Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography/2023 archive

GENDERID names

Regarding this edit that was reverted. There is an obvious conflict with the original wording and the WP:NOTCENSORED policy, which states, "Wikipedia may contain content that some readers consider objectionable or offensive‍—‌even exceedingly so. Attempting to ensure that articles and images will be acceptable to all readers, or will adhere to general social or religious norms, is incompatible with the purposes of an encyclopedia."

There are already guidelines and policies covering former names and privacy concerns, which is why I added links to the section. Why is there a special carveout for a transgendered person and we treat them different than any other person who changes names? Consensus doesn't get to override policy. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 01:09, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

We've been through this over and over. Check the archives. Discussing it again is unlikely to lead to a change. —David Eppstein (talk) 01:42, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

I've read the conclusions in the archives. The issue of former names and privacy is already addressed in BLP and on this page. GENDERID currently says to avoid the former name "even if reliable sourcing exists", which clearly violates core content policies and the MOS for former names. I have edited Wikipedia for 17 years and have never seen such an open violation of policy. Saying "go read the archives" is insufficient. If you don't want to discuss it, I'll start another RFC. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:38, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

You've been an editor here for many years. Don't throw it away on a tendentious anti-woke crusade. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:42, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

The answer to your question, Why is there a special carveout for a transgendered person and we treat them different than any other person who changes names?, is to be found in the many community processes linked at MOS:GIDINFO.

The "Coles Notes" summary of the discussions concerning former names is, primarily, that there is a concern based on BLPPRIVACY principles (WP:BLP having the weight of core policy) that is different for gender identity-related name changes than it is for other name changes. You may disagree with this, but it represents the way the community has adjudicated tension among its core policies for many years now, and with the input of many, many editors. Newimpartial (talk) 21:45, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

So, personally I think MOS:DEADNAME is right for the wrong reasons, because I think we should in general be much more deferential to name changes. There isn't something magical about a gender-based name change that makes it more worthy of respect than other name changes; the issue is just that our community has historically sucked at respecting individuals' right to be called by the name they request, so we made a carve-out for the case where that obnoxious practice was causing the most trouble. Setting that aside, no, this is not a NOTCENSORED violation. WP:NOTCENSORED does not require us to include anything. It just says we reserve the right to show anything lawful, when doing so would be in accordance with other policies and guidelines. The actual governing guideline is Wikipedia:Offensive material, which explicitly rejects giving any "special favor to offensive content". This is why, among other things, articles on human sexuality are almost never illustrated by live-action videos; it's why the image of fresh cuts at Self-harm was replaced with an image of scars; and so on.

So if someone were to argue "We should not include so-and-so's deadname because it is illegal under the laws of such-and-such foreign jurisdiction" or "because it's a sin in my religion" or any other non-PAG based argument, then NOTCENSORED is a valid rebuttal. But if someone says "We should not include so-and-so's deadname because it presents issues regarding privacy and human dignity, without there being a particular benefit to the reader in us including it", that's the regular kind of weighing of interests we do on articles all the time. And here, people have presented that argument so many times, and it's been affirmed by the community so may times, that it was enshrined in guideline. (And hey, just a guideline. I've seen IAR exceptions made here and there, usually when the subject has publicized their own deadname.) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 01:20, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Thanks Tamzin, very helpful. I think you touched on my point, that we should have a policy about former names without regard to transgender status. We have a guideline for former names, and a policy addressing privacy, and I think those make sense and already address the issue of non-notable former names. The guideline on WP:GENDERID currently censors useful and verifiable material based on the individual's personal feelings, which makes sense in a gender studies class but not an encyclopedia. I support keeping a person's sexual identity private unless there is good reason, but I don't agree with the way the guideline is worded. I think there is a way to update it that will not be unnecessarily offensive to transgender people while also not leaving a contradiction with policy that will endlessly churn out complaints.

At some point I'll work on an RFC, unless you think something can be worked out here. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 16:58, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Your belief that the hundreds of editors who contributed to the current consensus against the inclusion of non-notable former names of nonbinary and trans people over the last decade will suddenly change their minds when presented with your proposal - well, to be charitable, it seems exceedingly optimistic. Newimpartial (talk) 17:30, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Can you point me to the RFC that you are thinking of? I did not see that issue specifically addressed as you describe. Yes I did make an effort to search the archives. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:58, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

@Cuñado: Here are about 10 RfCs among the 70 or so discussions - Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Gender_identity#Discussion_timeline. Bluerasberry (talk) 18:29, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Please use MOS:IDINFO to navigate the prior discussions; that is what its timeline of discussions is for. The decision to clarify that non-notable deadlines are excluded from article space, rather than only the main biographical article, was made in 2020. The question of which deadnames should, and should not, be included in the lead of the main biographical arricle was decided back in 2015, and was revisited frequently but without significant changes until the restrictions on former names were expanded in 2020. In 2021 additional restrictions were placed on how notable former names of trans and nonbinary people should be mentioned.[1] [2] (All of these links are presented in the timeline section of IDINFO, with brief identifying descriptions of each discussion.) Newimpartial (talk) 18:29, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

I've suggested before that the appropriateness of including a deadname for transgender individuals shouldn't stop there, but should extend to any name changes, such as non-English names for immigrants or pre-marriage names for married people - if the sourcing is weak or relying on primary sources, we should not include that name. This would make one policy consistent across all BLP. But this was rejected because editors felt that it was required to include things like pre-marriage names in BLP articles. Hence the conflict here. Masem (t) 18:00, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Pronouns for transgender and non-binary people

Hi. I am a non-binary person. I have read the Wikipedia guidelines on transgender and nonbinary people (MOS:GI) and I really think they should be changed. Why does it specifically say only a living person gets the respect of being referred to by their preferred pronouns?

If a person's preferred pronouns were known why should they not be respected in death? It is high time to update these guidelines. Errlane (talk) 10:46, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

This is the BLP policy, so its application to dead people is limited only to the short period after death. That said, I think there's room in the policy that if a dead transgender person was known to prefer a certain set of pronouns via reliable sources, we should respect that choice (and of course, if a currently living transgender person with known pronouns dies, their preference doesn't disappear after death). If we have no such idea of preference, then using "they/them" is the more respectful route. Masem (t) 13:33, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

Are there any examples of articles where a dead person had preferred pronouns that we don't use? (Not at all saying it's not the case, I've just not encountered any.) — Czello 13:45, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

Do you mean MOS:GID? If so, where does it "specifically say only a living person gets the respect of being referred to by their preferred pronouns"? I see "Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender self-identification". EddieHugh (talk) 20:44, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

please explain (GENDERID examples)

(I noticed this on the MOS:GIDINFO page, but the content is transcluded from here)

As of this writing we offer two examples of "don't include the former name if not notable", both written in green (indicating this is how to write things):

• From Laverne Cox, not notable under prior name: Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) ...
• From Rachel Levine, not notable under prior name: Rachel Leland Levine (/ləˈviːn/; born October 28, 1957) ...

First off, the green text doesn't actually match what the articles (currently) say: The first article begins "Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) is an American actress and..." Green text should IMO be reserved for the actual words we want to teach readers to use. Plus, wouldn't it be better if the example actually contrasted what to write with what to not write (which is why we'd use a made-up example)

Why not use a made-up example, and why not write (in green) the exact phrasing we want readers to adopt:

• Jane Doe (born May 1, 1980) is an American celebrity. They are known for..."
• Jane Doe (formerly John Doe, born May 1, 1980) is an American celebrity. They are known for..."

Doe is not notable under prior name, so do not include it at all.

My question is: why did the community decide to not use this style of examples? CapnZapp (talk) 07:47, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

I don't know, but perhaps because it's redundant. The examples are of what names to use, not pronouns. We therefore do use the exact phrasing that users should adopt. (Your examples are also contradictory: the first recommends "they" and the second, for the same person, indicates that "they" is incorrect.) I'd argue that we don't need examples of pronoun use, because it's clear from the first paragraph of MOS:GENDERID (in your example, "Doe is not notable under prior name, so do not include it at all" is required to explain which name is which, but it's merely repeating that first paragraph). EddieHugh (talk) 13:17, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Nobody is discussing pronouns. Both I and the GENDERID is discussing whether to mention the former name. My example clearly shows how to write and how to not write it.

I'm saying that this...

If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name.

• Jane Doe (born May 1, 1980) is an American celebrity. They are known for..."
• Jane Doe (formerly John Doe, born May 1, 1980) is an American celebrity. They are known for..."

Doe is not notable under prior name, so do not include it at all.

(obviously switching to a made-up example so we can show the incorrect way of doing it; illustrating what we're telling users NOT to do) ...is much more easily understood than whatever the current text's examples is trying to say. Unlike the current text it avoids text you're not supposed to write (in other words, no they don't contain "the exact phrasing that users should adopt"), doesn't begin with a "From" (that I don't understand the purpose of), and extremely clearly illustrates both the green do and the red don't.

That I chose Jane Doe as my example name, and my choice of example nationality, "job", and pronoun, is entirely irrelevant and beside the point. CapnZapp (talk) 22:06, 23 January 2023 (UTC)

I thought you might be referring to pronouns because you wrote "the green text doesn't actually match what the articles (currently) say", and then included pronouns, which aren't in the examples, while the green text is exactly what's in the articles. Anyway, I think that the current text is adequately clear, if long-winded (one example for not notable and one for notable would be enough). EddieHugh (talk) 19:59, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

I would point out that one reason to include two examples for each case is to show that there is not "one correct template" to use to follow in each case. The notable examples, for instance, give one case where the pretransition name is a "birth name" and one where it is not. Newimpartial (talk) 21:04, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

• The "From" part, intended to explain from which articles the examples have been lifted, is completely unnecessary. But if you must link to real articles, don't mess up the example to do so.
• The contrast between green and non-green text is not great enough. Better is to offer examples consisting of green (or red) text only, with no explanatory nonsense inserted mid-example.
• Sorry, but just providing examples isn't enough. The purpose of a demonstration is to be clear. I don't mind keeping the two real-life examples, but overt clarity would then be needed. In the spirit of overt clarity: if you provide an example to show how to phrase it when pretransition name is a "birth name", say so. Don't expect the reader to "just understand". These guidelines aren't written primarily for people that already know what to say and what to avoid. For many readers, this article will be the first time they even hear about terms such as "pretransition name"!

For example (feel free to write better explanatory text; copying bits from reply above just to illustrate):

When pretransition name is a "birth name" (example from Laverne Cox):

• Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) ...

When it is not (example from Rachel Leland Levine):

• Rachel Leland Levine (/ləˈviːn/; born October 28, 1957) ...

When pretransition name is not notable (fictional example):

• Jane Smith (formerly John Hammer, born May 1, 1980)..."

(do not include non-notable pretransition name at all)

CapnZapp (talk) 18:18, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to assume I have answered y'all to your satisfaction, and that we are now in agreement. CapnZapp (talk) 15:38, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for "preserving the presumed intention", Newimpartial. However, wouldn't you agree your edits lost the explanation of why we have two green examples? That is (with your own words) "one case where the pretransition name is a 'birth name' and one where it is not"...? At least I don't know either of Laverne Cox and Rachel Levine, and wouldn't be able to discern any functional difference between the two examples (other than "one example subject has two last names, the other has one" and "one example includes pronounciation, the other does not") CapnZapp (talk) 19:28, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

What do you mean by Elliot Page's prior name not being a birth name? Wasn't Page christened "Ellen"? (And weren't we discussing these in the context of Cox/Laverne, not Manning/Page?) CapnZapp (talk) 19:34, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Prior to acting, Page's last name was a hyphenated form of his mother and father's surnames (Philpotts–Page), which was shortened for his stage name. It's a bit confusing since the hyphenated name is not in the linked article and it's not an obvious change (like from Norma Jeane Mortenson to Marilyn Monroe, for example). — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 19:51, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

In fact, the hyphenated name does not meet notability requirements (to my knowledge, the only sourcing for it that satisfies WP:IND is a local newspaper in South America). This has been discussed at length at Talk:Elliot Page. The consensus has therefore been consistent that "Ell*n Page" is a notable professional name, not a birth name, and this consensus was reflected in the choice of example for the MOS. Newimpartial (talk) 20:19, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Oh, come on. The purpose of giving examples is illustrating a point. In order to explain the point (why otherwise make it?) we need to explain an obscure detail that we have agreed to not divulge! The obvious conclusion is to use another example, where we can actually tell our readers what our example is meant to illustrate. CapnZapp (talk) 22:07, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

To be clear, I am not saying Page is a bad example. If we clearly (in our article) explain that Page is an example of a subject whose name is not a birth name, and avoid raising further questions by explaining why this is so, then it is a great example. If, however, we use Page as an example with zero elaboration as to why we use that example, it loses all instructive value. CapnZapp (talk) 22:15, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Where are you suggesting that this elaboration ought to be provided. Surely not in the article text of Elliot Page? Newimpartial (talk) 22:23, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

I don't know where the elaboration should be provided (or it if is even appropriate), but it's not clear to anyone unfamiliar with the lengthy discussions at Talk:Elliot Page why he would be used as an example for "not a birth name." It's about picking an example that makes clear the point being made, not further confusing the reader. Perhaps replacing "not a birth name" with "professional name" or "stage name" would be less confusing. — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 00:06, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

I have tried to reflect your suggestion in this tweak. Newimpartial (talk) 01:45, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

For the exclusion of pre-transition names, the difference is precisely that "one example subject has two last names, the other has one" and "one example includes pronounciation, the other does not". The value in those particular examples, as I suggested above, is simply to underline the fact that there is no single formula mandated in this branch of the decision tree, either. Newimpartial (talk) 20:24, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for explaining. But... this explanation needs to be provided to the reader of the article, because the point of the example is to convey a point. I certainly didn't understand this given only the examples - after all you needed to explain it to me! Regards, CapnZapp (talk) 22:11, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Does that make things clearer for the reader? The assumption I would work with is that a bio lede would follow MOS:FULLNAME and MOS:CHANGEDNAME, but with the stipulation that deadnames/prior names should only be used in very limited circumstances when the person was notable under that name. Do the multiple examples help understand this better? (And there really needs to be a pointer to MOS:GENDERID at MOS:CHANGEDNAME to make clear that pre-transition names are handled differently.) — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 00:21, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the carveout for pre-transition names of trans people deserves an effective pointer at CHANGEDNAME. Newimpartial (talk) 01:46, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Do the multiple examples help understand this better? As explained, the point of having two examples is that they are different. To me it is obvious this needs to be explained to the audience - it isn't enough that we that write the page understand what each example illustrates. Apparently, this obviousness does not extend to everybody. (While I'm not the one suggesting having twoi examples, I have no objections to it; I'm just clarifying that, to my understanding, the purpose of having two examples isn't to help understanding the basic point, it is to illustrate "there is no single formula" when you write such a lead sentence). Regards, CapnZapp (talk) 06:32, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

For the "no notable pretransition name" case, the two examples only illustrate "no single formula", since the difference between the cases doesn’t illustrate anything specific to pretransition names.

For the "notable pretransition name" case, the examples illustrate subtly different treatment for a birth name vs. a professional name, so they do illustrate a point that is relevant to pretransition names in particular IMO. Newimpartial (talk) 12:20, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I see your point and see the same thing mirrored at MOS:FULLNAME. I edited how the GENDERID examples are presented to parallel how similar examples are presented at FULLNAME and other sections of the article. This makes it clearer to me what is being described and required (and how it aligns/differs from the guidance elsewhere). — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 13:40, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Specific guidelines apply to living transgender and non-binary people (see § Gender identity, below).

Late in the previous discussion, a point was raised: shouldn't CHANGEDNAME point to GENDERID?

And so it does (very last line). However, note the word "living" in the current text. Does GENDERID apply to living subjects only or equally to deceased subjects? We afford greater protections to living bio article subjects, is GENDERID one of these?

If the answer is "yes only to living" then GENDERID needs to make this distinction. If the answer is "no; to all" the above line at CHANGEDNAME needs to be edited. (To be clear: I have no opinion either way, I just want to point out this possible discrepancy)

CapnZapp (talk) 06:38, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

MOS:GENDERID applies to living people ("If a living transgender or non-binary person..."). A large RFC about a year and a half ago found no consensus for changes relating to dead people.--Trystan (talk) 15:35, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Probably the existing pointer at CHANGEDNAME should be higher up in the section, perhaps after the red de Blasio example, since it creates a pretty big exception to what's stated upfront and currently falls after a section on changed surnames. — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 16:56, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Nationality

Out of no where this format à la "Austrian and American" comes to counter the long established tradition of the hyphen! Goodness gracious ;)

Where and when has this format been decided all of a sudden? Synotia (talk) 09:43, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Can you give an example. There is no nation of Austria-America, so Austrian and American or Austrian, American would be the correct way to show dual nationality. A hyphen is often used to describe ethnicity. Is that what you mean? MB 15:33, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

We write African-American culture for example, yet there is no nation of Africa-America either?

And has this been decided by a community consensus, or by just one single egghead? Synotia (talk) 16:00, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Agree with MB… if we are indicating someone’s ethnic heritage (not encouraged, per MOS:ETHNICITY) then the hyphen would be appropriate, but if we are trying to indicate dual citizenship we would need to link the two nationalities with “and” (and if we are indicating sequential citizenship - ie the person renounced one citizenship for another - I would suggest not trying to do so in one single sentence). Blueboar (talk) 16:05, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

No one seems willing to denounce themselves ;) Synotia (talk) 16:08, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Note that for ethnicity, MOS:HYPHEN says not to hyphenate:

Avoid using hyphen to connect racial or ethnic descriptors, regardless of whether or not they are used attributively (Aboriginal Australians, Asian American studies, Black British people).

—Bagumba (talk) 17:41, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Once again, I have no clue who came up with this, it goes against the established consensus on this encyclopedia. For ages people used hyphens and nobody had an issue with it. Only a very very small handful of articles use that weird format. Moreover, outside of Wikipedia I have never encountered it, making it feel made up as hell. --Synotia (moan) 12:49, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Should MOS:GENDERID apply to a person whose sole notability is due to a heinous crime such as murder or rape?

The following discussion 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.

---

Consider an individual such as Amber McLaughlin (born Scott A. McLaughlin). McLaughlin was executed for the murder and rape of a woman, committed while living as male, only transitioning to female while on death row. You will find a number of other cases of individuals who have transitioned post-incarceration for heinous crimes, although this is the only case (thus far) which has ended in execution. McLaughlin's notability is due to committing heinous crimes; although the primary source of notability is only for being executed for them, being executed for a crime can't really be separated from the crime itself (especially in a case such as this, in which nobody–to my knowledge–is suggesting this was the execution of an innocent person). (Technically MOS:GENDERID doesn't apply to McLaughlin, since it only applies to living persons–but I'm trying to raise a broader point here than just that one individual case.)

Here are some arguments why MOS:GENDERID should not apply in such cases:

1. In very many cases, the victim or their family will be offended by extending recognition to the murderer/rapist's newly claimed identity
2. Many victims of similar crimes will be offended – many female victims of male sexual violence (and their supporters) have expressed opposition to the recognition of such identity claims by perpetrators
3. The intention behind the policy is to extend respect to transgender people; I don't think making an exception in these narrow cases exhibits any disrespect to transgender people in general. On the contrary, unequivocally accepting these individuals' claimed transgender identities may actually promote transphobia

Note, I am only suggesting we should carve out an exception for heinous crimes such as murder, rape, child abuse, etc, not for less inherently abhorrent offences. Such an exception would not apply to e.g. Chelsea Manning, since whatever your view on her criminal convictions, few would seriously suggest they are on the same level as rape or murder. I was thinking about filing an RFC on this topic, but thought it would be better to raise it informally for discussion first. SomethingForDeletion (talk) 23:46, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Misgendering someone – for any reason – disrespects all transgender people. Deciding it is alright to misgender someone based on crimes they did implies having your identity recognized is a privilege that can be taken away, which should not be the case.

Furthermore (and maybe more important for Wikipedia) deadnaming and misgendering someone is factually wrong. Amber McLaughlin isn't not a woman because she is notable for committing horrible crimes. We don't misgender cis people who do horrible crimes, there is no reason this should change for trans people, unless Wikipedia decides transgender individuals are not really the gender they identify as, which is obviously incorrect. Catgirl-su (talk) 18:24, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

 Disagree We at Wikipedia don't offer extrajudicial punishment by imposing a different set of standards to convicted criminals than to other people. This should be SNOWBALL closed. CapnZapp (talk) 19:50, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I think, as with most things, it comes down to what reliable sources say, and ultimately WP:Consensus is the foundation. If the preponderance of reliable sources cease to recognise the transition as 'genuine' for some reason, then we could clearly discuss reflecting that in the article. But what you're discussing is a fringe case among fringe cases (fringe²), the MOS will never cover every single eventuality. JeffUK 21:59, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

WP:Ignore all rules. I agree with JeffUK that we should follow how the topic is described in the preponderance of reliable sources. If the MOS guide attempting to be respectful to people with gender dysphoria means that we're helping a criminal obfuscate their crimes for posterity, then ignore the MOS. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:54, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

How would you demonstrate that we're helping a criminal obfuscate their crimes for posterity as opposed to the possibility that their gender dysphoria was one of many issues they were struggling to cope with? – Muboshgu (talk) 16:33, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

It certainly should not be solely Wikipedians making that call. Reliable sources. BTW I disagree with the proposal to change the MOS, I was trying to point out that it doesn't need to be followed in every case. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 00:12, 10 February 2023 (UTC)

It seems to me that a person who committed a heinous crime under their former name is de facto notable under that former name (provided of course that the crime is attested by reliable sources), and thus the mention of that former name is covered by the existing wording of GENDERID. Rosbif73 (talk) 16:15, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Agree with Rosbif73… no need to change existing language. Which names to mention depends on which names the subject used when they became notable. There is no “one-size-fits-all” rule here. Specifics matter. Blueboar (talk) 16:32, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Also disagree for the same reasons everyone else does. There's no problems with the existing policy. Loki (talk) 02:47, 10 February 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.

Proposed GENDERID text revision redux

Per EddieHugh's request, below is proposed revised text based off what consensus here was showing, but edited to address their concerns.

When a living transgender or non-binary person's former name is not notable, that name should not be included in the article. For example:
When a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under their pretransistion pretransition name, that name should not be included in the article.
For example:

• From Laverne Cox: Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) ...
• From Rachel Levine: Rachel Leland Levine (/ləˈviːn/; born October 28, 1957) ...
• Avoid: Not notable, do not use: Jane Smith (formerly John Hammer, born May 1, 1980) ...

In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person who was notable under their prior former name, that name may should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article. Introduce the prior former name with "born" if they were notable under their birth name or "formerly" if notable under a prior former professional name, stage name, or pseudonym. For example:
In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person who was notable under their birth name or a former professional name, stage name, or pseudonym, that name should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:

• From Chelsea Manning, notable under birth name: Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987) ...
• From Elliot Page, notable under prior former professional name: Elliot Page (formerly Ellen Page; born February 21, 1987) ...

Thoughts, objections, concerns? CapnZapp, Newimpartial —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:58, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

I think using the old language for the first case, like "when a living ... person was not notable under a pretransition name, that name..." is more precise (and therefore better) than your proposal. The test is the notability of the person while using the name, not the "notability of the name itself" (whatever that would mean). Newimpartial (talk) 15:32, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Okay, adjusted above... Does using "pretransistion name" instead of "prior name" create any gray areas around gender change without a medical transition? —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 16:09, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't have thought so, since the relevant transition here is social, rather than legal or medical for example. But I would like others to weigh in. Newimpartial (talk) 16:19, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

• "pretransition" is misspelled "pretransistion"
• I would have thought that the usage of green/red text is standard and that the reader can be assumed to understand its meaning ^{(actually, is green/red text color-blind-friendly?)}, but okay - if MOS generally explains examples in red as "don't actually write this, this is an example of how to do it wrong" then we should definitely repeat that here as well. If this would be an isolated case, however, I think the explanation "do not use" from "Not notable, do not use:" should be removed.
• I like how the new text avoids claiming Page's prior name is not a birth name, since we appear unwilling to actually explain that.
• I like how the new text explicitly tells us when to use "born" and when to use "formerly". (Just wanted to point out this, since the new text adds a rule that wasn't there before. Previously there wasn't an actual rule against using other words than "born" for the notable under their birth name case - we just stated editors should use "born" or "formerly". The examples hinted at which word to use where, but examples aren't rules. And to be ultra clear: I have no objections, I just want to raise awareness in case anyone missed the fact the suggested edit doesn't just change the presentation of the MOS rules, it actually changes them)
• I concur with Newimpartial's objection.

CapnZapp (talk) 17:55, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. I've fixed the spelling. Looking at other examples on the page, some red text is introduced in the sentence preceding it with "do not use" or similar language. Others (particularly when paired with a green text example) it's introduced with Avoid on the same line, so changed to that. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 19:04, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing the discussion back here. Comments:

• Is "When a living transgender ... For example:" needed? Most of that is in the existing "If a living transgender ... the person's current name" paragraph. Would adding "For example:" to the existing paragraph be enough?
• The current "...former name should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under it" isn't very clear in its use of "should", but it differs significantly from the proposed "that name may be included in the lead sentence" ('should' versus 'may').
• I'm not sure about adding "pretransition name" to the list of terms used: what counts as "transition"? But then there's already "transition" in the same section. EddieHugh (talk) 23:09, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the first sentence of the proposed text is not needed, as it just repeats the existing "If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable..." sentence. I also think that shifting from "should" to "may" reduces clarity and is likely to lead to unnecessary disputes about when to include the former name. The section as written establishes that by "former name" we mean a deadname. The proposed text would result in switching between "former name", "pretransition name" and "prior name", which reduces clarity. Finally, I oppose mandating that birth names be introduced with "born", as opposed to the current guidance which says both "born" and "formerly" are appropriate, leaving the choice up to the editors of a particular article.--Trystan (talk) 23:59, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Comment: Yes, with Just wanted to point out this, since the new text adds a rule that wasn't there before. above I hope to have helped made sure this change didn't fly under the radar. (Unlike you Trystan I don't mind the change, but then again, I don't have a strong opinion either way). CapnZapp (talk) 07:10, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Okay, tried to address the seemingly repetitive first sentence, use former name throughout, and replace may with should when talking about someone notable under a former name.

Regarding formerly vs. born. The examples as MOS:CHANGEDNAME all use born for birth names, as does MOS:NEE. The discussion of "also known as" names at CHANGEDNAME and MOS:PSEUDONYM puts a different emphasis on the professional or stage name (e.g., Timothy Alan Dick (born June 13, 1953), known professionally as Tim Allen) than I think is what's intended in GENDERID. To my mind, presenting "born" as the proper word for a birth name aligns with the rest of MOS:BIO and "formerly" covers well the instances when the notable name is something other than a birth name. Can you provide an example of a case where it makes more sense to use "formerly" for a birth name or "born" for a stage name? —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 00:55, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Just to point out that examples can't make rules (or at least, shouldn't). That is, just because all examples use X doesn't mean there is a rule saying "you must use X"... unless there actually is rules text to that effect. We can't (shouldn't) expect readers to infer rules from examples. (I have no opinion either way; just want to keep the level of clarification high throughout this discussion, which I'm mostly monitoring so my proposed changes aren't lost half way) CapnZapp (talk) 07:06, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Can you suggest a better way to phrase things then? The existing text at GENDERID says introduce the name with "born" or "formerly":. MOS:BIRTHDATE says Birth and death labels are included only when needed for clarity. When given, use full words, whether immediately preceding a date or not: (which is referring to writing out "born" instead of using "b."). Examples may not be "rules", but they demonstrate the proper application of the rules to help aid in understanding them and almost every time a birth name is used in the examples when the person is known by a different name, "born" is used to mark the birth name. The only exception is MOS:NEE says specifically, when a birth name is given for someone who's changed their surname, Editors may denote this [the birth name] with "born" ... or, if the surname change is due to marriage, né or née may be used instead of born. (The conditional may is used here because of the exception for when né/née might be used instead.)

CapnZapp, as I see it, it's not a new rule, just a clarification that aligns with the rest of the MOS. The current GENDERID text specifies to use either born or formerly. The only difference is the revision specifies "born" for use with (notable) birth names (which is in alignment with the rule at MOS:NEE and the examples that illustrate the rules at BIRTHDATE, CHANGEDNAME, etc.), leaving "formerly" for use with other sorts of former (notable) names. Are there any cases where this would be problematic or where an editor would reasonably choose to use the words differently? Or should "may" be being used here instead of "should" (to mirror the verbs in MOS:NEE)?— Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:45, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Trystan, can you elaborate on your last point (let editors choose when to use born or when to use formerly)? Is there an instance where born would be used for a stage name? Or where formerly would be more appropriate for a birth name? How do you see this deviating from the rest of MOS:BIO, such as the statement at MOS:NEE to use born, unless you're dealing with a surname change due to marriage where né/née may be used instead? I'm seeing this not as a rule change but a clarification that aligns with the rest of MOS:BIO, but if there are cases where it doesn't work I'd appreciate being educated about them. — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:25, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

The current guidance to use either born or formerly came from a compromise solution achieved in this RFC, which discussed the different connotations born can have for trans individuals. I have no objection to testing if that consensus has changed (in either direction), but I suggest it be done through an RFC.--Trystan (talk) 14:52, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, I hadn't located that discussion. I've revised again to reflect that RFC; however, I also went back to "prior name" in one instance here so as not to have a soft implication that "former name" was connected to use of "formerly" (which was the assumption I was working under). —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 15:51, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Just so that we have everything on the table at once: yes, the 2015 RfC mandated "born" or "formerly", but it didn't mandate specific guidance about when to use one or the other, nor did it come to any particilar conclusion about the possible connotations of "born".

Also, the most recent prior discussion of this guidance, which resulted in the status quo text and determined the current selection of examples, was this one. Newimpartial (talk) 16:20, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, Newimpartial, I think with the revisions above there's nothing in conflict with either of those RfCs, but the changes still add some clarity, including the Avoid example, in response to the concerns CapnZapp raised in the "please explain (GENDERID examples)" discussion. — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 18:19, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm fine with that. Newimpartial (talk) 18:31, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Looks good to me as well.--Trystan (talk) 20:04, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Maybe I'm just slow today, but I'm struggling to understand what the strikeouts at the start are meant to communicate. What would come before "For example?" Both suggestions are struck out. What would that be an example of? - Astrophobe (talk) 17:44, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, those were parts of the initial draft struck in response to comments and questions. The striking of everything but "For Example:" was because others felt the proposed line was too repetitive of an existing paragraph that wasn't being considered for change. So, now "For example:" would follow the existing "If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name." — Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 18:07, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Any further thoughts/concerns/edits, or does this look good to deploy? Clean (hopefully) final version (with the existing, unchanged preceding) below ... CapnZapp, EddieHugh —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:17, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name. For example:

• From Laverne Cox: Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) ...
• From Rachel Levine: Rachel Leland Levine (/ləˈviːn/; born October 28, 1957) ...
• Avoid: Jane Smith (formerly John Hammer, born May 1, 1980) ...

In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should only be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article if they were notable under that name. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:

• From Chelsea Manning, notable under birth name: Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987) ...
• From Elliot Page, notable under former professional name: Elliot Page (formerly Ellen Page; born February 21, 1987) ...

Comment - I don't blame you for not knowing the tedious background, but many editors would regard your change to the final intro paragraph, from should only be included if to In the case of .... should be included as substantive and, given the background, even as requiring its own RfC. (The former only sets limits on inclusion, while the latter positively mandates inclusion when the condition is met - at least, that is how many of us read that policy language.) Newimpartial (talk) 14:28, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I don't read it that way. Both the existing text and the revision use "should" with the same limitation on inclusion (when the person was notable under the former name). That said, does this improve it for you? "If a living transgender or non-binary person was notable under their birth name or a former professional name, stage name, or pseudonym, only then should that name be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article." —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:44, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

That's marginally better, but I'd be much more comfortable with, "In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should should only be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article if they were notable under that name." Newimpartial (talk) 15:42, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, that works for me (and has been inserted above). —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 15:56, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Can that be changed to "in the lead" rather than specifically saying the lead sentence? For example, if someone was somewhat notable under their former name and if their lead sentence is already stuffed with more notable aspects of their life post transition then we might not want to put the former name in the very first sentence. I think it would be best to make this a "best but not mandatory" MOS practice. Springee (talk) 23:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

MOS:GENDERID currently specifies "in the lead sentence." MOS:FULLNAME says "should usually be given in the lead sentence," so there is wiggle room elsewhere in MOS:BIO... What do others think? —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 02:02, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

User:Tcr25, I have concerns about Rachel Levine being used as an example above. She was an academic researcher into eating disorders pre-transition, and published a number of articles in medical journals under her birth name. Obviously pre-transition she was a lot less notable than now, but I'm not sure she was entirely non-notable – and I think that's a rather different situation from someone like Laverne Cox, who as far as I am aware was a complete nobody pre-transition. A person might be interested in Levine's academic career/research/publications, and a person who wants to pursue that interest would need to know what name she published much of her work in that area under. By contrast, a person's reasons for knowing Cox's birth name couldn't be anything other than interest in celebrity trivia. SomethingForDeletion (talk) 23:06, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Notable in the guideline links to WP:GNG, which is a specific and well-defined threshold to meet. The consensus at the subject's article seems quite stable that she was not notable under her former name, so I think the example stands.--Trystan (talk) 23:55, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I don't have a strong feeling either way. If there's an alternate person you can suggest who is relatively high profile and would serve equally well to illustrate things, please suggest them. That said, and as Tyrstan noted, the consensus seems to be that Levine fits the case of not notable under her prior name. (She's also one of the existing examples on the article, so she's not a new example here.) —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 01:48, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I think examples in the MOS should be really clearcut cases. I agree Laverne Cox is such a case but not convinced that Rachel Levine is one. I don't think the consensus on Levine's article is necessarily dispositive as to whether it is a "clearcut case". If we can't find another example to replace it with, I think just having the Laverne Cox example is enough. SomethingForDeletion (talk) 09:37, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

You can see the discussion above why it is desirable to have more than example to show there isn't a single set format. I'm not opposed to changing the example, but would need some suggestions about who to use instead. In the meantime, since the Levine example doesn't change what's already in the MOS, I wouldn't hold up the rest of the changes over this example. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 13:03, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Given the repeatedly-estsblished consensus at Talk:Rachel Levine that her pretransition name is not notable, and its consistent exclusion from the article, I think the example is a good one. Newimpartial (talk) 13:34, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Given that discussion seems to have died out on this, I've moved the stable version of the examples and intro text to the MOS page. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 16:34, 10 February 2023 (UTC)

"should only be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article if they were notable" would be less ambiguous as "should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable". That would also match the previous wording. EddieHugh (talk) 17:26, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

I find the present text less ambiguous than the prior language, for what it's worth. Newimpartial (talk) 17:37, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

The first makes the inclusion conditional; the second highlights the condition to be met for inclusion. I think the effect are the same either way (the only reason to include a deadname is because the person was previously notable under it), just maybe a difference in which you stress. Neither feels more or less ambiguous to me. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 18:09, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

The ambiguity: is inclusion to be in the lead sentence and nowhere else if the person was notable under that name ("only... in the lead sentence"), or does inclusion in the lead sentence require the person to be notable under that name ("only if... notable")? We mean the latter, I think. EddieHugh (talk) 22:12, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

I restored this phrase to how it was ordered before the recent changes. Crossroads ^-talk- 00:29, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Sex in CONTEXTBIO?

MOS:CONTEXTBIO doesn’t make mention of sex (or gender), but it seems like there would be no reason not to treat it the same. We don’t need to clarify someone as a “female soccer player” or “female scientist”, except in cases like “first woman to win a Nobel Prize” (and so on). Am I missing something, or is this sort of consideration so obvious to be CREEPy? — HTGS (talk) 04:16, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

We don’t need to clarify someone as a “female soccer player” or “female scientist” — but we do categorise them (Category:Women's association football players, Category:Women scientists) and thus we should define them as such. Mitch Ames (talk) 05:06, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

@Mitch Ames I am not talking about categorization, but about the text (and specifically the lead sentence) of a biography, per MOS:CONTEXTBIO. And specifically, I am wondering out loud whether CONTEXTBIO should explicitly advise against including gender in the lead sentence. Whether or not people are put into gendered categories is of no concern to me. — HTGS (talk) 01:41, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

• Would this idea also apply to trans people? Would we no longer state “X is a trans-female soccer player” or “Y is a trans-male actor”? Blueboar (talk) 02:05, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

  I would assume that in most cases of trans athletes, their gender would be central or pertinent to their notability. This may also be true of trans people generally, but it would still align with people like Rachel Levine, who is notable (largely) independent of her gender, and whose lead paragraph currently does not mention that she is a trans woman.

  FWIW I didn’t pose the question with trans people in mind (I had just made this edit … is a New Zealand female rugby union player) so a carveout for trans bios would be fine by me. Eg, a footnote like “for trans individuals this guideline may not always apply”. But I do feel that CONTEXTBIO's current wording (gender … should generally not be in the lead sentence unless relevant to the subject's notability) would cover it well enough for the good judgment of good editors. — HTGS (talk) 02:32, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

  And, to be especially clear, I was (and am) posing an open question. The addition of gender seems to logically follow for me, but reasonable minds may differ. — HTGS (talk) 02:39, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Avoiding thingies

Do you need to avoid Bill Gates III? ErceÇamurOfficial (talk) 18:41, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Could you please clarify the question. Do you mean that we should avoid referring to "Bill Gates III" at all, or possibly not use "William Henry Gates III" in that article"?

Relevant MOS guidelines include MOS:NAME, MOS:FULLNAME, MOS:JR, WP:COMMONNAME.

Mitch Ames (talk) 23:38, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Additions to JOBTITLES

Hi, an extra paragraph was added to WP:JOBTITLES in this edit, likely a response to a dispute I had with the editor over applying JOBTITLES to position leads following the use of "The". There was no discussion over this paragraph so unsure whether it is against consensus or a worthy inclusion. Or simply put, can such addition be checked, it seems to be a rewording of the third point above the examples table but excluding the exceptions, does this paragraph now argue that it should be capped even after using "the" or "a"? Third point above, stated it can be capitalised when it is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article). DankJae 00:33, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Changes to 'Context'

These need to be discussed. The current wording is STABLE. Changing guidelines whilst involved in a dispute related to those guidelines (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Football#user:Skyerise) is incredibly poor form. GiantSnowman 16:42, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Not providing proper nationality context when possible leaves readers confused. I proposed that several uses of "usually" be change to "where possible" to prevent intentional omission of relevant nationality (-ies) by recalcitrant editors who assume every reader is going to know the relevant football nationality rules. The way it is being done is totally unclear. Skyerise (talk) 16:47, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

I disagree; we have literally tens of thousands of articles where the lede states 'X is a footballer. Born in X, they represented Y at international level' and as far as I can recall nobody other than you has ever said it is confusing. GiantSnowman 16:49, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Question: is this dispute about what categories to use or about how to phrase the opening text of the article? Blueboar (talk) 17:48, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

In a way, both. Having the nationalities clearly stated, rather than assumed from football rules (note that the players on other than national teams are treated differently and typically state the nationality up front), leaves no ambiguity about which nationality categories should be included. The way it is being presented makes it unclear where the subject is playing as a national and where they are playing as an expatriate, making it difficult to select or verify the correct categories. Skyerise (talk) 18:07, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Ok, so the next question is: does it matter whether a player is playing as a national or as an expatriate (and if so, why does it matter)? Blueboar (talk) 18:57, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Skyerise is not correct here. A player with unambiguous nationality will be described as e.g. 'English footballer', regardless whether they play at club or international level. A player born in country X but who plays for country Y due to (most often) parentage will be described as above. This is how it has been done for years, covers tens of thousands of articles, and has never caused confusion (as far as I am aware). GiantSnowman 19:29, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

It's also perhaps worth noting that the expats almost certainly have press documenting their actual citizenship, but the players of "unambiguous nationality" (the ones for whom all documented life activities occur within some particular country) may well not, because it's so obvious that nobody feels the need to say it explicitly. Unless we have a source explicitly stating that they are a citizen of some country, or stating their birthplace in a jus soli country, all we can go on is where they flourished. So leaving it somewhat ambiguous (calling them an "English footballer" rather than a "citizen of the UK who plays football for England", say) can be an accurate reflection of our sourcing. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:40, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

My complaint is that, contrary to what GiantSnowman has stated, is that at least some articles, no nationality is being stated before the profession as indicated by WP:CONTEXTBIO. Saying something like "born in X, plays for Y", where the subject is a citizen of both, requires that the reader know that "plays for Y" implies "is a citizen of Y". There is no logical reason for not being explicit. There is a reason for being explicit - without this even an experienced editor who happens to know nothing about football may misconstrue what categories are appropriate. Obviously, a reader who knows nothing about football will not necessarily come away with the fact that the subject holds dual citizenship. That's the whole point of WP:CONTEXTBIO - to make sure that the context is clear without assuming knowledge on the part of the reader. Reverting the clarification of nationality is edit-warring that verges on vandalism (since the OP called me a vandal for trying to improve the article). The only possible problem I see here is if they were born in a country that requires them to relinquish their citizenship when repatriating, but that can be determined from the relevant nationality law article.It's my understanding that very few countries require this in these modern times. Skyerise (talk) 17:19, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

Does anybody besides GiantSnowman have a problem with my revisions to Kenneth Paal and Eduardos Kontogeorgakis. Is there some valid reason not to follow WP:CONTEXTBIO here? Skyerise (talk) 17:32, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, as has been explained to you here and at WT:FOOTBALL. GiantSnowman 19:08, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Nationality issues

Hi All, There are numerous discussions going on both on wiki talk pages, via wiki (near) edit wars and within the art-world and in the media regarding reclassifying Ukrainian born persons (artists, chess players etc), current labelled as Russian. This could also impact other persons subject to historic colonial, conquered and other disputed areas. I think we need some clarity and potentially some individual ruling in some cases. So, can someone provide some expert guidance on the MOS.

Example Talk:Kazimir Malevich born in Kyiv, then part of the Russian empire, to Polish parent (does not clarify where they were born), studied in Russia, calls himself Ukrainian, was part of a Russian school (style of art, not educational)

Cheers 2404:4408:638C:5E00:75C2:43D3:364F:F481 (talk) 05:11, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

This is a complicated issue, by no means limited to Ukraine. I have ancestors in Europe whose birth places changed names as borders shifted, e.g., Gavrylyak, Polish White Russia. In such cases, should articles use the name at birth? The name at the time of writing? --Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 12:43, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

The article should give historical names and current names - example: “He was born in what was then Oldname, Russia (now Newname, Ukraine…”)” If necessary, explain it in more than one sentence. Blueboar (talk) 13:07, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

This is what I would have said, if Blueboar hadn't beaten me to it. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 14:09, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

MOS:NATIONALITY states that the opening sentence should refer to the country of which the person was a citizen when they became notable. It also says "in controversial or unclear cases, nationality is sometimes omitted."

I looked at Kazimir Malevich and I noticed that the opening sentence says he was a Russian avant-garde artist, with the hyperlink to Russian avant-garde. While his citizenship cannot have been Ukrainian at a time that Ukraine wasn't legally a country, this does not stop him being a member of the artistic Ukrainian avant-garde. He is the first person named on the Ukrainian avant-garde page so was certainly notable for it. So for this specific example I wonder if a formulation such as

Kazimir Severinovich Malevich (23 February [O.S. 11 February] 1879 – 15 May 1935) was an artist in the Ukrainian avant-garde...

would be more informative, less contentious, and remain consistent with guidance. I don't know if a similar formulation would help for the other discussions you mention. --Mgp28 (talk) 13:22, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Actually, reading the whole first paragraph for Kazimir Malevich it seems he is considered an artist of both the Russian avant-garde and the Ukrainian avant-garde, so what I suggested might not help. Either way, given that Russian avant-garde is a single hyperlink, the word Russian already appears to be being used as an adjective for the art movement not the artist, so changing the word order as I suggested might at least make this clearer. --Mgp28 (talk) 13:31, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi Mgp28 I am not sure at all that your statement "x wasn't legally a country", is the correct approach, forced or coercive citizenship is not necessarily what I would regard as my guide to "real" nationality or the heart is.121.98.30.202 (talk) 08:49, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

In this case, where an artist was clearly contributory to both Russian and Ukranian avant-garde movements, those facts seem more relevant to the context of the artist's life and importance than any direct statement about the artist's citizenship and/or nationality. I think Mgp28 is therefore likely to be on the right track. Newimpartial (talk) 13:01, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Nationality issues again

Could some outsiders please comment on what is the proper way to introduce Christopher Columbus (1451—1506) when taking into account WP:MOSBIO? On the talk page there's been a year-long continuous discussion over whether Columbus should be introduced as 'Genoese' or 'Italian', which are the two most frequently used adjectives in literature. There is a general consensus that Columbus came from the Republic of Genoa, one of the Maritime republics on the northern Italian peninsula, though his origins are sometimes disputed (see the article Origin theories of Christopher Columbus), and he later moved to Iberia working for the Crown of Castile. There's also plenty of sources that suggest the origins of Italian nationalism can be traced back to the Renaissance which was already underway in Columbus' lifetime. My position has been to introduce him by 'Genoese', and I've tried to impose a middle ground solution by removing nationality altogether, but such edits always get reverted back to 'Italian' instantly. WP:MOSBIO has been introduced to the discussion only recently, but there is ongoing discussion over the proper interpretation, with some even questioning the guideline itself. Machinarium (talk) 14:10, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I will take a leaf out of the long story over at Nicolaus Copernicus (go trough the talk-page archives if you want, but it's a tedious read)...and would say that labeling him as a "Renaissance explorer" might be an approach that could at least be tried (if it hasn't been tried before, I haven't looked). Lectonar (talk) 13:08, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Native American

I'm interested in reading the discussion that led to Native American citizenships being added to CONTEXTBIO, but I can't seem to find it. Anybody know of it's location? – ².O.^Boxing 07:26, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

It was discussed here: [3]. Looks like there were no objections and even an approval (from me). I've restored it on the page, since it was discussed when it was added, we should have a discussion as to whether to remove it. Pretty sure it comes from a related Wikiproject's existing standards. Skyerise (talk) 11:30, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

We just (last month) had a longer discussion about this on one of our various noticeboards … but I can’t locate which noticeboard it was on. Consensus was mixed. Blueboar (talk) 11:43, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I've noticed it's getting harder and harder to find old stuff. So many changes since the early days... Skyerise (talk) 12:53, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I found what Skyerise linked above, the proposal to upgrade it from a footnote to an example, but I can't find the discussion that lead to it being added as a footnote in the first place. Seems contradictory to the rest of CONTEXTBIO to me (and at odds with the general understanding of citizenship and nationality). I'm hoping there's some discussions I can read to get a better understanding. – ².O.^Boxing 13:30, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

On the underlying issue (and this restoration), I would observe the following:

(1) I agree with the argument made in the discussion Skyerise linked that indigenous identities in North America (and probably in many other places) are best understood as nationality/citizenship, not as ethnicity;

(2) for Canada at least, I disagree that citizenship (as opposed to nationality) is always the relevant framing; it seems to fit better for First Nations but less well for other indigenous groups (Métis, Inuit);

(3) while the example presented is fine on its own terms, it doesn't necessarily represent a "best practice" that could be applied to other indigenous biographies (a problem that also confronts several of the other current examples with respect to other BLPs, IMO). Newimpartial (talk) 12:55, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I can't disagree with Native American being viewed as such in North America, but Europe doesn't recognise their nationalities or tribal citizenships. There's also the article on Native Americans in the United States, which first describes them as Indigineous peoples, and that link says, The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples (bolding mine). That pretty much fits my (and probably many others outside of North America) understanding of Native American; it primarily relates to ethnicity/descent and doesn't relate to nationality or citizenship (that would be American).

