information that is incorrect is related to martial status, which in this case is an objective verifiable fact. It is not a status that is subjective or requires context or interpenetration, a matter of opinion, etc.
5. The subject, following the instructions of the editor rejecting the change, then goes on to Twitter to ask for assistance, because the subject has followers who work for State backed news outlets and major mass media organizations.
6. The subject then has a series of interviews for the sole purpose of updating an objective fact about their own Wikipedia article.
7. Subject's article is now updated after a sufficiently notable news outlet reports on the issue for the sole purpose of noting that a judicial decree has been issued and that the subject is no longer married.
8. Now that major media outlets - including and international state news agency - have reported on the change, edits are performed by non-subject editors.
9. The article is now correct in regards to marital status, barring some cleanup in terms of family and whether the controversy its self is notable.

After that, editors moved on to addressing how the situation occurred, alternatives to media coverage including the option to Tweet from a verified (separate issue, but going to be one very soon) account would have sufficed, or that perhaps deleting the entire mention of the marriage since it was of a non-notable person included in an article where the marriage wasn't the subject of the article could have been done, because that would also achieve the end goal.

That leads to why I'm here -

1. What happens to people who don't just happen to have a verified Twitter account with international media following it? Notable people are not required to have social media or websites, and while I recognize this is a corner case, it's perfectly reasonable to ensure processes and polices are updated to handle the situation.
2. Wikipedia already has policies, directives and nearly flat out instructions on what to do when someone requests an edit on themselves & are clearly a non-user. They do not appear to have been followed in either spirit or letter, and created a situation once again where wiki states that accuracy is important demonstrates that process is more important than accuracy.
3. While I appreciate the effort of other editors to find alternatives under other policies, there are a verity of simple solutions that prevent this specific error case form occurring related to accepting court orders/decrees or vital documents. I'm sympathetic to not using court transcripts, because pouring over testimony looking to pick out bits is a component of original research, but not a final order from a court when referencing the specific final outcome.
4. This entire thing was a gigantic waste of resources that many subjects would not have access to, in order to achieve a trivial change to an article.

Of course, as Denmarkforever informed me, I am coming to this with an expectation that getting verifiable truth into wiki and maintaining it efficiently and effectively is how everyone thinks wiki should function.

As they said, editors may believe that the process is more important. If that's the case, the process should be updated to prevent obvious and easily avoided inequity.

As for why I'm sticking to Talk, it is because i do not want to touch any article remotely related to the subject because honestly I don't care about the specific subject, I care about how wiki has created a set of policies, practices & processes that create negative outcomes, and how they can be fixed while still letting wiki be wiki.

And if you don't find "woman had to beg people on the internet to do an article on her in order to update her wiki page because wiki refused to accept a court order", with the original article ending "Well, this is what journalism is all about: righting wrongs." as a negative outcome and failure state, then we have a fundamentally incompatible worldview on the purpose of an omnipedia like Wiki and nothing I say will convince you otherwise, and nothing I write will have value to you. Pharniel (talk) 03:46, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia policies, and what individual editors believe those policies say, are often two different things. For example, most editors are unaware that Wikipedia only requires a handful of things to be cited (WP:MINREF). This article could have successfully been nominated as a Good article even if the divorce sentence was unsourced (WP:GACN). The fact that feedback by non-editors about the content of their article deserves fair consideration was also not followed here, even though it's stated prominently in WP:BLP, in several other policies/guidelines, and was affirmed by ArbCom (and is also just common sense). DFlhb (talk) 16:03, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Uncited stuff in WP:BLP:s tends to get challenged though, and then the MINREF "defense" is gone. It can also be argued that uncited stuff in a BLP is "likely to be challenged", per MINREF. Personally, if I had come across an uncited "is divorced" in a BLP, I would be likely to challenge it. I might also look for a source, but if I didn't find one, I would probably remove it. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:10, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

See my comment on WT:BLP; my comment presupposes that editors came to a consensus to include the divorce on the talk page (which should absolutely have happened here, per the subject's wishes), in which case MINREF would stand. DFlhb (talk) 17:33, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

It might have happened, but this [3] happened before anyone commented on the reply to the IP. After that, consensus to apply MINREF on that particular factoid was kinda moot. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:41, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

