Talk:Washington Redskins name opinion polls

Rewrite needed

The age of the studies cited indicates the need to re-write the article in the light of more recent ones, perhaps reversing the chronology.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 01:29, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I made several updates in February, including reference to the new Berkeley study (not a poll, but an academic rebuttal to polls). I will remove the update tag, since it is not needed.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 02:29, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Reversion for "copyright violation"

@Sphilbrick: Apparently my moving some of the content from Redskin to this article triggered a check for copyright violation which found the text in this blog. That blog post is an exact copy of the Redskin article from 2017, when it was called Redskin (slang). This is the second time I have encountered this problem, an automated process has tagged my copying of old text within WP as copying new text from a copyrighted source. Obviously the process needs to be refined to address this issue. Next week will be 14 years of editing WP, mainly articles on the Native American mascot controversy, and I have become accustomed to finding my own words not only in blogs but in news articles usually without attribution of WP as the source. That is not the case here, since the blog identifies the source as Wikipedia.

The reversion of this "copyright violation" also deleted my entirely new edits of the lead section, so I will be restoring all. --WriterArtistDC (talk) 14:30, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

It seems my work cannot be simply restored. I hope an admin can do so.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 14:41, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

WriterArtistDC, Please read:

Wikipedia:Copying_within_Wikipedia

Following this guideline accomplishes two purposes:

1. it is a requirement that edits be properly attributed, and following the suggested wording in this guideline will achieve that when copying with in Wikipedia
2. Wikipedia uses a tool called copy patrol which monitors recent edits to see if they match other locations. One thing it does not do paren although I've asked) is to identify when an edit might be a copy of material within Wikipedia. Because it does not do this, many false positives show up in this tool. Those will never be a problem if you follow the guideline. While I can't fully speak for any of the other participants using the copy patrol tool, I know I always look at the edit summary and I am fairly certain that the others do as well, so a false positive won't get accidentally reverted if you identify the source of the material in the edit summary.

It's my observation that many editors, even experience editors, are unaware of this requirement, but the problem exists because the required attribution wasn't provided. I'm sorry this is created more work for you and I, but in the future if you comply with the guideline it will not be a problem. S Philbrick(Talk) 15:58, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

WriterArtistDC, Feel free to restore all (making sure to comply with the guidelines) or if you haven't started that let me know and I will undo the revision deletion and restore. S Philbrick(Talk) 16:00, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

Sphilbrick, I don't have access to the reversions by you, so I cannot fix this. Only the first edit was of text copied from another article, the other 5 edits were re-writes that should not have been reverted. So the first edit should have had an edit summary "copied from Redskin#Opinion_polls" and it would have been ok?--WriterArtistDC (talk) 20:37, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

WriterArtistDC, Yes. I can't do more this evening, but I'll clean it up in the morning. S Philbrick(Talk) 00:56, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

WriterArtistDC, I said "Yes" a little too quickly. As noted on the guideline had it said "Copied content from Redskin#Opinion_polls; see that page's history for attribution", I would not have rolled back. S Philbrick(Talk) 00:58, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

WriterArtistDC, Fixed S Philbrick(Talk) 12:08, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Collaboration

@PRRfan:: After several overlapping edits to this and the section in the main Redskins controversy article, there needs to be a discussion. I have reverted the most recent change to the intro, because I think there needs to be more to indicate the nature and significance of the topic. That significance is that polls continue to be used by the mainstream culture to erase the reality of Native Americans insulted by the term.

Otherwise, I have appreciated that another editor has taken an interest in articles that I worked on alone for more that ten years. WriterArtistDC (talk) 12:23, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. I have a few suggestions. First, let's not focus on two specific polls in the intro, because the article/topic is larger than that and because doing so sets the reader up to be surprised when we start talking about some 2002 poll we didn't mention in the intro. Second, the technical problems with polling ought to be its own separate paragraph, not muddled with other ideas. Third, presenting facts in chronological order tends to make things clearer. For one example, mention the NCAI's 2013 statement that the polls' pernicious effect "persisted for decades" before the 2022 renaming. Adding in your concern about erasure, I suggest:

"...The authors of such polls generally concluded that large majorities of Native Americans were unbothered by the name. But academics noted several flaws in the polling that invalidated their conclusions: first, that standard polling methods cannot accurately measure the opinions of a small, yet culturally and socially diverse population such as Native Americans; and second, that the pollsters made no effort to verify respondents' claims to be Native American. More detailed and focused academic studies found that most Native Americans found the term offensive, particularly those with more identification and involvement with their Native cultures.

