Talk:Terry Fox

WP:URFA/2020 and reverted changes

Hi @Slp1:, @Resolute: and other talk page watchers: I am conducting a review of this article as part of WP:URFA/2020, an initiative to review featured articles that were promoted before 2016 and hopefully help them maintain their FA status. As I was reviewing, I was making edits to the article to address various concerns under WP:BEBOLD. Some of my proposed edits were reverted, so I want to discuss these changes on this talk page to get other editor's opinions. I am also going to pause my edits here, and instead make comments below on how I think this article can be improved: I want to avoid an FAR (and I don't think this article needs one if concerns are addressed) because there is already such a backlog of articles that are slated to brought to FAR (and frankly, those articles are generally in worse condition than this one.)

Some of the language that I wanted to change or remove are listed below in quotes. My rationale for the changes are described after the quote, and I hope others will give their thoughts on these proposed changes:

• "people from all walks of life lent their support to his run and his memory inspires pride in all regions of the country.": I was concerned that this lanaguage had an MOS:IDIOM with "all walks of life" and wanted to use different language. I felt "his memory inspires pride in all regions of the country" was not WP:NPOV and was too general to be understood by some editors on Wikipedia. I proposed changing this to, "people with various backgrounds supported to his run." although it doesn't have to be this exact language.
• I removed this text: "As Fox's advocate on The Greatest Canadian, media personality Sook-Yin Lee compared him to a classic hero, Phidippides, the runner who delivered the news of the Battle of Marathon before dying, and asserted that Fox "embodies the most cherished Canadian values: compassion, commitment, perseverance". She highlighted the juxtaposition between his celebrity, brought about by the unforgettable image he created, and his rejection of the trappings of that celebrity." I felt that this section had too much detail about Fox's profile on The Greatest Canadian. As this section already had information about his inclusion on the show, I felt this information was unneeded in this article and was too much detail for what is essentially only Sook-Yin Lee's opinion.
• I removed the following quote from Fox's mother: "She recalled, "He said, 'I thought you'd be one of the first persons to believe in me.' And I wasn't. I was the first person who let him down"." The preceeding sentence described how Fox's mother initially discouraged Fox from conducting his marathon, so I felt this quote was unnecessary as the information she described was already established in the article.

I do not think the other reversions that were made are important enough to note here: many were changes of minor grammar, flow or phrasing significance that I do not think are worth mentioning or changing back. Since some editors had concerns over my edits, I did not conduct additional changes to the article. Here are additional concerns that I have to the article:

• The Honours section has bullet points, lots of short sentences, and feels disorganised. I suggest that this section be rewritten as completely prose (no bullet points) and the information arranged thematically. I am happy to conduct this rewrite if others are willing for this to proceed.
• The paragraph starting with "Rock musician Ian Thomas had" needs a citation
• The "Steve Fonyo and Rick Hansen" talks about their connection to Fox, but I am unclear as to how Fox inspired the two people to conduct their own initiatives. This connection should be more explicit.
• The currency section should probably be merged into Honours.
• Some book references are included in the Bibliography, while others are only listed in the Citations section. This should be standardised.

Please ping me in responses. Z1720 (talk) 23:58, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

I am sorry for the delay but I have been busy elsewhere on Wikipedia and in real life. I will try to get to this as soon as possible. The next few weeks are very busy too, but I have not forgotten. Slp1 (talk) 02:06, 13 February 2022 (UTC)

New map?

Image currently in the article

Proposed image

Hi talk page watchers: I was concerned that the map in the article was difficult to discern at thumb-size because of additional information on the map that was not important to this article, such as labeling of cities like Happy Valley-Goose Bay or Sept-Iles and what appeared to be electricity lines or train tracks. I asked Guerillero to create an alternative map with less lines and information on it, making it easier to see Fox's route when the image is thumb-sized. Would editors be amenable to replacing the map with Guerillero's map? Are there any suggestions to improve the map? Both maps are included on the right. Z1720 (talk) 03:01, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

Strong Support. (talk) 08:41, 18 April 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 24 January 2024

Change "Although he was undergoing chemotherapy treatments at the time, Fox's energy impressed Hansen." to "Not knowing at the time that he was undergoing chemotherapy, Hansen was impressed by Fox's energy." in order to provide more context to readers.

Source: "The Greatest Canadian: Terry Fox". CBC. Say123d1 (talk) 05:50, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

 Done RWILD✉ 18:26, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

References