That being said, I agree with the format used for Wilma Mankiller as it's directly relevant to her notability (and noting the tribe in parentheses is informative), but certainly not for Donna Nelson, a notable chemist. I think any guidance would be more apprirate as a sentence or two in the ethnicity and religion part. Whether or not people view it as ethnicity or nationality/citizenship, it's clear it isn't on the same level as citizenship to a soverign state, which I believe is the spirit of the guideline. – ².O.^Boxing 13:30, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Tribal membership is a complex issue. But where it can be determined that the subject is a member of a a tribe which is considered a sovereign nation, they should certainly be described according to their membership in that nation. Some tribes do not have that status, see List of federally recognized tribes in the contiguous United States. I don't know whether any of this applies to First Nations. It is also my understanding that at least some nations at some times have had an open border policy with respect to indigenous peoples. My recollection is that England was one of the countries which extended this courtesy, though of course everything changed everywhere after 9/11. Skyerise (talk) 13:45, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, I will wait to hear more and probably reply again tomorrow (unless asked a direct question, per my editing restrictions), but I do think the spirit of the guideline is somewhat at issue here. I see two pieces of relevant text that can be used to discern this "spirit":

• In most modern-day cases, this will be the country, region, or territory, where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident, and
• Ethnicity, religion, or sexuality should generally not be in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability.

I have seen editors pull back and forth over two main points of disagreement about these passages:

• some editors will gloss the first point as though it said, "place the person in the context of their country of citizenship or residence", while others take the language more literally and allow for more variety of outcomes;
• some editors will take the second point as though it established a very high bar for the mention of anything that does not correspond to a nation-state citizenship, while others do not interpret the text this way.

While editors aren't always keen to acknowledge this, much of the resulting disagreement has to do with what editors are or aren't willing to acknowledge as "nationalities". It is clear to some editors that Welsh is a nationality meriting first-sentence mention in most cases, while not acknowledging equivalent status for Catalan or Quebecois nationality. To some New Zealand editors, it may seem evident that Maori identity should be a nearly-universal, required first-sentence mention in relevant biographies, but this might not be obvious to others. And so on.

What I think we nearly all agree is that it is against the spirit and the letter of the MOS for editors to seek sources for family background and to insert hyphenated identities in article lead sections based on such references. But it seems obvious to me, from a Canadian perspective, that when indigenous people carry their indigineity as a highly visible aspect of their identity, that that form of national belonging should be presented in an article lead, and that any wikilawyering along the themes of "only one nationality can be included"/"it should reflect a recognized Westaphalian state" ought to be set aside as un-encyclopaedic, IMO.

Also, I would point out to Skyerise that while First Nations in Canada have a status that is essentially similar to "Federally recognized tribes" in the US, the respective statuses of Métis and Inuit indigenous people - while also constitutionally entrenched - operate along different principles.Newimpartial (talk) 14:15, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

That's where my issue lies, and I see it like a WP:CONLEVEL issue; the US made a local decision that the wider community doesn't agree with or recognise. Consensus is against. Tribal nations do not have absolute authority or external autonomy (as demonstrated in Tribal sovereignty in the United States). By definition, they're not sovereign nations. Now, I understand there's slightly differing definitions of a sovereign nation/state, but the ones I've seen (including the definition under international law) have included having absolute authority and the ability to enter talks with other sovereign nations (foreign powers). That's what I'm basing my stance on; if they're not legally recognised as a soverign nation/state, and nationality/citizenship relates to soverign nations/states, then there is no nationality/citizenship. Internationally, that is literally the case; the EU considers tribal passports "fantasy passports", which means at least in Europe, their US-recognised dual citizenship does not exist. The two instances I could find of international travel--which would imply some kind of legal recognition--were in reference to tribal lacrosse teams; one was refused entry in to the UK in the mid 2000s and the other travelled successfully to Ireland within the last decade, but I don't find that very convincing when looking at the context (publicly invited by a government sporting body for a competition).

I think I'm in agreement with Newimpartial's point about when indigenous people carry their indigineity as a highly visible aspect of their identity, as long as the nationality/citizenship to the relevant sovereign nation is in the first sentence. – ².O.^Boxing 22:27, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, I don't think the recognition of North American first nations by the U.S. and Canadian governments is any more of a local decision that the wider community doesn't agree with or recognise than the UK/FIFA decision to recognize Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, as we have discussed at my Talk. I also don't think it is up to Wikipedia editors to decide who are or aren't sovereign nations, nor am I aware of any basis in WP policy to assign nationality exclusively by selecting among Westaphalian states. That isn't actually what the policy text in question tells us to do, it isn't what our articles do now, and I haven't seen a formal proposal here to change policy and practice to insist that this is what we should do, either.

Certain editors believe that all, or nearly all, biographical articles should provide a Westaphalian assignment of nationality of their subject, while other editors believe that the relevant country, region or territory is not always a national state, and that it is up to sources not editors primarily to decide which national identities are relevant to a subject's notability. But if there is a strong argument against the inclusion of Indigenous identities in the lead paragraph for biographies where they are strongly emphasized by high-quality sources, I certainly haven't seen such an argument in this section (nor does existing policy provide the basis for one, AFAICT). Newimpartial (talk) 16:23, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Best not lump Canadian indigenous and American indigenous people together. Sovereignty is not recognized in Canada in the same way. We have guidelines at indigenous Wiki project... but these are antiquated American style views.[4]. Moxy- 20:45, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

No, I don't mean to lump Canadian indigenous and American indigenous people together. I do maintain, though, that in both cases national identities have been documented in RS that may be relevant for the lead paragraph of a biographical article. Newimpartial (talk) 20:53, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Having nationality recognized by the country they inhabit is not the same as International recognition ( no passports) same as the Quebec nation simply National recognition with zero International implications. That said the example giving is to link Native American and or First Nation etc... then to link their tribal identity. This seems like we're linking Native American and First Nations all over the place for nothing more than a link that does not explain anything more than the tribal link would about indigenous heritage. Moxy- 21:29, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

I have to agree with Newimpartial here. As a member of the Indigenous Wikiproject, we deal pretty much daily with editors who don't understand the differences between citizenship and heritage, and who don't know how to accurately write about these things. Having the Wilma Mankiller example in this link has been very helpful. Even if the section needs to have some of the other entries compressed or removed, I am strongly advocating for putting it back. - CorbieVreccan ^☊ ☼ 21:16, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Most living people will be described with a single nationality...

This edit adding a section on nationality include the referenced phrase. Is there any objection to adjusting that, like the other similar guidelines here, to be explicit about exceptions where the subject still has a strong connection to a previous nation? --John (User:Jwy/talk) 04:26, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Presumably you mean these edits by User:Skyerise. I see that Skyerise has since been using that section as a bludgeon to erase the national origin of people who grew up and were educated in one place but now work in another, making the lead give the false impression that these people were always of the nation they happen to live in, even in cases where we do not have evidence of their current citizenship. For example, Vida Dujmović, from the former Yugoslavia (if I remember correctly Herzegovina, not Croatia?), educated in Croatia, edited by Skyerise to say she is (only) Canadian. She moved to Canada as an adult and still works there. By now she may well be a Canadian citizen. But we do not have evidence of that, nor do we have evidence for what the answer would be if you asked her what nationality she has or what country she is from. If you asked the same question of me, the answer would probably be "it's complicated". A clause saying "most people have one nationality" is obviously true, in the abstract: greater than 50% of the world's population has not changed nationality, I think. But it is ridiculous to apply that clause to the minority of people to whom it is not true, as if we can only accept an oversimplified picture of the world where "most" somehow has morphed into "all".

What I would like to see is a much more explicit policy that, for people for whom the question of nationality is in any way unclear (there is more than one country they have been associated with), we refrain from stating a nationality without explicit sourcing for that citizenship. Otherwise, we can say things like "Yugoslav-born computer scientist who works in Canada". To do anything else is to guess, and guessing is something we should avoid in biographies and especially in BLPs. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:04, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

What I would like to see is a much more explicit policy that, for people for whom the question of nationality is in any way unclear...: Guessing on one's nationality is already covered by WP:V and WP:OR. —Bagumba (talk) 07:57, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

The whole point of WP:CONTEXTBIO, back when the shortcut used to be WP:OPENPARA, has always been worded to prefer the use of a single nationality. Back when it was at OPENPARA, it had nearly exactly the same examples as I restored. At some point the material got reorganized and the examples got lost in the reorganization. The examples I added are pretty much what was there before the reorganization. I know Asimov was used at the first example in the original examples. The other examples may use different people than the original examples... The original reason for this - yes, I was around during early discussions that led to the guideline - was that nationalists and revisionists of various stripes want to "claim" the person. Thus there were edit wars between Americans and Russians over Asimov. The short version is: there is no reason to mention a country in which the subject simply resided without becoming notable for anything. The guideline also accounts for people whose citizenship is unknown but who reside in another country at length with obvious employment. They can't do that in the US at least without a green card. And that's why the guideline states "or permanent resident". While I personally don't add nationalities where citizenship is not clear, it is completely within the guidelines to call someone who has taught at Harvard for 20 years an American - even if they were born elsewhere, retain their original citizenship, and are only a permanent resident of the US. In the original discussions, the key was: where did the work for which they are notable mostly occur? If it is predominantly in a single country, that's the context that supported them while they did the things for which they became notable. Only if notable work was done over multiple countries should we even think about adding a second nationality. The guideline only cover the first sentence. There is no bloody reason to say "Yugoslavian-born Canadian" when we can say "is a Canadian blah blah. Born in Yugoslavia, he moved to ..." The "nationality+profession" is used for both short summaries and a quick check on proper categorization, which are two reasons for preferring a single nationality in the lead sentence. Skyerise (talk) 13:18, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes there is a reason to say "Yugoslavian-born who works in Canada", in exactly the example I gave. Because we do not have sourcing for any one citizenship. So to state a citizenship we would have to guess. We should not guess and we should not encourage guessing. It is very different from the case of Asimov that you cite: for Asimov, he came to one country (the US) as a child, and we have a source for him becoming a citizen of the US as a child. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:48, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Ah, it seems footballers are some sort of special international citizen with different rules - or at least so said @GiantSnowman:. However, while GS claimed that there are different guidelines for footballers, they did not link to any such guideline. So I am not sure whether such an alternate guideline even exists. If it does, I'd be happy to follow it if someone would be so kind as to point it out to me. Meanwhile I'm just skipping footballer articles when they come upon 'random article' Skyerise (talk) 13:26, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

An alternative is to NOT MENTION nationality in the first sentence - at all: “Joe Blow is a footballer, currently playing for Puddlesby United” … “Jane Doe was an acclaimed actress, best known for her staring role in the silent movie ‘Hamster Capers’.” Blueboar (talk) 13:44, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Why? It's much less informative and much less clear. The second example runs afoul of WP:PEACOCK - which frequently happens when the nationality is not present: then they are "famous", "prominent", or "acclaimed" rather than American or German. Skyerise (talk) 13:50, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Because usually a subject’s nationality has little (or nothing) to do with what makes the subject notable. The first sentence should focus on what makes the subject note worthy. It should focus on what they do or did… not where they came from. Blueboar (talk) 15:02, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Also because often for people who have flourished in multiple countries (as is very common in academia) we do not have sourcing for their citizenship. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:50, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

And we don't have to per "or permanent resident". The academic born in Europe who has lived and taught in the US for decades may reasonably be described as American even without a citation for naturalization. Skyerise (talk) 17:20, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

No. Stating a single nationality in the lead is unambiguously a claim that the person has a single nationality. In the cases we are discussing, it is often false and even more often unverifiable, and you are actively pushing for the inclusion of falsehoods and unverifiable claims in our article leads. In the case of someone who has one citizenship but works in another country, or a dual citizen, or someone who has held multiple citizenships while performing notable activities, we should not push the false narrative that they are entirely of one nationality. —David Eppstein (talk) 20:03, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@David Eppstein: Just as a footballer's citizenship can be determined from football rules, permanent residency in many countries can be determined from length of residency and employment, at least in the US; though residents of Commonwealth of Nations countries I think can work in any CoN country, and I don't know how the EU handles such things. If you think we should not do this, then perhaps we should start a discussion about removing "or permanent resident of" from the Context section, though its been there as long as I can remember. Skyerise (talk) 13:03, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

That is WP:OR. Do not do it. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:32, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Just to comment on footballers, I believe the real-world issue is that at any one time, players can belong to one and only one national team - they must have a passport in their national team nationality, but of course they may have passports in other nationalities and their country of residence or of work need not correspond to their national team nationality. In this instance, it would be an unfortunate surprise to readers if the national team nationality were not prominently presented in the arricle; in some cases it may he the greatest claim to significance of the player, according to the RS. Newimpartial (talk) 14:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

What I am seeing is a misunderstanding between ethnicity and nationality and citizenship. Moxy- 14:25, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

This is intented as a reply to me, so I will ask what misunderstanding you see. "FIFA nationality" is a strict subset of legal citizenship - it could also be understood as a subset of nationality of occupation. Obviously, nationality of residence and nationality of occupation are distinct concepts. But for people who are notable precisely in relation to a certain form of nationality (e.g., national team membership), should Wikipedia not continue to present this consistently in biographical articles? I don't know what "misunderstanding" you have detected. Newimpartial (talk) 14:36, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Americans are unlikely to differentiate between ‘citizenship’ and nationality’ in everyday language, this is not the case in other countries. Nationality should be listed only in addition to citizenship, and only in cases where it is verifiable and relevant to the article. For most articles, place of birth denotes nationality. When it comes to the United States, U.S. citizens are U.S. nationals. Still, not all U.S. nationals are U.S. citizens. Moxy- 15:20, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

We should not let footballers drive our guidelines for non-footballers. The fact that international footballers play for a national team, and are required by FIFA to be citizens of that nation, gives these people a definitive nationality that many other expatriates and emigrants do not have. We should not base our guidelines on the false assumption that nationality is as easy to determine for other people as it is for footballers. —David Eppstein (talk) 20:06, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Just to be clear, when I commented on footballers above it was only to point out a key characteristic of that case (that they may be notable for an activity that is dependent on exercising a particular nation's citizenship), not as a paradigm applicable to non-footballers. Also, I would point out to Skyerise that footballers are in fact a very specific demographic in that they may exercise another citizenship more frequently in their personal or professional lives than they do their national team citizenship - but the latter may be highly relevant and thetefore feature in the opening paragraph (q.v. Carleigh Frilles).

As I pointed out in my recent contribution to the discussion of Native American nationality, I have seen editors disagree not only about the application of the nationality guideline but about its spirit as well. (Moxy's comment above, Nationality should be listed only in addition to citizenship, is an example of what I referred to in that earlier post as a gloss, simplifying and transforming the guideline into a principle some editors support but which policy text does not actually stipulate.)

I would like to point to four biographical articles about Canadians that handle the issue differently, but each of which makes sense in the specific case: Jonathan David, René Lévesque, Mary Simon, Buffy Sainte-Marie. None of these correspond in detail to any of the examples Skyerise added to the MOS, but each seems to me to reflect the interaction between high-quality sourcing and Wikipedia policy in an appropriate way.

TL;DR - I don't think there is "one right way" to handle the diversity of cases of nationality in biographical articles, and I'm also skeptical that the list of examples added late last year are especially exemplary. Newimpartial (talk) 16:12, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I think that nationality can be defining for some people, ethnic origin can be defining for some people (probably fewer), and neither can be defining for others. Furthermore, for many article subjects neither of the above are verifiable. While I understand the desire for standardization, I think that neither, either or both should be included only if 1) verifiable and 2) defining for that individual. Buidhe public (talk) 07:54, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree. The original issue, as I understand it, was people claiming the subject for their side (ethnicity, nationality, whatever). For a subject that has verifiable connection to their birth country, including BirthCountry-CurrentCountry seems natural. The guideline should focus more on what fits the subject rather than defending against crusading editors - with that defense being covered as a special case "when there is serious contention." --John (User:Jwy/talk) 02:43, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps the solution is to not use any such descriptions in the intro of BLPs or bios-in-general. GoodDay (talk) 15:44, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Nationality in the lede is important context for a biography. GiantSnowman 15:48, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Consensus behind the section Skyerise added in November

I seem to have missed it, so could someone point me to the on-wiki interaction that established the consensus that was then documented in the series of edits under discussion above ([5])? While I see some useful clarification among those edits, I also see a good deal of confusion and an editorial preference to move further away from the sources of BLP articles than any previous consensus or community practice would require. Could someone clarify this, please? Newimpartial (talk) 14:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Can we move away from reliable sources? That seems like WP:OR and no discussion anywhere on Wikipedia can validate such an approach. Slywriter (talk) 15:26, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I, for one, am not suggesting that we can move away from reliable sources. I am suggesting, rather, that the added policy text encourages editors to depart from following the reliable sources in many cases. Newimpartial (talk) 15:35, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm also interested in finding the discussion that lead to these additions, specifically the Native American example. I found this proposal from November with only one reply from Skyerise before it was added. It's probably worth noting that CorbieVreccan was the one who added the footnote in March 2022. I had a look in the WP:IPNA talk page archives but couldn't find any discussion there. I'm still presuming there's one thats eluding me. – ².O.^Boxing 14:31, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I posted on this talk page. There were no objections. [6] Skyerise (talk) 16:36, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Native American wasn't in the previous examples. Considering there doesn't appear to be consensus for something so contentious, I'm going to remove that one until its been appropriately discussed. I don't really have much comment on the other examples; they're close enough to the previous ones and seem to accurately reflect the guideline. – ².O.^Boxing 08:46, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Determining 'which' nationality to use in a bio, has at times been a thorny topic. Do we go with "birth country"? The country the person lived in most of their lives? The 'only' determining factor, would be what do reliable sources do, per individual. GoodDay (talk) 14:53, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Might be naive of me, but don't we just follow reliable sources? Or is the issue these are all database entries deemed notable that have no RS coverage? Slywriter (talk) 15:25, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Then there's the United Kingdom situation, which can certainly be thorny. Some individuals prefer to be called British, which they're called as such in reliable sources. While others prefer English, Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish or Irish, which they're called as such, in reliable sources. But, that's another rocky area. GoodDay (talk) 15:41, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

The problem with that is that different sources have different standards. Many sources are reporting ethnicity instead of nationality, using terms like Italian-American, which is ambiguous. We should not follow such sources, but rather follow our own Manual of Style. Skyerise (talk) 16:32, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Err no... we follow sources, not our MOS. If our MOS disagrees with sources, the MOS is wrong and must be corrected to conform with WP:V and WP:OR. Slywriter (talk) 17:49, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

The MoS is not wrong. Whether to present nationality alone or combined with ethnicity is an editorial decision. Another publication's MoS may permit such constructions, or even encourage them, which is why they present the material that way. Neither our or their MoS is "wrong", they are simply incompatible. We do not "follow the sources" just to put ethnicity unnecessarily and inexplicably in the lead sentence. Better to take a whole sentence to explain it, usually in the early life section. Otherwise every black American will be described as "African-American", which conveys too little information to be clear. Were they born in America or Africa? If an African-American moves to Africa, are they now an American-African? Wouldn't white people who moved from the US to Africa also be American-Africans? It's best to unpack into ethnicity and nationality, and follow WP:ETHNICITY. Really. 20:59, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

My issue is that I know being hyphenated-American is important to the subjects of two biographies I take an interest in. They are proud of their origin, have been back to inspire those in their country and have even attempted to play for their country-of-origin national team. The current guideline strongly discourages leading with their (well documented) hyphenated status when it is a key part of their identity. The MOS should not do so, IMO. --John (User:Jwy/talk) 20:49, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Ethnic pride is specifically why ethnicity is not encouraged in the lead sentence. In such a case I'd suggest detailing why they pride themselves on their ethnic heritage as an Italian-American (or whatever) later in the lead. Skyerise (talk) 20:59, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Why discourage it if it is key part of who they are? I can see discouraging it if the editors are using it as an expression of their own view on matters independent of the subject, but if the subject is active in their birth country (it's not necessarily ethnic) it seems a good way to help establish "who they are." --John (User:Jwy/talk) 23:40, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

The problem is not so much people who are notable for their ethnic pride, but rather people who might possibly be of some ethnicity, maybe, if you guess by surnames, and Wikipedia editors with a lot of ethnic pride who want to highlight that supposed ethnicity everywhere they can find it. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:02, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Skyerise: Your addition of nationality examples in November had the edit summary: "add examples of presentation of nationality according to the committee-written guidance". For reference, can you provide a link to the old version where these came from, or a link(s) to relevant discussion for the specific wording. Thanks.—Bagumba (talk) 12:09, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Bagumba:, the MoS pages have been moved and reorganized so much that I cannot find them. I remember discussions leading to the examples being added (vaguely as I am elderly), and remember the examples being in the guideline in 2010 - 2012, when I was mostly working on New Mexico topics and Taos art colony biographies, before the whole MoS page and subpage structure got renovated. At some point during that renovation the examples got removed. I am sure they were there as I have been following these examples since about that time. At one time they were at the shortcut WP:OPENPARA, but that's been re-targeted several times and I suspect deleted at least once as I remember it existing before the current redirect was created. I continued to use it to point to the examples for some time, not realizing they weren't there anymore. Though perhaps I am just getting old and forgetful... I've also been unable to find a discussion leading to their removal, so I think the removal was probably inadvertent. I think examples are good to have, though perhaps some of the wording and intent can be improved, since I had to write them anew from memory there may be differences from the original that may need to be addressed? Skyerise (talk) 12:27, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

If I look at WP:OPENPARA's history, the shortcut was created on 19 December 2010‎. The examples at the MOS on that date mostly match the examples currently at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § Opening paragraph. I didn't find an explicit set of nationality examples from before.—Bagumba (talk) 16:19, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I wasn't involved in the discussion before the main section was added. But for the Native American bit with Wilma Mankiller: There was a lot of dispersed discussion leading up to it, at various article talk pages where the same issues kept coming up (as I referred to above), and at the wikiproject. When it was proposed on MOS talk, there were no objections. So for Squared.Circle.Boxing to say it was "contentious" doesn't line up with what happened. - CorbieVreccan ^☊ ☼ 22:48, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Dual nationality: hypenate or "and"

In the examples added on 13:05, 15 November 2022, there's two examples for dual nationality that use "and" and discourage hyphenating:

• Arnold Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, film producer, businessman, retired professional bodybuilder and politician

For a politician, dual citizenship can be a political issue, so it is important to be clear and avoid ambiguity. The lead sentence here is not about ethnicity ("Austrian-American") or the country of birth ("Austrian-born American"), but rather about dual citizenship.

• Peter Lorre (June 26, 1904 – March 23, 1964) was a Hungarian and American actor

This is an example of a person who established a career in Europe as a Hungarian, then emigrated to the United States and was naturalized and continued his career, and is thus known as both a Hungarian actor and as an American actor. The use of and again prevents the introduction of ethnicity or birth.

However, these examples were added to the MOS only shortly after they were changed in the respective bios:

• 12:51, 15 November 2022: Schwarzenegger changed from "Austrian-born American" to "Austrian and American"
• 12:57, 15 November 2022 Lorre changed from "Hungarian-born" to "Hungarian and American"

These were not stable versions. However, per the policy WP:PROPOSAL:

Most commonly, a new policy or guideline documents existing practices, rather than proposing a change to what experienced editors already choose to do.

Do the changes reflect a standard practice? Are there examples of where this has been followed, prior to the MOS change? It seems to contradict MOS:DUALNATIONALITIES:

For people and things identifying with multiple nationalities, use a hyphen when using the combination adjectivally and a space when they are used as nouns, with the first used attributively to modify the second

The changes still might make sense, but I don't think we should rely on WP:SILENCE as consensus for this.—Bagumba (talk) 16:40, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

As for contradicting dual nationality, that guideline make sense everywhere but the lead sentence, where it leads to ambiguity because it is mostly used there for combining ethnicity with nationality, which is a different thing. Skyerise (talk) 12:18, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Tense for the dead

When describing dead people as they relate to achievements, records and currently-living people, what tense should I use? Specifically, for Puti Tipene Watene, we currently have “he is the only person to both represent the New Zealand national rugby league team and become a Member of Parliament” and “He is the great-grandfather of rugby league player Dallin Watene-Zelezniak” (emphasis added). If there’s general agreement on the right way to phrase these, I think it would be worth adding them to the Tense section, even if only to guide confused souls like me. — HTGS (talk) 10:54, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think 'is' and 'was' respectively for the two specific examples above? GiantSnowman 21:42, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Right you are, GiantSnowman. Once someone "enters the record books", that part of them leaves the body to seek its fortune as a historical figure. Same name, whole other game. A grandfather is more like a lawyer or acrobat, where the sentience itself must be "in the flesh" to "do the job". Even then, though, it gets tricky. In the context of a family tree, ancestors and descendants still are exactly where they've always been, in pages like record books for relatively unimpressive accomplishments. When we start talking kings, queens and those thought to have perished in submarines, things turn drastically more convoluted and the likelihood of a short and clear way to put it for everyone to understand just ceases to exist. But yeah, think "place in history" vs "person on Earth" for a good "rule of thumb". InedibleHulk (talk) 06:48, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

The first one could be made less inelegant by using the present perfect: ...he is the only person ever to have both represented...and become.... (Conveniently, become is both the present tense and the past participle.) That puts the overt action in the past but is formally in the present tense, which is appropriate because the possibility of someone else doing the same thing has not closed. If the NZ team and Parliament no longer existed, then "was" would be correct. --Trovatore (talk) 07:36, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

First ever, only ever, both too wordy. Everything is always ever, by default, it's right there in the name. And "and" conveys the idea of two things just fine, forget "both", I advise. Aside from that, you might be on to something with "become". Good luck, rulemakers! InedibleHulk (talk) 04:27, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

MOS:FULLNAME vs MOS:JR

At O.G. Anunoby, his full name is verifiably sourced as "Ogugua Anunoby Jr."[7] MOS:FULLNAME reads:

While the article title should generally be the name by which the subject is most commonly known, the subject's full name, if known, should usually be given in the lead sentence (including middle names, if known, or middle initials).

However, MOS:JR says:

Using Jr., Sr., or other such distinctions, including in the lead sentence of an article, is only for cases in which the name with the suffix is commonly used in reliable sources.

Should "Jr." be included in the lead sentence's full name, if it's not part of the title i.e. WP:COMMONNAME? —Bagumba (talk) 18:46, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

It must be used in cases cases where the name with the suffix is commonly used in reliable sources. Hence John McCain starts with "John Sidney McCain III", his father John S. McCain Jr. with "John Sidney "Jack" McCain Jr.", and John S. McCain Sr. with "John Sidney "Slew" McCain". Hawkeye7 (discuss) 19:53, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Is there a reason for requiring suffixes to be commonly used, a higher standard than we have for other parts of a full name, such as obscure but verifiable given names e.g. Elizabeth Stamatina Fey (Tina Fey)? —Bagumba (talk) 02:13, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

@Wehwalt:: You recently made edits that introduced this restriction for reliably sourced full names in the lead sentence. Can you comment if this was the intended effect. Was there a wider discussion on this topic? Thanks. —Bagumba (talk) 08:39, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

I can only view a limited portion of the article, so I can't say if that sports column is in my view a RS that the Jr is used. It certainly doesn't seem commonly used in his case. As for the edits, I simply made clearer, by changing "well-attested" to "commonly used" what was the case, that such suffixes should only be used if commonly attested to in reliable sources. That's hardly new in the MOS. There are too many cases of people throwing in a Jr. because the father had the same or a similar name and there's no reliable source saying Jr. was ever used. I think the distinction you are looking for is that the "obscure but verifiable" parts of a name are legally part of the name but the "Jr." is a disambiguator, not part of the name, used to distinguish between two people, which is generally dropped at some point without a legal change of name. Are you saying that one column by a sportswriter in the Sun makes the suffix "well-attested" but not "commonly used"?--Wehwalt (talk) 13:27, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the background. The source says: He’s actually Ogugua Anunoby Jr., son of a scholar, brother of a former NFL player. If I understand your concern correctly, editors should not WP:OR that a person legally added Jr./Sr. to their name. I am familiar with David Arseneault Jr., whose WP:COMMONNAME is referred to with "Jr.", but where it's dubious that it's part of his legal name, since he has a different middle name than his father. With Anunoby, his father is not publicly notable, so there's no conflicting evidence that their middle names dont match, and there is no reason to believe "Jr." is dubious. In my experience, people's middle names and suffixes are not commonly referred to in reliable sources, but are generally presented on WP as their legal name if reliably verifiable. While there is reasonable doubt to not include "Jr." as part of a legal name like with Arseneault, I think "commonly used" can be too confused with COMMONNAME, setting an excessive bar, in Anunoby's case. Anunoby's page title should remain without "Jr.", but it seems reasonable that it's part of his legal name, as we would treat a source if it mentioned a middle name instead. —Bagumba (talk) 04:15, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

It seems to me that even "well-attested" is calling for something of higher magnitude than "reliably sourced". How would the "reasonable doubt" be established? Omission of the "Jr.", in Anunoby's case or generally, would prove nothing. Wehwalt (talk) 07:59, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

An edit summary at Anunoby said "32 of the 33 references used omit the suffix"[8] Of course it will, when it's not his COMMONNAME. The MOS change put new emphasis on the lead's full name, when MOS:JR before was only referring to a page title and the use of WP:NATURAL disambiguation. —Bagumba (talk) 10:34, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

I would see if there is support for Jr. in sources not used in the article, especially league, team, and from networks like ESPN. If they don't use the Jr. then the single sports columnist starts to look like an outlier. I'm not sure that the parallel between middle names and Jr. is appropriate, a source is not likely to synthesize a middle name but might use a Jr. or Sr. without much thought when they're discussing the father and he has the same name as the notable son. That doesn't mean the writer's discovered what the rest have overlooked, that he uses a Jr. No matter what the wording of the MOS, a single source would seem scanty there. Wehwalt (talk) 12:45, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Proposal: Moving post-nominals from lead sentences to article bodies

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is consensus in support of moving post-nominals outside of lead sentences. While the proposal divided the community, consensus is not vote-based. After a review of the discussion, I believe that supporters of the proposal had a stronger argument for why the post-nominals should not, by default, be included in the lead sentence. In particular, opposers did not successfully challenge the claim that most post-nominals do not significantly define the subject in question such that they provide the reader with an essential understanding of who the subject is. In light of this, the clutter issues raised by some supporters mean that this information, when relevant, should instead be spread elsewhere in the lead and body of the article. Per WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE, this should not be exclusively in the infobox.

A number of editors sought to argue that the proposal should be opposed based on English cultural traditions and/or our guideline on English national variations. I do not believe that editors citing WP:ENGVAR successfully argued how this guideline alters who a person is (WP:LEADSENTENCE). Furthermore, I gave no weight to arguments based solely on a cultural divide between English and Americans.

Editors are welcome to contact me through my talk page if they wish to discuss my closure.— Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Non nobis solum. 14:41, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

---

To bring WP:POSTNOM in better agreement with MOS:BIOFIRSTSENTENCE, I propose that this policy be altered to specifically omit post-nominal letters from lead sentences.

Per our guideline on biographical opening paragraphs, "the opening paragraph of a biographical article should neutrally describe the person, provide context, establish notability and explain why the person is notable, and reflect the balance of reliable sources." Post-nominal letters, many of which are unknown to laypeople, do not do any of those things. If anything, they actually delay a reader from getting to the part of the opening sentence that describes a person's notability.

Instead, WP:POSTNOM would advise that post-nominals be placed in the body of the article. If needed, the exact wording of this revised section will be determined after this RfC concludes. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:22, 4 March 2023 (UTC) edited/turned into RfC 00:42, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Discussion (Moving post-nominals)

Absolutely nothing should ever be in an infobox unless it is also in the real text of the article. Infoboxes are a summary, not a replacement. So "move to infobox" is a non-starter. Whether postnominals are lead-worthy is another question, but I think they are. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:03, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll remove that part of the proposal then. What makes them lead-worthy, in your view? What information do they impart to a reader that is critical to their understanding of the subject? Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 14:32, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

They are part of the thing we do in leads of giving the person's name in as full a version as possible. They are a part of the name. Maybe not a very important part, but more important than most middle names, which we also give in full when we know them in the lead. There is usually nowhere else in the article that the full name can naturally get spelled out; as I said above, the infobox is definitely not the place, because it is wrong and bad to put anything in the infobox that is not in the article text. In some cases articles have a section for honors or recognition or awards where some of these can go, but not naturally in a form that would explain the postnominal lettering. So by process of elimination the lead is where it should go. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:26, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

They are a part of the name. — No. By definition post-nominal letters "are letters placed after a person's name", so the are not part of the name. Mitch Ames (talk) 08:25, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

You can argue semantics all you want, but they are part of the string that you write when you address someone in a formal-enough context. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:33, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

they are part of the string that you write when you address someone in a formal-enough context — That may be the case, but the lead sentence of a Wikipedia article is not necessarily a "formal-enough context". There are many formal forms of address, but Wikipedia is not obliged to use them. For example, in a formal context, one would probably refer to His Majesty King Charles III, President Joe Biden, or The Honourable Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, but none or our articles use those forms in the lead sentence. Mitch Ames (talk) 01:02, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

You are missing my point. The question is not whether the lead is a formal-enough context. The point is that the lead is where we standardly provide the most-complete form of address of the subject, and this is an important part of that most-complete form of address. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:45, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

That reasoning doesn't seem to be supported by anything in MOS:INTRO, though. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:16, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Albo doesn't have them in the lead because he doesn't have them at all. Consider the Governor General instead: David Hurley. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:59, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Anthony Albanese's infobox includes honorific-prefix = The Honourable. Prime Minister of Australia's infobox includes style = ... The Honourable (formal). Mitch Ames (talk) 00:24, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• I support this proposal. There was a similar discussion a while back at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Biography/2022_archive#Fellowships_by_subscription,_e.g._FRSA regarding post-nominals. As I said at the linked discussion, I've always thought post-nominals in lead sentences were ridiculous and clunky looking (e.g. (and emphasis mine) "Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, DL, FRS, RA (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman"[8]...)[9] and would support the removal of post-nominals from the lead sentences of biographies altogether. No opinion on whether they are listed in the infoboxes, although if they are, the post-nominals need to be verifiable (sourced) and discussed in the body of the articles first. Some1 (talk) 16:10, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Strong support and probably more, and long past due. Postnominals should never be in running text, let alone in the lead sentence. I'm perfectly fine with them being in an infobox. Yes, ideally they should be in the article proper too, but only in prose, not as inscrutable acronyms. Having an occasional bit of statistics in an infobox but not the article is fine when done sparingly, and as long as it's sourced. Presumably, these letters are all linked to some sort of award or honor that the subject has received, and the article can talk about, though. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 18:26, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support If any of the postnominals are critical to their notability, that can be spelled out in the lede prose. --Masem (t) 19:05, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support - the lead should explain notability, but I suggest that a person is not notable because they have postnominals, but rather they have postnominals because they have done something notable (and it's the "something notable" that we should mention in the lead, not postnominals). Mitch Ames (talk) 00:31, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support These postnominals clog up lead sentences and devote undue weight to royal and aristocratic privilege. Describe the person's actual accomplishments in the lead and reserve the confusing alphabet baloney soup for the prose in the body of the article. Cullen328 (talk) 07:40, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
  • You do know that most people with postnominal letters are neither royal nor aristocratic? Comments like this just show the fundamental misunderstanding of the subject, particularly by people from countries that do not commonly use postnominals. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:12, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support As above, and also brings wikipedia into line with the practice and style of other encyclopedias. I think most readers do not expect, or want, this kind of clutter, which is often applied retrospectively and anachronistically to people in the past who did not actually use post-nominals. Celia Homeford (talk) 09:34, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support - particularly per Cullen. Parsecboy (talk) 23:39, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support per Cullen. Ealdgyth (talk) 23:49, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support - while POSTNOM, as currently written, allows only for significant honors and appointments, it is IMO frequently abused to justify post-nominals associated with fellowships, degrees, and memberships in certain groups, and not only in the lede. Such misapplication is often redundant within the same sentence where the membership is stated in prose. We don't allow religious honorifics like PBUH and given the misuse of the current policy, it might be worth not allowing any at all and spelling out the significant honors in prose as others have noted above. I am not against their usage in infoboxes as summaries of info within the article body. --FyzixFighter (talk) 15:32, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. Absolutely not. Commonwealth postnominals are a fundamental part of a person's style and are very commonly listed. I appreciate that people from countries that do not use them may not understand this and may not like them, but that's beside the point. Postnominals should be restricted to genuine (as opposed to made-up) postnominals for honours, fellowships and state-awarded appointments (like KC or JP) and only for countries that actually use them (that's mostly the Commonwealth). Infoboxes should never be a substitute for the lede and many articles do not even have infoboxes. And if the postnoms are bluelinked, as they should be, I see no confusion as some editors above have described. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:03, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
  • @Necrothesp: I respect the difference in opinion and only want to respond to your last point, as WP:EGG exists for a reason. Bluelinks alone aren't enough to ensure a reader's understanding. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 17:04, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
    • How does WP:EGG possibly apply to the expansion of abbreviations? -- Necrothesp (talk) 17:15, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
      • "Keep piped links as intuitive as possible", WP:EGG says, and something like FRSA is not intuitive to most readers. Hence, a link alone is not enough for a reader's understanding. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 17:35, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

        "FRSA" is the correct form of the postnominal and links to an article explaining what it stands for. This is completely unrelated to eggs or submarines, where an abbreviation, word, or phrase that means one thing is wikilinked to a different thing. Here, the link goes to the right place, not the wrong place. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:00, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support per nom. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:49, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support Coming to this from the perspective of someone who neither speaks English as a native language, nor was raised in an English culture context, I've always found things like Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, DL, FRS, RA an incomprehensible jumble of letters, distracting from the actually important bits at the start of the lede. Where post nominals are actually crucial for the notability of the person (for example, someone notable primary for a Victoria Cross), I'd expect them to be written out as prose. Where they are not, they can be left for the body and discussed there where relevant. -Ljleppan (talk) 16:52, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

  Those are the important bits at the start of the lead, and a VC winner will be introduced with the abbreviation. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:54, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

  The suggestion to write out "Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter" in place of "KG" in the lead is ridiculous and would contribute much more to WP:LEADCLUTTER than this proposal. Writing it "KG" in the lead, and expanding much later in the text that he was knighted in whatever year, is exactly the summarizing of later content that leads are supposed to do. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:03, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

  This is a bad read of my point, so let me write it out in more detail. My premise is that the lede, and especially the first sentence of the lede, has a single goal: to establish, as understandably as possible, the absolutely most vital biographic information about the article subject (name, when did they live, where were they geographically important) and their claim to fame, i.e. what is the very most important thing or two they are known for.

  For example, we write Sauli Väinämö Niinistö (born 24 August 1948) is a Finnish politician who has served as president of Finland since March 2012... or George Smith Patton Jr. (November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945) was a general in the United States Army... or Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice.. (I'd go as far as arguing that Churchill's lede should move the prime ministership closer to the name, as soldier is so vague).

  For almost any person-honor/award pair, that award itself is not the source of their fame/notability. We don't talk, at the start of the lede, about Niinistö's Grand Master and Commander Grand Cross with Collar of the Order of the White Rose of Finland, or about how Patton has the Grand Cross of the Military Order of the White Lion or, indeed, about how Churchill was a Knight of the Order of the Garter: those awards and honours are not those people's (main) claim to fame, and they are very high awards indeed.

  It is even more clear cut for lesser (in this context) awards, such as Churchill having the Territorial Decoration, Patton having the Legion of Merit or Niinistö having nine honorary doctorates. For all these things, appending them — as an incomprehensible soup of acronyms, none the less — to the subjects name in the very first sentence of the article highlights the less important, confuses the reader, and pushes the actual main claim to fame further and further down the article. They are, in my view, given WP:UNDUE weight in the first sentence of the lede.

  With that out of the way, there certainly are some cases where the honour/award, or rather the action that led to it, is the main claim to fame. These probably include those awarded with e.g. Victoria Cross or Medal of Honor or Mannerheim Cross. But even here, too, the actual post nominal is redundant for the first sentence of the article: we can simply write Robert Vaughan Gorle (6 May 1896 – 9 January 1937) was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross... without any need for the postnominal.

  And there will be some cases where the honours/awards are sufficiently important, in the context of the person's other accomplishments in life, that they warrant writing out in a subsequent sentence of the lede, but not in the first sentence. The practice of always writing out the post nominals immediately following the name ignores all nuance and considerations of dueness in preference for a notation that is horribly reader-unfriendly and more often than not highlights the (comparatively) unimportant, distracting from the crucial. Ljleppan (talk) 05:48, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Your claim For almost any person-honor/award pair, that award itself is not the source of their fame/notability turns out to be incorrect and false. For many people in academia in post-nominal-producing countries, in particular, and many of the post-nominals commonly used by those people in those countries, the post-nominal indicates being "an elected member of a highly selective and prestigious scholarly society or association" (e.g. FRS) for which membership is an automatic pass of our academic notability criteria. So putting it into the lead has the purpose, for those competent to read it, of clearly asserting the subject's notability. For those not already familiar with these abbreviations, the expanded form of the same recognition should be included later in the article text, of course, just like the expansion of other claims in the lead should be in the article text. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:34, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't see how this is any different from my example of Victoria Cross. Ljleppan (talk) 20:17, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) There's several further bad examples in the post-

  The Finish Award has postnominals but they are only used when writing in Finish., not in English.

  The Czech award has no postnominals, and even if it did, Patton being American wouldn't use such.

  The American awards mentioned have common abbreviations, not postnominals. They are NEVER used as postnominals.

  Honorary doctorates should never be worth mentioning in the lead unless it is somehow relevant to the persons notability and justification for having an article in the first place (ie Guiness World record holder for most honorary doctorates might be an exception).

  Gecko G (talk) 20:19, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  This misses my point so wildly I don't even know how to start addressing your comment, so I'll just leave it at saying... well, that. Ljleppan (talk) 20:37, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Our point is that your post has so many not relevant points that we don't see what point you are trying to make. So either A) you got sidetracked in making your point (happens to me all the time on wikipedia), or B) you misunderstand postnominals, or C) you have no point. I'm assuming good faith and that it is one of the first 2, but I don't know which (A or B). Care to attempt to make your argument again? Gecko G (talk) 20:44, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  My main argument flows as follows:

  1. The goal of the lede, and especially the start of the lede is to convey the most important biographical information
  2. Postnominals are primarily associated with honours/awards, while granted for notable things, are rather rarely the source of notability themselves. Yes, there are notable exceptions such as the Victoria Cross.
  3. Postnominal-awarding honours that are not the underlying source of notability are undue especially in the first sentence of the lede.
  4. Postnominal-awarding honours that are the underlying source of notability should in any case be written out in the first sentence of the lede, thus making the postnominal itself redundant.
  5. In both cases, postnominals are a poor method of conveying information in a general, global, encyclopedia.

  Regarding your A, B, and C, I'll just note that there's a certain set of further options you apparently didn't consider. But perhaps we'll just agree that a side conversation of increasingly snappy retorts is probably not useful here. Ljleppan (talk) 21:02, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  ok, thank you.

  I agree with #1.

  Number 2 is wrong.

  Numbers 3 through 5 don't take into account WP:ENGVAR nor various Wikipedia MoS's (and I further also personally disagree with #5, but that's not relevant).

  Postnominals are not primarily associated only with honours/awards. They are also connected with Fellowships (some relevant and important, some not, as discussed elsewhere), Academic Degrees, Professional Qualifications, and various religious things, and likely others that I'm unaware of due to my own ENGVAR.

  Different ENGVAR's put different importance's on those or use some, or none, or just different mixtures of them. For a global English language encyclopedia, Is the best practice not to use the ENGVAR that the individual whom the article is about would use, rather than forcing one particular ENGVAR onto everyone even when the subject themself would never use such? Gecko G (talk) 21:19, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I fail to see why you are making the distinction about academic fellowships etc. or how it somehow undermines my point. Either those postnominal-awarding fellowships/degrees/whatever are the primary underlying source of notability for the article subject, in which case they ought to the spelled out, or they are not and they are most likely undue at the start of the lede. Perhaps you, in turn, could spell the argument out more clearly. W/r/t ENGVAR, we already discourage other notational variations (see e.g. MOS:CRORE) that make articles more difficult to understand than necessary for a global audience. Ljleppan (talk) 21:29, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't see why you think that being sources of notability means that they need to be present in an expanded form in the lead. Leads are for summarizing briefly, not for expanding. If your argument is that they should be in an expanded form elsewhere than the lead, then yes, of course, but they should still be summarized in the lead. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:36, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  See MOS:INTRO, especially the second paragraph. Ljleppan (talk) 21:48, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  (edit conflict)I'm out of time right now, I will reply later. Gecko G (talk) 21:41, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Ok, back for a moment (not sure how long before I have to leave again).