@Pharniel: "He's named once in passing in a 2012 article, and has his name has not been notable since." A quick search brings up lots of WP:reliable sources which mention Emily Mandel's husband Kevin by name, e.g.:

• Publisher's Weekly, March 2012: "her husband, the playwright and producer Kevin Mandel" [4]
• Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 2016: "her husband, Kevin Mandel, a playwright and producer" [5]
• Monroe County Community College, 2017, citing author's and publisher's websites: "her husband, the playwright and producer Kevin Mandel" [6]
• Contemporary Women's Writing, November 2018: "playwright Kevin Mandel" [7]
• Quill & Quire, January 2020: "her husband, playwright Kevin Mandel" [8]
• Vulture.com, March 2020: "her husband, Kevin Mandel, a ghostwriter and headhunter" [9]
• Mango Publishing, August 2020: "meeting her future husband, writer Kevin Mandel" [10]
• The New Yorker, April 2022: "her husband, Kevin, a writer and executive recruiter" [11]
• The Guardian, April 2022: "Mandel lives with Kevin, her husband" [12]

— Chrisahn (talk) 03:19, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Unless either the subject or her former partner have requested it (e.g. via the Volunteer Response Team), given the amount of coverage, I don't see a case for removing his name. Cordless Larry (talk) 13:51, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Agreed. There is no compelling reason for deviating from standard practice. No privacy or other concerns have been given. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:32, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Resolving conflicts between WP:BLPPRIMARY & WP:BLPEDIT

Related discussion at WT:BLP, for the interested. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:54, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

RFC: attempt to correct the Wikipedia article

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is clear consensus not to include the material. Although there is a consensus that the material is allowed, there is also consensus that it is undue trivia for this biography. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 18:48, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

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Should Mandel's attempt to correct this article (about her divorce occurring) be mentioned in the article? Ovinus (talk) 22:58, 2 January 2023 (UTC) (Reworded non-neutral original RfC opening statement.)

Discussion

Original opening statement: Should there be censorship and no mention of Mandel's attempt to correct the Wikipedia article (about her divorce occurring) despite multiple reliable source, including the BBC, reporting about her problems with Wikipedia making the correction. Or should mention of this Wikipedia incident be allowed? NewGeorge2 (talk) 22:17, 21 December 2022 (UTC) User has been indefinitely blocked for abusing multiple accounts. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

• Yes, there should be censorship on this, no one must ever found out. Damn the BBC and This article has been mentioned by multiple media organizations: templates on talkpages. I just wrote WP:PROPORTION and WP:NOTNEWS to justify this governmental action. The government has spoken, it has been put in the memory hole, now keep silent. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 22:38, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Gråbergs Gråa Sång I'm getting a {{jokes}}-y vibe of "I've had enough" from your message, and I find it both amusing and relatable. I have nothing more to add, unfortunately. (Summoned by bot) I dream of horses (Contribs) (Talk) 01:07, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  Yeah, the "censorship" set me off a bit. The RFC-closer will give my comment due consideration in 30 days or so. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:15, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I think that it warrants some mention in personal life, which does seem like a section that does need significant expansion if possible. InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 02:50, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• Allowed. It would be unheard of to not mention an occurrence of this nature, which has no privacy/sensitive concerns, that got so much press coverage. It should ALSO be mentioned in another article dealing with Wikipedia in the press. We must have an article of that type somewhere. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 07:10, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  We're in WP:OTHERCONTENT territory now, but on "unheard of", hear this: Donna Strickland, Sushant Singh Rajput, Recession, List of most expensive artworks by living artists.

  We don't have an article that I know, though there are a few Category:Wikipedia coverage of specific events. There are the project pages like Wikipedia:Press coverage 2022, but those pages excludes coverage exclusively on a single WP-article, coverage of (some aspect of) the project overall is wanted. For the "one article" mentions there is the talkpage-template above. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:11, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  (edit conflict with Cordless Larry, I was adding to my previous comment) WP:CITOGENESIS exists. On the "one article" mentions, I recommend the ones at Talk:Donald Trump from around November 2018, for some reason not mentioned in the article.

