Talk:Patricia Bates

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California State Senate Section and Primary sources

Hello all,

After reading through the article, it looks like many of the bills have references only to primary sources, such as those provided directly by the legislature itself. Seeing as WP:OR mostly prohibits us from interpreting primary sources, I have some concerns regarding the amount of these sorts of things in the article (especially considering that this is a WP:BLP). I am wondering if anybody has been able to encounter secondary sources that reference these bills as well, so that we could insert those references and thereby improve the page. In the meantime, I have tagged the page with a notice. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 07:34, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi User:Mikehawk10. Since the bills linked each include a "California Legislative Counsel's Digest," which each explain what the respective bill would do, I don't believe that using the bills from "California Legislative Information" as references requires any interpretation on the part of Wikipedia editors. I do know that Wikipedia likes secondary sources, so if someone wants to add some, I think that would be fine. Not that you suggested this, but I do not think that we should remove any references to California Legislative Information or remove a bill for lack of a suitable secondary source. --LucasGK123 (talk) 02:14, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi LucasGK123. Thank you for the response. I'm also wondering if the inclusion of these bills is WP:DUE if we don't have secondary source coverage of the bills. I don't really have a means to judge the significance of a particular bill on my own, though I feel like if a bill isn't covered in-depth by a secondary source that it might not be worth including. I don't think that this means removing all the bills, though I think that the page would be improved by putting the list of bills into WP:PROSE with some relevant (secondary-source) coverage of how the bills have been received by the public. What are your thoughts? — Mikehawk10 (talk) 02:20, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Mikehawk10, I take back part of what I said! It looks like some of the descriptions of early bills may include interpretation beyond what is said in the Leg. Counsel's Digest, and at least one of the later bill descriptions uses an article co-written by Bates (what would that be under Wikipedia policies?).

I don't think inclusion of the bills would be judged under WP:DUE because I believe that policy refers to viewpoints, not something factual like bills passed, and I think that the reason a lot of the bills don't have any linked secondary sources may be just that nobody looked, rather than them not existing.

I think that your suggestion regarding WP:PROSE is a good idea. --LucasGK123 (talk) 02:49, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]