  You asked me to spell out why I mentioned the various examples (ie Fellowships, professions, etc.)- I did it to specifically refute your point #2, they are examples showing that they are not only nor primarily associated solely with Honors.

  MOS:CRORE is about number formats just like the American vs European number format of 1,234.56 vs 1.234,56 or vs. the Indic numerals so I fail to see the relevance (and really I'd argue that "Crore" is more of a translation issue, like using the archaic but correct "score", though admittedly that can be a blurry line distinction - but expounding upon that could result in a not-relevant side discussion, so I won't go into that unless you feel it's particularly relevant).

  In your above reply to David Eppstein about the second paragraph under MOS:INTRO you may have the germination of an argument, but it's a weak one (One vague broad sentence of an MOS may be interpreted to partially conflict with much more topic specific MOS's elsewhere - I would always go with the more specific instructions over the broad, general ones).

  If you think that only something 100% relevant to establishing notability guidelines should be in the lead - and I'm not sure if that's where you are in fact going with this, but if you are, then this conversation is merging into that which I have discussed elsewhere in this section, so rather than repeating myself and risking fracturing the discussion thread I would instead refer you to some of the various arguments below. (If that is not the point you are building to, then ignore this last part).

  Gecko G (talk) 23:37, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  As I said, you are free to mentally append fellowships, professions, etc. into my argument and explain how the underlying argument regarding dueness and redundancy is affected. Second, fellowships are, in my view closer to honours/awards than professions, and e.g. the first sentence of Fellow of the Royal Society seems to agree. Third, WP:POSTNOM already limits the use of postnominals, excluding [a]cademic (including honorary) degrees and professional qualifications, which should be omitted from the lead, so I don't see the point of going on about professions. W/r/t the MOS and more specific instructions over the broad, general ones, the MOS is absolutely filled with language highlighting how important it is that the lede is easily understandable. See both paras of MOS:INTRO and MOS:LEADSENTENCE regarding clarity; MOS:REDUNDANCY regarding redundancy and MOS:LEADREL regarding due weight. Yes, these are high-level principles, which is precisely the point of this discussion: many members of the community appear to believe the "more specific instructions" clash with the fundamentals, and it is the "more specific instructions" that should be adjusted so as to be in sync with the fundamentals rather than the other way around. PS, reading WP:ENGVAR with fresh eyes, I don't see what part of that this would fall under, as it talks about vocabulary, spelling and grammar rather than dueness of information. Ljleppan (talk) 06:40, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  As I said..." Where did you say that? That may perhaps significantly change and clarify my understanding of the argument you are attempting to make.

  I went and read all 4 of your linked MOS's, and other than perhaps an extreme technicality with MOS:BOLDAVOID, I don't see any reason in any of them to omit postnominals unless one is a die hard republican ("republican" in the anti-monarchist sense, not the American political sense) and even then that would itself be WP:UNDO and based on the false connection that all postnominals are monarchical honours (as myself and others have pointed out, but every time we do you just question why we are mentioning non-monarchical examples).

  Favoring overly broad Wikipedia wide guidelines (which have to be vague enough to be used for all kinds of things, Articles about historical events, about physics concepts, about work of art, inventions, places, political movements, etc., etc., not just Biographies) over that of more specifically narrow guidelines (i.e. just WP:Biographies, let alone very specific subsections of the later) is illogical to me, especially when the later were developed within the context and under the overview of the former.

  Regarding your ENGVAR comments, I am once again surprised that is being brought up (as mentioned elsewhere it seems obvious to me), but I'll refer you to the exchange further down between Mitch Ames & Tcr25, rather than repeating my own comments from there. Gecko G (talk) 00:09, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose They will not appear in the article body; the article body will list them as they are earned, but usually they will not all come together until the end. The whole purpose of the lead is to summarise the contents of the body, and the post-nominals do that. Putting them in prose in the lead is absurd. Commonwealth postnominals are a fundamental part of a person's style and often appear on monuments and documents. Infoboxes are not a substitute for the lead and many articles do not, nor are they required to, have them. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:54, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

  postnominals are a fundamental part of a person's style — no more so than prefixes such as The Most Honourable, ... Her Majesty, His Holiness, etc, which MOS:PREFIX explicitly says should not be included. Mitch Ames (talk) 00:35, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  A more accurate comparison would be to pre-nominal titles like sir and dame, which per MOS:SIR are included in the initial reference and infobox heading for the subject of a biographical article. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 00:47, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose They contribute to providing a concise overview and summary of the person. I would hope (expect?) the awards will be discussed in the body with context, although that could be just a sentence. I would not oppose a limit on the # of post-noms to include in the lead (and maybe even the infobox) to address the cases where someone's got an arm's length of 'em like the Churchill example above.  — Archer1234 (t·c) 01:27, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose particularly per Tcr25 & Archer1234's reasonings. If this was the Simple English Wikipedia I would instead support, but here oppose. Though not a thing in American English, my understanding is these are very important in other English's and even some none English languages (ie Portuguese, Swedish, etc.). I could understand placing a limit on what to include or not (like the prior discussion about Fellowships, which never really reached a satisfactory conclusion), or a maximum number to include, or issues like only including certain types (ie should Order of Saint John be included?, etc.). If, conversely everything is going to be excluded then the prenominal stuff like "Sir" should also be dropped and then that would run into issues of how do we name articles about people's who's name includes titles, ie William, Prince of Wales. Further, if there was a reader who doesn't understand postnominals, I would think having it only in the infobox would lead them to the assumption that the string of letters was article vandalism - whereas if it's on both the lead and the infobox that should give such an unaware reader at least reason to wonder if something else was going on, and hover over the links to see, and thus learn as I did the first time encountering such many many many years ago. Gecko G (talk) 02:11, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  If ... everything is going to be excluded then the prenominal stuff like "Sir" should also be dropped — I would support such a change. I've never been a fan of (MOS:SIR) including "Sir", "Lady" and the like; I don't see that they are any more special than other honorifics.

  issues of how do we name articles about people's who's name includes titles, ie William, Prince of Wales — I think they are fundamentally different, in that "Prince of Wales" here is a disambiguator - there are many Williams, but only one Prince of Wales. Mitch Ames (talk) 02:25, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would support dropping the prenominals from lead sentences too. Readers who aren't familiar with such stuff might think "Sir", for example, is a part of the subject's birth/legal name, especially when Sir is bolded and is not wikilinked to anything else. Pre-nominal and post-nominal letters are better left for infoboxes; see Winston Churchill's infobox, for example. Some1 (talk) 04:51, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  (replying to both): At least removing absolutely everything would be consistent, but now you are talking about modifying several MOS's (not just 1) and violating WP:ENGVAR. On the other extreme, including every single minor fellowship or academic degree would also be consistent but is clearly way too much (WP:LEADCLUTTER, WP:UNDUE, etc.). So there obviously needs to be a middle ground somewhere (a cut off in importance/quality and/or number?). I would argue that removing all postnominals is way too severe to place the middle ground at, especially since I don't find the arguments about confusion relevant when the proposed alternative (as mentioned in posts above, not in either of your two's posts) would be even more confusing. I think our current de-facto placement of the cut-off is good (ie leaving out lesser fellowships and the religious one's when not relevant, leaving out most academic degree achievements, etc., etc.) but could definitely be better clarified in the MOS, but as I'm a native speaker of an ENGVAR that only ever uses a select few postnominals so I would put more faith on the input from native speakers of ENGVARs which use more postnom's than my own to try to succinctly phrase that short enough to be included in an MOS. Basically I understand it, but am bad at explaining it because it's not something in my native dialect. Gecko G (talk) 20:07, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  now you are talking about modifying several MOS's (not just 1) — Obviously a separate specific RFC would be required, but there's no reason why we could not modify other parts of MOS (given appropriate consensus). It is not unknown for a proposed specific change to be shown to be a specific instance of a more general change that should be considered.

  violating WP:ENGVAR — Several posts have mentioned ENVAR, but I don't think this comes under ENGVAR at all. ENGVAR is about differences in vocabulary, spelling, grammar, date formats, not the importance of honorifics. Can someone quote the specific part of ENGVAR (or Comparison of American and British English) that they think applies here? Mitch Ames (talk) 03:49, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's not that WP:ENGVAR directly applies to postnominals, but that a similar principal is at play. Articles from some nations may have a different style than otherwise similar articles because of which orthography, date format, measurement system, etc., is used in that nation. A similar strong national tie is at play with the use of post-nominals and some countries (particularly the Commonwealth). The counter argument would be to think of postnominals as similar to MOS:CRORE; there's a strong national tie, but their use requires extra care and explanation because many readers will find them confusing. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 20:53, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  If you are going to change multiple long established wiki standards that affects thousands of articles (including what I'm assuming are hundreds of articles that have reached high quality reviewed status {GA, Featured, etc.}, thus would need to be all reassessed), there better be some very good arguments, none of which I'm yet hearing.

  If your stance is that a lead should be either 100% all or nothing (as discussed here and elsewhere), while I disagree, I can at least understand such a position IF editors are both upfront about that (I fear some editors are trying to piecemeal introduce it on unrelated issues) and are consistant with the stated all or nothing.

  I notice that several of the editors here have independently made the connection to ENGVAR issues, and once again Tcr25 ssays it far better than I am able to, but I would further note that it seems obvious to me so I'm surprised that would even be questioned. Parts of it might even fall under the MOS:TIES part of ENGVAR since they are country specific (the OLY postnominal being the only international exception I can think of- but even there countries that don't use postnoms at all wouldn't use OLY either). Wikipedia's own articles on both postnominals and list of post-nominal letters even break things down by different english speaking countries. Different countries use differnt types of postnominals, some use more or less than other countries, or different categories, or order them separately. If you look up biography or style guides from different countries, you'll see differences (I even came across one at one point, I think it was an Australian government one, that suggested postnominals should even be used when speaking! that seems like ridicoulous overkill to me, but I'm not Aussie so I don't feel qualified to say otherwise).

  Gecko G (talk) 00:02, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  To turn it around, you could think of it as leading us down the path towards an expansion of WP:ENGVAR to include how different areas view post-nominals. Gusfriend (talk) 07:58, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would of thought it was obvious, but given that 2 editors have questioned it, perhaps so. Gecko G (talk) 22:08, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

• Hesitant support, in favo(u)r of some alternative: I understand this is often important info for some people (subjects and readers alike), so I am not averse to keeping it, but I wouldn't be sad to see it leave the lead sentence. Perhaps we want to allow/recommend a separate section or sentence at the end of a lede? Something like The formal style for him is "Sir John Grey Gorton GCMG, AC, CH" or The formal address for the prime minister is "The Honourable Anthony Albanese MP" (or whatever would be actually correct). Royal folk like Elizabeth II would still have their section like Titles, styles, honours, and arms, since for them, the topic is too extensive for the lede anyway. MOS:POSTNOM should continue to proscribe academic postnoms like "Ph.D" (and MOS:CREDENTIAL things like "Dr."). — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 09:30, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Comment I think post-nominal letters are generally lede worthy. I'm less sure that they're first-sentence worthy, and I can see the point that they might pile up and create an alphabet soup. An end-of-lede sentence along the lines of "She is formally styled..." may be a decent option in some cases. On the one hand, extra short paragraphs stuck at the end of ledes are, I think, generally frowned upon. On the other, such a line might flow naturally in the prose ("In recognition of these accomplishments, she has received many accolades, and so her formal style is..."). I'm not sure. XOR'easter (talk) 14:35, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. I'm not finding the arguments that postnominals are confusing or vague convincing, which leaves the main argument being either they clutter the lede or WP:IDONTLIKE. To a degree I think this is similar to MOS:ENGVAR or MOS:DATEVAR. In the Commonwealth, postnominals like VC are more frequently seen, understood, and accepted. Elsewhere, they seem superfluous or confusing. It may be that more specific guidance around how many postnominals are too many is needed (currently, MOS:POSTNOM says: When an individual holds a large number of post-nominal letters or seldom uses them (common among heads of state and members of royal families), they should be omitted from the lead, and the titles only described in the main body of the article.), but I'm not seeing a good reason to get rid of them entirely. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:41, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Oppose. I find Carter's explanation here pretty much sums up what I wanted to say. Half-a-dozen post-nominal letters are no more intrusive than a middle name and can be quickly skipped by people who aren't interested. The template that hyperlinks the letters to the full names of the honours easily allows people who are interested but unfamiliar to learn what the honours are.

  I would also contrast post-nominal letters with peerages, which are many words long and often obscure the person's more commonly-known pre-peerage name. --Mgp28 (talk) 15:25, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support as a matter of WP:DUE weight. The first sentence should communicate the most fundamental, essential aspects of the topic. For a person, that would generally be, when and where did they live, and what sort of activities or accomplishments are they most notable for. The lead of Stephen Hawking (which is used as an example at MOS:POSTNOM) mostly hews to this ideal. If you needed to explain who Stephen Hawking was to someone who had never heard of him in the briefest possible terms, the points you would hit on are more or less what's in the lead sentence. Theoretical physicist. Writer. English. Died recently. Cambridge University. The element of the lead that sticks out as something you would not mention is the "CH CBE FRS FRSA". I can easily name a dozen aspects of Hawking which are not mentioned in the lead sentence and which are far more salient. And I'm not just saying this as a matter of opinion - I think that claim can be supported by RS. RS coverage of Hawking surely gives more weight to, say, his popular science writing, or his work on black holes, or his disability than it does to his formal titles. Colin M (talk) 15:22, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  The same argument could be made about the appropriateness of including a middle name in the lead sentence when the person and RS coverage do not commonly include it. To use this example, you would say "Stephen Hawking" when talking about him, not "Stephen William Hawking", but per MOS:FULLNAME "William" is included in the first sentence regardless of what weight RS give to his middle name. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 17:35, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I again find myself agreeing with Tcr25. For Stephen Hawking, how is his middle name being William, the fact that he was born on January 8th, or the fact that he was English, relevant by your argument, yet those are included in his lead sentence and all are typically included. Likewise you mentioned that there are several more salient aspects (ie his disability isn't even mentioned until the second paragraph, yet it's very well connected to what people commonly know about him). The lead sentence is never either 100% everything or 100% nothing. And given that we are dealing with different WP:ENGVAR's it can quickly get confusing, but since there aren't separate wikipedia's for each ENGVAR, we use the ENGVAR the individual would use. Gecko G (talk) 20:39, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't disagree with any of that. I don't think exact dates of birth and death should go in the lead most of the time, and would be happy to see them moved to the body (though they can stay in the infobox). The same goes for middle names which are not usually included in RS. I even wrote a mini-essay related to the latter problem. Colin M (talk) 21:08, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  ok, then see my above reply to Mitch Ames & Some1, as you are in the same boat. Gecko G (talk) 21:23, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

  Noooooo! At my estimate (a pure guess), about half the views of biographies come from people wanting this and only this. You don't think most people actually read them, do you? Johnbod (talk) 04:51, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  the appropriateness of including a middle name in the lead sentence when the person and RS coverage do not commonly include it. — As with dates of birth, one primary reason for including it is that is part of unique identity. A common way (in formal/official scenarios in real life) of distinguishing between two otherwise identically named people is by middle name, and/or date of birth. I might distinguish between John Henry Smith and John Joseph Smith, or possibly John Smith born 1970-01-01 and John Smith born 1981-02-03, but rarely if ever (possibly in some very specific cases) would I distinguish between John Smith AO, John Smith MBE, and John Smith (with no post-nominals). Mitch Ames (talk) 04:17, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm not from a country that uses much postnoms, but don't some of those countries consider postnoms "part of uique identity"? As for middle names, if they are only for distinquishing between two similar things, aren't disambiguators supposed to be used only if necessary? How is that consistent with a 100% (as discussed & defined elsewhere here) stance? Gecko G (talk) 00:05, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  don't some of those countries consider postnoms "part of uique identity"? — Not the I'm aware of. It's common (in Australia) to request "full legal name" and date of birth, but I've never had anyone (or any form) ask for postnominals. Even the Australian passport does not have a space for postnominals, suggesting that they are not part of identity for other countries. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:17, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would caution against trying to link the, possibly fictitious concept of a "legal Name" with "Identity". Different governmental authorities don't even agree what is and is not part of one's "legal name" (as just one example The US Social Security administration omits both middle names and suffixes from "legal name"), and even when you just substitute "legal name" with "birth name" that can cause problems if trying to forcibly link one with the other (ie Cassius Clay vs. Muhammad Ali, or trans issues of identities, to name just 2 examples off the top of my head)

  Given most citizens have no postnominals I wouldn't expect a government form's lack of a separate entry spot as proof (people worthy of having a biography article are more likely to have postnominals than some random citizen). I also don't see how one particular countries lack of such a form spot for postnominals means that other countries that make more usage of postnominals don't use them more. Postnominal usage varies, even just within the Commonwealth (ie compare Tanzania with Belize with Britain with etc., etc.) let alone outside the Commonwealth.

  A quick websearch finds one example, [#26 on this guide from the Canadian Defence Department] saying postnominals should be used in, specifically, Biographies. That's just one quickly found example, I would expect similar could be found for other countries.

  Gecko G (talk) 22:07, 12 March 2023 (UTC)

  I also don't see how one particular countries lack of such a form spot for postnominals means that other countries ... don't use them more. — I'm not saying that other countries don't use them; I'm saying that other countries do not require then as part of official identity. (My original point - in response to "the appropriateness of including a middle name [and/or DOB] in the lead" - was that middle names and date of birth can be part of your unique/official/legal identity, but postnominals are not, hence middle names and date of birth (DOB) are fundamentally different to postnominals.) I gave the specific example of the passport application form because the passport is used by countries other than the issuer. If other countries considered postnomimals to be part of unique/legal/official identity then the passport issuing country would probably include them in the passport (as they include middle names and DOB) because the other countries would want to know about them.

  Reiterating: I'm not say that postnominals are not important - just that middle names and DOB are fundamentally different to postnominals because the former are commonly part of unique/legal/official identity, but the latter are not. Mitch Ames (talk) 06:07, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

  What goes on/into a passport is at the discretion of the issuing country (within certain minimal International norms), so I don't see how that helps your line of reasoning w.r.t. Identity, nor do I see how it in any way undermines any of my points raised above.

  For the sake of argument, If country A uses them as part of "identity" (problematic per above, but for the sake of trying to understand the subpoint you are making let's temporarily go with it), and Country B doesn't, why would the fact that Country B's application form lacks a spot for it somehow be relevant "proof" that they aren't used in Country A? I'm afraid I don't follow (and we may be starting to get very off topic). Gecko G (talk) 07:06, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

  From the Passport article, with my emphasis:

  A passport ... contains a person's identity. ... It is typical for passports to contain the full name, photograph, place and date of birth...

  There's no mention of postnominals. The absence of postnominals isn't intended to be "proof" that another country doesn't use them; it's intended to support my original assertion that middle names and DOB are fundamentally different to postnomimals. Middle names and DOB are commonly and globally used as part of a person's unique identifiers - they are part of the minimal International norms of a "person's identity" and thus included on passports - whereas postnominals are not part of those international norms, and not so commonly used to uniquely identify ("disambiguate", in the real world) people with otherwise identical names. Mitch Ames (talk) 11:43, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

  Ok, I think I might now slightly better understand the sub-point you are arguing (though I still disagree) and I still find it unconvincing to the larger issue for the multiple reasons raised previously. Gecko G (talk) 18:27, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose: I had an instinctive dislike of the proposal but couldn't think of how to articulate it until I read WP:ENGVAR in the discussions above. I suspect that it comes down to commonwealth countries. It would be interesting to see the numbers of the different countries in Template:Post-nominals. Gusfriend (talk) 21:52, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

It looks like the template supports 21 countries — Antigua, Australia, Barbados, Belgium, Brunei, Canada, Fiji, Germany, Ghana, Hong Kong, India, Jamaica, Kenya, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sweden, United Kingdom, and United States — but (in a spot check of Category:Pages using Template:Post-nominals with customized linking) there are instances from other countries where the template is used too. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 22:38, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

My guess is that usage is concentrated in Commonwealth countries which would give weight to the argument that it is like WP:ENGVAR. Gusfriend (talk) 22:49, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

I also wanted to say that, at least in Australia, post-nominals are included as part of the name on plaques, statues and the like which means that it is in a certain sort of common usage.

The more that I think about it the more that I think that the topic deserves a more nuanced RfC taking into account national usage and preferences in a wider forum. Gusfriend (talk) 02:47, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

• Stong Oppose, but support enforcing the existing policy, with only really important ones in the lead. I think there is an ENGVAR-type issue here. If Americans wanted no post-noms in the first sentence of American bios that might be fine, and not make much difference. America doesn't use post-noms for many things like gallantry decorations, where Commonwealth countries very much do. Plus who is going to do the massive work involved in removing them, & putting them in the right place? Johnbod (talk) 04:51, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose, seems like taking a side on a cultural divide. Skyerise (talk) 17:05, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose -- I have a great deal of respect for the OP and several of the supporters, who I've worked with at MilHist and FAC, but as others have pointed out this does seem to be dividing roughly (I emphasise roughly) along cultural lines. Post-noms are a Commonwealth convention rather than an American one but we don't try and ram one English language style across all articles. Also regarding an earlier comment that they are a feature of aristocracy and privilege, I can say that the vast majority -- probably all -- of the relevant subjects for which I've written WP bios were working- or middle-class people doing deeds above and beyond the call of duty. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 19:24, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Strong oppose - Yes, the postnominals are unwieldy in the lead sentences, but the same could be said about the middle names too. They are a fundamental part in understanding who that person is and what they did. The worst inconvenience in inclusion is maybe an extra half-second of scanning the lead text, but the benefits in inclusion outweigh the pros in removal. We provide links to the relevant articles so that "laypeople" can understand them; the point of an encyclopaedia is to teach, not to withhold information for fears it may confuse people. Necrothesp also makes good points. Tim O'Doherty (talk) 22:16, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose "the opening paragraph of a biographical article should neutrally describe the person, provide context, establish notability and explain why the person is notable, and reflect the balance of reliable sources" If you are playing that statement of guidelines post-nominals it equally applies to long names like those who have 4 middles names. You may as well "trim" Akon's full name in the lead since he is not notable for it. Post-nominals and their full name are essentially in defining the subject in a formal tone.  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 02:04, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

  The problems I have with Post-nominals and their full name are essentially in defining the subject in a formal tone. (beyond not agreeing with it from the first principles) is that I don't understand why the same argument wouldn't apply to all other similar components often attached to names, such as academic titles, other honorifics, etc. Our manual of style takes a very strong, almost categorical, stance that these should not be included. Is your position that these standards should be relaxed to allow for further variation base on where the subject hails from? If not, perhaps you could help me see why these particular attachments to the legal name are distinct.

  As for Akon, I'd actually agree that the first sentence of the lede there is not very informative. In fact, I don't see the name the artist is commonly known with ("Akon") anywhere in the lede, which seems like a rather massive oversight. Ljleppan (talk) 04:43, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

  What academic titles are you referring to specifically? As in professor or something else? We cannot fit everything in to a lead sentence but post nominals are part of someone's name in a full formal context, if that also includes academic titles as well then yes I may well consider it but I would need specfics as to what you mean exactly. Things like professor at X university are typically in the lead sentence anyway.  Spy-cicle💥  ^Talk? 21:31, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  (It looks like Akon has been fixed ...) The difference I would see between VC, OBE, etc., and an academic title like Dipl.-Ing. or PhD is that the honor is earned in a way that is different and more notable/less common than the earning of the academic degree/title. Consider John Smith VC as an example: earning the Victoria Cross meets WP:ANYBIO; if he'd earned a PhD in economics instead, that alone would not be enough to support an article on John Smith PhD. Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 16:16, 13 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support. I agree with Colin M. Continuing with the illustrative example of Stephen Hawking, it is clear that the overwhelming majority of sources do not introduce him as CH CBE FRS FRSA (e.g. [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15]), irrespective of whether the sources are British or from some other country – ENGVAR has nothing to do with it. In any case, decisions about the relative prominence of content within an article must be rooted in WP:NPOV and the practice of sources. Typical sources mention him being a fellow of the Royal Society etc. several paragraphs down, at the earliest, and do so without giving blanket greater weight to those honours, awards, etc. that happen to officially have letters than to comparably significant ones which don't. Adumbrativus (talk) 05:18, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

  The BBC one is a timeline not either a biography nor an obituary. Here's a BBC example biography that does include postnominals [Russell T. Davies OBE], and here's another Dr. Who producer's biography who had an OBE listed at another site: [Verity Lambert OBE], or a [John Hurt CBE obituary at Pancreatic Cancer UK Charity] and his CBE was for Drama, nothing to due with Cancer - I need to get away from Doctor Who connections, so [Keira Knightly OBE at Any Biography] a biography website. In other arts beyond TV how about [a ballet dancer with both a CH & a DBE], outside the arts and outside Britain [Here's an Encyclopedia entry with an Australian example that includes a fellowship], Here's even [An American example properly utilizing religious postnominals in an obituary in a secular newspaper] - And America uses very few postnoms! Gecko G (talk) 06:51, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support postnominal awards are commonly non-defining, it looks clunky, it's not how RS typically refer to the article subject in the vast majority of cases. I don't see how ENGVAR enters into the discussion since regardless of the country postnominals are not commonly listed in RS. This makes it unlike titles such as royalty, popes, Sir/Dame which this proposal does not concern. Buidhe public (talk) 07:40, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
• I am loosely supportive of the principle of the proposal - postnominal lines can indeed get a bit cluttered - but I would not want to make it an absolute rule that they are always removed. Encouraging them to be used more carefully and selectively seems worthwhile. In particular, I think for cases where someone has one single specific honour that is virtually defining - we have a lot of articles that were written because someone had recieved the VC or was made FRS - then it seems reasonable to have that one as a single postnominal. I agree that for someone like Hawking or Churchill, FRS among a long line of imposing things is less critical, but for someone where it's the only thing listed I would be much more hesitant to remove it. There may also be an issue of how they were actually used by the subject - if they made a point of using them, having them in the lead seems more defensible. Andrew Gray (talk) 23:16, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

  On reading the proposal again, I'm also a little unclear what this means - "WP:POSTNOM would advise that post-nominals be placed in the body of the article". I can agree that the award should be listed in the body of the article - it certainly shouldn't be in the lead without it! - but presumably it would actually be spelled out, "Smith became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1986", and not "Smith recieved the postnominals FRS in 1986". The postnominals themselves wouldn't be in the article proper unless we have some very clunky wording or they happen to coincide with the award (eg something like the OBE which is commonly abbreviated that way). Not quite sure I can see how this would work in a straightforward way. Andrew Gray (talk) 23:20, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Andrew Gray: If someone is primarily notable for an award/appointment/etc. that carries a post-nominal, e.g. winning the Victoria Cross, wouldn't we explictly state that in the lead sentences anyway? :-) To your second comment, that's just clunky wording on my part. I meant that the reason for the post-nominals would be mentioned in the article body, not that they had to specifically kept in post-nominal form. A better wording for this can be worked out if the RfC concludes with support for the proposal. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 23:50, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

  @The ed17 I think for the VC, yes (most of our VC articles still lead off with the same boilerplate sentence, now I think about it...) but explicitly mentioning it in the lead seems much less common for FRS, I think - at least the ones I've sampled. I guess it varies in different contexts. Andrew Gray (talk) 00:00, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose, per Necrothesp and Hawkeye7. They're part of a person's formal style and have a similar standing to the titles described at MOS:SIR, which for the avoidance of doubt I also oppose deprecating. For stylistic consistency, editors should be encouraged to display post-nominals using the {{post-nominals}} template. XAM2175 ^(T) 16:58, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
• Comment I personally don't find the post-nominals intuitive, but I also don't see any strong reason to get rid of them. I mostly just skip over them. My question is, if we're going to include these, why don't we also include advanced degrees? Those are also, to use David Eppstein's formulation, "part of the string that you write when you address someone in a formal-enough context". --Trovatore (talk) 17:10, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  As discussed above, the line can't be to 100% include everything nor to 100% exclude everything, so the line has to be drawn somewhere. But where? Things like advanced academic degrees (PhD, etc.), certain Professional qualifications (MD, EUR ING, etc.), religious postnoms, and various fellowships (seems they fall into 2 categories- one is notable, the other not) all fall, for me, in the "gray area" where there's reasonable arguments both for and against inclusion. Given that competing, reasonable arguments exist on where within the gray zone to draw the line, any such future RFC on that would likely not be fruitful.

  However, this proposal for removing postnominals entirely is well outside any such gray area and I've not heard a single argument here in nearly 6 weeks of discussion that is even slightly convincing. These discussions are supposed to be about working towards compromises and changing minds, and usually after partaking in these long and detailed debates (outside of times when I'm partaking as a diplomat/moderator role) my final stance shifts more towards the middle of the controversy by the end, but in 6 weeks of this particular one I've only become more convinced in my opposition to the proposal. I am rapidly loosing interest in spending any further time on it since neither side seems to be making any progress (ie no one has changed their stance). If this was an actual RFC I would of called for the discussion to be closed well before now (And I'm usually the one complaining that RFC's get closed too soon!). Gecko G (talk) 18:17, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

References

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.

Question of pronoun use for nonbinary non-caring

Granted, I made up that classification because I don't know what the correct classification is but that is the pith of my question. How should we best handle the pronouns of those that have expressly admitted that they don't care?

For us to not care in the article makes a mess of things and can cause confusion in reading the article.

For us to enforce a pronoun against the expressed desires of the subject seems disrespectful.

Do we litter the article with "(he/she) said" or "s/he said"? Do we default to "they" (despite the desires of the subject)? Padillah (talk) 13:16, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

• If the subject has not stated a preference, follow the sources. Note - not any one specific source … you need to look at the pronouns used in aggregate by lots of sources. Blueboar (talk) 14:39, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
  • I'd largely second this. The only thing I'd add—and this is strictly hypothetical, but so is your question :) —is that we should be careful to distinguish between "a subject not caring what pronouns others use to describe that subject" and "a subject not expressing a gender self-identification." I.e., there's a distinction between "I go by he/him, but I don't really care if people call me she/her" (in which case the article should use "he/him" pronouns) and "I have absolutely no preference as to my pronouns."--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:13, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

    My apologies for not making clear:

    • The subject has explicitly expressed that they don't care what pronouns are used.
    • This is not hypothetical. This is in direct response to Chris Tyson and their lack of interest in their own pronouns.

    Padillah (talk) 16:58, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

    • My mistake! I misread the "made up that classification" as implying the issue hadn't presented itself. So, assuming no preference as to pronouns has been made, then I'd say combine -sche and Blueboar's suggestions. If the article is already one thing, consider leaving it in place, but if a clear majority of reliable sources use another, switch to that. (By default, I realize that approach is likely to leave assigned-at-birth pronouns for people who transition, but if they're genuinely declining to self-identify and, instead, saying they prefer any pronouns, then I think "leave it as is" makes the most sense.)--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 17:16, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

      @Jerome Frank Disciple: In case of Chris Tyson all RS, from what I've seen, use they/them. (see my responses at Talk:Chris Tyson)

      Also, what do you think of the notion that what Tyson's pronounces is doing should be treated as a neopronoun (to me it seems to be in that spirit), which would warrant they/them usage under MOS:NEOPRONOUN. I think in a situation where there wasn't a clear or unanimous usage in RS then NEOPRONOUN might be best to follow, which would result in they/them usage. Though, that is getting into the hypothetical. Iamreallygoodatcheckers ^talk 19:57, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

      @Iamreallygoodatcheckers:—if that's the case, I'd probably follow that! (Don't want to imply I'm somehow an authority on the subject, but I think my "proposed" solution of "in case of no preference: keep as is unless a clear majority of articles use certain pronouns" rule would endorse "they/them" if all of them do. :) ) As to the neopronoun issue ... I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you twice in one thread. I don't think I have enough subject-matter familiarity to give an informed response. It doesn't strike me as entirely unreasonable—in my experience, the "generally keep the article as is" rules can create cycles of edit warring—I remember, way back, there used to be frequent bouts over American/British spellings. "In case of no preference, use 'they/them'" certainly might be a cleaner approach!--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 13:02, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

(e/c) In the past, when it's come up that someone is fine with any pronouns and has no preference between the pronoun people had been using and some other pronouns, articles I'm aware of have kept using whichever of he or she they had been using (there being no reason to change), e.g. Rebecca Sugar's article uses she (and has a footnote that she uses either she or they). As discussed on her article's talk page, some people think all nonbinary people use they, but that's not always the case. In the case that prompted this, someone was referred to as he pre-transition, came out as gender non-conforming and said any pronouns were fine. If we were to speculate about the WP:FUTURE, then given that the person is on HRT I wouldn't be surprised if the person later expresses a preference for she or they — starting out with "any pronouns are OK" to be as accommodating as possible, and later realizing and expressing that only one specific pronoun is right, is a common trajectory. But that's something we can accommodate if it happens; right now, the person has said "any pronouns" are fine, the person's friends have kept using he, and sources have either used he, used they, or avoided pronouns. One editor interprets GENDERID as recommending they/them. I don't see that it recommends any change at this time. -sche (talk) 17:01, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

@-sche: with due respect to your response, I'm not aware of any sources that use he/him in regards to Tyson. Iamreallygoodatcheckers ^talk 19:58, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Of the seven articles I could find (that were not other wikis or pure fan pages) four of them use he/him.

The biggest issue I have in defending this is the lack of RS coverage. I'm beginning to think this point is moot when compared to the notability of the subject. As far as I can tell (from a quick Google) Chirs is notable for being on MrBeast and being trans. For WP that's not enough. @-scheand @Iamreallygoodatcheckers you have both posted your opinions, both here and on the talk page, let's give others a chance to weigh in and develop this discussion. Padillah (talk) 13:18, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Should nationality be included in the lead sentence?

We need to find a better formulation for opening sentences. The first sentence should focus on what makes the person notable… and in most cases the person’s nationality is a secondary characteristic, not what makes them notable. Most people are primarily known for being an academic, or a singer, or a business man (etc)… not an American academic, or a British singer, or a German business man. Blueboar (talk) 12:46, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia, like most encyclopedia, has already decided that nationality is important to convey up front. This is a totally separate discussion which should not be attached to my RfC. Start your own RfC about it. I'm changing the heading and heading level. To differentiate your tag-on from the my question. Pretty sure this is a non-starter, but hey, go for it! Skyerise (talk) 13:25, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

I think it’s common sense that national identity is intrinsic to who someone is as a human being, not their job. Trillfendi (talk) 14:21, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

If nothing else, the discussions currently visible on this page should make it clear that there is no clear consensus among editors what national identity means. Some editors assume that the relevant national identity for BLPS is always, or nearly always, represented by a national citizenship (and this is clearly the case in some instances - such as members of national football teams - where citizenship is directly tied to Notability). Other editors are more interested in following the sources, and the sources will often frame BLP subjects in more varied ways, emphasizing region or territory rather than Westaphalian state, and sometimes invoking national identities that may, for example, include Indigineity.

Some editors seem comfortable to exclude WP:V information, such as birthplace, from the lead section while being equally comfortable making what amount to WP:SYNTH assertions about nationality (assuming that someone who has lived somewhere for a while must have citizenship or permanent residency and have thus acquired a "national identity", for example). Some editors hold to a Westaphalian principle in most cases while not seeing the treatment of UK subjects (for whom the specification of English, Welsh or Scottish nationality is typically required even for non-footballers) may reflect a practice relevant in the case of other multinational states.

So I might personally agree that national identity is typically a defining characteristic for most contemporary living people, but that personal opinion doesn't help guide in (1) deciding how a person's national identity should be determined and (2) deciding what level of source support is required for inclusion of this information in the lead paragraph. Newimpartial (talk) 15:08, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

deciding what level of source support is required for inclusion of this information in the lead paragraph: At a minimum, it must be verifiable. —Bagumba (talk) 05:38, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

For the reasons laid out by Newimpartial and Blueboar, we really need to pay attention to how sources describe the subject and follow suit accordingly. If RS do not emphasize an individual's nationality, neither should we. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 15:19, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

In answer to the question: in most cases, no. Place of birth can be obtained from the infobox and body. If nationality is more complicated than that, the details can be provided in the body and (per 'lead summarises body') summarised in the lead if appropriate. There can't be many people who are notable for their nationality and we enter a quagmire with identification by region/people/religion, etc... taking it out of the opening is a clean solution. EddieHugh (talk) 18:03, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't really find the argument that nationality/citizenship doesn't tell the reader important information about the individual's notability. On the contrary, it usually conveys where the person is/was notable. Saying a German business man can convey geographic information about the subject as well as just the citizenship/nationality. TulsaPoliticsFan (talk) 23:59, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

The MOS:CONTEXTBIO guideline reads:

The opening paragraph should usually provide context for the activities that made the person notable. In most modern-day cases, this will be the country, region, or territory, where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident; or, if the person is notable mainly for past events, where the person was a citizen, national, or permanent resident when the person became notable.

It seems the de facto standard to achieve this has been to state nationality in the lead sentence.—Bagumba (talk) 02:01, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Except that country, region, or territory doesn't necessarily equate to where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident. The second part seems to mean almost exclusively Westphalian state, which would equate only to country. There are many cases where the region or territory may be more pertinent to identity and notability than country. See the prior example about Carles Puigdemont or the arguments on this page about Wilma Mankiller and whether or not tribal citizenship trumps Westphalian state citizenship. In some cases, nationality may not be directly relevant to their notability; for example Carsten Höller was born in Germany and apparently still holds German citizenship, but grew up in Belgium, made some of his early notable art in Italy, and now lives in Sweden. Is he a "German artist" because of his passport? An "Italian artist" because of his early work? A "Swedish artist" because that's where he lives? Or is "European artist" a better description absent any WP:RS where he is labeled German, Italian, or Swedish? Even when nationality/citizenship may help explain where a person is/was notable (per TulsaPoliticsFan's comment), is an adjective the best way to do it? For example, John Edward Bouligny's first sentence names him as "an American politician who was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives representing the state of Louisiana." Is "an American politician" really necessary there? Even if a reader wasn't sure if Louisiana was part of the United States at the time, it's clear he served in the U.S. Congress, so that should clue them to his nationality. In this case "American politician" is also ambiguous because he was elected as a member of the American Party (aka the Know-Nothings). Maybe the party affiliation is appropriate in the first sentence, but then it's not an indicator of his nationality. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 13:05, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I would be strongly in favor of a well-written RFC to de-emphasize nationality in cases where it is not closely connected with the biographee's notability. Most political figures should probably have nationality in the first sentence, but I see no good reason for it for, say, scientists and mathematicians. In many cases arguments over this piece of trivia become the most contentious aspect of the bio, which is just silly. --Trovatore (talk) 02:13, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

In the cases where a one-word description is contentious or over-simplified, the location of their notability can be described with additional sentences later in the lead. FWIW, nationality in the lead sentence appears to be the norm in Encyclopedia Britannica. —Bagumba (talk) 02:31, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

The location of their notability???? Mathematics and science have no location. Well, I suppose some sciences are about location-specific things, but not necessarily where the person studying them comes from or works. --Trovatore (talk) 06:42, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

The guideline says "should usually provide" (and there's anyways WP:IAR), so use common sense for exceptions. Perhaps "location" can apply if one does most of their research in a particular place e.g. their home country. —Bagumba (talk) 08:15, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

There's a reason it's linked from WP:CONTEXTBIO. The intent is to give the reader a quick idea about the where context. When is covered by parenthetical dates. Every reporter knows that who. where, and what, are essentials. Ask yourself - if you as a reader were just doing a quick check for context ... was he Polish or British? ... and really only intend to read the first sentence... what would you expect to come away with? How far into the article are you willing to read? If an automated process collected first sentence into an index, would it have enough info to give a quick idea of the whole context? Skyerise (talk) 13:49, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, the hypothetical RFC I would support might well comport a change to CONTEXTBIO as well. I haven't really read that guideline so I don't know whether it also would have to change, but that would certainly be on the table.

I don't see why a "where" context is necessarily always key to bios. If the person was known for things of universal importance, then they really have no "where". --Trovatore (talk) 16:32, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

How is the "where" context not necessarily key to a biography? Every person lives in a place, a where, somewhere. TulsaPoliticsFan (talk) 16:39, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

But why is that place important? Specifically, important enough to go in the first sentence? Sure, there aren't a lot of people who are complete cosmopolitan nomads (there are some, but for now we can consider that a corner case), but even if someone lives in a particular place, why should that place be one of the most important things the reader should know about the person? --Trovatore (talk) 16:56, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

The status quo text of CONTEXTBIO seems to imply a logic something like, "all lives are lived somewhere, therefore BLP articles should open with a statement about citizenship or resident status of the subject". This logic does not seem to some of us entirely consonant with the WP:5P. Newimpartial (talk) 22:14, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

But is nationality the best way to provide that where context? "Polish" or "British" might indicate where, but not definitively. If Pawel Tumilowicz were to meet GNG, "British businessman" would describe where he is active, but would misstate his nationality. "Polish businessman", as he's described in the Telegraph article, is correct about his citizenship, but not his area of activity. "Polish-born English businessman" or "England-based Polish businessman" would be most accurate (providing both nationality and geographic information), but would be discouraged by the "single nationality" guideline and could be ambiguous if "Polish-born English businessman" is taken to mean a change in citizenship. I think part of the problem here is that "British" and "Polish" as an adjective can describe both a geographic context and nationality or citizenship (as well as ethnic group), but WP:CONTEXTBIO specifies that nationality is the one that matters, even though it isn't always the best indicator of where. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:20, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Per the long-standing wording "Context (location, nationality, etc.) for the activities that made the person notable." I'd go with "Polish businessman based in England". We don't allow abbreviations like don't - why should we insist on abbreviating what we say in the lead sentence with hyphens? It just makes the details unclear. The idea here is quick clarity. Why should we begrudge the inclusion of the single word "in" as "too long"? Do you really mean to say that 3 to 4 extra characters is too high a price to pay for clarity? Skyerise (talk) 14:28, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I think the suggestion is more to drop the "Polish" rather than the "England". --Trovatore (talk) 16:38, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I think "Polish businessman based in England" is fine. What I would object to is what was stated in the #Most living people will be described with a single nationality... discussion: it is completely within the guidelines to call someone who has taught at Harvard for 20 years an American - even if they were born elsewhere, retain their original citizenship, and are only a permanent resident of the US. In the original discussions, the key was: where did the work for which they are notable mostly occur? If it is predominantly in a single country, that's the context that supported them while they did the things for which they became notable. Per that sentiment, Tumilowicz would be labeled "English businessman" (he presumably became notable in England, where he'd been living for a dozen years).

If I'm following you correctly, your main objection is to hyphenated nationalities (Polish–British in this case, which doesn't seem to be how Tumilowicz (or RS) refers to himself), but the prior discussions and the straight reading of CONTEXTBIO also lean into the idea that we shouldn't say something like "Polish businessman based in England" (or "Yugoslav-born computer scientist who works in Canada" to pull an example from the other thread).

The point I'm concerned about is that most people may well have one nationality, but nationality/citizenship isn't always what's relevant to their notability or identity. Adhering to The opening paragraph should usually provide context for the activities that made the person notable. In most modern-day cases, this will be the country, region, or territory, where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident, the Dalai Lama would be described as Indian, not Tibetan, which is ridiculous. (Yes, there is conditionality in the CONTEXTBIO statement, but "in most modern-day cases" implies that exceptions will be rare.) People should be described as they describe themselves and/or how WP:RS describe them. Sometimes this will mean a single nationality; other times it may be a regional or ethnic (hyphenated or not) adjective or a more complex phrase. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 18:31, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

This is a separate discussion from Skyerise's RFC above. The question on-point here is, should we call out Tumilowicz's nationality in the first sentence at all? What's wrong with just dropping "Polish"? Of course his nationality can be treated in the body, maybe even in the first paragraph, but why does it need to be in the first sentence? --Trovatore (talk) 18:51, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, there's a lot of overlap in these. I'd agree that nationality isn't always going to be needed or appropriate, but the where notability occurs may be relevant. So the conflation of nationality and location in CONTEXTBIO remains relevant (which is why it's been pointed to several times in this discussion). —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 19:08, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Nationality is important - it's defining, and the majority of categories are nationality related. Removing from the lede serves no purpose and would result in literally hundreds of thousands of articles having to be amended. It's not an issue. GiantSnowman 19:13, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Who says it's "defining"? What does that even mean? --Trovatore (talk) 19:27, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I think they're referring to WP:DEFINING since they're talking about categories. TulsaPoliticsFan (talk) 21:04, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I am not under the impression that an attribute needs to be presented in the lead sentence for the category system to work. Also, if the way the current category system works for biographies depends on WP:OR, then maybe the problem isn't with CONTEXTBIO? Newimpartial (talk) 22:05, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

yeah it is not clear what the problem is with having nationality in the lede? GiantSnowman 06:34, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, nationality is an important characteristic that I'd prefer listed for every subject. Ortizesp (talk) 06:42, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

So first of all, the direct question is not about the lead, but about the first sentence; these should not be conflated. The problem is that any ambiguity becomes a battleground for nationalists, and it gets pretty tiresome. As long as we can defer discussion to somewhere later in the lead, maybe even in the lead paragraph, we can usually come to some reasonable formulation, one that doesn't make nationality more important than the things the person is actually known for.