  And yes it's allowed, consensus will be what it will be. My argument is that there are decent policy-based arguments against inclusion, see my reply to NewGeorge2. WP:SUBJECT is on-topic too. IMO, Wikipedians sometimes overestimates the WP:DUE-ness of stuff like this, since we tend to be a bit passionate about WP. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:31, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  Remembered one more article you may find interesting, Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia. Per the nature of things, the refs are media mentions of WP. If you think the St. John Mandel "affair" fits at Reliability of Wikipedia, you can add it there. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• This RfC should be closed as the statement does not comply with WP:RFCNEUTRAL. Cordless Larry (talk) 08:16, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  I don't know if the OP is allowed to rewrite their statement slightly at this point. If they do, they should use strikethrough per WP:REDACT. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:58, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• Allowed As long as it's reliably sourced it deserves a mention here. I also agree with Cordless Larry that this RfC does not comply with WP:RFCNEUTRAL. I'm not sure it should be closed on that basis, but this might be a WP:SNOW close anyway since I can't think of a logical reason to exclude the information. While this is backed by WP:RS it's not really something anyone is going to care about in 20 years. So this should be omitted per WP:RECENT. Nemov (talk) 14:28, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
• Allowed but likely UNDUE. Of course it's not forbidden, but we also aren't trying to document every moment of the author's life. Just because she's (briefly) talking about us doesn't mean we need to write about it. pburka (talk) 15:11, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• In theory allow, but don't do it on this page, beside a trivial mention not sure why it's relevant to the page. Ortizesp (talk) 16:52, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• Do not include, or keep mention brief, as in the current version.(Summoned by bot) First off, I'd suggest the OP review the WP:RFC guidelines and be more careful when they write their next prompt, because these are meant to be written as a neutral presentation of the dispute, that does not inherently prejudice respondents to view one perspective or the other as the correct outcome. Describing one outlook as "censorship" is hardly that, especially when the use of the term clearly does not align with what that term means in the context of this project. But that caveat aside, clearly there is no per se rule keeping content of this sort out. But I don't see where any editor in the foregoing discussion was suggesting that as the reason to exclude, except in the OP's strawman argument.

The argument for exclusion, rather, hinges on WP:WEIGHT. The suggestion that the subject is marginally notable and "only became famous because of this event" is clearly belied by all evidence available and any reasonable reading of policy: she has written several best-selling novels, won and been nominated for major literary awards, and (most relevant for our purposes here) is covered by a wealth of reliable sources--as the robust reference section in the article clearly illustrates. Further, this article has been well sourced since 2014, as far as I can tell. The implication that this event is not just a significant source of her notability, but in fact the major cause, is clearly some combination of someone's hot take and a lack of understanding of what makes someone WP:NOTABLE for purposes of this project.

In that context, this event is clearly a pretty trivial event in the subject's public life, adds little or nothing of encyclopedic value to enhance the reader's understanding of the subject, and frankly looks a little like naval-gazing for us to include. The only quasi-noteworthy thing about this story (and as others have noted above, this is not an unheard of situation for a public personality looking to amend their Wikipedia article) is that in this case, the subject did the smartest and quickest thing necessary to create sourcing sufficient to meet WP:V. But that alone warrants a quick one-sentence mention at most, no matter how many drive-by news sources (not understanding the context of how this project works) repeated the story with the vague, clickbaity implication that it was an outrageous event.

Per WP:ONUS, the mere fact that a detail can be sourced (even redundantly) does not automatically guarantee that it is encyclopedically relevant for inclusion, and likely to enhance the reader's understanding of the topic they came here to read about. It's up to the party arguing for inclusion to demonstrate that value, and I don't see any argument above that does that. Indeed, I'm not sure I can see any argument for why this little event is WP:DUE for inclusion, beyond possibly a very brief mention. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 02:28, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• Allowed It should be mentioned briefly. Mnair69 (talk) 04:11, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• Allowed. Wouldn't call it censorship, either. If something is wiki-notable then it should be included. This whole thing has been kinda silly. At least the article's accurate now. RexSueciae (talk) 22:21, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
• Allowed It should be mentioned, but only briefly, as some previous users have pointed out. Iraniangal777 (talk) 08:32, 26 December 2022 (UTC)
• Allowed But the content could be much briefer and more neutral (widespread attention?? … as being unable to edit??). Pincrete (talk) 13:07, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Pincrete, I tweaked that a bit:[13]. Still think of it as navel-gazing, though. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:45, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• Comment and Allow No offense intended but I mentioned censorship in the RFC because User Grbers Graa Sang was engaging in edit wars, immediately removing all traces of the Wikipedia problem that Mandel had to put her divorce in the article. Rather that edit war, I started the RFC. It could be considered censorship if Wikipedia is so sensitive that it wants no mention of the systemic problem that Wikipedia has. That problem is that truth is not important in Wikipedia and anything that is not glowingly positive about Wikipedia must not appear in articles. This person, Mandel, got a huge amount of worldwide attention just because Wikipedia behaved like it did. It's good that the current version is no longer has harsh censorship regarding the divorce. I also vote that mention of the divorce and the problems Mandel had with Wikipedia to include it should be mentioned. She even had to arrange interviews just to get it changed. If she didn't, Wikipedia would still be fighting her. NewGeorge2 (talk) 20:34, 27 December 2022 (UTC) Striking comment from indef blocked user abusing sockpuppets in this discussion. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