"The polls and their erroneous conclusions were widely cited by teams, fans, and mainstream media. This misrepresentation of Native opinion impeded efforts to change the team's names for decades, the National Congress of American Indians said in 2013. Some argued that this demonstrated white privilege and erased authentic Native voices. More than a half century passed between the NCAI's 1968 resolution condemning the name and the February 2, 2022, announcement that the team would be renamed the Washington Commanders. "

PRRfan (talk) 14:26, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

Actually, the 2004 and 2016 polls are the only one's about the Redskins, the 2002 poll was about all mascots. It provides historical context, so it is mentioned only in the body of the article. I'm giving readers more credit for understanding that the intro cannot mention all the details of a topic. In fact, I want to leave them wanting more.

Our difference is that I cannot separate the technical issues from the racism. The significance of this topic is that polling organizations and their sponsors knew about the technical issues, but ignored them in pursuit of an "objective" measure of Native American opinion, but were actually trying to discredit the NCAI. The blockquote from Louis Grey hints at the problem; if it had been the NAACP calling out an instance of blackface, there would be no polling; it would have been gone with apologies. It is not a coincidence that it was the context of Black Lives Matter that moved the needle on recognizing institutional racism.

I will look at your proposed wording more carefully, but wanted to respond promptly. Thanks, --WriterArtistDC (talk) 17:13, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

No doubt you're right about BLM and the name change, but...do we have a reliable source that says that? Or that polling orgs aimed to discredit the NCAI? This is Wikipedia, not an essay. Anyway, if you don't like this structure for the intro (1: lead, 2: technical problems, 3: consequences), then the next-best way is probably chronologically: The 2004 poll happened, the 15-person paper underlined the problems, then the 2016 poll did the same, and what happened next. As for the 2002 poll: we need to at least hint at its existence because otherwise the audience's reaction will be: What is this? How far can I trust an article that throws unexplained things at me? Doesn't have to be much; perhaps: "Various polls helped shape public opinion on the use of Native American branding of sports teams in the 21st century, but two directly addressed the question of the name of the Washington, D.C., football team..." PRRfan (talk) 17:37, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

There will never be an open public discussion about the differential treatment of Black vs. Native people, it is viewed as pitting the interests of two disadvantaged groups against one another. There is no understanding of equality not being a zero-sum game. The mainstream, which retains implicit biases, would use the opportunity to cast the demands of different groups as competing, rather than complimentary.

As far as wording content for a general audience, I welcome having another point of view. The topic is too close to me, I know too many things about the subject that cannot be in a WP article because there are no RSs. In addition to being a subject area expert, I was born more than 70 years ago 4 miles from where FedEx Field now stands. I grew up oblivious to the meaning of r*dskins. This all changed when I began researching, followed by my attending the symposium at the National Museum of the American Indian in 2013 and all the other meetings and protests that continued until the Supreme Court inexplicably ruled that trademarking a racial slur was protected by the First Amendment. However, there are aspects to the topic that require expertise. Some of your edits make me wonder if you have full access to the cited sources, as I do.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 01:38, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

OK, so here's another point of view: because the concepts behind polling and statistics are unfamiliar to many (most?) readers, an article that turns on them should explain them in a concise paragraph. Once the concept is explained, further paragraphs can talk about the consequences of its use. Hence the proposed structure for the intro of 1: lead, 2: technical problems, 3: consequences. PRRfan (talk) 14:38, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

In the intro, I've added a few words to make clear that the two polls are only a subset of the polling issue, moved up the significance, and updated the rest to suit. See what you think. PRRfan (talk) 16:05, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, your rewording of the lead is good. I made several attempts myself this week, hindered by my recovering from an illness.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 21:02, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

POV?

This article is about opinions, and the quotebox has been at the top since I created it six years ago. It is not presented as fact, but attributed to an individual with standing to be heard, and makes explicit the sentiments expressed by many others. Certainly WP must contain many other quotes by civil rights leaders. WriterArtistDC (talk) 12:44, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi WriterArtistDC. I think having that quotebox in the lead elevates that particular opinion over others, where the lead should instead serve to summarize the issue and viewpoints. When you put a quotebox right there, it's going to be the first place a person's eyes go after clicking on the page. I think your GAs handle this better (in particular, I'm thinking of Native American mascot controversy and Washington's name controversy) as they use images to show the issue at a glance while allowing the lead and body of the text to deal in quotations. Anyway, this will probably be my only response here – I promised myself a few years ago to generally stay away from articles dealing in controversial subjects and modern politics. Power to you for being able to write about them and write about them well. Tkbrett (✉) 13:44, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, I think of the quotebox as the equivalent to an image, and serves the same function as the picture of protesters in Washington Redskins name controversy, which certainly presents only one point of view. I think every article should have a graphic, but polling has no pictures.--WriterArtistDC (talk) 14:04, 17 October 2022 (UTC)