As for many articles "having to be amended", I'm not advocating for a rule that would require removing nationality from the first sentence in cases where it's non-contentious or when it's actually a major part of the subject's notability. I would just de-emphasize it, make it clear that leaving it out of the first sentence is also a valid choice in cases where the source of the person's notability is not closely tied to nationality. --Trovatore (talk) 07:25, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

But there is already flexibility in pages where it doesn't make sense in the lead sentence. MOS:CONTEXTBIO says In most modern-day cases.... It's a guideline, not a policy, and even for those WP:IAR always applies. "What about..." exceptions don't preclude a general guideline from existing. —Bagumba (talk) 11:17, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Oh, sure, there's flexibility in principle, though in practice going against a guideline is a heavy lift even when the justification is pretty clear. I'm not really looking for a radical change here. What I've observed is that, on a repeated basis, large fractions of the bandwidth in editing discussions are consumed by arguments over nationality and other forms of group identity, on bios of persons where these are largely beside the point. I think it would be helpful to tweak the wording of the guideline to tone down emphasis on these.

One possible solution would be to state explicitly that, when nationality is ambiguous or complicated, it may be desirable to leave it out of the first sentence, and explain the complications later in the lead section. --Trovatore (talk) 19:51, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

I think the problem with equating nationality wirh citizenship, and then putting a poorly sourced statement about citizenship in the lead sentence, is fairly obvious, no?

I also think insisting on a national state as first sentence "nationality" (unless the subject is from Wales or Scotland) while ignoring how high-quality RS actually desctibe the biographical subject is pretty clearly problematic. Doing so in service of the category system would seem to put the 5P upside down, IMO. Newimpartial (talk) 11:29, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Question is - Can nationality be applied to all bio pages? That's a mighty big task, to get a consensus for an across the board application. GoodDay (talk) 15:24, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:CONTEXTBIO does say "in most modern-day cases." A living person is going to have, in most every case, a clear place where they were born, a citizenship (although they may have more than one), and a place where they live and work. For a many people, all three of those may be the same, but for many others they aren't. All of these will likely be included in a bio article, maybe in the lead section, but "nationality" does a poor job of describing which of those is relevant in the first sentence of a bio article. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 15:48, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Comment Where a subject is only - or mainly known in a particular locale,(US or UK for example) and only covered by local sources, addressing a local audience, nationality will often not be mentioned at all - since it will be assumed to be known by that audience. This obviously isn't an indication that the nationality of that person isn't important. I'm inclined to agree with those that say nationality, along with the where and when of birth and upbringing, and similar info is basic biog info - the number of people for whom such info isn't relevant and/or interesting is probably tiny(even if their life develops mainly elsewhere and/or in a different cultural environment). Pincrete (talk) 09:05, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

• Yes. Either nationality, country of birth (unless the country of birth was merely accidental because mother was accidentally or by-force temporarily away [vacation, quarantine, displacement, etc.]), citizenship, or all of the above should definitely be clarified in the lede sentence. Follow RS descriptions if necessary, but must list at least one of those. Softlavender (talk) 11:05, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
• Fundamentally relevant information to bios. One of the first questions a reader is going to have is what nationality is/was a person. Different approaches may be relevant for different articles and depending on sources. E.g. an ex-patriot might have "American-born" rather than "American" and some people born in Scotland might have "Scottish" while others might have "British". There is no one-size fits all for this, a bit of common sense is needed, and correspondence how the person is described in sources. Some articles may not need to state it at all. Again, common sense and individually tailored treatments are appropriate. WP:NATIONALIST clowns can be dealt with as they arise. —DIYeditor (talk) 11:24, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Request for comment: should we add nationality usage examples for lead sentences?

I propose that the nationality examples recently removed be restored. I ask that we break the discussion into two parts: first support or oppose !votes for whether we should include any examples. Second, discussion to resolve the exact wording and presentation of the examples to be added. Accordingly, I've put the most recent version at the top of the subsection. Skyerise (talk) 12:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support as nom. Skyerise (talk) 12:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support There have been a few recent RfCs that have used the examples here to find consensus. This should be restored immediately and then any discussions to change should happen after. Nemov (talk) 20:05, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support the principle of having a few examples, though the actual text and examples need further discussion. For a start, the introductory text talks about living people, yet all but one of the examples given are dead. The native American example also appears to be controversial and ought to be discussed separately. Rosbif73 (talk) 07:30, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
• Comment There is already an example at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § First sentence examples, with Cesar Chavez shown with "was an American labor leader..."—Bagumba (talk) 08:35, 30 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support - I hadn't seen this RfC and already reverted the removal. - CorbieVreccan ^☊ ☼ 22:50, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

Nationality examples

Most living people will be described with a single nationality, the one connected to the place where they currently reside and have citizen or resident status (modern-day cases). Examples of how to handle historical subjects vary:

The simplest example is someone who continued to reside in their country of origin:

• Daniel Boone (November 2, 1734 [O.S. October 22] – September 26, 1820) was an American pioneer and frontiersman

The second example is someone who emigrated as a child and continued to identify as a citizen of their adopted country:

• Isaac Asimov (c. January 2, 1920 – April 6, 1992) was an American writer

  Per the above guidance, we do not add ethnicity ("Jewish-American") or country of birth ("Russian-born American"). These details can be introduced in the second sentence if they are of defining importance.

In cases of public or relevant dual citizenship, or a career that spans a subject's emigration, the use of the word and reduces ambiguity.

• Arnold Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, film producer, businessman, retired professional bodybuilder and politician

  For a politician, dual citizenship can be a political issue, so it is important to be clear and avoid ambiguity. The lead sentence here is not about ethnicity ("Austrian-American") or the country of birth ("Austrian-born American"), but rather about dual citizenship.

• Peter Lorre (June 26, 1904 – March 23, 1964) was a Hungarian and American actor

  This is an example of a person who established a career in Europe as a Hungarian, then emigrated to the United States and was naturalized and continued his career, and is thus known as both a Hungarian actor and as an American actor. The use of and again prevents the introduction of ethnicity or birth.

Native American and Indigenous Canadian status is based on citizenship, not race. Indigenous people's citizenship can be listed parenthetically, or as a clause after their names.

• Wilma Pearl Mankiller (November 18, 1945 – April 6, 2010) was a Native American (Cherokee Nation) activist, social worker, community developer and the first woman elected to serve as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation.

Finally, in controversial or unclear cases, nationality is sometimes omitted.

• Nicolaus Copernicus (19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic canon

  Copernicus's nationality is disputed, so it is omitted.

Notes for examples

The above is a starting point for discussion. Skyerise (talk) 12:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC) Skyerise (talk) 12:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Comment - unless explicit consensus is obtained somewhere for Most living people will be described with a single nationality, the guideline shouldn't be saying that most living people should be described with a single nationality. This is true whether or not editors want to include a list of examples. Newimpartial (talk) 21:23, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. The examples flow from that "single nationality" point and I don't think that it's necessarily correct in every situation especially when the lines around what counts as "nationality" aren't settled. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 21:27, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Are you saying that it's not true that most people never have more than one nationality? Just trying to understand why you think it's an issue... it would be easy enough to modify that to say "Since most people are only citizens of their birth country, most subjects will be described with a single nationality." I never intended it to be prescriptive but rather descriptive. I would have thought that obvious logic, but apparently not... Skyerise (talk) 22:11, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether or not you realize this, but your modified proposal now imports the assumption that nationality equals citizenship: because X fact about citizenship, therefore Y rule about nationality in articles. I would not regard this as obvious logic, and it is not really a claim supported in the status quo of the guideline.

Also, the modified proposal carries the (probably unintended) implication that people who are not (and perhaps never were) citizens of their birth country, or people who had one citizenship at birth and obtained others later, will be described with multiple nationalities. I'm not sure this logic is in line with community consunsus, either. Newimpartial (talk) 23:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Which is a problem my original wording does not have. Are you just wikilawyering because you don't like the proposal? Can't tell. Skyerise (talk) 23:36, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

No, I'm not. I was simply responding to your modified proposal. The problem with your original wording is that there isn't evidence to date that the community supports it. Newimpartial (talk) 23:43, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Skyerise, no, the issue is that their nationality (in the sense of the nation-state in which they were born or live) may not be the most relevant thing in the intro especially if the direction is that a Westphalian state nationality is the only thing that should be listed. Depending upon the person, their regional, ethnic, or religious identity will be more relevant than their citizenship/residence. For example, a strict reading of single nationality, the one connected to the place where they currently reside and have citizen or resident status (modern-day cases). would have the lead for Carles Puigdemont describe him as a "Spanish politician" instead of (as it currently does) "a Catalan politician and journalist from Spain." His identity and notability are tied up with Catalonian independence, not his Spanish citizenship. As others have noted in the myriad discussions and threads here, we should follow WP:RS and shouldn't insist upon a Westphalian state nationality in the first sentence when it may not be the best way to describe someone. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 00:26, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Sounds like an excellent example to add! Skyerise (talk) 01:46, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Comment: I was looking for more writing on this and found two wikipedia essays that may be helpful. This one (Wikipedia:Citizenship and nationality) is originally from 2007 and seems to have been received poorly. This essay (User:Mr248/Citizenship and nationality) was written in 2021 as an attempted rewrite of the 2007 essay and I thought was super interesting and may be helpful in building some consensus here.TulsaPoliticsFan (talk) 23:49, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Remove Daniel Boone There is already a basic example showing "an American" (Caesar Chavez) at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § First sentence examples

Remove Isaac Asimov MOS:ETHNICITY already says: Ethnicity, religion, or sexuality should generally not be in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability., and MOS:BIRTHPLACE says Birth and death places, if known, should be mentioned in the body of the article, and can appear in the lead if relevant to notability However, there may be cases where it is tied to their notability. Anne Frank, an WP:FA, reads ...was a German-born Jewish girl ... Chris Lu, a WP:GA, reads ...is a Chinese American political advisor...—Bagumba (talk) 08:56, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Schwarzenegger and Lorre Are there other exisitng examples that show support for "and" over hyphenated dual nationalities? As discussed at #Dual_nationality:_hypenate_or_"and" (above), those two bios were changed within the hour before the MOS examples were added. Also note that MOS:DUALNATIONALITIES supports hyphenating.—Bagumba (talk) 09:05, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Remove Nicolaus Copernicus Already multiple examples at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § First sentence examples that do not use nationality.—Bagumba (talk) 09:08, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

• Comment. In addition to Bagumba's demolition of these examples... the first example is wrong: Boone isn't described as American in that sentence; he's described as an "American pioneer", which is linked as a single phrase. He was also born before the US was created, so can't be an example of "someone who continued to reside in their country of origin". In the second example, "continued to identify as a citizen of their adopted country" is too open to interpretation: what does "identify as a citizen of their adopted country" mean? What evidence is needed to support it? For Schwarzenegger, "avoid ambiguity. The lead sentence here is ... about dual citizenship"; is it? He wasn't an Austrian politician and he wasn't an American bodybuilder, so I don't see how this construction has reduced ambiguity. Around half of Lorre's talk page discusses his nationality, so this is a shaky example (Hungary didn't exist as an independent country at the time of his birth). In the final example, "in controversial or unclear cases, nationality is sometimes omitted" is wording to be avoided: it's encouraging the inclusion of nationality when it isn't relevant. And "Native American and Indigenous Canadian status is based on citizenship, not race"... great (although what does "status" mean?) ... (as with the other examples) what about the rest of the world, outside North America? And the opening – "Most living people will be described with a single nationality, the one connected to the place where they currently reside and have citizen or resident status" – jumbles nationality, residence and time. EddieHugh (talk) 22:20, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Reverts

@Jerome Frank Disciple: Please do explain this IMHO unfounded revert. And please note: We also have the Nixon example in the preceding text, which is resumed in the table as well. Hildeoc (talk) 12:47, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi! First, in reviewing this, I did notice something I missed the first time. When User:Surtsicna reverted you [16], it was because you suggested pope could be capitalized even if not used as a title.

But I still wonder what your addition does except extend the table. By my reading, MOS:OFFICE isn't complicated or ambiguous on this point. Prior to the table, it says that positions are not capitalized when referred to generically and are only capitalized in certain circumstances, included when used as a title or to address a specific person. It then provides quite a few examples, pope included, to illustrate both those exceptions. Then, the table provides three different examples of formal positions, showing where they would and would not be capitalized. Your proposed inclusion ... just added a fourth example. But what extra insight or helpfulness did it provide?--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:57, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Once again, you could say the same for the "president" examples, couldn't you? And considering the fact that pope is often falsely capitalized (as in my previously erroneous example ... was cronwed Pope) when deemed solely a title, this fourth example for the sake of clarification probably would not really hurt, would it? Hildeoc (talk) 13:31, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

First, is position often mis-capitalized? I haven't seen that—and, frankly, I'm not sure you adding a mistake to the MOS (and being promptly reverted) shows that this is a recurring issue. Second, and more importantly, even if the pope is often mis-capitalized, is that because the MOS is unclear or because the editors mis-capitalizing it haven't reviewed the relevant portion of the MOS? I strongly suspect the latter, and adding an extra example to the table will do nothing to change that. You haven't stated how the MOS is not sufficiently clear as is. Are there long debates I'm not aware of in which people argue about whether the pope should be capitalized according to the MOS?--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 14:37, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Why are you being so fastidious here? Check out this or that, for instance. And why don't the president examples seem to bother you, even though they are already invoked in the text preceding the table? Hildeoc (talk) 15:46, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

... I'll be honest I didn't expect you to link to random grammar articles on whether the pope is capitalized. I meant on Wikipedia—but fair enough! My fault for being ambiguous. My position is that we don't need a fourth example to the relatively longstanding three that we have—specifically, that the example offers no clarity not already offered by what's been there. In theory, we could also have new rows for many positions—attorney general? pastor?—but none of these examples would add clarity; they'd be redundant and detail for the sake of detail. Happy to have other editors weigh in if they think the pope row is an improvement.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:53, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Capitalization of professor

Hi all, I recently got an edit reverted (see here) in an article about a university where I changed "Professor" to "professor" in front of a person's name.

I was linked MOS:PEOPLETITLES, which states: "Overview: Titles should be capitalized when attached to an individual's name".

However, the section in "Titles of people" called "Academic or professional titles and degrees" specifically states "Academic and professional titles (such as "Dr." or "Professor"), including honorary ones, should be used in a Wikipedia article only when the subject is widely known by a pseudonym or stage name containing such a title".

The capitalizations I changed were simply of professors, not people known as "Professor [Name]". I'm wondering if my initial edit was correct here, as I'm a bit confused now. Any help is appreciated, thanks so much! HeyElliott (talk) 18:28, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I actually hadn't noticed that portion of PEOPLETITLES before. From memory, I had thought that the policy applied to subsequent mentions ... but I may have to go through some articles I recently worked on and fix that! Either way, I do think your edit was mistaken. "Professor" is being used as a title in the diff you link—even in your version; you're just making it a lower-case title (which MOS:JOB allows for "commercial and informal titles", e.g., "OtagoSoft vice-president Chris Henare; team co-captain Chan". So, if the issue is that academic titles shouldn't be used, then the appropriate edit would be to say, for example, "and Patrick Nuttgens, a professor" ... not "professor Patrick Nuttgens". If it is permissible to use "professor" as a title on first mention, I'd read the guideline to require capitalization.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 18:44, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Ah, okay, that makes sense, thank you! So since it states that academic titles shouldn't be used, it looks like I should edit it to say "and Patrick Nuttgens, a professor".

Thank you again, and I hope you have a great day! HeyElliott (talk) 18:47, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, of course "Professor" should be capitalised in front of someone's name. I agree the section in MOS:PEOPLETITLES is confusing, but I believe what it actually means is that we should not refer to someone as "Professor Smith", but only as Smith (and also that we should not include academic titles inline in the first line of someone's article). It's perfectly acceptable to include an academic title when referring to someone in an article not about them for the first time using their full name (Professor John Smith), just as we would include a military rank (General Sir John Smith). "Blah, a professor" just looks ridiculous, incidentally, and is completely unnecessary. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:04, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

I appreciate the follow-up input. I'm not sure I'd agree with the "ridiculous" comment ;) (after all, it's not that unusual to list a job description after a person's name— "John Smith, a professor at UCLA, said" ... "Jeff Smithy, a construction worker at a nearby power plant, left ..." etc.) But otherwise, your understanding of the section was what my recollection was; I just have a hard time squaring that with the text of the section. If this guideline only covered subsequent use, wouldn't MOS:SURNAME be sufficient? It says: "After the initial mention, a person should generally be referred to by surname only – without an honorific prefix such as 'Mr.', 'Mrs.', or 'Ms.', and without academic or professional prefixes like 'Dr.', 'Prof.', 'Rev.', etc. – or may be referred to by a pronoun." Given that, under your interpretation, what's the point of MOS:CREDENTIAL?--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:39, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

The problem here is that "a professor" in American English tends to be a euphemism for "an academic". Whereas elsewhere "professor" is only an academic title restricted to the most senior academics (full professors in American parlance) and is not used as a generic term for academic staff. You could say "John Smith, professor of English" if he does indeed hold a chair in English, but "John Smith, a professor" is certainly not a good alternative for the far more natural "Professor John Smith". I agree with MOS:CREDENTIAL being fairly pointless, except where it refers to the first line of a biographical article and use of postnominals for degrees. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:34, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I have made some changes that I think clarify what most people understand MOS:CREDENTIAL to be getting at, and how we seem to apply it generally. As always, correct me if I am wrong. — HTGS (talk) 02:56, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Ooh, to be on the safe side, I did regret that edit. Ultimately, I'm concerned that it touched on far more than what was discussed here (changing the policy for post nominals and also suggesting an "attachment to the institution" change that I didn't see anyone here discuss—and, based on what we did articulate, that rule wouldn't be consistent with my understanding or Necrothesp's understanding). Maybe those statements are how we apply the policy generally, but I'd like to see a bit more evidence. I think we should probably discuss the specific changes before we make them.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:35, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment, Jerome Frank Disciple. I appreciate that not every change I made was discussed—and in fact, much of it wasn’t a direct response from to this discussion, but an attempt to make the guideline reflect what I see as convention and good practice—but what I hope is that none of it was unreasonable or disagreeable. If you disagree with the particulars, please revert those, but sometimes it’s just better to let the guidelines move forward, rather than hold a debate on every word. If you are amenable, would you consider putting back the changes that you would agree with? Or otherwise let us know which changes go against your own preferred practices? — HTGS (talk) 23:24, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

I realize sometimes shortcutting the deliberative process can be far more efficient, but I also think we have to take the pains of deliberation when necessary, and I'm currently leaning towards thinking that it's necessary here, though as a compromise I've tried to work back in some of your proposal. As I said, I know you made a claim about how your proposed changes reflect how "we seem to apply" MOS:CREDENTIAL generally, but I'm wary of that claim given the lack of examples. My more specific concerns are: First, why did you take out "at their first mention" from the post nominals section? Are you aware of many articles that include post nominals after the first reference? Second, I think the language of the intro you added didn't make much sense. "For the subject of biographies, [academic titles] ... should be used in a Wikipedia article only when the subject is widely known by a pseudonym or stage name containing such a title." ... Did this mean, essentially, "The subject of a biography should only have an academic title attached to their name if that subject is widely known by a pseudonym or stage name containing such a title."? If so, I'm okay with that, and I've made that change, but I think that the wording I used is clearer. If you meant something else or you disagree, obviously feel free to revert me. Third, I don't think your placement made much sense. Why was the new guidance on academic titles (i.e. relationship with the institution discussed) included after the discussion of post nominals, and not in the first paragraph? Also, are you saying the titles should only be used on pages related to the institution? Doesn't that go against the School Project guidance?--Jerome Frank Disciple 23:42, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Hopefully it’s evident that I wanted to parse the division in how we treat the subjects of biographies and how we might introduce other people (typically experts) in other pages (whether the biographies of other people, or not). As the two paragraphs run, I wanted to make clear that the first was for subjects of bios, and the second for other people.

To your questions:

1. Did you mean that I added "at their first mention"? I added this because I don't see that for the typical case where we mention, quote or otherwise include a person, that we need to give their title more than once. At best, this is a principle that maybe we could leave unsaid (per WP:CREEP), but I don’t subscribe to CREEP as much as many others, and it fits easily enough in there where we are (trying to be) being quite clear in how we credential people.
2. Yes. 100%. I don’t find your version as clear, but as far as I can tell, they mean the same thing.
3. I genuinely didn’t have any good idea where to put that (Academic and professional titles ([eg] Professor Margaret Doe) should only be added if the person has a relationship to an institution being discussed.), so I just plonked it on the end. I thought it obvious that it should not be relevant to subjects of their own biographies. Please do rearrange within that second paragraph if you have a clearer way to put it.
   As to the actual addition: our attitude is generally “don’t add credentials or titles without good reason”, but, per above, there is clear interest in keeping (eg) “Professor Patrick Nuttgens” on the University of York page. Affiliation to any pertinent institution seemed the best reason to include such titles; there may be other reasons.

Oh and to be clear, I’m entirely happy to be disagreed with, or corrected on phrasing, but I didn’t have a clear impression you did disagree, and I would hate for us to have to deliberate on such wording for no reason haha. — HTGS (talk) 11:14, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

My mistake on "at their first mention"! I'm okay with that being re-added. Also, I'm in favor of some of that paragraph being clarified, because quite frankly the use of "subject" is confusing. "Post-nominal letters for academic degrees following the subject's name (such as Steve Jones, PhD; Margaret Doe, JD) may occasionally be used within an article where the person with the degree is not the subject" ? I'm still a bit confused by the third point there. I'm on the move but I'll come back later and see if I can parse it.--Jerome Frank Disciple 11:28, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

RFC re: MOS:GENDERID and the Deadnames of Deceased Trans Persons

Hello! There's a new RFC on MOS:GEDNERID, based on the discussions regarding "next steps" in the above RFC. Link to the village pump discussion. The RFC will capture 3 topics, a broader inquiry than the above RFC, and, as to two of the topics, it will include multiple options. Thanks everybody--Jerome Frank Disciple 18:54, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Where is the agreement on asking these questions? There's a lot of discussion above, but I don't see agreement, and now the questions – not agreed on – have been raised on another page. I don't see this as being a respectful approach. EddieHugh (talk) 18:25, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I apologize! Certainly wasn't my intention to be disrespectful. When discussion died down on the the above RFC (which was an RFC as to the proposal ... that spent a fair amount of time discussing what should happen next ... and then pivoted towards whether deadnaming should be limited at all), I decided to be bold and just suggest a different RFC. (I thought it might be a bit too much to essentially have an RFC for what an RFC should say, particularly bearing in mind that everyone is free to propose alternatives to an RFC's proposals!) I worked with User:Sideswipe9th, who proposed the last RFC, split the inquiry into three questions, and tried to incorporate proposals or ideas that were mentioned above and that were discussed in the discussions I had seen. Fortunately, the newest RFC has attracted a fair amount of attention and—at least for now—it appears a consensus might be possible on each of the questions—with other users suggesting one beginning (I can't emphasize enough it's very early) to look like a SNOW close. Hope you can participate!--Jerome Frank Disciple 18:34, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Remove the "living" qualifier in MOS:DEADNAME

Sideswipe9th's proposal

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 no consensus on whether to remove the Living qualifier and follow Sideswipe9th's proposal. Supporters of the proposal argue that respect for the figure in question should not end while dead, while opponents bring up that our guidelines on righting great wrongs would be violated. I see that both arguments have equal strength, and that the Wikipedia community cannot firmly agree on which direction is best.
I would like to recommend that in order to have a firm closure on the proposal to avoid more discussions on this topic ending up as no consensus, that a new proposal be formed taking into account both sides' beliefs. I see that this is already happening, which is a good sign, but such discussions, considering that the result will have massive implications for the project as a whole, absolutely should be listed at Centralized Discussion. Regular contributors to the NPOV noticeboard could also be a great resource to help mediate and develop the proposal further.
Per the No Consensus procedure, given that there has not been a significant challenge to the qualifier since October 2020 despite it possibly maybe being added BOLDly, the status quo prior to this discussion, which is to include the living qualifier, shall remain in place unless and if so until a new consensus is developed. InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 23:19, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

---

At present, DEADNAME contains two paragraphs relating to how to handle the deadnames of trans and non-binary people across the project, with one paragraph giving guidance for people who were not notable prior to transition, and one for people who were notable prior to transition. Both paragraphs contain the qualifier that they only apply to living trans or non-binary people, and in practice there is some leeway granted per WP:BDP for a period after death.

Digging into the history of this, the living qualifier was added in October 2020 with the edit summary referencing a post-RfC discussion that's linked at MOS:IDINFO. Upon reviewing that discussion, I came to the conclusion that the living qualifier was added somewhat boldly, and while the post-RfC discussion went on for a significant period of time after it was added, the continued discussion was on whether or not the DEADNAME guidance at the time only applied to article leads.

Could we remove the living qualifier, from the two relevant paragraphs in DEADNAME, such that the guidance applies to all trans or non-binary biographies? In context, this would mean that the text would now read:

If a transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name. For example:
...
In the case of a transgender or non-binary person, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under that name. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:
...

Impact wise, for dead trans and non-binary individuals who were notable prior to their transition, this would result in no change. However for dead trans and non-binary individuals who were not notable prior to their transition, this would mean that the only name that appears in their biographies or any content relating to them elsewhere is the name for which they were notable under.

As for why I'm proposing this, recently I created an article about the killing of a transgender teen in the UK. She was very much not notable under her former name, and the article reflects this by only using her post-transition name. However for a short period on 12 February, both The Times and Daily Mail included the killed teen's former name in their reporting, and several days later a few editors tried to use an archived version of The Times' article to add the teen's deadname to the article. While at present we can continue to remove and suppress that as necessary per WP:BDP allowing for BLP derived protections applying for 6 months to 2 years post death, there will come a point where that ceases to be the case. In the case of that article, as well as any other article about a trans or non-binary person who was not notable prior to transition, adding their deadname adds no encyclopaedic value. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:23, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Notified WikiProject LGBT Studies and WikiProject Biographies about this, as this discussion is relevant to both projects. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:28, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support: lots of people seem to be mistaking this for a privacy issue that expires when a person dies, when the larger issue is that using trans people's birth names are actively weaponized against them and that this issue will impact trans people reading these articles who will feel like their identity will no longer be respected when they die, cis people reading these articles who will feel it is acceptable to only refer to trans people by their chosen name to their face, and will allow editors to go out of their way to include trans people's birth names where they don't belong in the interest of discrediting trans identities. trans rights are a big issue in the US right now and anything that can be done to make the climate better should be done, especially when the strongest argument against doing so is that trans people don't need privacy if they're dead or that it would be censorship to omit their birth name, which I find to be a wholly disingenous argument. Tekrmn (talk) 19:00, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support. While deadnaming the dead can't hurt them individually it can hurt their living friends and relatives. It can also distress other trans people who might reasonably fear similar disrespect after their own deaths. Both readers and editors can be affected by this. If this information had some encyclopaedic value then we would have to balance that value against the potential distress caused but, as there is no encyclopaedic value, this issue does not arise. In fact, it could serve to make articles more confusing. It is enough for an article to say that a person was transgender for the reader to be adequately informed. The motivations for adding deadnames are very suspect. Justifications demanding "truth", "accuracy" and the like are most often (but admittedly not always) made in bad faith. It reeks of gloating, gravedancing and general trolling. The behaviour of some on the article you mention has been both vile and disruptive. Anything we can do to try to cut off avenues for that sort of disruptive and offensive behaviour is beneficial to Wikipedia's readers, its editors and also to wider society. --DanielRigal (talk) 00:47, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  While deadnaming the dead can't hurt them individually it can hurt their living friends and relatives. It can also distress other trans people who might reasonably fear similar disrespect after their own deaths.

  This really isn’t our duty of care, and if it were, we would have drastically different content policies across the board. Any article about a victim of a crime carries the risk of hurting the person’s family and friends, for instance. — HTGS (talk) 03:09, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  you're ignoring the part that it can effect other trans people- additionally, a victim of the crime was hurt by somebody else and a wikipedia article about it would only be a reflection of that. there's no encyclopedic reason to mention someone's birth name unless it was notable, and then it should only be mentioned in the lead. people can and do go out of their way to deadname trans people in articles because of the word living in the policy. Tekrmn (talk) 19:18, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  there's no encyclopedic reason to mention someone's birth name unless it was notable

  I largely agree with that, I’m just saying it’s not our place to protect readers from content when that content is appropriate for an encyclopedia. We don’t censor content, but we do avoid unencyclopedic content that is unnecessarily offensive. There’s certainly room for avoiding deadnaming in many cases, just not on the basis of protecting other trans people from seeing a deadname. — HTGS (talk) 05:10, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  that is already written into the MOS, it specifically says the birthname should be mentioned if the person was notable under that name. what we are talking about is cases where it isn't notable, and is therefor unnecessarily offensive content that has no encyclopedic value. Tekrmn (talk) 06:00, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  There is a huge gap between "a name under which a subject was notable" and "a name with no encyclopedic value". "A name under which a subject was notable" means that the person, while using that name, received such significant coverage in reliable sources that they pass WP:N and warrant their own stand-alone article. That's an extremely high bar; the point at which it becomes unavoidable to at least mention the name once, even for a BLP, because the name is referred to in so many other sources that readers are likely to come here looking for information on the individual, even long after the subject has transitioned. But most names mentioned in Wikipedia don't meet that test, including alternate names of notable people and all names of non-notable people. It can't be concluded that none of those names have encyclopedic value. We don't include gratuitously offensive content, but we do include content that some readers consider objectionable or offensive‍—even exceedingly so—if it is verifiable and relevant. For articles that are not protected by BLP, the question becomes when a deadname is relevant, not whether the person was notable under it.--Trystan (talk) 15:25, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  and how would it be relevant if they weren't notable under it? Tekrmn (talk) 15:28, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  One reason would because reliable sources consider it relevant. For a current example, see the Isla Bryson case example that I posted below. BilledMammal (talk) 15:34, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  I don't see her birth name in this article and I certainly don't see how it would be relevant. it reliable sources consider it relevant than it would be notable. your argument is circular. including someone's birth name where it is not notable (or relevant) /is/ gratuitously offensive. Tekrmn (talk) 15:39, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  it reliable sources consider it relevant than it would be notable Something can be relevant without being notable.

  I don't see her birth name in this article and I certainly don't see how it would be relevant. It is not currently in the article because the only current exception under MOS:DEADNAME is that the person must have been notable under their previous name; Isla Bryson wasn't notable under it. It is relevant because reliable sources consider it relevant and include it in their reporting; see my comment below for examples. BilledMammal (talk) 15:45, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  You have yet to name a way it could be relevant without being notable, and I certainly can't think of one. You're trying to tell me that Isla Bryson wasn't notable under her birthname but it's still relevant despite there being an entire wikipedia article about her under that name, making her notable under that name. Again, your argument doesn't make any sense. what reason would there possibly be to include a trans person's birth name if they weren't notable under that name? Tekrmn (talk) 15:51, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  If reliable sources routinely include their previous name, then that would indicate the name is relevant. Wikipedia-notability is not exactly a perfect bar here. Elli (talk | contribs) 15:54, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  then why don't we include all of the information from every reliable source in wikipedia articles? Tekrmn (talk) 15:56, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  If information is included in most reliable sources on a subject, we probably should include it. We don't include everything because Wikipedia isn't meant to be extremely detailed, but a name is a few words at most and not worth excluding on that basis. Elli (talk | contribs) 15:59, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  including someone's birthname if it's not relevant is inherently gratuitously offensive. that is why we should exclude it where not relevant. Tekrmn (talk) 16:07, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  This is circular logic. Obviously we should exclude the name if it's not relevant, as we would do for any irrelevant information. If reliable sources are routinely including it, though, it clearly is relevant. Elli (talk | contribs) 16:10, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  I have yet to see anyone give an example of how someone's birthname would be relevant unless they were notable under it aside from vague assertions that a reliable source might find it relevant. regardless, what this conversation is actually about is the distinction between living and dead individuals and allowing the use of their birth name throughout the article once they die, not when it is appropriate to include someone's birth name at all. Tekrmn (talk) 16:16, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  Elli: I'm not totally sure I agree. Is the standard for relevance just inclusion in reliable sources? It seems to me that there are lots of facts included in many reliable sources that are ultimately left out of a Wikipedia article. For example, on 2023 Nashville school shooting, many reliable sources note that the shooter had driven a Honda Fit to the school, but we don't include that fact in the article.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 14:35, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

  @Jerome Frank Disciple, I fear you step into strawmanning here, even if it was a humorous one. Not every detail reported repeatedly is inherently notable; we know this. Unless the Honda Fit was outfitted with a bomb and driven into the school, it's certainly not pertinent to the article. But, the shooter's name as reported by police and news and discovered by readers in a Google search is certainly notable in the basic reporting of who, what, when, where, why. Penguino35 (talk) 19:38, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

  The article using their former name as the title is about a different person. And the reason is because it is relevant to the article; why it is relevant can vary. One reason, as I gave above, is because reliable sources consider it relevant. BilledMammal (talk) 15:57, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  then how is it relevant to the article? nobody would assume that this Scottish rapist who used to go by the same name as an Oklohoma Democrat were the same person unless you connect the two articles to try to make a point about relevance. Adam Graham is also the name of an actor, but that isn't mentioned in the article on Adam Graham the politician because it's not relevant. Tekrmn (talk) 16:12, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  The issue isn't that people would assume they're the same person, but that some people might search up information on the case by the name "Adam Graham", since the media is using that name in the context of that case. Excluding the name when sources routinely include it is weird; it's not actually protecting any meaningful privacy interest since the name is as public as can be, and it just makes our article less informative and incomplete compared to what other organizations have published. Elli (talk | contribs) 16:23, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  then why did they link me to an article about someone else? sure you can make that argument, but again, we're not discussing what makes someone's birth name worth including, we're discussing removing the "living" qualifier from the MOS so that people's birth names cannot be spread over the entire article the moment they die. Tekrmn (talk) 16:31, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  Their point is that there should be a hatnote on that article as a form of disambiguation, since we have articles on two people who can reasonably be referred to as "Adam Graham". Elli (talk | contribs) 16:40, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  While deadnaming the dead can't hurt them individually it can hurt their living friends and relatives. - if you’re talking about living friends and relatives, perhaps using the new name can also hurt friends and relatives. This effect of hurt to others (whichever name is used) just cancels out. starship.paint (exalt) 03:34, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

• Might the same apply to any name change? --John (User:Jwy/talk) 03:07, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Not even all other name changes made for personal safety (organised crime informant, totalitarian regime whistleblower, etc). Deadnaming trans people gives the impression that the shape of your junk is encyclopaedically relevant, which is not often the case. It's also exposing a deep and hurt part of the subject's psyche, like publishing their diary entries. Not only is it irrelevant trivia, it's also creepy. Folly Mox (talk) 03:31, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Deadnaming trans people gives the impression that the shape of your junk is encyclopaedically relevant — Mentioning that someone is trans at all gives the impression that the "shape of [their] junk" is relevant. The definition of transgender is someone whose gender identity/expression differs from the sex that they were assigned at birth. Realistically ("more than 99.95% of births"), that means their genitalia. If it wasn't relevant, the person would just be a "man" or "woman", not a "trans man" or "trans woman". Mitch Ames (talk) 02:11, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  Theres lots of adjectives you can put before man or woman. Trans men are also just men as trans women are just women. So its not an inherently necessary qualifier. Filiforme1312 (talk) 02:28, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  Might the same apply to any name change? Honestly I'd say yes. What the deadname protection from GENDERID does right is that it treats any and all former names as a privacy issue. If a person wasn't notable under the former name, then we don't include it. What it gets wrong is that it only provides that protection to trans and non-binary people. Making this proposed change the standard at MOS:CHANGEDNAME for how we handle all name changes would I think be a huge improvement on how we handle such name changes for everyone else, though given that it would potentially affect a large number of articles a separate discussion and/or RfC would be warranted. Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:52, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Is this still on the table in any capacity? I very much agree the deadname protection should apply to all people regardless of gender identity. Limiting it to trans and non-binary people is an unnecessary wrinkle at this point.

  1) It technically excludes anyone who falls outside the realm of "cisgender" but does not specifically and publicly identify as trans or non-binary.

  2) There is no objective reason to exclude cisgender people from a protection like this, either.

  If someone changes their name and then becomes publicly notable under exclusively the new name, I don't see what bearing their gender should have on whether the former name holds encyclopedic value.

  Ex: The magician Teller. He's gone by Teller for his entire public career, socially and professionally. Yet his birthname is consistently re-added to his wikipedia page. Penn Jillette recently cited Wikipedia (Penn's Sunday School E909) as a place where people read Teller's deadname (Jillette explicitly used that term), and then repeat it in a misguided "attempt at familiarity."

  What encyclopedic value does that hold?

  What encyclopedic value does it hold that it wouldn't hold tomorrow if Teller came out as trans or non-binary? Thereisnojoyinmudville (talk) 05:11, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

• I would prefer to go the opposite direction. Wikipedia is not censored, and former names have encyclopedic value. I think there should be a policy about any former name that doesn't have a special carveout for transgender cases. Regarding the question of living, I'm surprised that the only argument is that it might trigger someone. WP:CENSOR: Discussion of potentially objectionable content should usually focus not on its potential offensiveness but on whether it is an appropriate image, text, or link. If the former name is an issue of privacy, then it would only apply to WP:BLP. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:19, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  You don't seem to understand what trigger means. Do you mean "upset" or "offend" perhaps? EvergreenFir (talk) 05:35, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  I was referring to this comment above: "it can hurt their living friends and relatives. It can also distress other trans people". Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:08, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Two questions:

  1. For a trans or non-binary person who was never notable under their former name, what encyclopaedic value does including their deadname after their death add to an article?
  2. For any person, who changed their name and was never notable under their former name, what encyclopaedic value does including their former name add to an article?

  Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:44, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  This issue is simple. Notability is a test of whether there should be an article or not. Notability is not applied to verifiable contents. The argument here is for privacy of changed names, and that is governed by WP:BLPNAME, and that policy does a great job of addressing non-essential details like former names. What I'm opposed to is this MOS entry that says that in the case of trans people, original names are censored. Applying that policy, most cases would turn out just like you're requesting, without the original name.

  I'm not sure how to answer your question on encyclopaedic value, as this seems obvious to me and in non-trans cases it is unquestionably standard, like Prince (musician), J. K. Rowling, Kirk Douglas, Meg Ryan, etc. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 23:43, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  In my view, this presents justification to extend the policy to cisgender and other non-queer individuals as well, to generalize as un-notable or unnecessary names. See for example Asmongold, where a name was removed for similar privacy concerns to the deadname situation. (Or, one time I read on Apple News that Stormy Daniels would rather her birth name not be as publicized (but unfortunately I can't find a source for that). I see no reason why this differs from a similar situation where an LGBTQ+ person has a non-notable prior name.) casualdejekyll 22:51, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

• Just linking a relevant RFC from 2021: RfC on non-notable pre-transition names of deceased trans people--Trystan (talk) 05:27, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• I think the close of the 2021 RFC is still valid. The need for the privacy protections of WP:Deadname do fade over time. So… I have to OPPOSE the proposal to extend it forever… however, I would support including a warning that DEADNAME also covers the recently deceased. Blueboar (talk) 12:34, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  The closure of that RfC made a recommendation that a subsequent RfC be held, on a narrow question of extending the BLP protections inherent in GENDERID for deadnames, after determining what that period of time should be. So in light of that closure, if it is to be a finite period, how long do you think that time period should be? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:41, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Regarding "Recently deceased". Lets say that a trans person dies today. On what date do I get to stop treating them with the respect and decency that the WP:DEADNAME policy asks of me? Like, when in the future do I get to stop doing the proper and right thing? That's important to know. Recently is rather vague. If I want to start deliberately disrespecting a trans person, how long after they die do I have to wait before I do that? --Jayron32 17:57, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Sarcasm aside, WP:BDP covers this. — HTGS (talk) 05:26, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  But unlike most of what BDP covers this feels weird to add ever. There's a very obvious reason why we can add someone's previous address years after their death and only then: by that time they're not living there any more, nor does their estate even, so they have no privacy interest remaining in that address. And most privacy interests covered by BDP are similar.

  However, a previous name is a different sort of privacy interest, which doesn't expire. The reason for not using it is the same decades after death as it is when the person is still alive: they asked people not to use that name for them. And also, by doing so, they make it an incorrect name, reducing the encyclopedic value of including it significantly. There are few situations I can think of where a name excluded under MOS:DEADNAME would be useful to include without it. Loki (talk) 15:54, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  the [trans] person ... asked people not to use that [dead]name for them. And also, by doing so, they make it an incorrect name ... — It's not an "incorrect name" for them for the period of time before they stopped using it - it was their actual name. If a (hypothetical) trans woman was assigned male at birth and named (including on the birth certificate) "John", was enrolled at primary school as John, answered to John, introduced herself as John, then - up until she change her name - "John" was her name. If at 13 she asserts that she is female, calls herself Mary, and all her family and friends do likewise, then "Mary" is her name from that point on, but not before that time. We might agree that she was always female, since birth (and initially "misdiagnosed" as male), but her name - even if it did not match her female gender, and even if she subsequently does not want people to use it (including retrospectively) - was very definitely John for those first 13 years.

  One obvious encyclopedic value for including the birth/former/dead name is to allow our readers to do further research about a person, in particular before the name change. Just because the trans person's earlier life is not notable enough for Wikipedia, it does not mean that our readers won't be interested in learning more about the person's early life. This is particularly the case where we specifically mention the difficulties the person had pre-trans.

  Just because a person changes their name does not mean that the previous life - in which they used their original/birth name - ceases to exist. (If it's almost always relevant to include someone's birth date, then why is their birth name less relevant?) We may not cover it, but our readers should not be prevented from learning about it. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:12, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  we're not preventing readers from learning about people prior to their transition by not including their birth name. presumably, if there is anything remotely worth looking up from before their transition then their birthname will be in the sources which they are easily able to click on.

  to use your misdiagnosis analogy, the person's birth name would be exactly the same as their assigned gender at birth. both were given at birth before the person was able to identify themselves and both were never an accurate reflection of that person. when we refer to trans people prior to their transition we don't start using their birth name because that was what people were calling them at the time.

  date of birth tells you a lot about a person, especially in the context of an encyclopedia. the time period a person was alive in is very relevant. a name they used to go by but no longer do is not relevant unless notable. Tekrmn (talk) 04:18, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  This response is very confusing. At 2023 Covenant School shooting you are aggressively advocating for removal of the birth name of the perpetrator despite repeated and continuous use in reliable sources. But here, you say a name they used to go by but no longer do is not relevant unless notable (emphasis added). I'm curious how you reconcile that statement with the clearly notable birth name of the perpetrator at that article. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:07, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  ...their birthname will be in the sources which they are easily able to click on. — Not necessarily - Some reliable sources are not easily accessible. Mitch Ames (talk) 00:44, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  as you are well aware, I was advocating for the remocal of his birth name in a third location. It belongs in the lead and in the bio template, but there is no reason to put it anywhere else. Tekrmn (talk) 05:09, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  ...the person's birth name would be exactly the same as their assigned gender at birth. both were given at birth before the person was able to identify themselves and both were never an accurate reflection of that person. — The difference is that (using my example) Mary asserts that she has always been female (although it may have taken a while for her to realise it), but she does not assert that her name has always been Mary. Mitch Ames (talk) 01:41, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  your analogy would only make sense if being female meant having a vagina. as it stands, your logic is flawed. a trans woman saying she was always female is not saying she was born with a vagina, she's saying "use this language for me." likewise, a trans woman changing her name is not saying she was never called by her birth name, she's saying "use this name for me." they're exactly the same. in either case you would not refer to her by what she was assigned at birth because they were never a reflection of her identity. it's called a deadname because you aren't supposed to use it anymore. Tekrmn (talk) 05:28, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  Now your reading your own interpretation into what someone says. (Admittedly that someone is my hypothetical example, so she may not be an accurate representation.) A trans women saying she was always female isn't saying "use this language", she is saying "I identify as female and have always been female". Can we find specific examples? The National Center for Transgender Equality's FAQ says that "Some people can trace their awareness [that their gender identity differed from what they were assigned at birth] back to their earlier memories", (my example, Mary knew she was female). Are there any examples of a trans person saying "My name has always been Mary and was never John"? Mitch Ames (talk) 09:43, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  your response does not address my point, and your argument still doesn't make sense. yes, a trans woman's gender has always been female, therefor that is the word we should use to describe her. no, a trans woman's birth name did not fit her identity, therefor that is not a word we should use to describe her. Tekrmn (talk) 02:34, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose removing the qualifier, but agree that this should apply to the recently deceased as well. Treating this as an extension of the protections that BLP offers that's relevant to trans/non-binary people is the way to go here. Getting stricter than that, or expanding this to anyone whose name has changed, only makes our site less useful to our readers without protecting a similarly compelling privacy interest as we do here. Elli (talk | contribs) 12:58, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Comment. Looking at the RFC, one issue with applying DEADNAME to deceased people involved figures from the past who didn't have as clear of a distinction between name and deadname in the sources. I don't think it's reasonable to apply DEADNAME to someone from the 18th century who may or may not have considered their birth name a DEADNAME and when reliable sources are providing both names. That said, for more recent cases, given evolving expectations and understandings, it would make sense to continue DEADNAME provisions after death for someone not notable under their prior name. (Basically something like Option B in the 2021 RFC, but I don't know if 1920 is the right place to draw the line.) At the risk of CRYSTALBALLing it, I think we're likely to see reliable media sources more commonly excluding deadnames from coverage, which may make some of this moot. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 13:22, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Comment. I oppose extending the BLP-based protections in WP:DEADNAME to dead people (beyond the period for which WP:BDP applies). As I said in the RFC, the guideline against mentioning a deadname is explicitly grounded in the very strong protections of WP:BLPPRIVACY. We mention a deadname of a person covered by BLP only when absolutely necessary, to identify a name of prior nobility. Based on the privacy concerns, we exclude the deadname even if it is of some relevance. Once BLP ceases to apply, those privacy concerns end as well. I don't think James Barry (surgeon) or Billy Tipton would be improved by removing the deadnames. Both articles discuss their subjects in ways that would be horribly intrusive for a living person, but are appropriate for a detailed exploration of a life lived in a very different time from our own. For Brandon Teena, the deadname seems to have been removed without much discussion, despite the name being explicitly referred to (without being given) in two important contexts and its clear relevance to the various chosen names the subject went by. That said, for most trans people alive today, their articles, even after their death, are unlikely to warrant delving into the deeply personal circumstances life in the way that is done for historical trans people or victims of crime, so the deadname won't usually be relevant.--Trystan (talk) 15:50, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Regarding for most trans people alive today, their articles, even after their death, are unlikely to warrant delving into the deeply personal circumstances life in the way that is done for historical trans people or victims of crime, so the deadname won't usually be relevant: I think my concern would be in cases where editors feel the deadname is necessary for encyclopedic completeness, similar to how we often include middle names even for people who generally don't use them and when its not part of how they are notably known. Does that reach the level of the DEADNAME being relevant? If not, and there aren't other questions of relevance or notability for the dead name, should DEADNAME still apply? —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 16:38, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  I would say no, routine encyclopedic completeness should not be considered sufficient for relevance in this case. I think it the standard should be something like "significant, detailed focus in reliable sources on the subject's pre-transition identity (beyond standard biographical details like birth and family)." For example, James Barry (surgeon) § Early life could in theory be rewritten to obfuscate the birth name, but it would be very convoluted, and I don't think leaving it out could be defended on the basis of it being irrelevant. I admit it would be very challenging to get consensus for such a standard, as many editors would support never including it, and many editors would support always including it.--Trystan (talk) 17:04, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  For James Barry, I would tentatively agree that including what we consider to be his deadname is of encyclopaedic value. However that is only because Barry's story is unusually complicated.