  Systemic problem? Wikipedia had a momentary hiccup that was pretty quickly resolved and now everybody's got a funny story to tell and an RFC on the talk page that'll probably wrap up soon-ish. Edit wars aren't new. Disagreements about interpreting Wikipedia policy aren't new. As long as the wording is neutral and accurate...I dunno. It's good to be cautious, but I'm not nearly as worried about this whole thing. RexSueciae (talk) 18:22, 30 December 2022 (UTC)

• Remove. It's navel-gazing on our part and has no bearing on her actual biography. If sources cover her "Wikipedia incident" as a significant event in her life, i.e., if it has enduring coverage, I could see the case for it, but for now it's trivia. This RFC was not phrased neutrally; I don't see how WP:CENSORSHIP has any bearing on this discussion and I don't think this is a matter of "allowed" or not—it's simple editorial discretion. czar 01:59, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

  Most of Wikipedia does not have enduring coverage. So wipe out 95% of Wikipedia? No. Look at lots of 14th century Popes, no coverage in the news at all. Look at randomly selected Wikipedia articles, same thing. I get it that Wikipedia doesn't want coverage that makes it look bad but the way to fix that is to stop being bad and start being good. Denmarkforever (talk) 05:47, 10 January 2023 (UTC) Striking comment from indef blocked user abusing sockpuppets in this discussion. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

• Remove Irrelevant, per Czar. Think about it: Were this a biography in a news publication written five years from now (see WP:RECENTISM), would this information be present? I've added a more neutral opening statement. Ovinus (talk) 22:56, 2 January 2023 (UTC)
• Remove As noted by Czar and Ovins, this media mention about wikipedia is a trivial fact which should not be mentioned in the article per WP:RECENTISM and WP:PROPORTION. When first reading the article the sentence about wikipedia in the article sounds out of place. The reason it sounds out of place is because the information is trivial and not of lasting effect on the general retelling of Emily Mandel's life. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:35, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

  A google search reveals a significant proportion of Mandel's life is the Wikipedia story. Denmarkforever (talk) 05:48, 10 January 2023 (UTC) Striking comment from indef blocked user abusing sockpuppets in this discussion. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

• Allowed - Can't see the harm in having a brief mention of an incident relating to the subject's personal life if it has enough reputable sources backing it up. PraiseVivec (talk) 12:12, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
• Remove per Czar. In the grand scheme of a person's life, what is the importance of "that time I got annoyed and tweeted about Wikipedia once"? As Czar said, it's navel-gazey self-importance on the part of Wikipedia editors believing every article subject's (negative) interaction with the encyclopedia is of utmost and world-changing importance. It's not. As far as I can tell, this whole discussion has spiraled out of control because of two brand new single purpose accounts, Denmarkforever and NewGeorge2. It's not that big a deal, bro. Axem Titanium (talk) 21:16, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

  Why don't you call me a Communist pedophile? After all "brand new single purpose account" is the same thing in Wikipedia lingo. I have no single purpose so that is a personal attack on me. Denmarkforever (talk) 08:17, 6 January 2023 (UTC) Striking comment from indef blocked user abusing sockpuppets in this discussion. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

  Because single purpose account is WP-jargon, see Wikipedia:Single-purpose account, Communist pedophile is not. Per [14], the WP:ESSAY fits, fwiw. That said, IMO you have not been WP:DISRUPTIVE. I disagree with your position that Mandel's claim to fame is the media mentions of her WP-whatever, but that's just disagreement, it happens. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:12, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