  For Billy Tipton however, the question that needs to be asked is under what name did Tipton become notable? According to the article, his transition was a surprise to all of those people directly involved with his life as they only became aware of it after he died, and his name change occurred some time in the early 1930s as his music career was beginning. With the possible exception of Non Earl Harrell, none of his later romantic partners were aware of his transition, and the only reason we're even aware of it today was because it was discovered by paramedics while attempting to save his life in January 1989.

  Perhaps there's more in the sources that I'm not aware of, but on the surface it looks to me as though Tipton was not notable under his former name. If that is the case, then as a follow-on question, what encyclopaedic value does including his former name add to the article? With regards to the rest of the article content, excluding his former name would not prevent us from discussing all of the other details surrounding his transition, nor would it I think cause confusion to readers by not including it. On the surface it looks as though he used the name for a relatively short period (approximately 20 years) with respect to the rest of his life. So what vital encyclopaedic value does including his former name add to the article? Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:04, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Once the privacy concerns relevant to a BLP are long over, I don't think the appropriate test is either vital encyclopedic value or under which names they were notable. Simple, concrete relevance of the name - as determined by fairly summarizing the way the subject is generally discussed in reliable sources - is what I would argue for. Billy Tipton might well be an article worth reviewing, as the coverage of the subject's pre-transition life is actually very brief, and the birth name doesn't come up in any specific ways. But any applicable guideline should require assessment of relevance on an article-by-article basis.--Trystan (talk) 17:40, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per Blueboar, and for the same reason we have different policies for living and deceased people generally. GiantSnowman 15:57, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Comment. It seems to me that there are two importantly different issues being conflated here. Sideswipe9th argues that non-notable former names are not encyclopedically notable, whether for transgender persons or otherwise, and that's at least a cogent position to take. If we're really just discussing offering guidance that such names should not usually be given, the same as we don't usually refer to biographees as "Dr", for example, well, the stakes are fairly low here.
  That's very different from recognizing a privacy interest to deceased persons, and suggesting (though I doubt the MOS actually has "jurisdiction" over this) that such information should be oversighted or revdelled, as opposed to just removed as part of style cleanup.
  Revision deletion is an extreme measure that goes against the presumption of openness in the encyclopedia and should be used only in cases of grave necessity. Non-administrators can't in general even find out why a revision was deleted; they just have to trust. I don't think the privacy interests of deceased persons rises to that level. --Trovatore (talk) 17:02, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  For the vast majority of articles, I would not see the temporary inclusion of a former name of a deceased person as rising to the need for oversight suppression or revdelling. In those cases, I would envisage GENDERID (or NAMECHANGE if there was consensus to broaden that) to be a reason to exclude mention of a non-notable former name from the article by default, without a need to revdel or suppress it, while also allowing for a per-article consensus to include it.

  There are some exceptions however, like the killing article I mentioned in my opening post, where the addition of a former name would only serve to denigrate the deceased. In the context of that article for example, readers do not need to know her former name to know that 1) she was killed, and 2) she was transgender. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:17, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  To be clear, I would oppose oversighting that article. --Trovatore (talk) 17:20, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

• I would oppose this, per Blueboar. However, this guideline does need to be revised. It needs to be expanded to cover other name changes where a privacy concern exists, it needs to clarify that it covers the recently deceased, and it needs to have an exception added for when the former name is WP:DUE - for example, we should include a hatnote at Adam Graham to Isla Bryson case, and we should include the name Adam Graham in that article, because that name is considered relevant by reliable sources, such as the BBC, the Glasgow Times, the Herald Scotland, and the National, and we are expected to follow the sources.
  I am also concerned about WP:NOTCENSORED issues; the arguments in support of this change appear to be directly in conflict with that policy and could be applied to other arguments where editors have argued for censorship, such as of images of Muhammad. BilledMammal (talk) 17:58, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Even were it not for DEADNAME, there would be a strong presumption against such a hatnote. If BLPNAME applies to a war criminal who shot multiple unarmed civilians in the back – and consensus is that it does – then it surely must apply to Bryson, who would be just as notable as the other thousand or so convicted rapists in the past year (i.e. not) if it wasn't for this culture war bullshit gripping the UK (and US) at the moment. Which is why the hatnote was revdeled from the Adam Graham article, of course.

  Just because people off the encyclopedia are using these thin edges of the wedge to justify a bigoted culture war doesn't mean we should follow their . We are not tabloid journalists muckraking for profits or notoriety in a changing world; we are an encyclopedia. Cooler heads should and must prevail. Sceptre (talk) 18:23, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  Referencing WP:BLPNAME here doesn't make sense; we already identify the individual by using their current name. I see that an edit on the article was revdeled, but it can't have been for that reason.

  Journalists at reliable sources like the BBC aren't tabloid journalists muckraking for profits or notoriety in a changing world. BilledMammal (talk) 19:03, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  The BBC are demonstrably just as at risk of the culture war brainworms (and related institutional capture) the rest of British civil society seems to have contracted over the past few years (thanks a lot, Boris Johnson); after all, what was "We're being pressured into sex by some trans women" if not exactly that? Sceptre (talk) 21:38, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  If you think the BBC is unreliable for trans topics than you need to open a discussion about downgrading it at WP:RSN. BilledMammal (talk) 03:06, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support Treating people with respect and decency doesn't stop at the moment they die. --Jayron32 17:52, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support and I'm frankly surprised by all this opposition. The only cogent argument against the change I've seen is in cases of long-dead figures whose trans status was not entirely clear like James Barry. I'd support adding a caveat about that, but in general there's nothing about this guideline that is unique to living people or otherwise BLP-related. Loki (talk) 18:22, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support. Even if a trans person died long ago, if they never gained any notability under their deadname we have no valid reason to include it in this encyclopedia. Avoiding deadnaming is not just a matter of privacy for the immediate subject being written about, but respect for all trans people. Yes, I expect to be accused of bias (being trans) and WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS etc., but truly, I see no encyclopedic value in including non-notable deadnames. Funcrunch (talk) 18:26, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Comment If this is going to become a formal discussion with !votes then it needs to be opened as an RfC, probably at WP:VPP. I would also suggest that you include alternative revisions, such as those proposed by Blueboar and myself, to fully comply with the requirements of WP:RFCNEUTRAL. BilledMammal (talk) 18:28, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  It might come to an RfC, but we've already seen from the 2021 RfC that more than two options would split the vote in a way that makes consensus nearly impossible to determine. I've no objection to us workshopping an RfC if we truly feel that we need it, though we will need to consider ways to appropriately "chunk" this so that a consensus can later be determined (multiple narrow sequential questions maybe?).

  That said, there are many ways to arrive at a consensus, and an RfC is but one. If we can reach a consensus here without one, then do we truly need one to cement it? Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:47, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Yes; for a proposal like this we need the input of uninvolved editors that a formal RfC would bring, and because it would overturn the result of a previous RfC. BilledMammal (talk) 04:33, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

• Unfortunately, as can be seen above and in the above-linked prior RFCs, this is a situation where there are so many views it's difficult to even get consensus on what question to ask, let alone get consensus for any answer to a question, because various people would rather ask various different questions. I mean: in answer to this question about removing the "living" qualifier from DEADNAME and applying it to dead trans people, some people have commented above that they would rather the question have been about removing the "transgender" qualifier and applying DEADNAME to all former names, whereas other people have commented they'd rather remove DEADNAME and apply it to no names at all.
  Another complicating factor is ... while it seems obvious to many people that because a modern person like Laverne Cox's deadname is non-notable and including it would serve no purpose but transphobia, it's perverse that policy/guidelines say if you murder Laverne Cox you then are allowed to insert her deadname into her article two years later (or earlier, depending on interpretations of BDP) ... not only do some people disagree and think it's good for policy/guidelines to say that ... but there are also, separately, questions about whether it should apply to people who lived and died long before the modern era, and yet, do people agree on where to place a cutoff, given that some people don't agree on whether to place a cutoff, but for mutually exclusive reasons, either thinking it should apply without cutoff to all names, or thinking it should apply to no names? I would be fine with removing "living" (few if any of the reasons for not using someone's non-notable deadname are changed by someone murdering them), but I think there are too many moving parts for it to be likely for this to reach a consensus on anything.
  Regarding Brianna, I would point out that if the news articles which would be cited for some piece of information are still live but have been updated to no longer include that specific information, it seems pretty shaky for Wikipedia to include it—can we be sure it was accurate, and wasn't removed because the paper realized it was inaccurate or unverifiable? Here, it might be helpful to think about a less-politicized example: if a news article says a shooter was seen leaving the scene in a white car, and the site later updates the article to say the shooter was seen leaving the scene in a black car, or to not mention the color of the car, do we cite the archived version to say in our article that the shooter was seen leaving in a white car? The information — Brianna's deadname or the car's color — would presumably also be WP:UNDUE (if the only available RS was revised to not give it any weight), and Wikipedia is WP:NOTINDISCRIMINATE. -sche (talk) 18:30, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

  Regarding the back-and-forth above about whether a name being "notable" and being "relevant" can possibly be different standards: well, let's not let perfect be the enemy of good, if we can agree to something like "For [non-recently] deceased transgender people, do not include their former name if it is not relevant." that'd be an improvement. And it might help with issues around modern vs historical people. (Sure, let me anticipate the likely response, that people will just disagree on whether a name is relevant: people also disagree everywhere across this encyclopedia every day on whether things are DUE, FRINGE, NPOV, BLP-compliant, etc, etc, etc, but guidelines are useful nonetheless.)
  (At a minimum it would be helpful to add some language, whether in a footnote or in the prose, clarifying that merely referring to a dead person does not mean a deadname will/must be included, since there are all the other policies and guidelines linked above to consider.) -sche (talk) 16:56, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  your proposed clarification would not make any difference. if there is any precedent that does not specifically prohibit unnecessarily including someone's birth name then people are going to do it. Tekrmn (talk) 17:02, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  "For [non-recently] deceased transgender people, do not include their former name if it is not relevant." I think that would be an excellent addition to the guideline. I would suggest something like "...if it is not specifically relevant.", to clearly convey a higher (but unspecified) standard than routine inclusion of a birth name. As you say, there would be some difficult discussions in applying it, but perhaps those discussions would let a more detailed consensus evolve that could subsequently be incorporated into the guideline.--Trystan (talk) 17:16, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  Adding intentional ambiguity to our guidelines here is about the last thing we should be doing. Elli (talk | contribs) 17:30, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  how is the word specific any more ambiguous than no word at all? Tekrmn (talk) 17:56, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  How is "specifically relevant" different from "relevant"? We don't define "specifically relevant" anywhere. It's just going to lead to more arguments over its meaning, when we should be striving for a more objective standard here. Elli (talk | contribs) 17:58, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  as Trystan said, it conveys a higher standard for what can be considered relevant. I think the bigger issue is the "living" in the MOS, but this comment thread is already largely about what constitutes relevance (which everybody seems to want to protect but nobody can define). I think indicating that there has to be a specific reason the person's birthname is relevant in the article beyond "reliable sources used it" is a step in the right direction. Tekrmn (talk) 18:23, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

• I'm not convinced a bar of notability is always equally useful for all dead, especially historical, people. How about something about significant (nontrivial) encyclopedic value and/or common use in RS? ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 19:09, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose, procedural and otherwise - as noted above, this RfC in Aug.-Sep. 2021 covered basically this issue, and did not find consensus for a change. To actually change it should only happen after an RfC overturning that. In all fairness, the closure (by a panel of 3 admins) did leave the possibility open for that, but contained pertinent advice in that regard. As for my own position on that matter, I explained it in that RfC and feel no need to repeat it here and now, but I do emphasize that this in no way is carte blanche to include deadnames for those who are deceased, as this should be decided based on each article's circumstances, and in many many cases, including the article OP is concerned about, is WP:UNDUE or even not reliably source-able. Indeed, claims appearing only in past versions of sources and that were later removed should be considered retracted claims and not reliable enough to even pass the WP:V threshold, let alone NPOV/DUE. Crossroads ^-talk- 00:56, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  people are using this as carte blanche to include deadnames whether or not that is your intention in keeping this wording. Tekrmn (talk) 01:09, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  Where? People misuse guidelines relatively commonly, in good and bad faith, but that isn't a reason to change them. Crossroads ^-talk- 01:40, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  the 2023 covenant shooter page for one has been full of people using any excuse to include the shooter's birthname and old pronouns in places where it doesn't belong. the article is currently fairly respectful of the shooter's identity but it's still an ongoing conversation and it took a lot more effort than it should have to get it to that place.

  There's no good reason to keep this guideline though, the main argument I'm seeing is privacy, which may not be relevant to the deceased but it is relevant to trans people all over the world, and in many cases people who knew the deceased.

  additionally, it seems like we are coming toward a consensus for a change now so I'm not sure how relevant an outdated talk page is. Tekrmn (talk) 03:40, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  I don't see anything that looks close to a consensus for any particular change. --Trovatore (talk) 05:50, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

• It seems like the discussions and edit-warring over the deadname at 2023 Covenant School shooting is what prompted this discussion (the article is Fully-protected right now because of that). As others have mentioned already, similar issues have been previously addressed in this 2021 RfC: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography/2021 archive#RfC on non-notable pre-transition names of deceased trans people. Some1 (talk) 12:32, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

  While that article is a problem with respect to the commonly held interpretation of the GENDERID guidance, and a good example for Crossroads' question of where editors are misusing the guideline, I was pretty open in my opening post about what prompted this discussion. As other editors present here can attest to, this issue of the deadname guidance ceasing to apply when BDP ends is something I've been discussing on the Wikimedia Discord since October 2022. Sideswipe9th (talk) 15:48, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support I don't see this a privacy issue, but an accuracy, dignity and style issue. I do not see a good reason to have separate practices simply because the person being discussed is no longer living. Its surprising to see people argue in favor of separate style policies based on such arbitrary criteria as the concerns MOS:DEADNAME seeks to address are much broader than simply those of BLP. Filiforme1312 (talk) 20:31, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
• Strong support. Jayron32 so eloquently put it: Treating people with respect and decency doesn't stop at the moment they die. If you can't respect dead trans people, then that's a problem. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 20:49, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose on the basis that WP:DUE/WP:UNDUE makes the matter redundant after death. Our encyclopedia should follow our sources, and this feels like editorializing for the sake of it. If our sources consistently use a name for one of our subjects, then we should as well. —Locke Cole • t • c 03:29, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose: We treat living (or recently deceased) people differently to dead people, as laid out in WP:BLP. I don't see why birth/former names should be treated differently to other privacy issues. It's not disrespecting a dead person to mention the simple (presumably verifiable) fact that they had a different name for the first part of their life. (Note that "mentioning" a person's name is not the same as "using" it - the latter may be disrespectful, the former is not. We can briefly mention the birth name, while using the post-trans name throughout the article.) The fact of a person's birth name is an intrinsic part of that person's biography, just as much as the date of their birth. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the birth name has encyclopedic value because it allows our readers to do further research about a person, in particular before the name change. Just because the trans person's earlier life is not notable enough for Wikipedia, it does not mean that our readers won't be interested in learning more about the person's early life. This is particularly the case where we specifically mention the difficulties the person had pre-trans. Just because a person changes their name does not mean that the previous life - in which they used their original/birth name - ceases to exist. We may not cover it, but our readers should not be prevented from learning about it. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:40, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  @Mitch Ames: Note that "mentioning" a person's name is not the same as "using" it - the latter may be disrespectful, the former is not. We can briefly mention the birth name, while using the post-trans name throughout the article. That is exactly the reasoning to support this change, because editors are trying to say that MOS:GENDERID doesn't apply to dead people and we can therefore use their deadname throughout. If we remove the "living" qualifier it will be clear that we should only mention the deadname of deceased persons, not use it. ––FormalDude (talk) 06:40, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  The proposed new version (at the start of this section) says that for all trans/non-binary people, including dead ones, a former [non-notable] name (a deadname) ... should not be included in any page, ie anywhere at all, thus prohibiting mentions. Mitch Ames (talk) 07:46, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  @Mitch Ames: If their deadname was notable though, the policy says it can be mentioned. I guess my confusion is why you think we should mention a non-notable deadname for people who are deceased, but not living people? Why would deceased people not be afforded the same respect to the preference of their own name? ––FormalDude (talk) 08:16, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  why you think we should mention a non-notable deadname for people who are deceased — For reasons I've covered in previous posts, I think that a person's birth/former name is inherently relevant and encyclopedic, so worthy of mention.

  Why would deceased people not be afforded the same respect to the preference of their own name? — It's not about "respect" it's about privacy - MOS:DEADNAME says "Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest". We have a whole page WP:BLP describing the ways we treat living people differently to dead ones. I don't think names are somehow special. Mitch Ames (talk) 08:34, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  it is not about privacy, and someone's birth name is not relevant without specific reason Tekrmn (talk) 12:58, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  without specific reason Identification, as we would with any other person, trans or not, that changed their name. It's not, on its face, any different than including a maiden name (which we do in many articles), or "real names" for famous people who use stage names (and whose articles are located at the stage name). To be crystal clear: I am not against MOS:DEADNAME for living subjects. But for those who have passed, the potential harm is outweighed by being complete (especially if other policies, like WP:DUE are rigidly followed, and such naming is proportional to the coverage in our reliable sources). To the extent WP:BDP allows for a temporary extension of BLP/MOS:DEADNAME (with editorial consensus), that ought to be enough. —Locke Cole • t • c 21:46, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  it is different than including a maiden name or a legal name for a performer who uses a stage name. it is unnecessary and harmful to the trans person in question as well as the entire trans community. Tekrmn (talk) 17:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  Encyclopedias are historical records for people. If you believe recording historical facts is "unnecessary" and "harmful", you may not be clear on what our purpose here is. This is part and parcel of why WP:NOTCENSORED exists. We don't self censor to avoid offending people. Whether it's through explicit images, or in this case, identifying someone by their former name if reliable sources do as well. —Locke Cole • t • c 19:12, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  The thing about NOTCENSORED is that it's a reason to not remove content that some readers might find objectionable or offensive, but it is not in itself a reason to include content that others find objectionable or offensive. Citing NOTCENSORED as a reason to include a dead trans or non-binary person's deadname is a misuse of of that policy and the related offensive material guideline. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:21, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  I’m sure you’re aware, but I did state we should follow our reliable sources. And as I’ve said previously elsewhere, we should follow WP:NPOV, specifically WP:DUE, when dealing with such content. —Locke Cole • t • c 19:42, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  NOTCENSORED is a reason to avoid excluding content when the argument for exclusion is that people deem it to be harmful, offensive, etc, and that is the general argument for the position of "almost always exclude deadnames" here. Elli (talk | contribs) 19:50, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  and what is the argument for inclusion? Tekrmn (talk) 22:15, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  WP:DUE —Locke Cole • t • c 23:04, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  @Locke Cole: Going to use Laverne Cox here as an example, as a couple of editors elsewhere in the discussion have mentioned her previously, but this question would equally apply to Rachel Levine (the other example listed in GENDERID), or any other trans or non-binary person who was never notable under their deadname. BDP notwithstanding, if Cox died right now, why would we need to include her deadname? What identification purposes would including whatever her deadname is that wouldn't already be solved by searching for the name by which she is solely known?

  I can think of plenty of reasons not to include it. She was never notable under that name. She doesn't use that name, and has as far as I know gone to some effort to not reveal it. There's no information about her early life that we would need that name to find. Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information or trivia. So what is it about her death that would mean that it's now content that we should include? Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:35, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  She was never notable under that name. This argument has never been persuasive for me. Marion Morrison was never notable under that name, either, but we include it (and have a redirect for it) nonetheless. Likewise Leslie Townes Hope, Donald Yarmy, Cherilyn Sarkisian, Merwyn Bogue, Florencia Vicenta de Casillas-Martínez Cardona (without the redirect; piped here) and many others. The idea that DEADNAME is not something to mention based on pre-transition notability doesn't convince me any. We include encyclopedically the birth names (and for Cher, intermediate names) of notable subjects as a matter of course. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 00:15, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose The dead expect nor fear nothing, meaning no disrespect, no privacy and no harm, among all other real world problems. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:48, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support If it is inappropriate to include a deadname when the person is alive, then it remains inappropriate once they've died. Otherwise we'd run into situations where people would then add in the deadname the moment the person dies because they'd claim this MOS no longer applies. Which is blatantly dumb. Also, several of the Oppose votes above seem to be making arguments that would run afoul of the current wording in regards to living people as well, so their claims should be disregarded as not relevant. Silverseren^C 04:06, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  By that logic, it's inappropriate to embalm, burn or bury a dead person since it would have been a few minutes before they transitioned. If you look at human rights, you'll notice a pattern of preferential treatment for the living. This is a feature, not a bug. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:18, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per Blueboar, Crossroads, and InedibleHulk. — Czello 08:25, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose, largely per Mitch Ames. The article should be written using the person's most recent chosen name, if known, unless they were overwhelmingly known by another name. However I don't see any "disrespect" in stating the neutral fact that their parents named them with a different name, and reporting what that name was. It's not usually going to be one of the most important things about them; I wouldn't put it in the first sentence. But it's very standard to report birth names in the "Early life" section, whether the subject liked the name or not. --Trovatore (talk) 18:53, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose, Per InedibleHulk and Blueboar. Koltinn (talk) 21:34, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support This is not a privacy issue, but one of basic dignity. It is inline with editorial practices of major publications. Further, the current exemption/loophole has an affect not just on the subjects, but on the general atmosphere of the project and transgender people generally, including readers and editors. Filiforme1312 (talk) 03:41, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
  • While we are not formally !voting here, if we were, this would be a duplicate !vote. On the merits, I haven't seen anyone explain in what way reporting a birth name is an offense against respect or dignity. --Trovatore (talk) 16:50, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. If the former name can be reliably sourced then there is no problem with including it, as with any other name change. This is an encyclopaedia and encyclopaedias include such details. -- Necrothesp (talk) 09:31, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. Emotive rhetoric aside, there’s been no attempt to give a lucid argument as to why the real or imagined privacy needs, in death, of one minority group should be privileged above numerous others' equally speculative claims to privacy. For the sake of close relations (the only purpose of the "recently deceased" clause) an argument could be made for formalising that phrase in some reasonable number of years (>10) for certain categories of information. The notion that encyclopaedia articles not discuss the birth name of dead historical figures, an implicit result of the above proposal, is absurd. Cambial — foliar❧ 13:30, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. per Blueboar, Crossroads, and InedibleHulk. I wholly endorse Jayron32's comment that Treating people with respect and decency doesn't stop at the moment they die. - or at least it shouldn't, particularly the recently dead. But I see no reason why excluding their birthname should be done automatically as proposed. Where there is no good reason to include, it should not be included, but where relevant it should be allowable. This proposal is too broad and may lead to absurdities in our coverage. We should trust to editor judgement rather than imposing a 'one size fits all' rule. I could probably support a less draconian change. Pincrete (talk) 17:43, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support. The spirit of the MOS:DEADNAME policy is that failing to acknowledge respect the totality of a trans person's abandonment of their deadname infringes their essential dignity; the taking up of a new name as part of transitioning has greater meaning and greater importance than the taking up of a nom de plume or the like, because the deadname – even when given with the best of intentions – is an extension of the 'mistaken' gender assigned at birth. I see no reason why our respect for this principle should end at any given person's death, as Jayron32 so eloquently puts it. XAM2175 ^(T) 17:53, 12 April 2023 (UTC), ^{edited 11:48, 13 April 2023 (UTC)}

  That said, I do accept the concerns that some editors have expressed regarding the effect this change could have on our coverage of long-dead subjects. In general I support the "recently-deceased" sunset we apply in the BLP policy, but in this specific topic – given my rationale above, and recognising that most change in social and medical attitudes to gender has occured comparatively recently – I would instead suggest that DEADNAME should apply to all people who are currently alive or who were alive for any amount of time after a certain fixed point in the twentieth century.

  On the whole though, I still support the proposal at the top of this section and would prefer that it was implemented and then tweaked to better handle historical coverage, rather than endlessly deferring acceptance and implementation because we get caught up in options paralysis. XAM2175 ^(T) 18:20, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  I really like this suggestion of the 20th century and onward as it generally reflects the modern conception of deadnames. I can think of a few gender people who existed prior to this who expressed similar feelings about past names but still feels like a good easy point to use for an MOS. Filiforme1312 (talk) 01:01, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  failing to acknowledge a trans person's abandonment of their deadname infringes their essential dignity — By that logic we should definitely acknowledge the change of name in the article, by explicitly stating that they changed their name. But to say "Mary changed her name" without mentioning what she changed it from, seems somewhat incomplete. Mitch Ames (talk) 23:55, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  why would that mean we need to acknowledge their name change? that should be mentioned in the transgender article, but that doesn't mean we need bring it up on every article that mentions a trans person. Tekrmn (talk) 02:31, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  why would that mean we need to acknowledge their name change? — Because (according to XAM2175) failing to acknowledge a trans person's abandonment of their deadname infringes their essential dignity. I suppose we could acknowledge that they abandoned their deadname without actually saying that they changed it. But saying that "Mary/she abandoned her old name" implies that she changed it, because it's used in that sentence or elsewhere in the article.

  Just to be clear, I do not agree with XAM2175's statement ("failing to acknowledge ... infringes their essential dignity"), I was merely pointing out that it's not a very good argument for suppression of the deadname. Mitch Ames (talk) 05:37, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  In retrospect using "acknowledge" was a poor choice, and I have edited my original post to better reflect my meaning. The gist is that I don't believe that encyclopaedic completeness is sufficient grounds to include a deadname; rather, only when said deadname already has notability attached should there be a presumption of inclusion. In respect of the principle of least astonishment for our readers, I would feel in general that the fact the subject of an article has a deadname at all need not be introduced unless necessary – as while I completely agree that the principle should be observed as fully as possible, I don't wish to see it used as a coatrack for deadnaming. XAM2175 ^(T) 12:05, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

• I should make it explicit that I support the spirit of this proposal, although I'd prefer mine! There are limited reasons why we should be deadnaming trans people; the current rules we have regarding trans peoples' deadnames have been formulated over many years in line with the principle that a person's name is integral to their identity, which is a topic where we should, at least, take note of the sensitivities involved. I'm not convinced that death of a subject changes the balance regarding inclusion of deadnames that drastically that a distinction necessarily needs to be made; the special protections of BLP are a sufficient reason to exclude UNDUE information, but not a necessary reason before exclusion can be justified. Basically: unless you can justify it editorially, it's best not to include deadnames, and if you're looking for an excuse in policy to do it, then you probably can't justify it editorially. Sceptre (talk) 21:13, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support as a matter of basic respect and dignity. Any case where including the deadname would actually be relevant is covered by the "notable under former name" clause. I also think this discussion can be converted into an RfC. Galobtter (talk) 07:34, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose as WP:RGW gone overboard. I can get on board with the idea that we as a project should not be willfully inflicting harm on a person. And I accept that using a deadname or misgendering does do that, so I can get behind the idea that what we usually say, (we follow the sources, we are not here to change the world but to document it, our opinions do not matter, what matters is what the weight of the reliable sources) should not always apply, but that should as be limited as possible to avoid the harm while not turning our long established practices upside down. This does that though. When the considerations of BLP pass, we no longer have a reason to not follow our policy on WP:WEIGHT. When the sources shift in one direction or another, we follow. We dont lead. For a living person who may suffer some actual real injury as a result of that, then absolutely we take that in to account and give that substantial weight, so much so it overrides our non-negotiable policy. When that possibility of harm is removed then that policy should revert to being the controlling one for a discussion on what should our article say. nableezy - 23:14, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per Nableezy, Locke Cole, Crossroads and Mitch Ames. I’ll add my opinion that the current guideline is to protect living subjects from being exposed to their deadname if not notable. If the subject is dead, they won’t be exposed any more. Consideration of how other people feel, who are not the subject, I do not feel it is relevant, because they may feel negative towards either the old or the new name. So, we should follow sources, what they report. starship.paint (exalt) 03:34, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
• Support. This is the simplest solution and would result in a single policy that gets applied everywhere; it also reflects what's increasingly the most common practice among the highest-quality sources, making it a reasonable inclusion in our MOS. And many of the concerns above seem misplaced - obviously, proper sourcing would still be required for the fact that it is their preferred name; sourcing indicating that they were notable under their deadname would still be reflected in the article, and so on. Likewise, I don't agree with the arguments above that this would somehow make our articles less accurate - in high-quality sourcing, using the correct name is how you cover trans people accurately; it is linguistically correct, beyond all else (hence why this is fundimentially a MOS issue.) We would not include archaic or excessively informal language in our articles, even if vast swaths of lower-quality sources could be found using them; similarly, it makes no sense to argue that we should disregard a basic principle of modern, high-quality academic writing simply because sources exist that use lower-quality language. --Aquillion (talk) 11:42, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
  • Comment You say "using the correct name is how you cover trans people accurately", but that's about using rather than mentioning. I don't think anyone is proposing to actually refer to deceased persons using a name other than their chosen one, at least in the usual case. The question here is whether it should be forbidden to report the birth name, if the person was not already notable when using that name. --Trovatore (talk) 01:54, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

    I would say it applies for mentioning their name as well. In my field, we’ve been writing about trans people just fine without the use of deadnames. It is a bit odd to see how wikipedia is lagging over a decade behind academics in this area. Filiforme1312 (talk) 19:07, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose I think MOS:DEADNAME takes the wrong approach by treating trans people as somehow different from everyone else. IMO, name changes should not be treated differently depending on whether or not the person is trans. I realize this is an unpopular opinion, and I've avoided certain areas because of it. Adoring nanny (talk) 02:54, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose - Per User "Adoring nanny" above....I think having the policy in the first place (even for living people) was a mistake - one which prioritized ideology and went against (what had been) core Wikipedia principles - making a mockery of things like "NPOV" and "not censored." If a person is notable enough to have a biography on Wikipedia, their birthname is inherently notable. As far as I'm concerned, a trans person who changes their name should be treated no differently than a woman who changes her name when she gets married, or a author/artist/musician/performer who has a pen/stage name (which in some cases they legally change their name to). The article of course should primarily use the new name, but the old/birth name should be noted if reliable sources can be cited for it. In any case, I oppose the proposal as it would simply be the expansion of a bad policy to cases where there's even less justification for it. This proposal seems to have been inspired by the Nashville shooting, where the media has primarily used the shooter's birth name, but where some people want Wikipedia to exclusively use the shooter's new name. -2003:CA:8708:3F10:A06:7FE8:46B0:8C69 (talk) 10:22, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

  If a person is notable enough to have a biography on Wikipedia, their birthname is inh[e]rently notable. That seems a bit circular to me. There's all types of facts about a person that we wouldn't include in an article about them, for examples, sometimes because it wouldn't be consistent with summary style. I think the question has to be why is a birth name inherently relevant? I would lean towards thinking that it's often not—it's a mere factoid, no more "inherently" worthy of inclusion than a person's height, weight, children's names, or any such detail. --Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:09, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

  No, I don't think that's circular at all. Whether or not a person is notable enough to have a Wikipedia biography article is determined by its own set of notability guidelines, which have nothing to do with whether or not the birth name is included. What I'm saying is simply that IF a person is notable enough to be included in Wikipedia, their birth name is inherently worthy of inclusion, as it's a basic fact about that person, which should always be included in a biography. This is why we include, for example, the birth names of married women who changed their names, even if they changed their names before becoming notable. Most biographies have sections about the person's childhood, which usually happened before they became notable (with some exceptions for child actors and the like). And it'd make no sense for a biography to talk about what happened during the person's childhood but omit the name that they went by at that time!

  Like I said, the only legit reason (in keeping with "NPOV" and "not censored") for omitting someone's birth name is if there's not a reliable source to substantiate what it is. Anything else is simply purely ideological - an Orwellian attempt at rewriting or denying basic historical facts. -2003:CA:8708:3F1A:2506:B0AD:F222:26D5 (talk) 14:25, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

  But why is their birth name inherently worthy of inclusion? It seems to me that you're just restating the same thing as evidence of it self. It's "inherently worthy of inclusion" because it's a "basic fact"—what does a "basic fact" mean? Bychance, is it a fact "inherently worthy of inclusion"? "[I]t'd make no sense for a biography to talk about what happened during the person's childhood but omit the name that they went by at that time! Why? Again, you're saying these things as if they're self evident, but I don't see how they are.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:44, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose If sources also mention the person's birth name, then so should we. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 09:49, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per Blueboar, Crossroads, InedibleHulk, and Mitch Ames. There's nothing wrong with stating the simple, neutral, verifiable fact that a trans person's parents gave them a different name at birth than they chose later on, mentioning it once (maybe twice?), and using the preferred name for the majority of the article. Anything wrong with it is either a WP:RGW or a WP:WINC issue. Cheers! Fakescientist8000 00:29, 2 May 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.

The following discussion 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.

---

A different approach?

Whilst I'm sympathetic to the proposal, I think @Sideswipe9th: might be approaching this from the wrong angle. I don't think it's too unreasonable to argue that names are gendered terms for the purposes of GENDERID and as such, we should prefer their chosen name. Indeed, as I've pointed out in previous RMs, the articles for high-profile trans people such as Elliot Page and Caitlyn Jenner were moved almost immediately on this principle.

However, there are some times where inclusion of a deadname has editorial justification; for example, Caitlyn's athletic career or Elliot's early movie career. Wikipedia is not censored, of course, but neither does Wikipedia include needlessly provocative content. There is a fine line between content being included for being encyclopaedic and being included for the sake of inclusion; for example of a different area where I think we struck the right balance on this, the article for Muhammad (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), I believe, strikes the balance correctly when it comes to depictions of him.

As such, I propose the following paragraph for inclusion between paragraphs one and two of GENDERID:

Where a person has changed their name for reasons related to their gender identity, it is generally preferable to use their new name in most contexts. Ensure that when their former name (colloquially known as a "deadname") is included, it is done sparingly and is editorially justified.

As it is at the moment, there's actually nothing in the letter of GENDERID that would prevent The Wachowskis being called by their former (and credited) professional name at The Matrix (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), even though we generally agree it would go against the spirit. This would close this hole and formalise the default to preferred names, but provide an opportunity for inclusion of deadnames if (and, I hope, only if) it can be justified editorially (in the case of The Matrix, I think the "credited as" footnote is the right balance). Sceptre (talk) 17:43, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree with this proposal, and if the above proposal doesn't pass I'd like to add an explicit mention that this applies to living or dead people. Loki (talk) 18:22, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

I think this is already covered further down: In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current name as the primary name (in prose, tables, lists, infoboxes, etc.), unless they prefer their former name be used for past events. If they were notable under the name by which they were credited for the work or other activity, provide it in a parenthetical or footnote on first reference; add more parentheticals or footnotes only if needed to avoid confusion..--Trystan (talk) 16:01, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

That still talks about just living people, but I'm not convinced that all the reasons for non-inclusion of deadnames all vanish upon the subject's death. Sure, there's a privacy aspect, but that's only one aspect. As -sche points out, it feels rather perverse that if Laverne Cox ended up murdered, we would be able to include her deadname after two months despite no editorial reason for including it other than "because we can". Sceptre (talk) 18:00, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

(It's not even unique to murdered trans people. If she died of a heart attack we'd still have the same problem.) Loki (talk) 19:29, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

(That's not unique to MOS:DEADNAME; all BLP protections expire shortly after the death of the subject). BilledMammal (talk) 03:05, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

How about amending the fourth paragraph to say "In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current (or, if dead, last-used) name as the primary name..."? That should broadly prohibit using a deadname for any individual, living or dead. I hope it is a change that could gain a clear consensus, as it is seperate from the more contentious question of when it is appropriate to mention a deadname.--Trystan (talk) 14:44, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks Trystan -- I think this is in the right direction. Since not everyone is familiar with the use–mention distinction in those exact terms, I might reword slightly to clarify that this does not (at least in itself) ban merely reporting the birth name. I could support that if the non-ban on reporting the name, for deceased persons, is made sufficiently clear. --Trovatore (talk) 03:45, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Support: There's no reason to include a deadname whether a n is alive or not. Roman Reigns Fanboy (talk) 04:57, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Proposed RfC questions

Should MOS:DEADNAME apply after the death of the subject?

A: Yes

B: For a limited period, in line with WP:BDP

C: No

Currently, the former name of a living transgender or non-binary person can only be added to their article if the individual was notable under it. Should a second exception be added to MOS:DEADNAME for when inclusion of the name is WP:DUE, such as when it is often included by reliable sources?

Should MOS:DEADNAME be altered to apply to all living individuals where a risk of harm occurs when their former name is disclosed?

BilledMammal (talk) 03:21, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• C, at least as it pertains to the lines which specifically and explicitly apply to the living. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:30, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  @InedibleHulk: In response to your edit summary, this isn't where we !vote - this is just the WP:RFCBEFORE to determine what questions the RfC should ask. The RfC itself I believe should be at WP:VPP. BilledMammal (talk) 04:31, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  Oh. Support the first question. I consent to having my vote copied and pasted by anyone, when appropriate, as long as it's in whole. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:34, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• Should MOS:DEADNAME be altered to apply to all living individuals where a risk of harm occurs ... — I think "a risk of harm" is either to restrictive (do you mean "any risk, no matter how small") or too subjective (how much risk?). Some qualification may be required. See also: WP:HARM. Mitch Ames (talk) 04:47, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  You make a good point, but I'm not sure how to word it - although it seems that if we word it correctly we may be able to merge question two and question three. BilledMammal (talk) 05:01, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• The scope of the second question is unclear. Is that an intended changed to MOS:CHANGEDNAME (applies to everyone) or MOS:DEADNAME (applies only to trans/non-binary people)?
  Similarly the third question has a problem with scope. Should MOS:DEADNAME be altered to apply to all living individuals...? As it currently stands, MOS:DEADNAME applies only to "any person whose gender might be questioned" and/or any "transgender or non-binary person" (as does the verb deadname, typically) but your proposal to "apply to all living" apparently includes all people (including unambiguously cisgender males and females). Mitch Ames (talk) 09:24, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  The second question is to MOS:DEADNAME; I've modified it to make that clear.

  The third question does need further work; I've struck it for now. BilledMammal (talk) 18:05, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  I've added insertion markup to the second question, so the modifications are visible (without having to use diffs). Mitch Ames (talk) 00:57, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

• I think the reference to BDP in the options for the first question unnessecarily complicates things. BLP continues to apply for a period after death, and this RFC isn't going to change that. I would propose asking "Should MOS:DEADNAME continue to apply after the subject is no longer covered by WP:BLP? (A) Yes (B) No (C) No, but a different standard should apply." For question 3, I would suggest "MOS:DEADNAME currenty applies to living transgender and non-binary people. Should this scope be expanded to apply to all living individuals where a risk of harm occurs when their former name is disclosed?"--Trystan (talk) 13:48, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  At the moment, MOS:DEADNAME stops applying the moment the person dies. We need an option between that and applying forever, and the option that has garnered considerable support in this discussion is to apply WP:BDP. BilledMammal (talk) 18:05, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  That's not clear. As far as I can tell, the status quo is that WP:BDP already applies. Loki (talk) 18:30, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  That interpretation doesn't align with the current wording of MOS:DEADNAME. BilledMammal (talk) 18:38, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  It does however align with the more commonly held interpretation and application of GENDERID. For example, see the February 2022 RM for Gloria Hemmingway where the guidance for the deadnames of trans and non-binary people who were notable pre-transition was applied to that article and its name. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:06, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• The first question is the same as the last RfC, less than 19 months ago. I don't think it was an enjoyable experience for anyone. Has something substanial changed since then to warrant going through it all again? I don't think so. The closure of the last RfC recommended "a subsequent RfC that frames the subject very narrowly: Extending for some period the BLP protections for deadnames of people who were never notable under the deadname, and determining what period it should be", not re-running the whole thing. So something such as:

  For how long should MOS:DEADNAME apply after the death of the subject?

  A: For a finite period that is in line with WP:BDP

  B: For a finite period that is longer than required by WP:BDP

  If B, then a subsequent RfC could determine the period (which of course would be finite, given the outcome of the previous RfC). EddieHugh (talk) 14:16, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
  I agree that having three questions is too many, I don't think it makes any sense to have two options that are basically no different than each other. the whole point is that someone dying doesn't make it okay to deadname them for no reason, so whether that changes one year or 10 years later does not matter, the questions should be do we keep "living" qualifier or do we get rid of it. Tekrmn (talk) 14:54, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  I'd support that yes/no question. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:06, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  I support this question, and don't like any of BilledMammal's questions. As a participant in that RFC it's clear that any alterations to MOS:DEADNAME need to put to very specific questioning or responses will be all over the place. Loki (talk) 18:32, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
  I agree with EddieHugh, the first proposed question by BilledMammal is a re-run of the 2021 RfC with slightly different phrasing. That RfC was closed with no-consensus because, as the closers of that RfC stated, having multiple mutually exclusive options makes determining a consensus significantly harder.
  I somewhat like Eddie's proposal of a narrow RfC on two options. A finite period in line with BDP, or a finite period that is longer than BDP. Though naturally, as per my opening comment in this discussion, my ideal would be an infinite period after death. As much as I'd like to add a third option to Eddie's proposal for an infinite period, I think that would again be a re-run of the 2021 RfC with different phrasing. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:12, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
• In so far as the second question goes regarding WP:DUE, I think the question has it backwards: WP:DUE already overrides this, if editors here want this guideline to have a carve out for deadnames that explicitly excludes WP:DUE concerns, that should honestly be part of WP:NPOV. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:26, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

  I agree that WP:DUE overrides this, but it is often not considered in discussions. Because of this, I think it would be beneficial to make it clear that MOS:DEADNAME is overruled by DUE. BilledMammal (talk) 18:05, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

• I'm putting most of my thoughts (including about the proposal to include 'due' names of [even] living people, which seems like a separate issue) in the subsection below, but will say here I think the approach above would need careful consideration/revising if we were going to go ahead with it... although, in some respects—perhaps a sign of how complicated it is to construct a question about this—the area I think might need the most reconsideration is also the one which might already be presenting things in the neatest way, which is options B vs C. Since they're presented as separate, C comes across as overturning or carving out an exception to BDP § Recently dead to make recently-dead trans people less protected than other recently-dead people, which it's not clear we could do ... yet since it seems other people think B is rather the option that'd change things, perhaps just presenting them both like this and going "which one?" really is the tidiest way of asking about them (and leave it to the closers to figure out what's a change and what's the status quo, ha). But on a balance, I'm nonetheless more inclined to an approach like the one in the subsection below, which seems to address the range of possible criteria better than the smaller set of options above. -sche (talk) 23:37, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Eddie's oversimplification, because there's no option to treat lines specifically about the living as inapplicable to the dead. Of all the many types of comparable people, living people and dead people by far have the least in common. That's not debatable. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:51, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  That makes you opposed to WP:BDP, which is a policy on a different page (WP:BLP), so would have to be discussed there. It makes an exception in some circumstances for "people who have recently died, in which case the policy can extend based on editorial consensus for an indeterminate period beyond the date of death—six months, one year, two years at the outside". EddieHugh (talk) 12:12, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

  BDP is a bit oddly worded, but otherwise fine. It says such extensions would only apply to contentious or questionable material about the subject that has implications for their living relatives and friends, such as in the case of a possible suicide or particularly gruesome crime. Someone's birth name is hardly that kind of material, especially in cases where living relatives and friends use that name. On the other hand, the case that spurred this talk has all sorts of questionable material about suicide and gruesome crime. I think BDP can only reasonably apply to some parts of BLP-related rules or suggestions, and certainly not those explicitly pertaining to the living or rights, duties and privileges more broadly afforded to them exclusively (for obvious reasons). InedibleHulk (talk) 21:22, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

• A. I don't see any magical time period when the policy should stop applying. --Jayron32 13:03, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  @Jayron32: this isn't an RfC; it's proposing the questions for a future RfC. Elli (talk | contribs) 13:14, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Madeline's RFC proposal

Idea:

When should a deceased transgender person's deadname be mentioned?

1. Only when they were notable under that name (same as for living people).
2. Only if it has a specific/nontrivial relevance to their biography as shown by common usage in recent reliable sources.
3. Only once they have been dead for a specific period of time.
4. Always.
5. No guideline (status quo).

■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 15:02, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

nobody is arguing we should never mention trans people's birth names. currently, for living people it is supposed to be mentioned once and only if it's notable, but once they die you can use it wherever you want. the argument is that the rules shouldn't change when people die. Tekrmn (talk) 15:09, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

What part of my proposal are you addressing? ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 15:15, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

all of it, your questions address whether or not we can use the birth name at all, but the topic at hand is where the birth name can and can't be used. Tekrmn (talk) 15:20, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Is it, though? ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 18:07, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe not yet, but I would like to in the RFC. Filiforme1312 (talk) 05:53, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

I like this formulation, and I think it has the best prospect to lead to a constructive RFC discussion .--Trystan (talk) 15:49, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

This is a good format as well. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:26, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

I disagree with this format; the above discussion has produced two alternative options to revise the current guideline. This includes one of them as option 1, but excludes the second. Option two and option three are also vague, and question two can apply to living individuals as well as deceased ones - it should be split off as I propose above into a second question. BilledMammal (talk) 18:09, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

I also like this formulation. Loki (talk) 18:33, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Update: further discussion has convinced me that five options is probably too many to achieve consensus. So, while I like the general idea here, I think it needs some more work. Loki (talk) 01:42, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I like this question, but I worry that with 5 mutually exclusive options, determining a consensus outcome will be incredibly difficult.

Arguably you could merge choices 1 and 2 together, as they're I think describing the same thing. For a trans or non-binary person who was notable under their deadname, adding their deadname would have specific and/or nontrivial relevance to the article, in the same manner that it has for living trans and non-binary people. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:18, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, but not necessarily the other way around. For example, certain historical trans people were not notable under their deadname because they became notable for transitioning, but the deadname may in some cases arguably be relevant to include. I.e. not entirely trivial, but not notable on its own. I'm not sure what I think of this, actually, but I wanted to leave the option available. I'd much rather have an RfC with five mutually exclusive options in the opening statement, than one with two and a bunch of respondents adding their own slight variations. ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 19:59, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Since many RfCs (about many topics) go nowhere if people split between too many options, my suggestion FWIW is to ask a single yes/no question on whether to add a guideline that for dead transgender or non-binary people, former names should be excluded if they are non-relevant [or non-notable, or un-due, whatever word we decide to go with]. (Or, to word it a different way: included only if they are relevant/notable/due/whatever.) -sche (talk) 00:00, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

That said, I think Madeline's approach is also good. Let's consider how to word option 3, though: what idea are we trying to cover with this option? A previous RfC had an "Only if they died before a certain time" option, which covered the idea that historical people from before a modern understanding a trans people might merit different treatment, whereas "Only once they have been dead for a specific period of time" suggests we can't deadname Brianna Ghey yet but it'll be fine twenty (or however many) years from now — is that an option some subset of people want?
BilledMammal, when you say that Madeline's proposal only includes one of two options for revising the guideline, what is the option you say is excluded? Is it the question you proposed above about adding a guideline to include 'DUE' former names of [even] living [and not just dead] people? IMO that feels like a separate issue, changing the existing guidelines that affect living people vs. the rest of this discussion being about adding a guideline about dead people, so it might be better suited to being asked separately, IDK (this requires more thought). -sche (talk) 00:00, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Possibly option 3 "Only once they have been dead for a specific period of time" should be split into "... a specific period of time" (which will stated in the DEADNAME guideline) and "... an indeterminate period of time, based on per-case consensus, per WP:BDP". I know adding another option is not good, but I think BDP ought to mentioned explicitly, because it's not clear whether it is covered by 5 "No guideline (status quo)". Mitch Ames (talk) 01:17, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose This has already led to more questions than answers, some about the questions and some about the answers. Too complex. Nice try, though! InedibleHulk (talk) 06:00, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
• This proposal is also a re-run of the last RfC less than 19 months ago, and does the opposite of what was recommended in its closure: it adds more options. EddieHugh (talk) 12:20, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

-sche's proposal

Based on my and others' comments above about the need — highlighted by the last RfC and by its closers — to ask something very tailored and without overmany options, my proposal is to ask a single yes/no question along the lines of

Should we add the following guideline to MOS:GID?

For dead transgender or non-binary people, former names should be included only if they are specifically relevant.

Possibly we could include some short neutral explanation (in the framing of the RfC, not the guideline) that This is only about dead people because there is already guidance about living people. (Anything about changing what's done for living trans people, or for non-trans people, should be a separate RfC.) -sche (talk) 00:55, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I also support this question, and for similar reasons to what you've outlined. I could even see clarifying further what "specifically relevant" means. Loki (talk) 01:39, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, no, absolutely. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:45, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

My first shot at a clarification would be ...included only if not including it would confuse the reader. But that's just off the top of my head, there could definitely be other better options. Loki (talk) 01:55, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Your name is LokiTheLiar and you introduce yourself to readers as Loki. I'm not complaining. But you of all people should know that anything can confuse some of the cowriters some of the time. InedibleHulk (talk) 02:00, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

For the most part I like this question. My only concern is specifically relevant is kinda a nebulous term, and could lead to many prolonged article talk page discussions over its meaning. If we could clarify what that means more specifically, even if we include that as a footnote in the sentence then I think this could be the simplest way to resolve this. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:49, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose, the question seems to be whether or not the privacy concerns for a transgender person's former name should be extended beyond what is already covered in WP:BLP. The consensus is clearly against the proposal, so an RFC is kind of pointless. This particular wording tries to exclude the mentioning of the former names "only if they are specifically relevant", which I would interpret as "notable", which under the current MOS they would be included anyway. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 02:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

  I disagree that consensus is anything like "clearly against the proposal". Loki (talk) 02:42, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

• This clarifies nothing because "specifically relevant" is unclear. Depending on how you can interpret this, it's either too restrictive (compared to what consensus is clearly against) or redundant to what we already have. Strongly oppose having an RfC with this question. Elli (talk | contribs) 19:40, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Next steps

We currently have five different proposals, from Sceptre, BilledMammal, Maddy from Celeste, -sche, and myself. Each proposal has had some supports and some opposes, which I'll not summarise here, and there does not seem to be a clear best option at least by my involved reading. In order of proposal:

1. I proposed removing the word "living" from the second and third paragraphs of MOS:GENDERID.
2. Sceptre proposed adding a paragraph between the first and second paragraph of GENDERID, to ensure that when a deadname is included in an article, it is "done sparingly and is editorially justified"
3. BilledMammal proposed an RfC on whether GENDERID should apply after the death of the article subject, with 3 answers.
4. Madeline proposed an RfC on when a deceased transgender person's deadname should be mentioned, with 5 answers
5. -sche proposed an RfC on adding a single sentence to GENDERID, which states that deadnames for deceased trans or non-binary individuals should be included only if it is "specifically relevant".

If we are to take only one of these proposed questions to an RfC, which one should we use or take forward for further refinement? And when we've got a final phrasing, where should we hold this RfC? Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:57, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

For myself, I tend to favour the 3 yes/no proposals from Sceptre, -sche, or myself. When looking at the close of the August 2021 RfC on extending GENDERID/DEADNAME in a similar manner to this discussion, the closers of the RfC remarked We also feel this RfC, by offering several options, made it harder for any consensus to emerge. and made a recommendation that any subsequent RfC on this issue [framed] the subject very narrowly on Extending for some period the BLP protections for deadnames of people who were never notable under the deadname, and determining what period it should be.

As no follow-up RfC to the one in August 2021 has been held, it seems reasonable that the RfC that emerges from this discussion fulfils that requirement. Accordingly that would rule out BilledMammal's proposal, as it seems to be a re-run of the August 2021 RfC with different phrasing, and Madeline's proposal, as it has 5 different !vote options. Of the remaining three proposals, all would fulfil the requirement to frame the subject narrowly, as they are each asking for consensus to either subtract (my proposal) or add (Sceptre's and -sche's proposals) to the existing guideline, and the only options are either yes or no.

However, where all three of these proposals fall down in some way is on the second part of the recommendation from the August 2021 RfC closure, on extending for some period the BLP protections for deadnames of people who were never notable under the deadname, and determining what period it should be. While I could argue that my proposal would fulfil that in part, as it would in effect make an implicit indefinite extension of the BLP protections for deadnames, that seems unfair to the two other proposals that fulfil the narrow requirement.

If instead I look at taking one of these 3 narrow proposals forward for further refinement, I think -sche's proposal would make the best base to build off of. In doing so, I would suggest that the phrasing be amended to something like For dead transgender or non-binary people, former names should be included only if they are specifically relevant were notable under that name or a period of [to be determined] has passed since their death. The RfC would then have two questions, the first being a yes/no on adding the proposed sentence, and the second for determining what the period of time after death should be. For the second question, a small number of default options like in-line with WP:BDP, 6 months, 1 year, 5 years should be included, along with the option for editors to write in shorter or longer periods should they desire. Doing it in this manner, a suggested addition that extends the BLP protections for deadnames, and a second question that determines for how long, would best fulfil the recommendation from the August 2021 RfC.

In terms of venue, holding it here is fine. The August 2021 RfC was held here, with a listing at WP:CENTRAL, and many related discussions and RfCs on other aspects of the GENDERID guideline have been held here. I don't see a specific need to hold it at one of the Village Pumps, though notifying them once it is launched, along with at least the Biography and LGBT WikiProjects, would be prudent. Regardless of venue we could also look at listing it on CENT if it is felt to be necessary. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:36, 11 April 2023 (UTC) amended to clarify modifications to -sche's proposal Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:27, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm personally not a big fan of a time limit. I feel that time limits are trying to grasp at the fact that the previous names of historical figures that have been conjectured to be trans (like the Public Universal Friend) often have much more encyclopedic value than the previous names of recently dead trans people who weren't notable under their previous name (the example that comes to mind is Sophie Xeon).

Maybe let's try something like As Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, only mention the previous name of a deceased transgender or non-binary person when there is some concrete encyclopedic value in doing so? Loki (talk) 21:24, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Mmm, I take your point on time limits. I dunno if I see any other way to square the August 2021 RfC closure though without one in the text. Unless we ignore that part, and just focus on the recommendation that any future RfC on this particular issue be narrow in focus?

Is your proposal a full replacement for -sche's? Or is it to be amended into it in some way?

On some concrete encyclopaedic value, do we actually have a policy, guideline, information page, or essay that expands on what that means? WP:NOTEVERYTHING has a somewhat brief note about how we are a summary of accepted knowledge, before going into various NOT examples. I would fear that, by not having an accepted definition of what encyclopaedic value means somewhere, we'd ultimately wind up with the same repeated discussions as if we kept the specifically relevant part of -sche's original proposal. It would also open the door to both good and bad faith versions of arguments like this is a biography of X, their birth name is relevant. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:44, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

The criticism of some concrete encyclopedic value is fair. I don't think we'll be able to get too concrete here because it's hard to think of every single edge case. But here are some examples of cases that might be illustrative:

• Chelsea Manning's deadname is mentioned in her article even though she's still alive, because the event she's primarily notable for happened when she came out. This will not change after her death, so we should still mention her deadname.
• Christine Jorgenson's previous name is mentioned briefly to say it's the same as her father's name. Alone, I don't feel this would be enough; however, it's relevant to note that Christine Jorgenson did not have the same concept of a "deadname" as modern trans people, and therefore did not have any qualms saying what her previous name was in her own words in her autobiography.
• The Public Universal Friend's previous name is mentioned because it's an important part of the story of their alleged death and rebirth, and because other Wilkinsons appear in the article and without the Friend's previous name the reader would be missing information as to why this is relevant. Also, while the PUF did not want to be called by their previous name in the present tense nor did they acknowledge being the same person, they didn't have any trouble acknowledging the previous existence of a person named Jemima Wilkinson.
• Sophie Xeon's previous name is not mentioned even though they are dead. Even though the article has an "early life" section, it's very brief, and there doesn't seem to be any real informative value to including names in it.
• Tokugawa Ieyasu is not a trans person, but a historical figure who went through several name changes. His previous names are all mentioned, but to be honest they are mentioned so briefly there doesn't seem to be any real information conveyed in most of them other than the mere fact that he changed his name. And because the change is reflected in a change of how the article refers to him over time, the name changes actually make the article more difficult to follow, in my opinion. The important info here is that he used to be part of the Matsudaira clan, he changed his name several times, when he changed his personal name to Ieyasu and what it means, and when he changed his family name to Tokugawa, what that means, and why he did it.

So some general principles I'm starting to pick up on here are: we should mention a previous name if it gives the reader important context about part of the subject's life such that the reader might be confused or misinformed without it, or if the name or the occasion for changing it is meaningful in itself. We should not mention a name if the name has no importance outside the mere fact that it was changed, or if such a mention would cause the reader to be more confused than not mentioning it. Loki (talk) 05:28, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I would oppose any stricter standard for reporting a birth name simply on the basis that the name change was gender-related. I don't see that any adequate justification has been offered for such a restriction. The claims that it's about "respect" or "dignity" are entirely unconvincing. That said, I am happy to agree that we should use the most recent chosen name to refer to the person. --Trovatore (talk) 06:06, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I feel like if the current standard is being properly reflected in the article on Tokugawa Ieyasu, we probably need a stricter standard for mentioning any name change, because the name changes in that article are quite frankly a bit gratuitous. This is entirely aside from any idea of respect or dignity: from just a basic WP:PLA standpoint it's confusing to mention that he changed his name and then almost immediately changed it to something else. That feels like it could have been handled by the footnote at the top of the page if even that.

Aside from that, I don't think that there's much of a problem on any of our previous articles, but I would still oppose reporting it in a page like Sophie Xeon's because I don't think there's any point to adding it. The appropriate standard definitely drops a lot after someone dies, but it doesn't go to zero. Loki (talk) 06:27, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I mean, one thing is you don't think there's any point in a particular article. That strikes me as a case for editorial judgment at a particular article, not so much for centralized rulemaking.

Birth names in general are usually seen as a point that readers find interesting, whether or not they need to know it to understand the article. Fibonacci was born Leonardo Bonacci; Tartaglia was born Niccolò Fontana. You don't really need to know that to understand their lives, but it's an easily digested point of focus to lead into the discussion of their early lives. For Tokugawa I don't know if I'd list all the names, but I'd keep the birth name (and yes, I agree that readability is better if the article doesn't keep switching).

The claim that the names of trans persons should be an exception has not in my judgment been well substantiated; it strikes me as a political claim, one that it is not really our role to promote. --Trovatore (talk) 07:09, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I would also keep Tokugawa's birth name, but mainly because for him specifically it's important to note that at birth he was part of clan Matsudaira and changed his clan name later when he became more prominent.

Fibonacci's birth name is important because it's an important part of the derivation of his nickname Fibonacci. Tartaglia's birth name is, in my opinion, not particularly informative (except I guess for clarifying that Tartaglia is a nickname).

While I do think trans names should be an exception, I'm increasingly convinced that the standard for including birth names as a whole should be raised, because I feel like they have greater potential for confusion than the guidelines currently seem to consider. Loki (talk) 17:52, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I like Scepter and sche's proposals best so far (with the caveat that sche's needs a much clearer criteria than "specifically relevant"). I don't like BilledMammal's proposal because past RFCs have shown that any future RFC needs to be brief and tightly worded to have any hope of achieving consensus. Madeline's proposal is okay in that it's the most tightly worded of any of them, but as a consequence it has too many options to achieve consensus. Loki (talk) 21:02, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

I realised after reading this message that I didn't make it clear that I had amended -sche's proposal when I quoted it. I've amended it now to strike the text I removed, and made my addition to it in bold.

Otherwise, yeah I agree that "specifically relevant" is such a vague and undefined criteria that it would lead to endless per-article discussions that guidelines like this are supposed to minimise or avoid. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:30, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

As I commented above, I think there is the possibility for two RFCs. One on the difficult question of when to mention a deceased trans/nb person's deadname. (My preference is for -sche's original proposal, as I think "specifically relevant" is reasonably clear for a guideline, and certainly clearer than "encyclopedic value".) And a second one to clarify the guideline on the use of a deadname (i.e., to refer to the person by the name). It would be fairly straightforward to amend the first and fourth paragraphs of MOS:DEADNAME to clarify that using a trans/nb person's former name, whether they are living or dead, is only acceptable when the individual clearly expressed that as their preference. Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words ... that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise. ... In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current (or, if dead, last-used) name as the primary name... I think an RFC on use has a good chance of achieving a clear consensus and resulting in a positive improvement to the guideline.--Trystan (talk) 23:22, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

I like the idea also having an RFC on what name to use, and your proposal of how to revise the guideline to accomplish it is nice and concise. :) As you say, it should be a separate RfC because it addresses something quite different. (Whether a person thinks deadnames should be mentioned in dead trans people's articles, or shouldn't, there's no denying that the question of whether to mention them keeps coming up and would benefit from being resolved, independent of what name to use as the main name to refer to someone.) you may already be thinking about this, but I would suggest that any RfC about what name to use spell out very clearly in the introductory/explanatory text that it's about determining what name to use as the person's main name to refer to the person, e.g. in sentences like "Two years later Name became a pilot", and spell out that this is a separate question from whether to mention former names, because otherwise (even if the RfCs run concurrently) I suspect enough people will mistake such an RfC as being about whether to mention / include former names that the results will be quite muddled. -sche (talk) 01:24, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

If we are trying to work from the closure of the last RFC (and not simply re-poll the same question for a new result), then any RFC question should probably suggest a specific length of time and reconcile that number with the actual need for privacy for the person’s family (in line with, but as an extension of WP:BDP), and—to align with comment about victims in that close—should also seek to have the new guideline distinguish public figures from low-profile individuals. — HTGS (talk) 02:26, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

One comment that's partially based on the debate at Talk:2023 Covenant School shooting and my efforts to determine how this policy would apply to the shooter. A few of the proposals concern this language: "notable under a former name (a deadname)". But I think there are two different interpretations of that language, and some more clarity might be appreciated:

1. Interpretation 1: a person must have been notable when they identified as their "deadname" for that name to be included. Under that reading, the fact that a person's deadname was widely reported would not confer notability unless, at the time of that reporting, the person identified as that deadname.
2. Interpretation 2 would essentially flip the inquiry on its head: It would allow a widely reported deadname to be used if the person was not previously notable under their most recent self-expressed identity.

While I don't want to blend the talk pages, Hale does serve as an example in which the outcomes would be different depending on the interpretation used. Hale was not notable when he identified by his deadname. However, when the incident occurred, his deadname was widely reported—possibly (for example, in the case of the New York Times) because, at the time of the breaking-news reports, it was not clear how Hale identified. ("There was confusion about the shooter’s gender identity in the immediate aftermath of the attack" [17]).--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 23:08, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

The issue with the yes/no is that it excludes the compromise option of applying BDP, which has seen a lot of support in this discussion; I don't think excluding such an option and presenting this as a binary choice is compatible with WP:RFCNEUTRAL.

And, to restate what I've said above, if we are going to be asking editors to discuss revisions to this guideline, we should take advantage of the opportunity to ask about other aspects of the guideline - such as whether we should make it clear that WP:DUE applies, and that names which the individual was not notable under but whose inclusion are WP:DUE should be included even for living individuals. BilledMammal (talk) 02:50, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately we already had the RfC on applying BDP back in August 2021 alongside the options of applying to all and applying to all who died after 1920, and as the closure noted having a three way choice split the vote such that a consensus was impossible to determine. That particular RfC recommended that a future one be held on a narrow basis, which would be some form of a yes/no or other binary choice question. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:52, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

That close recommends a binary choice question about Extending for some period the BLP protections for deadnames of people who were never notable under the deadname, and determining what period it should be. A proposal to remove "living" doesn't do that; if you want to follow its recommendations then I suggest asking Should MOS:DEADNAME continue to apply after death in line with WP:BDP?

If we need to limit the RfC to a binary choice I also think this would be better than suggesting that we have to chose between two extremes, and I suspect that even if the BDP option isn't included at the start it will be by the end, as I and, based on the above discussion, many others, would be !voting for it as our first choice. BilledMammal (talk) 19:15, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, that wouldn't answer the question at hand. BDP covers people who died in the last "two years at the outside", but the issue we've been discussing here (and which gets raised repeatedly around this encyclopedia) is whether to mention dead trans people's former names. (I.e., at all.) An RfC on whether to mention the former names of people who died in the last two years would only answer a tiny sliver of the question at hand. -sche (talk) 01:26, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

How about an RFC to eliminate the two paragraphs on former names and use the existing policy at WP:BLPNAME, which already addresses privacy and sources? Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:33, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

The problem with BLPNAME is that it applies to private individuals, not public figures. For people who are notable enough to have a biographical article about them, like the two named examples of Laverne Cox and Rachel Levine currently in GENDERID, they are are public figures and not private individuals. BLPNAME does not apply to them, though it does apply to their family members. In order to remove the two paragraphs on former names from GENDERID, a similar paragraph or two would need to be added to BLPNAME to allow it to apply to public figures and cover the same circumstances where an individual changed their name prior to becoming notable.

Plus even if we did all that, which would I think be an improvement for how we handle non-trans or non-binary name changes, we would still have the issue that after death, someone could include the previously excluded by policy/guideline name whenever BLP ceased to apply. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:47, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Surely, under most circumstances where a trans person's status and consequently their birth-name was not at all notable while they were alive, that would continue indefinitely after their death, irrelevant private info is still private and irrelevant whether the person is alive or not. However, if their name and status become widely covered in RS as part of their dying, or after their death for reasons we may not be able to wholly foresee, we should be free to ignore the letter of MOS:DEADNAME - or we cannot cover the topic clearly. This isn't substantially different from what we would do in any other circumstance with info that might be regarded as 'private'. Pincrete (talk) 08:26, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

That's kind of my point. BLP deals with all the issues we're debating here, and does it better. If a person is a public figure their privacy is different, etc. If we just apply BLP to the case of transgender former names, most would not be included, but when former names are widely documented in RS for public figures, they *probably* get included in a neutral and factual way, while referring to the individual by their current name and pronouns. When someone has died, the rules change. I think if we need a change, it is to reduce the scope of GENDERID. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:07, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

When someone has died, the rules change. I've seen several editors express this above, but none have expressed why. What is it about the death of a trans or non-binary person that makes it acceptable to subsequently start including the name under which they were not previously notable? Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:40, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

I’d expect it to be if our RS documented it and such inclusion was an NPOV concern. This doesn’t mean we suddenly start misgendering them or use the deadname excessively, it should be proportionate to its use in RS. —Locke Cole • t • c 18:52, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Surely, under most circumstances where a trans person's status and consequently their birth-name was not at all notable while they were alive, that would continue indefinitely after their death While I can see why it's reasonable to think this, unfortunately it's not true. As I said in my initial post opening this discussion, there are a couple of reliable sources that published the deadname of a recently killed transgender teen from the UK. There are also multiple reliable sources (and numerous unreliable) that have published the deadnames of Laverne Cox, and Rachel Levine, the two named examples for individuals who were not notable prior to transitioning. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:35, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

I think you are arguing for excluding the original names because they are offensive, and that reasoning will fail. Wikipedia includes information that is exceedingly offensive all the time. The only valid argument to exclude the names is for verifiability or privacy, and the latter is governed by BLP. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:49, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

So first, we don't include material because it's offensive either. See WP:GRATUITOUS.

Second, the argument here is not really about offense. To give an example based on Aquillion's formulation above, we have many many different ways of spelling Shakespeare's name in primary sources, because at the time English spelling was not standardized. But we don't even mention the spelling "Shakspere" in the article, even though we have several sources where it appears in the title. Why not? Well, because there's really not a lot of encyclopedic value in listing every single spelling of Shakespeare's name. Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. If a former name isn't important to a person's life story, then it's trivia, and we don't have to include it.

It's the same reason we don't generally include complete lists of medical issues or addresses in biographies: there's just no good reason to do so. Loki (talk) 20:33, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Looking over these, my opinion is that we should start with the first two questions (Sideswipe9th and Sceptre's) as separate RFCs; additionally, they don't really overlap or contradict each other, so they can be run as separate RFCs. These are simple, straightforward yes-or-no questions with direct, specific, proposals for wording, which addresses the lack of clarity in the previous RFC. The other three RFCs would only be relevant if Sideswipe9th's RFC failed; if it did, one of them could be held after that, depending on what the tone of that initial RFC looks like. --Aquillion (talk) 11:33, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

My issue is that the discussion on Sideswipe9th proposal already looks pretty split, and so I don't think an RFC would gain consensus. If we're going to make a decision based on what Sideswipe9th's RFC looks like, we can just make that decision based on the discussion above. Loki (talk) 20:35, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

As I mentioned above before I realized the full size of this discussion, I would say that in addition to Sideswipe9th's proposal, the phrasing "transgender or non-binary" is in my opinion unnecessary and this should be broadened to read "If a person was not notable under a former name..." This removes the need for specific mention of deadnames entirely while increasing the privacy of living individuals (and dead individuals, if such a thing is desired.) I also think it's an entirely ridiculous statement to claim that someone's birth name will suddenly become encyclopedic at any point after their death if it was not encyclopedic while they were living. (I do think there is probably more nuance in this situation, on a per article basis, then a hard and fast MOS rule really can account for.) casualdejekyll 22:57, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

It is not that the birth name "suddenly becomes" of encyclopedic interest. It was always of encyclopedic interest; I would maintain that birth names always are. The standard of DEADNAME is not whether the name was of encyclopedic interest, but whether the person was encyclopedically notable under that name. --Trovatore (talk) 23:10, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

@Trovatore: Well, how do we define encyclopedic interest? I feel that the birth name in these situations is WP:INDISCRIMINATE - it has no bearing on any of the other content of the article and is super unlikely to be even mentioned outside of the lead. How would the knowledge of the birth name help a reader? In the case of trans and queer individuals, I highly doubt anyone even wants to know the birth name - I know I wouldn't ever be looking for it. And even with cisgender people - I can't see why this has any more relevance then saying what they had for breakfast on November 7th, 1997, even if there was a reliable source for it. At the end of the day, I think notability measures the lasting impact of a topic or person on the world - and therefore we should be covering a person primarily from the perspective of the stuff they did and why they did it. 100 years from now, will anybody care about the deadname? At all? (I don't know but I believe I have a very solid guess: No.)

All of this poses the question of why this is in the MoS and not some other policy page. How is this explicitly information-related policy considered a formatting choice? casualdejekyll 23:27, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

casualdejekyll I don't think it's indiscriminate in the "Early life" section, basically because it's part of the standard stuff encyclopedias report. Birth name, birth city, parents' names — none of this is really essential to understand the person's life, but it puts particularity to the circumstances of their early life.
As I said elsewhere, I would not ordinarily put this stuff in the first sentence of the article, but I think it fits well in "Early life". --Trovatore (talk) 02:00, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

I can think of contexts where this information would be of supreme interest for historical subjects, even (or perhaps especially) for those who are looking to understand and respectfully appreciate the legacy of trans individuals. A case that stands out to me from my own editorial experience (having been RfCd to a relevant discussion) is Albert Cashier. For those looking to do research on such a figure, eliminating any reference to the deadname (though arguably the birth name is a little more nunaced in such historical circumstances and we have less certainty in the wishes of the subject, but in any event, the alternative name) hinders the ability of the reader to do follow up research, and arguably removes some of the context of the important historical context of the subject's story, because there is more to the name than it's mere arbitrary existence: the fact that this name was forced on them (or at least possibly so) is a part of that story, so removing all reference to it would be damaging to the reader's interests--and arguably the dignity of the subject, to the extent we consider that an encyclopedic interest (mileage may vary on that, but clearly DEADNAME would not exist unless the community as whole considered that value added).

As others (Tcr25, Trystan, and Trovatore) have expressly noted or touched upon above, we seem to be conflating multiple issues here, and I can't help but feel that maybe the solution/change to the policy language needs to be a little more nuanced than Sideswipes proposal, even if we mostly agree that it identifies something that needs to change. There are different editorial concerns for modern individuals covered by modern sources under a modern lens than we face with anacrhonistic sources and historical topics. For the latter, the deadname (or again, whatever we call the given name in this context) is much more likely to be an encylcopedically relevant part of the person's story and the historicity of research about them, regardless of which name is more associated with the nexus of their notability. The Cashiere example I raise might not even be the ideal case to underscore the point I am making here, because it is at least debatable which name/identity he became notable under, and their trans nature is a big part of their notability, but there are undoubtably subjects that could be impacted by a well-intentioned but overbroad use of policy language which would mandate removal of a second name without a more refined and context-sensitive rule governing the application. I have to think there's a more nuanced approach here, though I have to admit a more ideal wording is alluding me at the moment. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 01:04, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

I thought it would have been obvious from context that I was specifically referring to situations where a person was not notable under their former name. If the name was notable, then it's worthy of inclusion for sure. That wording was bad, actually. What I'm trying to say isn't that ALL uses of it are indiscriminate, so much as saying that MOST of them are. casualdejekyll 02:15, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

How would the knowledge of the birth name help a reader? — If the reader wanted to more research about the person, in particular their pre-name-change years, then the birth name would certainly help.

100 years from now, will anybody care about the deadname? — People doing any genelogical research will. Mitch Ames (talk) 01:17, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

I admit that you're right on your latter point, but Wikipedia:NOTGENEALOGY compels me to ignore it.
Regardless, I'm beginning to realize that my personal passions in this area are getting in the way of civility and such, so I think I'm going to withdraw from this discussion. I apologize for using your time. casualdejekyll 02:14, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

@Casualdejekyll No, please don't. Your points have been good! It really is true that deadnames are not usually of particular encyclopedic value.

There are exceptions of course, and Albert Cashier definitely is one of them. In fact they're a difficult case, because they were not notable under their deadname but their deadname really is of enough encyclopedic value that it should be included anyway. But they don't prove that that's true for every trans person, and in fact I rather think they're an exception that proves the rule: the reason their name has encyclopedic value is exactly because of their exceptional life story, and so that implies that the names of other people without similarly exceptional circumstances would not have encyclopedic value. Loki (talk) 03:58, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

And for the record, I generally agree with this. The question is how we word the policy language such as to codify the standard rule while also leaving flexibility for the more complicated historical cases. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 20:48, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

We don't appear to be making progress here, in part because people disagree over what questions should be asked and what options should be provided. To address this I think we just create a list of areas of MOS:DEADNAME/MOS:GENDERID that editors disagree with and ask one question for each of those areas, with the various options for those questions being all those that have sufficient support to have a chance of gaining consensus. In some cases this means we won't be able to reduce the number of options to two, but we can't anyway - even if we exclude an option if it has sufficient support editors will !vote for it anyway - so I suggest we don't try to and instead ask editors to preference their !votes; if the result is "no consensus" we can then hold a second RfC, excluding all but the two options with the strongest support. BilledMammal (talk) 06:53, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't know if we're not making progress here. I think we're both too involved in this discussion to make a determination if there is or is not a consensus towards any one specific proposal, or a hybrid of multiple proposals. I wonder if we might make an unusual request at WP:CR, where we ask for someone uninvolved to assess the consensus state of the current discussions without actually closing them?

I don't think running multiple RfCs, particularly in quick succession, is a good idea. WP:RFCBEFORE pretty clearly states that RfCs are timing consuming and editor time is valuable, and running multiple RfCs on this back-to-back would consume a lot of editorial time and good will. Sure we can do it, but will editors actually attend the follow-up RfC if the first one results in no consensus? Or will the response to a second RfC be the wiki equivalent of Brenda from Bristol? Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:14, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Spitballing: what if we ask (in one RfC) a set of agree/disagree Qs about the different levels of inclusion-vs-exclusion which have been suggested? Unlike an RfC of one multiple-choice question "when should names be included?" with overmany choices, here each level of inclusion would have two options (agree/disagree), so for each one it should be clear whether there's consensus for it, against it, or no consensus, without needing multiple RfCs. We'd have to decide how to word each line, and whether it's better to have pairs like 3 and 4 below or to collapse them into one option like "include if and only if" (IMO pairs like 3 and 4 allow people to agree with multiple options better than if the options were "do X only if Y" and "do X only if Z", but collapsing them would be more concise), but the idea is:

Please indicate whether you agree or disagree with each of the following. Deceased transgender or nonbinary people's former names ("deadnames") should:

1. always be included in their articles.

2. always be omitted from their articles.

3. be included if the people were notable under those names [like for living people].

4. be omitted if the people were not notable under those names.

5. be included if they are specifically relevant.

6. be omitted if they are not specifically relevant.

7. be included once WP:BDP ceases to apply ["two years at the outside"].

(Again, wording can be changed, options collapsed or added, but this is the concept.) This way, it should be possible for people to express and closers to assess where consensus is, e.g. "most people agree with X and disagree with Y". Thoughts? -sche (talk) 01:54, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I have two main objections to this framework

1. It doesn't distinguish use from mention, and we've seen from the discussion that some people think the argument is more about whether former names should be used to refer to the person, and others think it's more about whether we're allowed to report it.
2. It tries to make a one-size-fits-all rubric for all articles, not leaving room for editorial choices at particular articles.

My position would be that it should not be forbidden to report former names, and that they're presumptively of encyclopedic interest on the basis that it's a standard piece of information about early life, but that we should not ordinarily refer to the subject that way — and I certainly wouldn't say they "always" should be included, just that there should not be a rule against mentioning them. --Trovatore (talk) 06:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

My objection is that many of these options are mutually exclusive, making this not significantly better than the last RFC for assessing consensus.

I understand the desire to resolve all the issues at once but IMO that is a trap. We should ideally ask one yes-or-no question. I don't know what question exactly, but it should definitely be a single question, and if it falls to get consensus either way, then we should ask different questions until we see what the community agrees on. Loki (talk) 11:57, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

If we want a single RFC with a yes/no question, my preference would be to clarify not using deadnames to refer to trans/nb people, living or dead, unless that was their clearly stated preference. Resolving the use issue first would make the mention issue (when to include it) cleaerer.--Trystan (talk) 12:58, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I think we could run simultaneous separate RfCs on "use" and on "mention", since they are different issues. But are people currently using deadnames in any article that an RfC about anything discussed above would result in different guidance on? The only examples I'm calling to mind offhand are ones where the person died so far in the past that there's also disagreement over whether the person was trans, so it's unclear that editors would decide a guideline about trans people applied. Mentioning deadnames, on the other hand, is clearly an issue that comes up a lot all around this encyclopedia, so it'd be beneficial to try to resolve it. -sche (talk) 15:00, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I am not aware of any articles where using deadnames is currently a problem, and agree that typically indicates a guideline is working well without the need for changes. However, there does seem to be some use-mention confusion in the above discussion, so thought clarifying the guideline with respect to use might help to somewhat simplify a difficult issue. Perhaps it wouldn't be contentious to clarify that the guideline against using a deadname also applies to deceased subjects, so wouldn't need a full RFC?--Trystan (talk) 18:19, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Use and mention are different issues, but also interrelated ones. To use a deadname in an article, you first have to mention it. If the guidance forbids mentioning the deadname in certain circumstances, then you would also be unable to use it in those circumstances.

That said, I'm not sure that use of a deadname is a major issue here, as the use of a name after the first mention is covered under the separate MOS:SURNAME guidance. Minus the exceptions for mononyms, patronyms, pseudonyms, nobility, royalty, etc., our articles really should only be referring to a subject by surname and pronouns only after the first use. Historical examples like Public Universal Friend aside, are there any modern examples of articles where we would refer to Jane Doe as Jane instead Doe in our article prose? Note that for the purposes of this question, any article where we use the forename instead of the surname, regardless of whether or not it's about a trans or non-binary person, would be helpful. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:33, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

First name mentions can be necessary in content that mentions people with the same last name, such as family members (see Zelda Fitzgerald). Schazjmd (talk) 18:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Ok, I could see a use guidance that supplements MOS:SAMESURNAME and maybe also MOS:SURNAME and MOS:GIVENNAME being warranted in that particular circumstance. But at the same time, we don't need to reinvent the wheel of the circumstance specific guidance, so:

As the first paragraph of GENDERID already requires us to use the gendered words that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender identity, I think working something like For the purposes of MOS:SURNAME, MOS:GIVENNAME, and MOS:SAMESURNAME, refer to any trans or non-binary person with the name that reflects the person's most recent expressed gender identity. into that same paragraph would provide both continuity of guidance for which name/pronouns to use in complicated cases (covering the use case), while also referring to the more specific guidance without needing to repeat it. This would also still leave the second and third paragraphs of GENDERID, which cover the mention case. Ie, only mention the former name of a trans or non-binary person if they were notable under it.

Obviously my wording is nowhere near final, or maybe even representative of what we might find consensus for. Just think of it as a starting point until something better comes along. It also still leaves us with the conundrum over the deadnames of deceased trans and non-binary individuals, but it would at least clarify the use-distinction issue that some here have raised. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that is the sort of change I think would be very likely to gain consensus, as well as amending the later portion of MOS:DEADNAME that applies to use: In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current (or, if dead, last-used) name as the primary name...--Trystan (talk) 19:14, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Yeah that makes sense. One other benefit of this approach is that we don't run into circumstances where, because of the current phrasing of GENDERID, editors can make arguments over using the former name of a trans or non-binary person, but with their post-transition gendered terms and pronouns. Ie, we won't run into a situation where we use the name John Doe to refer to a trans woman, while also using she/her pronouns and feminine gendered terminology.

For that particular RfC, the question would be a pretty straightforward yes/no binary of something like should we add the following sentence [snip] to the first paragraph and amend the fourth paragraph to [snip]. We should probably make another subsection so that we can briefly workshop those changes, and find a smooth way to more neatly integrate it with the existing guidance on pronouns and gendered terms.

That still leaves us though with the other problem to resolve of mentioning the former name of deceased trans or non-binary individuals, and under what circumstances it is or is not appropriate to mention. Regardless of the proposal that we eventually wind up with on that, it should I think be a separate RfC that could run in parallel or separately to the one on use of the former name. But even for this discussion, if we can more clearly define which RfC is about use and which is about mention it might make it easier for us to come to a consensus on what questions to bring forward to an RfC. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:52, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree it'd be good to add guidance about not using deadnames. Note that some trans people change surnames as part of transitioning (e.g. Fallon Fox), so the requirement to use WP:SURNAMEs does not, on its own, inherently or entirely preclude deadnaming. -sche (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Resolving the use issue first would make the mention issue (when to include it) clearer Would it? You cannot use a deadname if you cannot mention it. Would we not need to resolve the mention issue first, before we can resolve the use issue? Or is this a chicken or the egg causality dilemma? Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:39, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It goes without saying that we can't use it if we don't mention it, but I think warrants clarifying that we shouldn't use it even when we do mention it.--Trystan (talk) 19:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree with Trovatore, former names should be reported and they have encyclopedic value. BLP already handles the various sensitivities, including the living/dead distinction, and GENDERID should not make a special case to exclude former names of transgender people just because they changed gender. GENDERID should simply clarify that the encyclopedia uses a person's preferred name and pronoun. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:30, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

No it doesn't, because we already don't use deadnames, and no one is seriously proposing we should! The only issue where there is actually debate is whether we should mention the names. Obviously we aren't going to be deadnaming people in wikivoice. Elli (talk | contribs) 05:35, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

For what it’s worth, I have concerns that focusing too much on the use-mention distinction could encourage bad actors to try to sneak their way around the current rules. That’s why I proposed the wording “inclusion” and “editorially justified”; it’s basically a “use your common sense” rule. (So, for example: including Caitlyn Jenner’s name, especially in regards to her athletic career, would be common sense, even though she’s alive; including SOPHIE’s, as a trans person who took her privacy incredibly seriously, wouldn’t, even though she’s dead). We already make these sorts of allowances when it comes to nationality; for example, it would be technically correct, but incredibly silly, to describe Willie McRae as “British” outside of talking about his time in the military. Honestly, unless a demonstrable detriment (again, defined in common sense terms) can be shown to the contrary, I’d argue that “just refer to people how they’d prefer” rule is the NPOV treatment (in so much as not doing so is rude at best, and pushing your beliefs on them at worst). Sceptre (talk) 05:15, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I’d argue that “just refer to people how they’d prefer” rule is the NPOV treatment (in so much as not doing so is rude at best, and pushing your beliefs on them at worst) Not always. For example if someone describes themselves as Jewish but reliable sources disagree then we shouldn't refer to them as Jewish.

The NPOV way is to follow the sources and WP:DUE. This will usually result in us aligning with the individuals preference, but not in all cases and if we allow our own judgement to determine what these exceptions should and shouldn't be then we would be violating both WP:NPOV and WP:OR - two non-negotiable core policies.

I also think you are looking at this the wrong way for mentions; it doesn't make sense to mention SOPHIE's because reliable sources don't mention SOPHIE's. It makes sense to mention Caitlyn Jenner's, because reliable sources do mention hers.

If our rule is just to follow reliable, independent and secondary sources then we won't have a problem - bad actors may try to squeeze it in with primary sources, but so long as the rule is clear that primary sources are unacceptable for this then we can easy reject those. BilledMammal (talk) 05:23, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I firmly disagree with what you're saying, because there are absolutely reliable sources that mention SOPHIE's deadname. I'm not going to post them here both because it feels disrespectful and because I don't want to get rev-del'd, but you can easily find big WP:NEWSORGs mentioning her deadname within five minutes on Google.

The simple fact is not every fact that can be sourced belongs on Wikipedia. We rarely include a deceased person's address even though that's often reliably sourceable because it usually has zero encyclopedic value. (So for instance, even though this lady's house is now a museum we don't mention her former address in her article, only the article for the house.) Many trans people's deadnames are similar: there's really just no reason to include them. Loki (talk) 07:14, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

And how many sources mention it? Would it be WP:UNDUE for us to do so, or would it be WP:DUE? I should have been clearer, but I didn't mean a single source is sufficient to mention SOPHIE's name, nor that a single source not mentioning Jenner's would be sufficient to exclude it.

What I am saying is follow WP:NPOV. If the name is WP:DUE, as it is in the case of Caitlyn Jenner, then we include it. If it is WP:UNDUE, then we don't. What issue can there we with that? BilledMammal (talk) 07:33, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Santos's claims to a Jewish ethnicity has nothing to do with the principle I'm talking about, because he was making a statement of fact that can be, and was, disproven. If Santos made a statement of Jewish faith, though, then the only WP:DUE response would be to include his statement of faith and no others.

A core principle in polite society has been, for a very long time, that an individual is the final arbiter of their own identity in certain cases, which includes gender identity; as much as American and British conservative politicians are trying to push this as part of their culture war, I don't think this principle has appreciably changed. The second principle is that referring to someone by their deadname often (not always, but often enough) goes hand-in-hand with denying their identity. Hence, the starting position should, I believe, be against inclusion.

However, there are circumstances which can, and do, tip the balance; for example, it would be entirely justified to include the name "Bruce" when we're talking about who won the 1976 Olympic decathlon.

I agree that we shouldn't be engaging in instruction creep. That's why I believe my proposal is the best one; it keeps to the principle that an individual is the sole arbiter of their own identity, but allows for common sense deviations where justified if – and only if – it can be justified. Sceptre (talk) 15:05, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Your example was an individual claiming to be Scottish over British? However, regardless of whether Santos claimed the ethnicity or the faith we should follow reliable sources. For example, some Black Hebrew Israelites claim to be Jewish, but whose status as such is disputed by reliable sources. In those cases, we can and should reflect both their claim, and the fact that reliable sources dispute it.

From a practical point of view, do you have an example where the inclusion of the deadname would be WP:DUE, but it shouldn't be included? BilledMammal (talk) 15:30, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Well, like religion, sexuality, and gender identity, national identity (in the context of Britain, at least) is also one of those things where it's understood to be personal and subjective to each person; as such, you're not going to get prosecuted for making a false declaration on the census if you put yourself down as Scottish! (Which is a decent rule of thumb, I think.)

Secondly, in the case of Black Hebrew Israelites, we just say they're BHIs; they're often very outspoken with saying they're as such!

Also, practically, no, I don't think there are cases where inclusion would be DUE but shouldn't be included under either the current or proposed versions, but – like I've said – I'm concerned about bad faith actors trying to lawyer against the spirit of the rule without an explicit backstop. Sceptre (talk) 17:18, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

My issue with this is NPOV does not require is to WP:paraphrase or use the exact same words as RS. Filiforme1312 (talk) 18:52, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Small proposal

There appears to be universal consensus in the above discussion that we should not use deadnames to refer to trans/nb individuals in wikivoice (as distinct from the issue of when we mention/include them). Does anyone object to clarifying MOS:DEADNAME so that the provisions on using a deadname are no longer limited to living individuals?

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words ... that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender self-identification... In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current (or, if dead, last-used) name as the primary name...

This change would not preclude an RFC about when to include deadnames for deceased subjects.--Trystan (talk) 12:57, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I have two objections to this. First, there are cases where for historic individuals their most recent expressed gender self-identification is disputed. In those cases we should follow reliable sources. Second, this will be interpreted as a prohibition on mentioning the name. We should make it clear that this is only a prohibition on using the name, not on mentioning it.

If it is reworded to account for both of these, then I have no objection. BilledMammal (talk) 13:04, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

So, if the ellipses are removed, the first sentence would read: "Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources." In other words, I think your first point—that we should follow reliable sources as to the most recent (or last) self-identification—is already captured by the policy.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 14:21, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think I like this version from Jerome better than Trystan's. Though I can understand the purpose, I'm not sure if I like putting the if dead portion into an ellipsis. It's something that I think could be more naturally phrased into the rest of the paragraph. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:46, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

• Strong support (though, as a minor note, I'm not sure I see the need for the second sentence alteration—seems redundant to me). I was actually really hoping this would get addressed. It's not at all rare to see the argument @Trystan is attempting to address—I've only seen 4 or 5 discussions concerning naming, and I think I've seen the argument in all of them. And, if we're getting into wikilawyering, I have to say it's not an unreasonable argument: What they say is that the phrase gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) does not encompass names, given the examples in the parentheses and the fact that deadnames are only specifically mentioned in the next paragraph (on living subjects). Still, I'm persuaded by the counterargument—that gendered names are an example of gendered words. And, in the debates I've seen, at least, that argument has consistently won out—any enduring debate (if any) concerns how often (if at all) a birth name should be mentioned. Still, I think the guideline is currently ambiguous, and it fosters making the guideline explicit, as Trystan suggests, would save a lot of needless debate.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 14:13, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think it's really necessary with WP:DUE as described below. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

While I'm not sure yet on the phrasing, I think that the intent of this proposal for clarifying the use of deadnames is definitely something we should bring forward to an RfC. I like the idea of something that integrates smoothly into the existing first paragraph of GENDERID, as we can put that to a straightforward yes/no RfC that has the highest chance of finding a consensus for or against. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:03, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support Sensible. --Jayron32 12:25, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Alternative proposal - Follow WP:DUE

Is there a reason we cannot follow WP:DUE here? For example, are there any articles where mentioning the name would be WP:DUE but we should not mention it? For borderline cases, we can have a guideline that states we should err on the side of not including the name, strongly so in the case of living individuals. We wouldn't need a guideline telling us to prefer sources from after the name change as WP:NAMECHANGES already does that.