  STOP PERSONAL ATTACKS!!!!!!!!!! I do not have a single purpose account. Grabergs Graa Sang is an edit warrior, very disruptive, not here to build an encyclopedia. Denmarkforever (talk) 05:44, 10 January 2023 (UTC) Striking comment from indef blocked user abusing sockpuppets in this discussion. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

• Comment Came here from the Signpost about this. I agree with the opposing editors here in that this incident does not have lasting significance (hundreds of such BLP COI requests have been made on Wikipedia, some unusual such as this but nothing out of the usual course of business, if we were to start including them this might as well turn out to be an encyclopedia on Wikipedia). I dont think it is of much notability either for this article or even articles relating to Wikipedia's coverage (under TRIVIAL, RECENTISM, DUE and other cited policies/guidelines by users above). Gotitbro (talk) 23:08, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
• Remove Either she got a divorce or she didn't. Her "attempt to change Wikipedia's article about her to include the divorce" is non-notable trivia. Some1 (talk) 02:56, 12 January 2023 (UTC)
• Remove. Wikipedia editors may be fascinated with how Wikipedia works, but the rest of the world likely sees this as navel-gazing trivia. Can you imagine a professionally edited encyclopedia, maybe from the pre-internet days, mentioning in an article that they'd received a letter from the subject of an article, asking for a correction or update? I can't. It's not encyclopedic. So why would we mention it here? WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:38, 18 January 2023 (UTC)
• Remove just because a fact is reliably sourced does not automatically make it of encyclopedic value, NB WP:UNDUE. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 02:17, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:Wikipedia_Signpost/2023-01-01/In_the_media#How to get divorced on Wikipedia

For the interested. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:57, 1 January 2023 (UTC)

WP:BLPCAT BRD

@Gotitbro added Category:Canadian LGBT writers which makes an amount of sense, but note the banner on that page.

I removed it: "Reverting this per WP:BLPCAT, "and the subject's beliefs or sexual orientation are relevant to their public life or notability, according to reliable published sources.""

I was reverted by @Valjean: "Ummm....??? She had a very public fight to get her status changed here at Wikipedia. She divorced her husband and now lives with a woman."

I still think I'm right per WP:BLPCAT here. The WP-divorce-thing doesn't reach "relevant to their public life or notability, according to reliable published sources." It was public, but not "relevant" per policy is my reading, adding cats like these is just LGBT-tagging. That's my view, opinions, editors? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:36, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

I only added that because I remember reading something related to that effect, about her work (which is said to include such themes) and her personal life. I can understand if this is not a prominent part of her professional or public life and don't necessarily object to the removal. Gotitbro (talk) 07:42, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

If the category is based on the awkward sentence "As of 2022, she lives in Brooklyn and has a girlfriend", then both the sentence and the category should be omitted for the time being. It reads as gossipy/fan magazine-y, not something that should be in (what should be) a formal encyclopedia. --Animalparty! (talk) 07:22, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't mind that much, but in a BLP it's fairly normal to note where someone lives and their "family status", if the sources are good. And they are. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:13, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Valjean, per comments here, are you ok with removing the Canadian LGBT writers category again? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:14, 11 March 2023 (UTC) Valjean pingfix Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 14:14, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

She is openly gay, so the category shouldn't be controversial. It's an insult to her and all LGBTQ people to deny her open identity this way. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:36, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

That's a heck of a lot of people I managed to insult by removing a category. Hopefully, most of them are unaware of it at this point. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:49, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it is a lot of already mistreated people. I'm straight as fuck, but I defend the oppressed, and this is bringing their oppression here. That Wikipedia allows the erasure of LGBTQ people here is reprehensible. We're supposed to document this stuff, and categories should cover something that should not be controversial. If someone is openly LGBTQ, then they should not be denied. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:34, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

"erasure of LGBTQ people..." I'm getting worse and worse here. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:58, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

While her sexuality may not be relevant to her notability, I believe it is relevant to her public life. Doctorhawkes (talk) 00:58, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

If the WP-divorce-thing amounts to that, sure. IMO, it doesn't. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:47, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

Ping to Bearcat, incase you didn't see this discussion before you edited. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:06, 14 March 2023 (UTC)