It would neatly resolve this entire debate, it would prevent any conflicts with a policy we are forbidden from having conflicts with, and it would help with WP:CREEP. BilledMammal (talk) 13:10, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

As I mentioned upstairs, I do think we need some sort of formalising the starting position should be against inclusion, because — especially in the current climate – not doing so would allow for bad faith actors. Maybe MOS:IDENTITY could do with some sort of explanation of the "in cases of subjective identity, an individual's own views are king" principle that we apply to other cases such as faith and sexuality (and – in some cases – disability and race). Sceptre (talk) 15:27, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

As I mentioned above, do you have examples where following WP:DUE like I describe would require us to include a deadname that should be excluded? If there isn't a circumstance then I wouldn't be concerned about bad faith actors, because they will need to demonstrate that inclusion is DUE and won't be able to. BilledMammal (talk) 15:32, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

(1) Would your proposal also replace MOS:GENDERID as it pertains to living subjects? (2) I'm not sure just saying "use WP:DUE" covers things. The debates I've seen have sometimes concerned how often to reference a birth name, not just to reference it all. Does WP:DUE really resolve, for example, whether a birth name should be in an article lede, an infobox, a specific section, or all of the above?--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:36, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

(1) No. (2) It would; DUE isn't just about whether content should be included, it is about how prominent it should be. BilledMammal (talk) 15:38, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree as to WP:DUE, but, generally, that comes up when we're deciding, say, whether to devote one or several paragraphs to a subject. How does DUE address how many times a name should be mentioned? What amount of coverage translates to one time? Two times? Three times? That matters because that's often the scope of these debates—"should we say the name 2 or 3 or 4 times?"--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:47, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

There isn't a set rule as it depends too much on the specifics. It would have to be determined on a case by case basis, as with all NPOV decisions. BilledMammal (talk) 15:54, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

But, as to dead subjects, the current limitation on references to deadnames doesn't apply, meaning, in a sense, all we have is an amorphous WP:DUE inquiry ... and the guidance WP:DUE provides has clearly not been sufficient to consistently resolve debates—which, I'd suggest, is why so many of these debates are ending with "no consensus."--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 16:02, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

The version I propose would address that; it would make it clear that for borderline cases (as no consensus tends to be) we should err on the side of exclusion. Finding consensus in those discussions is also made harder because editors often don't consider WP:DUE; we can help with that by making it clear that DUE should be considered. BilledMammal (talk) 16:11, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Hm, I appreciate the elaboration, but I'm gonna have to go with oppose. I don't think that the borderline rule + DUE really addresses whether to mention a name 1, 2, 3, or 4 times. Take a debate where some editors say 0 times, some say 1 time, and some say 3 times. Let's imagine that 50% of editors fall in the 0 or 1 category, and 50% fall in the 3 category. What do we do? Is the borderline number the 3rd mention, or the 2nd? Does the policy ultimately because that each mention of a birth name has to be supported by a consensus? (That's actually intriguing, but I don't think that's what you're actually meaning to propose, and, regardless, I expect it would ultimately prove unwieldy.) I think more guidance, not less, is needed.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 16:17, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

If I understand correctly you believe a single mention should be decided on the basis of WP:DUE, but whether we include multiple mentions should be decided on the basis of something else? Do you have a suggestion for the something else? BilledMammal (talk) 16:23, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, MOS:GENDERID runs afoul of WP:DUE regardless of its good intentions. I'm open to seeing some examples where WP:DUE wouldn't have worked, but in all the ones mentioned so far I haven't seen a case where DUE wouldn't have worked if applied appropriately. I do think one thing GENDERID should do is clarify that for trans/non-binary individuals we should give more weight to recent sources for pronouns (similar to WP:NAMECHANGES does for names). Other than that, it's far simpler to remind editors to give DUE weight and follow NAMECHANGES as appropriate. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:14, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Examples of where DUE would not have worked, or would have resulted in lengthy per-article discussions on inclusion versus exclusion because DUE is subjective.

• Laverne Cox
• Nicole Maines
• Jazz Jennings
• Liz Fong-Jones
• Brian Michael Smith
• Ed Le Brocq
• Stephen Whittle

All of these individuals have had their deadnames published in varying numbers of reliable and unreliable sources. Despite this, all of these individuals were not notable prior to their transition. Some of these individuals had not used their deadname for years or decades prior to becoming notable. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:39, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I am not familiar with any of those individuals or the coverage about them. Are you saying that including the deadname would be DUE for all of them? BilledMammal (talk) 18:41, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm saying that for these individuals there are enough sources that have been published that mention their deadname that making the deadname guidance based solely on DUE could result in us including them where we currently exclude them for privacy concerns, or at the very least result in numerous lengthy per-article discussions on inclusion versus exclusion of them. In some circumstances, should those discussions result in inclusion of a name that was previously excluded, there are serious risks of harm to the individual, their privacy, and their dignity.

Such discussions will result in inconsistent application of the guidance, because how DUE is defined in each article's circumstances will be highly dependent on the editors involved in those discussions. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:48, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't quite understand. Are you saying that for these individuals the inclusion of the deadname is DUE, isn't DUE, or is borderline? Alternatively, are you saying that it is debatable? BilledMammal (talk) 19:00, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Are you saying that for these individuals the inclusion of the deadname is DUE, isn't DUE, or is borderline? It is all of these things at the same time, because DUE is a subjective measure. There is no objective test over whether something is or is not DUE. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

This seems to bring us back to my comment below: DUE is how we handle every controversial topic in the encyclopedia. The argument that it is fit for purpose for all those other topics but isn't fit for purpose for this one doesn't make sense to me. BilledMammal (talk) 19:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Are you saying that including the deadname would be DUE for all of them? As an aside, this particular question is one why I and I suspect several other editors have hesitated on producing any such lists. While there are many editors like yourself who will be asking this in good faith, there are also many editors who will ask it in bad faith. Because of the current anti-trans culture war and moral panic, particularly from the United States, there are editors who edit articles relating to trans and non-binary individuals and topics solely for the purpose of denying self-actualisation and claiming that trans and non-binary people are not who they say they are.

For example, until it was bluelocked Lia Thomas' BLP frequently saw editors (typically IPs and those who had gamed autoconfirmed) editing the article to insert her deadname (can't give examples as these have rightly been oversighted), preform mass pronoun changes, and insert all sorts of anti-trans dogwhistles. Because there exist sufficient numbers of low quality reliable sources on Thomas' deadname, a straight DUE based guideline will result in endless discussions and RfCs on the article talk page on inclusion or exclusion of what we currently consider to be a non-notable deadname. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:02, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

There will always be bad faith actors. However, as I said above, relying on DUE should prevent them from causing issues; if including the name doesn't meet the criteria of DUE then they won't be able to prove that it meets the criteria of DUE.

Considering your example of Thomas it might result in one RfC but it shouldn't result in endless discussions and RfC's; that becomes a conduct problem (Wikipedia:Tendentious editing) that can be handled by contentious topic procedures. BilledMammal (talk) 19:08, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

but it shouldn't result in endless discussions and RfC's Please look through the talk page history, including both comments on the current live page and its archives, as well as comments that were removed prior to archiving. Even with the current objective version of the deadname guidance, where inclusion is only warranted if the trans or non-binary person was notable prior to transitioning, which Thomas was not, there are endless discussions and edit requests for including Thomas' deadname. Making the deadname guidance subjective based, by tying it to DUE, will result in countless more discussions on it because even if we exclude all of the bad faith editors for conduct problems, every good faith editor defines DUEness differently. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:17, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Continually reopening a settled question is a conduct problem. However, it isn't a problem unique to this topic area; look at Talk:Adam's Bridge for a different example; there are dozens of requests each year to rename it to Ram Setu. We handle it there by referring editors to the FAQ and established consensus, and don't need to waste time on endless discussion - the last real discussion was years ago. What we don't do is handle it by setting aside a core policy. BilledMammal (talk) 19:19, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I have to say, the possibility that WP:DUE alone would provide sufficient guidance and not "result in endless discussions" ... is a little undercut by what's happened to this section, which quickly blown up and currently features a majority of editors asking, "What? How would this work?"--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 19:44, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

all of these individuals were not notable prior to their transition — Le Brocq was notable pre-transition under his birth name as "a musician, music teacher and radio presenter. ... as well as for ... numerous charitable efforts". He was also notable under his intermediate names Eddie/Ed Ayres (he changed his surname when he married), including for writing his memoirs about his transition.) Mitch Ames (talk) 07:52, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

The problem with DUE is that it's an entirely subjective measure. If you ask 100 editors how they measure it, you will likely get close to 100 different answers back. Some editors feel that only a couple of sources are needed to demonstrate dueness, others think that it requires many. Some editors will base it entirely upon volume regardless of quality, others will give credence that one high quality source is worth 5/10/20 low quality sources. Some editors will make arguments against inclusion based on how recent a thing is, which for self-declared name changes would be almost unworkable. To base this entirely upon DUE would result in hundreds or thousands of redundant discussions over how to accurately refer to trans or non-binary article subjects, with the definition of accuracy being highly personal to the editor making the arguments.

Later in this section, you asked for an example of where a DUE based guideline would require us to include a deadname that should be excluded. While that is a valid question, and one that I'm know there are examples of that I just can't recall at this time, it's not the only type of article that would be affected by this. Elisa Rae Shupe was, back in 2016, the first person in the US to obtain legal recognition of having a non-binary gender identity. Three years later, she detransitioned, changed her name back to her birth name, and became very prominent in anti-trans political circles and publications with her story being used to push pro-conversion therapy narratives. It was during this period that the majority of sources about her were published. In 2022, she retransitioned, and took on the name Elisa Rae, however because of this the sources that were previously giving her coverage simply stopped. After all, why could anti-trans sources cover someone who made the decision to retransition? Until recently, with the publishing of a large series of leaks of emails that Shupe was party to, no sources covered Shupe's retransition or her name change. Thankfully the current formulation of GENDERID, alongside a request from Shupe to update her article and WP:ABOUTSELF allowed us to use self-published sources (in this case, Shupe's blog) to cover the basic uncontroversial facts that she retransitioned and took on a new name. A straight DUEness based guideline would have prevented this, or at least would have required significant lengthy discussion that could otherwise be avoided. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:24, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

To be clear, this proposal is only in regards to MOS:DEADNAME - when to mention the individuals deadname. Most of your reply appears to be concerned with when to use the deadname, which this proposal will not change. BilledMammal (talk) 18:05, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Respectfully, I think you've misunderstood what I've said about Shupe. In order to use Shupe's current name, we need to be able to mention it. However a straight DUEness based guideline would have either prevented us from mentioning it (and by extension using it) until at least March 2023 because the only sources available for it until that point were self-published by Shupe (well over a year after she retransitioned), or it would have required extensive back and for discussions on the talk page between editors who believe that self-published sources can contribute to due weight, and those who believe otherwise or that multiple sources are required to support due weight, alongside a possible WP:IAR and BLP exemption. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:11, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this would apply to that; whether to include their current name doesn't have NPOV considerations, and WP:ABOUTSELF would apply. However, if you are concerned that this would have prevented that we can easily make it clear that this only applies to an individuals former name:

An individuals birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should only be included when such inclusion in WP:DUE. In circumstances where inclusion is borderline we should err on the side of exclusion.

BilledMammal (talk) 18:19, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Ok, this wording would largely solve the problem at Shupe's article but it brings us back to the subjective problem of how you measure DUE. How I measure if a fact like a name meets DUE differs from how you measure it, and how we measure it very likely differs from how other editors measure it. There is no objective measure of this, and that is a problem for mentioning what is in life a privacy and dignity concern for trans and non-binary individuals. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:28, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

DUE is how we handle every controversial topic in the encyclopedia. The argument that it is fit for purpose for all those other topics but isn't fit for purpose for this one doesn't make sense to me. BilledMammal (talk) 18:38, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

DUE governs balancing significant viewpoints found in reliable sources. It doesn't provide meaningful guidance on whether to include individual verifiable facts at a granular level. If 2 out of 20 reliable sources say that a subject obtained a degree in economics at the University of Toronto, and the other 18 sources don't discuss education, it would not be constructive to remove that cited fact from a brief mention in "Early life" on the basis of it being UNDUE. However, if 90% of reliable sources have a specific editorial policy not to mention deadnames outside of certain circumstances, that is good reason for Wikipedia to consider adopting a similar editorial policy. But it doesn't flow automatically from DUE.--Trystan (talk) 18:31, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

The two significant viewpoints here would be to include and to exclude the former name. DUE is perfectly suited to handling that. BilledMammal (talk) 18:38, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Actually, it isn't. In the first case, WP:DUE is only about how one should consider representation of a viewpoint, but does not mandate how that representation is to be determined. It neither mandates, nor prohibits, anything. It just provides some general guidance for how people should frame the discussions around an issue where there are competing viewpoints. Secondly, the debate around a name is not a "viewpoint". A viewpoint would be "Henry VIII is regarded as one of the most powerful kings of his day". This is not that kind of discussion. There is a general agreement that the person in question was known by that name. WP:DEADNAME is a specific policy that establishes specific guidelines on when and how to use that name. It's a very specific set of instructions, and we just follow them. If you want to abolish or modify the policy directly, then do so, but trying to find a loophole or a way to bypass even dealing with it, just don't. Take a stand against the policy itself and get it overturned, or follow what it says. Stop trying to have your cake and eat it too. It's a waste of time. --Jayron32 19:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

That's this discussion though! We're trying to clarify the meaning of the guideline, so "it would change the meaning of the guideline" isn't really a good argument against any particular proposal here. Elli (talk | contribs) 20:00, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think the correct link is wp:BALASP. That is really the section most editors mean, myself included, when we say DUE. That said, I do not favor this change. If it's purely a MOS issue then presumably local consensus can overrule following it. However, DEADNAME is often treated, even on talk pages, as a hard rule then I would oppose because it's a BLP issue rather than purely a style issue. In either case applying that rule to people for whom the BLP protections don't apply (ie dead for a while) means we can't justify it as a BLP protection. At that point BALASP should be the driver. Springee (talk) 20:08, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@Springee: To be clear, I propose making WP:DUE (or, as you point out, WP:BALASP) the main driver for both living and dead people. BilledMammal (talk) 07:34, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Suggested RFC Questions

Okay. I think an RFC needs to cover three distinct things:

1. how we principally refer to a trans person,
2. when should a birth name should be included, and
3. if a birth name should be included, how/how often should it be included

I suspect (hope?) that the first question isn't very controversial, but, for the reasons I mentioned under User Trystan's proposal, I think it should be separated and included. On the other hand, I think the last issue there is the hardest one, and maybe the hardest to answer or even ask about. Certainly, I think any guideline we come up with will have to allow for discretion and will, at best, only serve to guide that discretion.

A few people have brought up WP:CREEP. I think that's, on the whole, a misplaced concern here. I've now seen more than a handful of these debates. It's true, there are differences between them—there are nuances that we probably can't address with a guideline—and we shouldn't try to! But it's also true that many of these debates do hit the same notes, and when those same notes are debated from scratch each time, the discussion of the nuances is actually hindered. In particular, as to non-living subjects, almost every debate ends up devoting a large amount of texts to the issues I mentioned above: In terms of (1) how to principally refer to the subject, (2) whether to use their former name at all, and (3) how (or how often) to use their former name, what are the implications of a large amount of media sources using the former name? It's extremely repetitive, and it doesn't make sense to have that broad of a discussion on each individual page—it's the type of recurring issue that absolutely should be handled by guidelines.

That doesn't mean a one-size-fits-all approach should be used. Most of the proposals leave room for discretion. But if we address these macro, recurring issues at the guideline level, and properly leave room for discretion, we can actually better address the nuances of particular cases.

I've seen a lot of great points made by editors on every side. But I think, to some degree, we're getting lost in the weeds. I think we can narrow down an RFC to a series of yes or no questions.

Proposed RFC Questions:

1. As to deceased trans persons, should we always principally refer to such persons by their last-used name of choice, as reported in reliable sources? (If yes, we could use Trystan's proposed wording.) (For the historical figure issue, which is often brought up, we could also add a caveat that this guideline is only triggered when a majority of the reliable sources that discuss a person's last-used self-identification agree as to that identification, but think that's implicit)
2. Should we always exclude the birth name of deceased trans persons who were not notable prior to transitioning?
3. When a birth name should be included in an article, should that birth name be included as a parenthetical with the page's first reference to the subject (e.g., "Gloria Hemingway (born Gregory Hemingway)?"
4. After the first reference to a birth name, should every reference to the birth name need to be specifically warranted by context?

I've tried to capture some essence of most of the proposals in these questions. @Trystan:, obviously the first question is entirely thanks to you. @Sideswipe9th:, you'll probably notice I took from your proposal to craft the second and (partially) third questions. @Sceptre:, I'm sure you'll see your proposal in the final question, and if you think it'd be better, I'm happy to switch "warranted by context" with "editorially justified". @BilledMammal:, you might think I've snubbed your proposal—on some level, I don't blame you. But, as the guidelines exist now, the deadnames of deceased trans persons are not covered. As such, if the consensus is straight-up "no" for questions 2, 3, and 4, I think your proposal wins by default.

Realistically, I think we have a shot of consensus as to question 1 and question 2 (though I'm actually not totally sure which way question 2 will go!). But I think it's worth asking these questions and getting to the RFC, because I think any consensus we do achieve will provide not just more, but better guidance.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 20:50, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

On the format, would this be one RfC with 4 questions? Or two to four RfCs depending on how you chunk the separate questions?

On the proposed questions, I think questions 1, 2 define the scope of what we're seeking consensus on, but that these particular issues are I think better addressed by making a straightforward yes/no proposed change to the existing guidance. If we ask those questions, as written, then I think a lot of the comments will be along the lines of Maybe, but I would like to see a definite proposal before supporting or opposing, which could leave us in a no consensus situation where we'd need to re-run it again with defined proposals.

I'm not so sure about the scope of 3 and 4 though. Have the where in the article and how many times in the article questions really come up that often in our now lengthy discussion on this? Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:00, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I'd say one with four—I think we can manage separating them off.

Response regarding questions 1 & 2

As to questions 1 and 2, I think there's some value is simplifying the question to the core issue. First, regardless of wordings proposed, I think they are binary questions. In other words, agreeing to Trystan's proposal would be the exact same as agreeing to question 1—if an editor would want more nuance—as you suggested would be the case with your "maybe" editor ... they'd have the same response to Trystan's proposal. Same story with question 2 and your proposal—unless I misread (a distinct possibility!), your proposal doesn't allow for discretion as to persons who were not notable prior to their transition—you only introduce discretion for persons who were notable pre-transition. And, given that, I think separating the questions like this is more likely to yield a consensus than presenting full alternative proposals. As we've seen on this page, "I agree with this in principle but I like this phrasing better" isn't exactly an uncommon occurrence! I think proposing phrasings is more likely to yield a phrasing debate. I've tried to formulate the questions as to get to the essential issue. Again, given that the proposed phrasings don't present more nuance, if there's not a consensus as to that essential issue, there's not going to be a consensus on the phrasing.

Response regarding questions 3 & 4

I think questions 3 and 4 have gotten a fair amount of attention, both on this page and others, but, as you can tell, I did try to split up my "Issue 3" into two different questions—once again, because I think doing so is more likely to get some consensus. In terms of number of references, I think the discussion under BilledMammal's proposal got into that quite a bit, but I also think Sceptre's "editorially justified" proviso implicitly (though necessarily) spoke to number of references. Question 3, I think, is fairly non-controversial—it asks, assuming a name should be included, whether the name should be paired with the first reference to the person. I don't know that that many people would disagree with that. (The current version of 2023 Nashville school shooting doesn't follow that rule, but I think a majority of people on the talk page who say the shooter's birth name should be mentioned do say it should be in the lede.) Again, I think the opportunity to provide better guidance should be taken. But I also think question 4 has a chance. Frankly, in general, we use surnames to refer to persons after the first reference, and in most, though not all, cases, a trans person's selected name will keep their surname. There just aren't that many reasons to use a first name at all, so, from my perspective, it's fair to say that each invocation of a birth name should be justified by context. (As a simpler alternative, I suppose we could also say that a birth name should be paired with each recitation of the person's full name, but I haven't seen that suggested, and I didn't want to introduce totally new proposals with these questions. As stated, I tried to base them off the proposals that have been made.)

--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 21:11, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

agreeing to Trystan's proposal would be the exact same as agreeing to question 1 Yes based on implication, but not exactly in practice. Trystan's proposal is a concrete, definite change to the guideline. It's asking should we insert/rephrase the text of the guideline to this other version, yes or no? In doing so it lets editors compare the current version and a specific replacement version when making their determination for supporting or opposing. Question 1 as you've formulated it however is asking if there's consensus for a change, without specifying what form of that change will take. As a result it's a much more open ended question, because that particular change has many different forms.

your proposal doesn't allow for discretion as to persons who were not notable prior to their transition Do we need much, if any, discretion for trans or non-binary people who changed their names prior to becoming notable? The historical examples that have been mentioned previously, like James Barry and Public Universal Friend wouldn't fully be covered by any version of this, including the current version of the guideline, as their gender identities are unclear in the historical record. I'm trying to think of a modern example where we'd explicitly need such a discretionary statement in the guidance that ultimately wouldn't also be inherently covered by WP:IAR.

Question 3, I think, is fairly non-controversial—it asks, assuming a name should be included, whether the name should be paired with the first reference to the person. I don't know that that many people would disagree with that. True, and it would largely be seeking to codify standard practice. Again though, this is better handled by asking if we should make a specific change to the existing guidance along these lines, as that gives editors something concrete to compare against (ie new and old versions).

The problem I see with question 4 is that if we were to incorporate it into GENDERID, it would need to be compatible with the existing guidance on MOS:SURNAME, MOS:SAMESURNAME, and MOS:GIVENNAME. Those particular bits of guidance already codify how we should refer to a person after the first mention of their name. In my comment above at 19:52, 18 April 2023 (UTC) and those before it, I suggest that if we want to incorporate this that we should draft a specific addition to GENDERID that recommends a default input for which you should apply the other more relevant and already existing guidance.

TLDR; version, I think we're better served by making this RfC ask for concrete changes to the existing guidance in the typical "change X to Y" format, than open ended questions that ask if we should make changes but not actually ask what specific changes we should make. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:56, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think we have to be realistic. I mean, take a look at just the comments your proposal got here. Given the division, I'd guess—and it is just a guess—that the chances that proposal attracts a supportive consensus at an RFC are relatively slim. My operating theory is that consensus will be hard to come by, and we're best served by an approach that's most likely to yield as much consensus as we can get. I'd say a consensus on questions 1 and 3, for example, would be better than a "no consensus" on everything. And I think breaking down the issues into their elemental parts, as much as possible, is the best way to get any consensus. It avoid a scenario in which, for example, one proposed phrasing has multiple implications, and maybe a consensus exists to support one of those implications, but the proposed phrasing is ultimately rejected because no consensus exists to support the other. Phrasing debates, as you said, will detract from the ability to form a consensus. I mean, hey, both you and I have already made "but what if" comments under Trystan's proposal—and we support that proposal!

As to the discretion—of course not! I wasn't saying that your proposal should have discretion on that point. My point is that the question posed works as a stand in for your proposal. The question I presented doesn't leave room for discretion. If your proposal did have room for discretion, then the number of people who support your proposal could, theoretically, be greater than the number of people who'd respond yes to the question I posed. That would make a consensus less likely. But since neither has room for discretion, then, at the very least, anyone who'd support your proposal would also say "yes" to the question. (And, since there's no room for phrasing debates, I think it's fair to think that more people would say yes to the question.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 02:17, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Sideswipe that it would be best to have a specific phrasing, and generally to be as specific as possible. I don't think the problem with the proposal above is that it proposes a specific phrasing, but just that it's not very popular.

While it might seem at first like vagueness might be useful to get a broader consensus, any consensus achieved that way is illusory. If two people vote "yes" to a vaguely worded proposal meaning two totally different things, then trying to get them to agree on a specific phrasing later will be impossible, and the alleged consensus will never be able to be converted into any actual change to the guideline.

The advantage of a specific phrasing is that once the RfC passes, it's passed, and the guideline can be edited right then and there. And remember, Wikipedia does not require unanimity: some people can oppose a proposal and there can still nevertheless be a rough consensus for it. Loki (talk) 05:03, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that I'm using vagueness, so much as I'm asking the question "Should we do x, y and z" rather than "should the policy say x" (which may or may not happen to cover x, y, and z. But I suppose I agree that the above proposals may just not be popular enough to go forward at all (though I'd hold out hope for Trystan's proposal, given that I think it's already what's used in practice). Unfortunately, I'm not sure this "let's talk about what we would ask an RFC" thread, which is already fairly large, is getting any closer to starting a viable (i.e. likely to yield some consensus) RFC--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:41, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I've been thinking this over a lot over the last couple of days. I think no matter what RfC we run, there are going to be people opposing. There's a few mutually exclusive perspectives on handling this, and there's no real way to reconcile those.

Loki is correct when they say that any consensus from a vaguely worded RfC will be illusory, because as soon as you go to the next step of trying to define what form that should take, the consensus breaks.

To get progress on this, I think we have to do something a bit unusual. With all due respect to editors who would oppose broadening GENDERID's deadname provisions in any way, regardless of how it's phrased, I think for the purposes of this discussion of finding consensus for what RfC question to ask, we need to discount them. That's not to say that their contributions are unwelcome or invalid in any way, it's just that this is the wrong discussion to say things like "I oppose any change to broaden DEADNAME" or "I think we should get rid of DEADNAME entirely".

Instead what we should do is look at the contributions from editors who are in favour of changing the guideline, but disagree over which proposed change to take forward to an RfC. From those editors we can figure out which proposal has the strongest consensus to bring forward to an RfC, tweak the proposals wherever necessary. Then if/when the RfC launches, those editors who either oppose any change to broaden the guideline, or think we should get rid of it entirely, can make their cases at the RfC. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:48, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

My personal preference is to start by defining a ladder of possible proposals. Then, start with the rung on the ladder most likely to achieve consensus. If it doesn't, then nothing can. If it does, then progress to the next rung of the ladder, and so on. Wherever we stop is the largest change that could plausibly achieve consensus.

The disadvantage of this is that it will take a lot of time and energy. But also running a bad RFC will take a lot of time and energy, and that won't get us a useful result at the end. Loki (talk) 21:28, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

I would like to make one final pitch, if you two will indulge me. Just this one paragraph:

It's actually not the case that "vagueness" will doom a question. In fact, it's often just the opposite. In law, this is the eternal tension between "rules" and "standards". You'll notice that my questions started with what I said was probably the least controversial aspect. And, as to that aspect, question 1—you might also have noticed that the question I propose is maybe the least vague proposal here. "Should we always do X" isn't vague—it's a solid rule, no room for discretion. And it's not vague precisely because I think a consensus of editors will be willing to agree to that hard rule. Conversely, as to the more controversial subjects, my proposals are more wishy washy. "Justified by context" is a standard—it's wishy washy. And it's also there for a reason: Why? Well, we likely have a non-consensus of editors who think a deadname should never be mentioned after the first reference. And they wouldn't be willing to vote for rule that says "a deadname can be mentioned all the time." We also likely have a non-consensus of editors who think a deadname should be freely mentioned after the first reference. And they wouldn't be willing to vote for a rule that says "a deadname can never be mentioned." But both groups might think that they can justify their preferences by providing some context. Standards aren't as clear, and they provide a bit less guidance as to the right outcome than rules, but they're still better than nothing.

Still, if you all think you can get a consensus some other way, I'm all for it. I think we already have a "ladder" of proposals, right? Trystan's, Sideswipe9th's, Sceptre's. I'd say, of those, Trystan's probably has the highest chance of getting a consensus. After that, it's more difficult—more people have responded to Sideswipe9th's proposal, but that proposal's thread doesn't make it seem like a consensus is anywhere close. Sceptre's proposal is more vague than Sideswipe9ths—Sceptre says that a deadname should be used "sparingly and [only when] editorially justified". For the reasons I said above, that makes me think it's more likely to get a consensus. There are probably editors who want to use deadnames a lot who still think they can fit their preferences within that rule—even the most ardent editors who want to use deadnames freely aren't likely to thing it's necessary to do so more than 3 or 4 times in an article. They can argue that such use is "sparring" and "justified".--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 21:45, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@Jerome Frank Disciple: My proposal would cover the deadnames of both living and dead non-binary individuals; while it could (and should) be argued that it already applies to both as the MOS can't overrule a core policy, some editors argue it doesn't. BilledMammal (talk) 07:33, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Oh, sorry. When I asked "Would your proposal also replace [the current] MOS:GENDERID as it pertains to living subjects?", you said, "No." I have to say, I'm really skeptical that it's even worth putting a RFC forward that suggests changing the policy as to living subjects. Frankly, aside from a few spare comments, I haven't seen a ton of debate around that issue at all.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:39, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

It wouldn't affect MOS:GENDERID (first paragraph), it would affect MOS:DEADNAME (second paragraph). My impression of the discussion is that there is some support for allowing more flexibility on when we can mention a living individuals dead name, such as at the Isla Bryson case; I believe it is worth considering. BilledMammal (talk) 13:17, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Hm, I'm not sure I see that, and, if it's there, it should probably be a separate RFC. After all, this talk has all occurred under the subsection "Remove the 'living' qualifier in MOS:DEADNAME", and I think the vast majority of the discussion has been devoted to how we treat deceased trans persons.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 14:02, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

• Doesn't WP:DEADNAME already address the three points at the very outset of the OP? Taking each in point, with the relevant quote from WP:DEADNAME: 1) how we principally refer to a trans person, "Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed gender self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise." when should a birth name should be included "If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name... and if a birth name should be included, how/how often should it be included "In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under that name. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly"." It's pretty straightforward already. Why do we need an RFC on this? --Jayron32 11:56, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
  • Hi @Jayron32:! As to your first bold point, I agree with your interpretation, and I think a consensus of Wikipedia editors do. But it is a recurring point of debate, as I mentioned in my Strong support vote under Trystan's proposal (link to section). (Sorry—I don't mean to send you all over the talk page—the fact that I'm so spread out here is my fault, but I don't want to overload the talk page by repeating my points too much). In short, many editors argue the phrase "gendered words"—partially given that it identifies the type of words it addresses—(e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server)—doesn't include names. As to your second and third bold points—that does absolutely address names for living trans persons. But this discussion is mostly on how to address deceased trans persons.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:22, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
    • Oh, that's simple as can be. Simply remove the qualifier "living" from any and all parts of WP:DEADNAME. --Jayron32 12:25, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
      • Well, that's what Sideswipe9th proposed (or, at least, proposed proposing), though, as you can see, there's a fair amount of opposition.--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 12:44, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
        • Though, as you can see, I voted in that discussion some time ago. --Jayron32 16:28, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
        • When and how to use former names is at WP:BLP. This MOS is censoring information to avoid offense, which eventually will be changed. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:25, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
          • I'm not sure if that was meant as a response to me, but this comment confused me. As I understand, this RFC is focused on deceased trans person (and all of my proposed RFC questions were specifically directed to the treatment of deceased subjects). With the exception of potential application via WP:BDP, WP:BLP wouldn't cover those cases. (I do know you've, in other cases, opposed to any MOS:GENDERID policy and said we should follow whatever a majority of sources use(d), so I assume that is still your position.)--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 15:29, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

            Sorry if the communication was confusing (this section has 333 comments!). Yes, the proposal was to remove the "living" qualifier. There seems to be confusion over whether the current MOS censoring former names is due to privacy or to avoid offense. If it is privacy, then BLP handles everything, including recently deceased. If it is offense, then Wikipedia is not censored. Either way, this MOS should eliminate the special censorship of transgender former names, and certainly the idea of expanding it to deceased individuals is a non-starter. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 16:27, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

          While I agree that MOS is most certainly the wrong place to have these policies - "censoring information"? Isn't that only a bad thing if the information should be included? casualdejekyll 15:46, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

          Can you elaborate, of course noting that not every decision to exclude information is censorship, on what this "censoring information to avoid offense" is? --Jayron32 16:27, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

          What you see as a matter of offense and "special treatment" I see as a matter of respect for a marginalized group. Referring to a trans person by their deadname is not only disrespectful to them, but to trans people as a whole, as we have to constantly defend our identities.

          Now, you may accuse me and other trans editors of WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS, WP:ACTIVISM, WP:SOAPBOX, etc. Others have. I'll say in response that conversations that ignore or minimize the well-being of our trans editors and readers diminish the usefulness of this encyclopedia. Funcrunch (talk) 18:58, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

"Referring to a trans person by their deadname" has nothing to do with what I said or proposed. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 03:01, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I'll rephrase that sentence to clarify my stance then. Mentioning the former name of trans person who did not gain notability before their gender transition is not only disrespectful to them, but to trans people as a whole. Funcrunch (talk) 03:12, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

The "respect" rationale has been mentioned before, as has "all trans people". I'd like to see a reliable source for this. If (a reliable sources says that) a specific person has stated their request not to have their deadname mentioned, then that specific person's wishes are known, but where's the reliable source that says all trans people do not want their deadnames mentioned? Where's the reliable source that says mentioning one person's deadname disrespects all trans people? Isn't such generalisation just stereotyping people, which I thought would be considered a bad thing. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:52, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I think this is where surface level familiarity with the topic cones into play. Filiforme1312 (talk) 04:35, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Indeed; I'd like to hope Mitch is incredibly out of his depth rather than sea-lioning or concern trolling, because that sort of comment is like editing a hurricane WikiProject article without knowing how wind works. Sceptre (talk) 23:46, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

If I asked for information about a specific feature of the wind in a discussion about hurricanes, where that particular feature was fundamental to the discussion, I would hope that somebody would be able to either point me to a reliable source on the matter, or at least point me to the relevant (sourced) section of a Wikipedia article that covered the matter. Presumably (the other) participants here are all familiar with the specific issue, so it ought to easy enough to find such a source. So let me ask directly:

• Do all (or most?, or many?) trans or non-binary people object to their deadname being mentioned (not used)?
• Does mentioning one trans person's previous name disrespect all of them? Why? Surely they don't all "think the same and have the same opinions"? If a trans person does not have an opinion of the matter, aren't you just foisting your own opinions onto them by saying they must have be disrespected?

Reliable sources (and/or relevant section of Wikipedia article) that address these specific questions - preferably a direct quote to support the assertions - would be helpful here rather than unsupported assertions. Mitch Ames (talk) 14:49, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Just a side note: I've seen the "but isn't that implying that all X think Y, a stereotype?" argument before, and I really find it unconvincing. We're allowed to make style choices based on the majority. The note at MOS:RACECAPS that we shouldn't use "old epithets" is not at all contingent on a finding that 100% of persons who could be described as those epithets would object to that description. I've yet to see anyone say "BUT DOESN'T NOT USING THOSE EPITHETS AS A RULE TREAT PEOPLE AS A MONOLITH, A BAD THING?"--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 16:46, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

A lot of this is covered in the deadname article, its sources, and related articles. While I will inline link to parts of it and other relevant articles below, I would suggest reading the articles in full would better inform you (and any other editors).

Most trans and non-binary people object to their deadname being mentioned, whether accidentally or on purpose. Depending on the environmental context, the mentioning of their deadname can out them as trans or non-binary to people who did not know. It can lead to risks of psychological and physical harm from individuals who are ideologically opposed to trans and non-binary people existing. The act of deadnaming also has a measurable and well known harmful psychological effects on the individual [18], with people whose name and pronoun changes being respected having a significant drop in the rate of suicidality and self-harm.

On the group, widespread deadnaming is one of many factors that result in many trans and non-binary people remaining in the closet. It's a similar effect to how many lesbian, gay, and bisexual people would remain in the closet until the wider acceptance of non-heterosexual sexualities from the early 2000s onwards, as coming out as non-heterosexual had significant risks of physical and psychological harm. As almost any trans or non-binary person can tell you, the act of seeing others being deadnamed and disrespected is one of several powerful factors for why they may feel that it is either not safe to transition or that there's no point at all in transitioning. Afterall, what is the point of coming out, saying "Hi my name is Jane, please use she/they pronouns when referring to me" if everyone around you is going to disrespect you by continuing to call you John and use he/him pronouns, or vice versa. Widespread deadnaming in the media is frequently seen as creating a hostile environment for non-cisgender gender identities [19], which is why there are often public outcries when the media needlessly deadnames, misgenders, or otherwise minimises or disrespects the gender identity of a non-cisgender individual or group. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:57, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

• I'm probably just going to step out of this topic because I don't have a firm grasp on all the issues but if I can gain an understanding I would !vote in an RFC. To me, if there is encyclopedic interest in a person's prior names, that should prevail, and if there is not, respect and kindness to their wishes should prevail, and if such wishes are clear (e.g. a modern day trans person vs. a farther back historical person whom we are retroactively interpreting as trans? maybe not the best example?) there is no reason not to honor them after the person is deceased. For me I think I need to see some examples, concrete or hypothetical, as again I don't have a good conceptual understanding of this topic. I know some have been discussed here already and I'll admit I may just not be prepared to understand all the issues because I can't entirely make sense of it to be honest. I do think an RFC with multiple choices is a valid idea, and people can support one or more choices as they see fit. I don't think that unfairly makes it hard to find consensus (or lack of) for a close. —DIYeditor (talk) 17:42, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

  I think your general summary of what Wikipedia's priorities should be is basically right, but to explain:

  The modern trans community, in general, does not like previous names to be revealed. Part of this is just a general discomfort with that previous identity (the same discomfort which caused them to transition) and part of this is out of a fear of harassment, as one of the most common ways for transphobes to harass a trans person is to call them by a previous name and pronouns. You can see if you look at the page of most prominent trans people that there are a larger than normal number of history entries that have been rev-del'd; these will be from trolls adding a deadname to the article.

  This is all fairly simple when dealing with living trans people: the fact that real life harm is involved means we don't include previous names unless they were previously notable under that name (which both significantly reduces the amount of real-life harm we're doing by including the deadname and significantly increases the encyclopedic value of the deadname) or the person in question is explicitly okay with us including their previous name. However, a few factors complicate this when dealing with dead trans people:

  1. The risk of real-life harm from deadnaming a dead person is, if not gone entirely, certainly significantly less.

  2. In the case of historical trans people, or especially historic people conjectured to be trans, it's often unclear what their wishes actually were. So for instance, Albert Cashier adopted a male identity for most of his life but doesn't seem to have given specific instructions outside of that. He also lived long before the norms of the modern trans community were set. What would he think about us mentioning his birth name? It's very unclear.

  3. Especially but not exclusively in the case of historical trans people / historic people conjectured to be trans, it's sometimes the case that their birth name has encyclopedic value even if they weren't notable under it. So for instance, the birth name of the Public Universal Friend is a pretty important part of their life story, for reasons that should be clear from the page.

  4. The modern trans community is young enough that there just aren't a lot of examples of notable dead trans people from the modern community. To the extent the issue has been considered, the modern community is still strongly against deadnaming people even after their death, largely because transphobic relatives often do this.

  5. In the case of someone like Leelah Alcorn whose death was directly connected to transphobia and being misgendered, it feels very wrong on an intuitive level for us to also misgender her. That's probably why that featured article does not contain her deadname, even omitting it from quotes.

  My personal feeling on this is that we should have separate guidelines for modern trans people who are dead and historical trans people. But I don't have a great idea for what the separator should be other than maybe year of death. Anyone who died before around 1950 would be a historical figure by this standard. Loki (talk) 19:20, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

  ... wrong ... for us to also misgender her. That's probably why that featured article does not contain her deadname — Surely mentioning a deadname ("John Smith (born Mary Smith) ....") is not the same as misgendering ("John started her first job"). Mitch Ames (talk) 23:45, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

  While the use-mention distinction is important (and the foundation of much of our policy on this stuff), I don't think that it is the only important thing here. Mentions can still in some cases be harmful. Loki (talk) 00:36, 2 May 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.

Capitalisation of titles

Are titles capitalised if they come after a name? For example, Rishi Sunak, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom as opposed to Rishi Sunak, prime minister of the United Kingdom. DDMS123 (talk) 23:40, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Nope! Per MOS:JOBTITLE, they are only capitalized when coming before the person's name.--Jerome Frank Disciple 13:43, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Of course, per JOBTITLE, that exact construction could be capitalised in most contexts, as it uses the proper title. — HTGS (talk) 05:59, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Indeed. It's a proper name for a unique office and is therefore capitalised. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:50, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Conflict between JOBTITLE and SURNAME

JOBTITLE is quite clear that titles are generally not capitalised, including when 'a formal title for a specific entity is [not] addressed as a title or position in and of itself.' I take this to mean that we should use 'William, prince of Wales' over 'William, Prince of Wales', as the person rather than title title is being addressed. Conversely, SURNAME uses 'Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester' and 'William, Prince of Wales'.

Which subsection is right, if there is a conflict? A.D.Hope (talk) 18:26, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Really interesting pickup! ... I would personally say, here, go with the capitalized version. Per WP:NCROY, royalty often use titles in lieu of surnames. As such, the title is part of the name. Though subtle, I think there's a distinction between saying, for example, "William, Prince of Wales" vs. "Charles was the prince of Wales". Notably, capitalization seems to be standard practice around the various articles: In this ongoing RFC discussing how a list of funeral attendees should be presented, no one is suggesting lowercasing titles. --Jerome Frank Disciple 18:43, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I do think there's a discrepancy between what the MOS states and actual Wikipedia practice; a reasonable reading of JOBTITLES would give 'William, prince of Wales' and 'Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester', but actual practice would fully capitalise both.

I am sympathetic to the NCROY argument that as royals often don't have surnames we should treat their titles as such and so capitalise them, although that doesn't translate to the nobility, like Dudley. Interestingly, another conflict is that NCROY suggests not using numerals, so 'Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester' rather than '1st earl of Leicester'. A.D.Hope (talk) 19:23, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I could have this wrong (if so, someone correct me)… but… My understanding is that the capitalization really depends on context. We would entitle his bio article: “William, Prince of Wales”. In running text we would also use: “William, Prince of Wales, attended…”(as that is referring to him by his formal royal title). However, in a different context we would write: “William became the prince of Wales in 2023”, because that is more of a job description. Hope this is correct and helpful. Blueboar (talk) 18:47, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I have comes here from Talk:List_of_guests_at_the_coronation_of_Charles_III_and_Camilla#RfC_on_capitalisation_and_peerage_format where I have expressed the view that MOS:SURNAME should guide us in the capitalization of, for example, William, Prince of Wales. It seems that MOS:SURNAME and many examples of usage on Wikipedia treat William, Prince of Wales as a name but that the conflict comes from,

When followed by a person's name to form a title, i.e., when they can be considered to have become part of the name

which tells us that we can only count it as part of his name if the title comes before his given name rather than after. Would it be reasonable for this sentence to say something more like,

• When they can be considered to have become part of the name, i.e. when combined with a person's name to form a title: President Nixon, not president Nixon; Pope John XXIII, not pope John XXIII; William, Prince of Wales, not William, prince of Wales

This would remove the conflict between the two sets of guidance but perhaps would have other unintended consequences. Mgp28 (talk) 05:32, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Celia Rose Gooding § RfC on pronouns

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Celia Rose Gooding § RfC on pronouns. — HTGS (talk) 03:44, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Worth noting that there are two dominant arguments (including my own), and that either of them should probably set precedent here. — HTGS (talk) 03:45, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

"Noteworthy" or "notable" roles in the first para/sentence

In December 2020 the "Opening paragraph" section ended its list of what should be included with:

4 "The noteworthy position(s) the person held, activities they took part in, or roles they played; (Linking WP:NOTEWORTHY for "noteworthy")

5 Why the person is notable. (linking Wikipedia:Notability (people))"

Today the equivalent text, now called "Opening sentence", reads:

4 "One, or possibly more, noteworthy positions, activities, or roles that the person is mainly known for, avoiding subjective or contentious terms. (linking Wikipedia:Notability#General notability guideline for "noteworthy")

5 The main reason the person is notable (key accomplishment, record, etc.) (linking Wikipedia:Notability (people))

However, try to not overload the first sentence by describing everything notable about the subject; instead, spread relevant information over the lead paragraph."

Does anyone know if the change of link destination in #4 was discussed? If so where? Thanks, Johnbod (talk) 01:50, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

Excessive clutter of Gaddafi example

I was analyzing the guidance about First mention. The Gaddafi first sentence example seems to have excessive clutter needlessly. I think readers come to biographical articles mostly to answer who the person is. The first sentence seeks to answer that in a nutshell. What is the full name of the person is a secondary concern. If this latter is too long it is best to leave it elsewhere in the lead, not in the first sentence. Per MOS:FIRSTBIO, try to not overload the first sentence by describing everything notable about the subject; instead, spread relevant information over the lead paragraph.

The reader many times just seeks to answer "who is Gaddafi?" Then the most reasonable answer is concise, easy to read info. In the current form, the reader needs to go through all of this before reaching an answer, Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi (Arabic: معمر محمد أبو منيار القذافي; /ˈmoʊ.əmɑːr ɡəˈdɑːfi/; c. 1942 – 20 October 2011), also known as Colonel Gaddafi,....

I tried to make the guidance more flexible but User:DrKay did revert, apparently objecting that the article doesn't have the format I added as an option. I have to note that articles are in constant state of evolution and the Gadaffi example is just an illustration. My added option was an illustration of a format other editors think might be better, including me. I don't think necessarily only the current format needs to be included as if it was a fixed rule.

My addition was Colonel Muammar Gaddafi (c. 1942 – 20 October 2011) was a Libyan politician, revolutionary, and political theorist. He was born Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi.... It was done with the thought in mind of guidelines about conciseness, readability, and avoiding clutter whenever possible. Also, I added the option instead of replacing altogether the previous example with some other page because in some cases it might be advisable to leave the full name for a variety of reasons.

Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 03:52, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I support this effort, but I also think it is wise to use good examples, rather than make them up (we are after all, trying, when possible, to enshrine good practices that have community support, more than dictate good style from on high). If you don't have a good example to quote, it should be straightforward to create one. I do engage in this sort of edit on occasion myself, but I cannot think of a good example off the top of my head. — HTGS (talk) 04:10, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

My objection to the Gaddafi example is that it pushes the information that he was the ruler of Libya too far down. That should be mentioned right up front, as it is what is most notable about him. Wehwalt (talk) 12:24, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

@Wehwalt I don't understand said objection. My edit had the same information in two sentences as the current first sentence. In addition, those two sentences were 25 words (174 characters) in length, whereas the current first sentence is 32 words (222 characters) long. If anything, the latter seems to push the information more than my version. What gives? Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 23:59, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

In my view, his leadership of Libya should be in the first sentence, as it is what makes him most notable. An opening in which the main claim to notability is pushed down so far may not be one we want to cite as an example. Wehwalt (talk) 02:11, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree. Therefore, I modified the first sentence of the Gaddafi page. I think it would be a good example to avoid clutter, if the change sticks. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 02:48, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

 Implemented[20]. Any questions let me know. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 22:38, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Horrible convoluted example Moxy- 13:02, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

Can you be more specific and point out issues that bother you please. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 22:50, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

Pronunciation notes

added for section, signing so as not to hinder archiving later — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 21:08, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Remove bold for honorific titles in lead sentence

Can anyone explain why MOS:SIR, on honorific titles, demands that the title be placed in bold in the first use of the name? The honorific title is almost never part of the article title, and further: it makes it harder to parse quickly for the reader, especially when the person’s name is already listed in full, with all the many names and nicknames that some biographies begin with.

Eg: Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill versus Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill

I propose we reverse this guidance, or at least remove it. (Except of course to keep bold full titles for subjects whose honorific titles are part of their article titles. Eg, Sir Samuel Hood, 1st Baronet.) — HTGS (talk) 13:41, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Because titles like "Sir" and peerages are almost always included when people are referred to. It's a title, not an honorific. It would be ridiculous to bold a nickname, a full name or a former name and not bold a title. If we're only going to bold parts of a name that are used in the article title then we should presumably debold all these other elements too (Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill)! -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:33, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I disagree with the premise that “titles like "Sir" and peerages are almost always included when people are referred to”; I frequently hear knights referred to without their titles. Winston Churchill comes easily to mind. I also disagree that even if these are titles (and not honorifics—whatever the distinction means), that that should preserve them in bold.

Again, I have no goal to remove these titles, but I do think the name is easier to parse without the bolded title. We bold the whole name, but I cannot see the title as part of the whole name (again, with the stated exception for Sir Samuel Hood and the like). — HTGS (talk) 03:07, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

In Britain, you very rarely see knights or dames referred to without their title. Because it would be incorrect. After he was knighted, Winston Churchill was no longer Mr Churchill but Sir Winston. Nothing has changed. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:00, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Winston Churchill was no longer Mr Churchill but Sir Winston We don't bold-format (or even include) "Mr", so why should we bold "Sir"? Mitch Ames (talk) 03:21, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Again, I have no intention to remove the word Sir (or Dame, etc.) from any of these articles, so it’s hard to say if we’re on the right track here. But, for reference, the International Churchill Society does not appear to prefer the title consistently in its own use ([21]), nor does the Encyclopaedia Britannica use it at the start of its article ([22]; though I fully appreciate there are distinct styles at play there). — HTGS (talk) 06:05, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

I'd support this proposal, since editors who aren't familiar with honorific titles might, for example, think Sir is a part of Winston Church's full name since it's bold. I'd also support removing honorific titles in general from lead sentences (unless the title is part of the subject's common name, but even then, it should not be bold). Some1 (talk) 23:35, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I don’t believe there’s any confusion here, but to be clear: removing honorific titles from lead sentences is not part of this proposal (and if it were to become the subject of debate it is not something that I would have the MOS dictate). — HTGS (talk) 02:58, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

I also support removing the bold format from "Sir", because it is not part of the name, and not part of the article title. Necrothesp says that it is "a title, not an honorific", but it is actually both; the first sentence of MOS:SIR says "The honorific titles Sir, Dame, ...", and the linked articles say "Sir/Dame is a formal honorific address". Mitch Ames (talk) 01:29, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Once again, I would point out that most of what's bolded in the first line isn't part of the article title! Only bolding what's in the article title would be a massive change in Wikipedia's style and making an exceoption for "Sir" and "Dame" would make no sense and would smack of favouring the opinions of those who don't like titles. The fact remains that in Britain and some other Commonwealth countries they are still a big deal and almost always used where appropriate. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:00, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

As pointed out by HTGS, higher titles of peerage, baronetcy and knighthood replace lesser titles such as Mr. We don't put Mr. in articles because it is the default title for men.

If using deferential style, one would refer to Sir Winston Churchill in the first instance, and Sir Winston in subsequent references. Winston Churchill's unknighted grandson would be referred to as Mr. Winston Churchill in the first instance, followed by Mr. Churchill. But with the MOS style, subsequent references are to Churchill for both men.

There is no reason to capitalizebold Sir in the first mention. It's a title, not part of the name.

TFD (talk) 08:12, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

One presumes you mean to say bold, not capitalise, @The Four Deuces. — HTGS (talk) 06:07, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

There seems to be a misapprehension by some that "title" and "name" are mutually exclusive. A "name" is just the word or sequence of words which identify a particular thing, and in the UK at least, a title can be part of a person's name. A knight's legal name under British law is "Sir John Smith", not merely "John Smith". This is fundamentally different to something like "Mr", which is just a social courtesy not forming part of anyone's legal name. The unspoken assumption seems to be the only things "allowed" to be part of someone's name (as decreed by the internet) are given names and surnames, when this isn't how it always works. Take Charles III: "III" clearly isn't either a given name or a surname, yet starting his article "Charles III ..." would be absurd. Or peers, whose titles also form part of their names: "Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington" would be rather odd (particularly for someone universally known as "the Duke of Wellington" rather than by his given name and surname). And we allow people to have self-assumed titles used as part of stage names to be treated as part of their name: a self-named Lady Gaga is fine, but if she genuinely held a title she'd have to be "Lady Gaga"? I'm sorry, but that's just nonsense. Proteus (Talk) 15:36, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

in the UK at least, a title can be part of a person's name. A knight's legal name under British law is "Sir John Smith", not merely "John Smith". — It's probably worth noting that explicitly in MOS:SIR. References:

• UK Passport Office guidelines "Titles of nobility are part of a person’s name and identity"
• Deed Poll Office (a private firm, not a government office) " “Officially recognised” British titles are considered a part of a legal name in the U.K. This includes: ... holders of knighthoods"

Mitch Ames (talk) 23:49, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Can I assume the example of Lady Gaga was a joke? Because I really don’t want to have to explain how and why that example is unhelpful.
Again, this change is limited in scope, and does not need to affect the duke or the king. (Although I don’t personally see that change as problematic for the duke. It would be very easy to note that he is “also well known as the Duke of Wellington”.) — HTGS (talk) 06:00, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

But why do you want to make a limited-scope exception for pretitles? Sir Winston Churchill was as much Churchill's name as Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, was Wellington's. More so, in fact, as the latter was pretty much exclusively referred to as simply as the Duke of Wellington (and the same goes for most peers). -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:47, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

@Necrothesp: Great question. Primarily because I see that as a compromise and the less contentious change, but also because I am more interested in the far more common modern articles, where the subject is not well known as Dame this, or Sir that, and also because it leaves avenue for people with your point of view to advocate for moving Winston Churchill to Sir Winston Churchill (I could easily ask you why, if he is so known as Sir Winston Churchill, his article isn’t at that page). If it were my encyclopaedia it would look a little different in many domains, but full disclosure: I would personally prefer to have Arthur Wellesley’s name bolded, immediately followed by explanation that he was also known as the Duke of Wellington (in bold). But it’s not my project, and that isn’t my hill, and so I’m respectfully not trying to change those articles which I read as being particularly concerned with the full title of someone’s name. — HTGS (talk) 21:19, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

To be clear, I have never advocated that the pretitle should be included in the article title (except for baronets for disambiguation purposes, and only with "Xth Baronet" appended) and I have actually moved many articles away from such titles over the years. I would also point out that most modern knighhts and dames are known by their titles. Maybe not in the USA, but certainly in the UK. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:24, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this exemplifies the misapprehension I set out above. You speak of "Arthur Wellesley" as though that somehow remained his only real or valid name, with "Duke of Wellington" as something he was merely "also known as", as if it were some kind of nickname or stage name. He wasn't "known as" the Duke of Wellington: he was the Duke of Wellington. That was his name. Legally speaking, it actually replaced his surname (he would have been described in legal documents as "Arthur, Duke of Wellington"). Proteus (Talk) 17:36, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

@Necrothesp and Proteus: Is there a compromise approach you would accept? I think most of us would be happy with phrasing that simply does not require the bold ‘Sir’ universally. Perhaps there is a standard of usage that could be applied? I only suggested the exclusion of those article-titles that do include the honorific-title as a starting point, but there are other ways we could preserve bold in more cases. Otherwise we can simply remove the guidance and let editors decide on a page-by-page basis... though that seems tedious. — HTGS (talk) 21:32, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm afraid that sounds to me like a recipe (a) for inconsistency (by design) and (b) for endless tedious arguments about whether someone is best known with or without "Sir" or "Dame" in their name. It also lacks a principled basis: if "Sir" is part of a person's name (which is is), then it should be in bold regardless of whether it's commonly used or not, because our policy is to put names in bold, even when they are rarely used full forms of names. We don't remove the bold from middle names simply because they're very rarely used. Obviously if someone rarely uses a title (as with many recently knighted actors), then that should be noted, but that doesn't stop it being part of their full name. Proteus (Talk) 17:36, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Necrothesp and Proteus: "Sir" and "Lord" (or "Dame" and "Lady") are customarily treated differently from other titles like "Mr.", "Dr.", "Rev.", "Hon.", etc. in that they can be (and often are) used when addressing people in an informal register, by their forename, rather than their surname. They're treated as a more integral part of the name than the others, and bolding them reflects that. Whether they are legally part of the name, whatever that means, or whether it's logical (it isn't) is beside the point. I note also that the opening line of the Britannica article linked above (bolding as in the original) is "Winston Churchill, in full Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill..." In other words, our existing style is compatible both with custom and pre-existing encyclopedic practice. Choess (talk) 04:21, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

MOS:ETHNICITY

MOS:ETHNICITY currently reads: The opening paragraph should usually provide context for the activities that made the person notable. In most modern-day cases, this will be the country, region, or territory, where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident; or, if the person is notable mainly for past events, where the person was a citizen, national, or permanent resident when the person became notable. For guidance on historic place names versus modern-day names, see WP:MODERNPLACENAME. Ethnicity, religion, or sexuality should generally not be in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, neither previous nationalities nor the country of birth should be mentioned in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability.

The second sentence ("this will be the country... where the person is currently a citizen... or resident") is contradicted by the second-last sentence, "Ethnicity... should not be in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability..."

I have no scientific way of demonstrating this, but don't over 99% of BLPs and biographies ignore this, and include nationality/ethnicity in the opening sentence. Can we remove the word "Ethnicity" (and the implied "nationality") from that sentence? Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 10:58, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

There is often overlap, but… Nationality/citizenship is not identical to Ethnicity. To give an example, say someone is a French citizen with Japanese ethnicity… In the lead sentence we would say “Jean Doe is a French photographer”. We might note his Japanese heritage somewhere else in the article (perhaps in an “early life” section), but we would not include it in the lead sentence. Blueboar (talk) 11:18, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

To me, the key tension/contradiction is between the first sentence and the second. The paragraph assumes that the context for the activities that made the person notable will generally be the country, region, or territory, where the person is currently a citizen, national, or permanent resident. In this formulation, either the phrase "in most cases" has to do a lot more work than many editors seem willing to entertain, or the framework of nation-state citizenship ends up being imposed on cases where it does not actually reflect the context for notability.

So we have the carve-out for the UK "home nations", but at the same time editors stumble long doing OR investigation or making heroic assumptions about the presumptive "citizenship, nationality or permanent residency" of academics who have multiple legal citizenship, and whose context of notability may not be especially tied to any nationality. On enwiki we also accept contrasting treatment of similar biographical figures depending on just how far editors are willing to ground the opening paragraph in the balance of the "context of notability" documented in the highest-quality sources available, or rely on a fundamentalist reading of MOS:ETHNICITY that, in the hands of some editors, would accept only an identity accompanied by a passport and a seat at the UN.

While I do recognize tensions in the rest of the section as well, I think the key elision happens between the first sentence and the second. Newimpartial (talk) 15:39, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

The first two sentences read fine. The problem is that some will ignore "in most modern-day cases" and treat it as "in all modern-day cases". And there's anyways WP:IAR to customize individual situations, when there is consensus that it makes sense for that page. —Bagumba (talk) 17:54, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

As Blueboar said, ethnicity is different than nationality. If we were to list ethnicities, many Americans would have some strange "ethnicity" attributed to them, which may actually be legitimately discussed later in their "Early life" or such section after the lead. It is quite relevant and important to identify what nationality people are (or what country of the UK they are from or associated with, if any, in the case of the UK). Ethnicity per se should not be in the lead unless the person is notable for their ethnic background or something related to it. An indigenous activist might be notable for their ethnicity (vs. nationality) but someone who is merely indigenous but not notable for anything related to it does not need to have that listed until details about their background are handled after the lead. —DIYeditor (talk) 08:20, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

The question here is not whether or not to recognize that ethnicity is different than nationality, it is whether or not to treat all articles on the basis, consistent with US political culture, that "nationality" approximates national citizenship or residency. By contrast, from a Canadian perspective, prominent Quebec nationalists are notable in the context of their Quebecois nationality (not equivalent to ethnicity, which may indeed be considerably more complex). Prominent indigenous activists and cultural figures may be prominent in the context of a First Nations national identity (not identical to ethnicity, although recognition of an indigenous identity may have preconditions related to ethnicity). And so on.

It seems to me that "citizenship, nationality or permanent residency" is not intended in this guideline to override the context for the activities that made the person notable, nor should it be construed as insisting that "nationality=citizenship(/residency)". Also, the argument that it is important to "identify what nationality people are" in the case, say, of academics where their birthplace differs from their country of residence and where their citizenship and "nationality" are not a matter of public record - well, it seems to me that the presumption that this sort of information ought to be included needs an actual argument in its support, beyond a (seemingly lazy) reading of the first paragraph of ETHNICITY. Newimpartial (talk) 12:17, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

Age of person in an infobox

Please see Template talk:Infobox person#Template:Age for a proposal regarding {{age}} whereby, when a date is unknown, it would change from showing a single number to a range of ages. Johnuniq (talk) 03:54, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

it's preferable a more readable form

The sentence "The sentence seems to contain unnecessary clutter—it's preferable a more readable form." is, ironically, missing a word. -sche (talk) 05:18, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Fixed! Although rather than add "in", I switched it to "a more readable form would be preferable"--Jerome Frank Disciple 13:32, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

What does notable mean for MOS:GENDERID?

This ... could be a hot-button issue, but I think it's one worth settling. MOS:GENDERID currently distinguishes between living persons who were notable under a former name and those who were not. Does "notable" in the MOS:GENDERID context mean WP:NOTABLE or, in effect, "noteworthy"? This isn't a philosophical question: I actually only realized the potential discrepancy when @Trystan: brought it up at the Cheshire home invasion murders talk page. That article discusses a living person who was convicted for several felony counts (and originally sentenced to death) related to the article's subject—a fairly grisly home-invasion murder. After her conviction, the person in question transitioned while incarcerated. There's no dispute that, per WP:PERPETRATOR, she should not have had her own article prior to transitioning (or, frankly, now). At the same time, the act for which she is noteworthy was committed prior to her transitioning, when she was living under her birth name. So ... should her birth name be included?

Of course, if notable means WP:NOTABLE—a subject deserving their own article, the answer is no. But I've found that, often, notable as to a content-inclusion question often means, effectively, "noteworthy" (WP:NOTEWORTHY notwithstanding). For example (and this is currently under discussion), WP:NOTDIRECTORY says, "Disambiguation pages (such as John Smith) are not intended to be complete listings of every person named John Smith—just the notable ones." But no one interprets that policy to mean that disambiguation pages can only contain references to persons who have their own Wikipedia article. There are also all sorts of ways content guidelines get around saying "noteworthy": MOS:TIMELINE says to consider "importance to the subject"; some policies emphasize that we need a "summary" (see WP:NOTEVERYTHING, WP:SUMMARY) (how do you just have a summary? by excluding non-noteworthy info). I don't really have a stake in this—but I think it'd be worth clarifying to make instances (like the above) clear.--Jerome Frank Disciple 01:08, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

My inclination is to say that when a policy or guideline says "notable" they mean the same thing WP:NOTABLE means by notable unless there's good evidence otherwise.

Which is to say: WP:NOTABLE is not a policy that defines notability as a particular way, it is a policy that states that the standard for having a Wikipedia page is notability (in the ordinary sense meaning noteworthy), and also here is the procedure to establish notability. This is why there are lots of more localized notability standards for particular topics: the thing they are all aiming at is the same, it's just different procedures to establish it. Loki (talk) 01:35, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Is "good evidence" based on what else is in the policy or what's practiced by users? (That is, I don't think WP:NOTDIRECTORY's invocation of notability—which actually links WP:NOTABLE—contains any reason to doubt that "notable" doesn't mean the policy, but obviously the practice isn't consistent with that at all.)--Jerome Frank Disciple 02:10, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Maybe this should be folded into the ongoing series of RFCs on GENDERID? It seems to me there are issues in common with what is being discussed at the village pump. Wehwalt (talk) 17:33, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Nah:

1. This relates to the deadname of a living person, which isn't an issue currently be discussed in the RFC (and wasn't discussed by the prior RFC).
2. This is not a common issue and we haven't had any RFCBEFORE. It's not even clear that there are strongly different positions—I for one don't really care either way; I'm just trying to figure out what the policy is.
3. In terms of what's being discussed in the current RFC: Yes, there are one or two users with really unique takes on WP:NNC: At their most extreme, these users think that any reference to noteworthiness in a content guideline violates NNC, more modestly they think that NNC prohibits other policies or guidelines from incorporating WP:N standards for a content question (excepting lists, which are specially exempted—though at least one of these users also objects to its use in lists). If taken seriously, that position would invalidate not only this guideline, but portions of policy (like WP:NOTDIRECTORY) and other guidelines (like WP:GAMECRUFT). The position is ridiculous for several reasons—it's not only a weird interpretation of NNC, but it depends on an even weirder elevation of NNC into constitutional status, such that not even IAR couldn't save the affected policies or guidelines. (It's also just completely not practicable, but I've said enough.) Frankly, that's an issue that would probably have to be handled at a far broader level—perhaps an RFC at related to WP:NNC, so I don't think we need to dive in here.

--Jerome Frank Disciple 18:03, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Oh I didn't even catch that it links WP:N. Then yeah, of course it means WP:N. Loki (talk) 00:51, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

But of course everyone enforcing that policy on DAB pages doesn't enforce WP:N in the listings (if you've ever seen a DAB page with something like "John Smith, a character in article", you'll know what I mean).--Jerome Frank Disciple 13:20, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Why would "John Smith, a character in article" be a counter-example?

Like, let me explain where I'm coming from. Most people named John Smith are not notable because they are or were completely ordinary people with no or very few reliable sources about their life. A handful of people named John Smith are notable, and a handful of those people actually have their own article. But you can't use the lack of a Wikipedia article as evidence of non-notability, especially when they're prominently mentioned in some other Wikipedia article. There's several Wikipedia policies that direct people to not make articles for people who would by the GNG or by common sense be notable.

For example, Harry Du Bois the character isn't non-notable just because we have an article on Disco Elysium but not its main character. The standard in WP:N for determining notability is significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject (and it itself notes that this is a procedure for proving notability and not a definition of notability). Disco Elysium itself clearly clears this barrier, and many of the articles about the game are also about its main character. We don't always make a separate article in this situation, especially if the character is very closely tied to a single work, but that doesn't mean that the character isn't notable. Loki (talk) 23:27, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Huh! I don't want to get too sidetracked, but I'm not sure about real-world implications re: "But you can't use the lack of a Wikipedia article as evidence of non-notability, especially when they're prominently mentioned in some other Wikipedia article." Yes, perhaps the person in question just hasn't had an article about them written yet, but that's usually not what's discussed in these debates (over DABMENTIONs). (I agree with you that we often don't make separate articles for characters when the character is very closely tied to a single work, but I think most users read that kind of restriction as stemming from WP:N: after all, a WP:PERPETRATOR closely tied to one event is often said to not be "notable" enough for their own article with reference to WP:PERPETRATOR.)

The editors who favor inclusion usually concede that the listing in question isn't notable enough for their own article, and I don't think even the editors who tend to favor exclusion would say that every DABMENTION that's not notable enough for its own article, although some do oppose pure DABMENTION disambiguation pages (like Adam Boyle).

Also, relevant here, MOS:DABMENTION says that a person can be "notable for purposes of inclusion in a disambiguation page", which further suggests "noteworthy" is the standard being applied (after all, how can someone be notable for the purposes of a single page? either they meet WP:N or not). To clarify: When I've seen this discussed before, most editors—at least of those who support keeping "notable" within WP:NOT, will say that it only imposes notable "in the colloquial sense", which I'm paraphrasing as "noteworthy".--Jerome Frank Disciple 23:43, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

WP:N means notable in the colloquial sense. It doesn't define a jargon term, it defines a procedure for proving that a topic meets the colloquial definition of notability.

There's definitely cases like WP:PERPETRATOR where someone's notability is so linked to some other page it doesn't justify creating a separate page for them, but that doesn't mean they're not notable at all. See for instance WP:ONEEVENT, which explicitly acknowledges the person's notability in its own title before going on to consider the question of whether to make an article for the person, the event, or both. Loki (talk) 00:09, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I feel like you might be fighting my (real-world) hypo a bit here :) Again, it's usually conceded that the entries are not notable enough for their own article under WP:N. The fact that some MOS:DABMENTIONs might be notable enough for their own article ... and just, by chance, no one has made an article for them is possible, but that's usually not what's debated or discussed. I'm also not sure it's fair to say WP:N is just notable in the colloquial sense and isn't a jargon term. To be clear, WP:N says:

A topic is presumed to merit an article if:

1. It meets either the general notability guideline (GNG) below, or the criteria outlined in a subject-specific notability guideline (SNG) listed in the box on the right; and
2. It is not excluded under the What Wikipedia is not policy.

The general notability guideline then gives a sentence and provides specific definitions for 5 of the words in that 1 sentence. You might say that WP:N is an effort to formalize notability in the colloquial sense, but it is absolutely jargony, and it's not really a synonym.--Jerome Frank Disciple 01:24, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

WP:N is bureaucratic, not jargony. I realize this is a subtle distinction but it's a subtle distinction that's crucial to this discussion. Loki (talk) 15:01, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

But you're still fighting the real-world facts! :P Oh well, it sounds like you're saying that MOS:DABMENTIONs that wouldn't be permitted to have their own article under WP:N shouldn't be included on DAB pages. Fair enough!--Jerome Frank Disciple 15:34, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

No, I'm not saying that. There's many cases where a topic is notable but Wikipedia policy, including the procedure listed in WP:N would prevent it, from having its own article. This doesn't mean that the topic isn't notable, though, and in fact sometimes policies like WP:ONEEVENT explicitly acknowledge that something is notable while directly instructing the reader not to make a page about it. Loki (talk) 16:48, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Okay, so notable means noteworthy, as it's used in WP:1E. Got it.--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:59, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Sorry—I thought that was my original question. I don't know what got lost in translation.--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:04, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Loki that notability in the context of MOS:GENDERID clearly means that the subject met WP:N. The wording about notability in MOS:DABMENTION is relatively recent. It isn't, in my opinion, very clear, or a good example of applying the concept of notability in other policies and guidelines. The addition was an attempt to align the DABMENTION guideline with the statement at WP:NOTDIRECTORY that DAB pages should only include notable entries, though that statement is agreed to be contradictory and universally ignored. A better solution would have been changing WP:NOT, rather than attempting to redefine notability for one specific purpose.--Trystan (talk) 15:31, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good to me! So then we all agree the former name should be removed from Cheshire home invasion murders?--Jerome Frank Disciple 15:33, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that I'm convinced. A perpetrator of crime, such as this, would satisfy WP:GNG generally, it's just that for policy reasons, we do not give them their own Wikipedia article, as "rewarding" them for crime by giving them an article under their own name. Conversely, allowing them to remove the name they were arrested and tried and convicted under for heinous acts, entirely from Wikipedia, is also something that some may be uncomfortable with. I'm not convinced that "notable" in WP:GENDERID was meant to mirror the carved-out prudential exclusions to where we do not give someone an article under their own name. I would tend towards the interpretation that it means "noteworthy".Wehwalt (talk) 15:52, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Honestly, while, for me, it's a close call, I actually narrowly agree that that's the more reasonable interpretation here, not necessarily for all the reasons you listed, but definitely because it feels a bit weird to transfer over the carve-out.--Jerome Frank Disciple 15:58, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I strongly object to watering down the requirement for including a living trans/nb subject's deadname, such that they would merely need to meet the standards described in WP:NOTEWORTHY, rather than the much more stringent standard of having met WP:N while using their deadname. The WP:N interpretation is clear in the wording of the guideline.

However, after reviewing the above discussion, I do agree that, in cases like Cheshire home invasion murders, it makes sense not to take into account specific guidance like WP:PERPETRATOR, which is best understood as saying that some subjects meet GNG but are usually best covered as part of another article. Per WP:NOPAGE, at times it is better to cover a notable topic as part of a larger page about a broader topic... As Loki points out above, WP:1E address people notable for one event, which indicates they are notable, even if they wouldn't normally be given an article.--Trystan (talk) 16:32, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

• For the purposes of GENDERID we are saying that if we could have had a stand alone article on the person under the pre-transition name, we can mention that name in the current article. Blueboar (talk) 16:58, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

  Okay, so you're in favor of removal of the former name in Cheshire home invasion murders? Sorry maybe I should've centered that page more in my Q.--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:01, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

My continual interpretation is that WP:DABMENTION and the wording in WP:NOT are correct and that nobody really disputes this even if they think they do. Nobody would even want to include non-notable people on a disambiguation page: WP:N outlines a procedure for determining notability, and explains why we're using notability as a standard for page creation, but the definition it gives for notability itself is merely "worthy of note".

What the dispute is about is whether people who don't have their own article can be included on a disambiguation page, which is a very different standard. Notable topics often don't merit their own article, for reasons like WP:1E, WP:PERPETRATOR or WP:NOPAGE. Loki (talk) 16:58, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Okay, so when a page links to WP:N, it's not necessarily incorporating all the exception in WP:N, it's only referencing a general concept of noteworthiness, yes? So you're in favor of keeping the name in Cheshire home invasion murders?--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:02, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Quickly reading the article and the hatnote on the name, yes. Loki (talk) 17:26, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think it makes sense to treat "notable" here as strictly meaning "passing WP:N", and the Cheshire case is a good example why. At a minimum, I would interpret "notable" to mean "eligible for an article, or would have been eligible if not for considerations that are distinct from notability (e.g. WP:NOPAGE or WP:BLP1E)". To be honest, though, I think it would be better to eliminate the "notable" wording entirely and make it a question of whether the person was a high-profile individual. It's both simpler and more in line with the distinction we're trying to draw here. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 17:54, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think high-profile individual is quite the right barrier here. Unless the intention is that we include the former name if they only became high-profile after changing their name? Otherwise that would allow editors to include the deadnames of people like Nicole Maines, or Jazz Jennings. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:03, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

@Sideswipe9th: My ideal change here would be If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name → If a living transgender or non-binary person was a low-profile individual under a former name. I don't believe either Maines or Jennings was a high-profile individual pre-transition. Note that this would be neither a strict superset nor subset of the current criteria. Some obscure Olympic bronze-medalist who later transitions might have been notable under their deadname but not high-profile; while a published author who doesn't quite pass GNG until after their transition might have been high-profile under their deadname but not notable. Isn't what we really care about whether the person voluntarily engaged with public life under that name? Not whether they meet our semi-arbitrary criteria for who gets a Wikipedia article. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 18:29, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Aaah, got it now! For some reason I thought you might have been proposing something like If a living transgender or non-binary person is a low-profile individual their former name should not be included...

You're right, your proposal wouldn't allow for the inclusion of Maines or Jennings former name, nor the hypothetical obscure Olympic medallist. Now that this is clearer my only concern would be how would this apply to SNGs like WP:NACADEMIC? Publishing impactful research wouldn't necessarily make someone a public figure, but would allow for us to create an article about them. Many academic journals now allow for retrospective name changes for trans and non-binary authors, with the changed name replacing the former name without notice. If a researcher changes their name after we have created an article about them, and all of their papers including those published pre-name change now use the new name exclusively, what name(s) would we mention in our article about that person? Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:42, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

GENDERID - When to include deadnames, post-RfC discussion

The RfC over at VPP on the second and third paragraphs of GENDERID has just closed. While there was no clear consensus for change based on the options provided, it seems as though we are closer to a consensus than before we started, and there's a recommendation for further discussion with a narrow focus.

Based on the words of the closer, the consensus lies somewhere between option 2 and option 3. To save some going back and forth between here and the RfC, in summary option 3 was to never include the deadname of a trans or non-binary person who was not notable prior to transitioning, and option 2 was to include the deadname if it would satisfy the principle of least astonishment. The options for no change, and always including the deadname were soundly rejected. So for this discussion, let's focus solely on finding the middle ground between never including the deadname, and sometimes including the deadname. In short, what is the barrier for inclusion?

Reading through the discussion and closure, I think something like Demonstration of the significance of the deadname in high quality sources as shown through discussion or analysis of the name, and beyond mentions of the name. seems like it would address the concerns raised. It raises the bar for inclusion beyond a simple majority of sources, which many felt was too low, while also allowing consensus to form for inclusion in a manner that isn't based on WP:IAR. It also keeps things solely within the realm of due and undue weight, as it is based on the depth of coverage about the deadname and not solely based on the sheer volume of mentions of it.

If we can find consensus on where the barrier for inclusion should be here, based on the comments made in the just closed RfC, I think we can avoid the need for a future one. However if we must have a further RfC on this, then we need to keep any future RfC on this issue as narrow in scope as possible. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:11, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

Surely not... we've only just finished discussing this after 2 months. And less than 2 years after the last time. Last time, the closing recommendation was: "we recommend considering a subsequent RfC that frames the subject very narrowly: Extending for some period the BLP protections for deadnames of people who were never notable under the deadname, and determining what period it should be." This wasn't pursued. Why pursue part of the more recent close? Could we not all have some peace for a reasonable amount of time? EddieHugh (talk) 19:26, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

I mean, the closer actually suggested that there be a follow up to topic 2 after workshopping some ideas; I actually think there's some argument for using the momentum and information gleamed from the RFC rather than waiting and potentially no longer having a sense of the community's position.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:34, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

The discussion that was just closed came with the recommendation for further discussion on the narrow issue of what the barrier for inclusion should be, to quote from the closure I suggest that some language taking into account the responses and concerns be workshopped, and possibly another RFC be held if the language doesn't get consensus through discussion.. The closure of the RfC from 2 years ago also had a similar recommendation for further discussion on a narrow topic, however in that case we never actually had that discussion. I don't want to see us stuck in the same situation situation where we don't actually have the further discussion as recommended the closure of an RfC, and so I've started this discussion.

As for why we should follow the recommendation from the more recent closure, it's a simple matter of consensus changing over time. The just closed RfC is more representative of where the community consensus currently lies than the closure of the RfC from two years ago. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:38, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

Is it? We could re-run the one from 2 years ago (joking). EddieHugh (talk) 19:43, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

We've had one RfC yes. But what about a second RfC? Post RfC discussion? Surely you know about the post RfC discussion? (also joking)

Seriously though, the biggest failure from the 2021 RfC is that no-one actually followed up on the recommendation to find out what period BDP should be extended for with regard to deadnames. However because consensus can change, I think that recommendation has been superseded by the recommendation from the just closed RfC. And so, wanting to avoid the same failure of not actually having the recommended further narrow discussion, I feel it best to start now while it's fresh. A time gap will just open the door to re-litigating what has just been rejected, and I want to avoid that. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:52, 6 June 2023 (UTC)

Second breakfast? Elevenses? Luncheon? Afternoon tea? [etc.]  Thank you, Pippin! – .Raven  .talk 03:34, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

JFD Proposal (withdrawn)

Note/Moment of Inspiration: User:HTGS suggested this variation on option 2 from the last RFC that might be worth considering: "Mere verifiability is not enough to justify inclusion, but a preponderance of high-quality reliable sources is". Now, that sentence probably gets at the sentiment I was trying to capture when I crafted option 2, but it disregards WP:PLA (which quite a few editors thought was inapt) and it makes the preponderance of sources the factor rather than a factor.

But, of course, the closer's finding was that we should thread the needle between options 2 and 3, and I think HTGS's version, while perhaps more articulate, is really just a minor variation of option 2. THAT SAID, I was recently working on a close request involving MOS:CAPS, which includes this line: "Wikipedia relies on sources to determine what is conventionally capitalized; only words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in a substantial majority of independent, reliable sources are capitalized in Wikipedia." A substantial majority is a higher standard than a mere majority, and the term "only" sets a high bar. Finally, I think we can add one more caveat: that the substantial majority have to principally refer to the person by their former name. I think this is as close as we're going to get to being able to thread the needle. ScottishFinnhishRadish (the closer) also suggested listing an example of a case in which the name of a deceased trans person who was not notable prior to transition should be included. @Sideswipe9th:, as we've discussed, I think Aiden Hale is the obvious example here—there was an RFC on him quite recently, and a pretty overwhelming majority supported mentioning the name at least once. Additionally, even today, most reliable sources principally refer to Hale by his birth name. So, all this said:

Proposal: If a deceased trans or nonbinary person was not notable prior to transitioning, when should an article mentioning that person include their deadname?

If a deceased transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should similarly[1] be excluded unless either (1) a majority of reliable sources use that name as the person's principal name or (2) the person is regarded by reliable sources as having wavered on or otherwise had a unique relationship to their trans identity. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example: From Leelah Alcorn: Leelah Alcorn (November 15, 1997 – December 28, 2014) ... Note: Alcorn was not notable prior to transitioning, and the majority of reliable sources used her chosen name. From Danielle Bunten Berry: Danielle Bunten Berry (February 19, 1949 – July 3, 1998), formerly known as Dan Bunten, ... Note: Berry was notable prior to transitioning. From 2023 Nashville school shooting: Aiden Hale (born Audrey Elizabeth Hale) .... Note: A clear majority of reliable sources principally referred to Hale by his birth name. [1] This is in reference to the previous paragraph, discussing the exclusion of the deadnames of living trans people who were not notable pre transition. Update: Version 1 started with, "For a deceased trans or nonbinary person, mere verifiability is not enough to justify inclusion of a birth name or former name." Per Enos733's comment re: length, below, that was excised.--Jerome Frank Disciple 12:39, 7 June 2023 (UTC) Update: "substantial majority" modified to "clear majority" in light of increased emphasis on "principal[] references" and some concerns about ambiguity.--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:29, 7 June 2023 (UTC) Update in response to comments by @Cuñado: to better match existing phrasing.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:39, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Fin.--Jerome Frank Disciple 01:04, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

My one concern here is it sets the bar too high for a consensus. If editors are willing, I think we could say "substantial" should be removed ... after all, if most sources principally refer to a person by a name (rather than just trivially noting the name), there's a decent argument that name should be in an article about that person.--Jerome Frank Disciple 01:09, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

My suggestion would be, for now, to simply go with what there is fairly clear consenus on: "For a deceased trans or nonbinary person, mere verifiability is not enough to justify inclusion of a birth name or former name." I don't think any articulated standard of when to include it is likely to get consensus, and it will likely take more time for a community consensus to evolve.--Trystan (talk) 04:20, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

But is that really splitting the difference between options 2 and 3? For me, that's a lower baseline than option 2. Unless I'm missing something I think the option 3 supporters would mostly (if not entirely?) support option 2 over that. --Jerome Frank Disciple 12:34, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

mere verifiability is not enough to justify inclusion I think this suggestion is a reasonable fall back if we can't find something more specific, and something that we could tie inline to policy points like WP:VNOT and WP:NOTEVERYTHING. However while it raises the bar slightly from the current lack of guidance, I find myself agreeing with Jerome that this is a lower baseline than option 2 from the RfC. I think we should spend some time here trying to find something that better fits the situation the RfC has left us in. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:03, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

This proposal seems to be a bit wordy. My suggestion is to mirror the passage for a living individual: "If a deceased transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, unless reliable sourcing exists." or "...unless a preponderance of reliable sourcing contains the former name." - Enos733 (talk) 04:46, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

"unless reliable sourcing exists" would be "mere verifiability" though, right? And the preponderance line is basically what option 2 was: We're trying to split the difference between option 2 and option 3, right? If we want to shorten the proposal; we could just excise the first sentence? (I'll do that above and note the change.) --Jerome Frank Disciple 12:35, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

For living people, the line is "even if reliable sourcing exists." Perhaps an even better line comes from the close "except when of encyclopedic interest or when necessary to avoid confusion." So my proposal would be:

"Include the birth name or former name of a deceased trans or non-binary person only if the person was notable prior to transitioning, when the former name is of encyclopedic interest, or when necessary to avoid confusion." with a footnote saying "All names must be verifiable and found in reliable sources." - Enos733 (talk) 15:15, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm still not sure that splits the difference between option 2 and option 3. Per the close, the consensus was for something in between those options, yes? Obviously, what you're proposing would be less restrictive than option 3, but can you explain how what you're suggesting would be more restrictive than option 2? (I'd also say that if we use that language, we should also include the closer's not that a name is not inherently of encyclopedic interest, but, as I see it, that's a secondary issue)--Jerome Frank Disciple 15:23, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I am not confident that there is language that clearly splits the difference between option 2 and option 3 that is not subject to gaming. I think the best we can do is to lean into WP:NOT and the fact that a former name is not inherently of encyclopedic interest.

Perhaps the first line of MOS:GENDERID would provide some overall guidance of when a former name is used and read something like: "A former name of an individual is not inherently of encyclopedic interest." then perhaps adding a second line of "In general, a former name should only be included if the subject is notable by a former name or if the use of the name is necessary to avoid confusion."

I think by providing the overall guidance early in the section, we do not need to be so precise in the individual paragraph. - Enos733 (talk) 15:46, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

or if the use of the name is necessary to avoid confusion While it's a simple enough proposition on the surface, when you actually try to steelman it as an argument I think it leaves it open to too much interpretation to actually be a useful guideline. There's so many different ways you could define necessary to avoid confusion, in good faith and in bad, that it would result in endless talk page discussions similar to the situation we currently find ourselves in.

Ideally because this is a variation of a WP:VNOT argument (and to a lesser degree WP:NOTEVERYTHING) as we want the barrier for inclusion to be something like Demonstration of the significance of the deadname, not just that it's verifiable, I think we need to die it to something like WP:DEPTH. Unfortunately DEPTH is part of the SNG for events, and I think if we try to use that we'll get endless questions about why we're using an article notability guideline for a specific bit of content. Is there another shortcut that anyone is aware of, or relevant policy paragraph that we could make a shortcut to that would suffice? Sideswipe9th (talk) 15:59, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

How about "or when there is a demonstrated need to use the name to avoid confusion"? Enos733 (talk) 16:07, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Again I think that has too many different ways you can define demonstrated need, starting with something as simple as they changed their name, we need to know their previous one. Unless there's a specific test we could wikilink demonstrated need to that narrows the phrase beyond a plain reading of the words. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:12, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think we are going to find language that is completely clear and applies to all biographies. My first line would be that a former name is not inherently of encyclopedic interest. Everything else in MOS:GENDERID then becomes additional guidance about pronoun usage and guidance around the limited exceptions of when a former name may used. - Enos733 (talk) 16:28, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

For now, I do think we should at least try to follow the closer's finding that an intermediary position between option 2 or 3 is the path towards consensus. Option 2 inherently implied that a former name is not inherently encyclopedic—I do really think that your proposals are actually lowering rather than raising its standards. If we're not able to actually split the difference ... why wouldn't we just go with what option 2 was rather than lower the bar further?--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:31, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

How I read the close and the discussion was that most people viewed the former name as not inherently encyclopedic, and that only in limited circumstances would a former name of a previously non-notable individual be appropriate. The challenge here is to define those very limited circumstances. I do not think that trying to define "a majority of reliable sources" or "principally referring" is necessarily going to provide clear guidance.

The closer uses "if the name is necessary to avoid confusion." While I understand that this language is not completely clear independently, when paired with "a former name as not inherently encyclopedic" - we have two phrases that work nicely together that limits when a former name is to be used. - Enos733 (talk) 16:52, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I assume you're not intending to say this, but it almost sounds like you're denying that the closer said the consensus position would split the difference between option 2 and 3. The closer, of course, did say just that: "it is clear that the actual consensus lies somewhere between option 2 and option 3 .... Another indicator that the consensus is between these two options ....". But you seem to be conceding that the baseline you're proposing is below option 2. In other words, it's a nonstarter.--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:34, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I am reading and responding to the overall close of the discussions. I think that overall point provides us more clarity and direction than the close of question 2. Where I think community is at is that the difference between sometimes (option 2) and never (option 3) is rarely or in very limited occasions.

Now, the trick is to craft a statement that captures that sentiment. My attempt is to craft a general statement "Former names have no intrinsic encyclopedic value." From that general principle, the language provides guidance on the limited exceptions when a former name can be used.

I hope we are not chatting past each other, since I think we are in alignment of what the policy ought to be, even if we may still have different perspectives on what language the guidance should be. - Enos733 (talk) 18:00, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

We should let the sources guide us… so when a significant majority of sources mention a deadname, so should we. If lots of sources think a name is important enough to mention, surely we should consider it important enough as well. Blueboar (talk) 16:03, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Like a two thirds supermajority? I don't think that would work, and is maybe even contraindicated by the RfC closure. As the close noted Many responses supporting different options specifically called out the difficulty of dealing with a "majority" of sources, e.g. is 50%+1 sufficient? How does a majority take into account emphasis and source quality? That to me goes beyond mere volume of mention a deadname in sources, and straight into the depth of discussion in sources about the deadname. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:07, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I do think MOS:CAPS's ambiguity on that ("substantial majority") point has worked, in spite of the ambiguity. To some degree, I doubt that we'll be able to think of a true rule as opposed to a guideline that's open to interpretation and disagreement. But perhaps substantial majority is too high a bar—it's getting some pushback. To merge @Blueboar's suggestion re: significant majority and @Sideswipe9th's concern re: ambiguity, depth, and emphasis ... how about:

when a clear majority of sources principally refer to the person by their former name

(Will change the above ctop proposal + note the change.)

"Clear majority" is a bit ambiguous, but less so than "significant" or "substantial" majority, and, realistically, how often are we really going to get into situations where it's 51% / 49 % ? Having reviewed several of the article debates prior to the RFC, I really can't recall one in which reliable sources were split down the middle. In the case of Hale, for example, it's really more like 90/10. And I don't think we should let the possibility of an edge case discourage us too much. Let's be frank: if there is a 51/49 case ... it's not actually going to come down to editors' views of what constitutes a "clear majority". Additionally, the focus on what sources "principally refer" to the person by their former name ensures we're not overly emphasizing sources that just mention a former name as a point of trivia.--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:27, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Consider a multi-chapter biography that consistently uses the subject’s deadname in its one chapter discussing subject’s childhood, but consistently uses the Trans-name in the chapters covering the subjects’s life after transition. How would that fit with your “principally refers” criteria? Blueboar (talk) 16:44, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

With the exception of a historical figure like James Barry, do you have an example of this for a trans person who transitioned sometime in say the last fifty to seventy years? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:47, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Christine Jorgenson's autobiography refers to herself this way. Loki (talk) 17:01, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

What's the title of the autobiography?--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:44, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Christine Jorgensen: a personal autobiography Loki (talk) 17:46, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Seems like a principle reference to me! :) (Of course, not everyone has to agree ... and in the event a single source would matter under the proposed guideline—which, as I've said, is really unlikely—and in the event that single source uses the type of structure Blueboar describes—also quite unlikely ... then I think we can trust article-specific discussions to figure it out.)--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:48, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

But in the autobiography, she only refers to herself as "Christine" post-transition. Pre-transition she refers to herself as "George", and quite a lot too.

This was the standard way to refer to trans people up until relatively recently. Books and newspapers were doing this up through the 90s at least, so we should absolutely have a way to deal with this in cases where these sources are predominant. Loki (talk) 02:46, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

@Blueboar: I'll absolutely agree that it wouldn't be clear! But wait a second ...

First, keep in mind we're only talking about people who became notable after transitioning. I'd be a little surprised if a bibliography on such a person didn't principally refer to them by their post-transition name, and perhaps we could debate whether the title of the bibliography, for example, indicates a principal reference. But let's back up even further:

I think we can both agree that structure is fairly rare—not particularly likely that one source, let alone many, takes the approach as to a particular person. So, taking your hypo at face value, why would anyone following the proposed guideline care about such a source? Well, the proposed guideline says we have to consider what a "clear majority of reliable sources" do. So the source could only matter if ... it, alone, would make the difference between a "clear majority" and "not a clear majority"?

Not only would such an article would be the type of 51/49 article that I didn't run across a single time while going through various article debates ... but the resolution of the debate would come down to this fairly rare book structure? Wow! I mean, that just strikes me as a hypo that's so rare that we can leave it to WP:IAR and individual article discussion, if it ever happens.--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:47, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I appreciate the mention, Jerome, but I think what you might be missing from my suggestion is how much space there is between “Mere verifiability” and “a preponderance of high-quality reliable sources”. That space was intentional. It sets boundaries that reasonable minds will agree on, but leaves more difficult marginal decisions to the editors who write our biographies.

It does feel like editors here keep trying to circle discussion back to “how do we make sure we have a rule we can enforce?” (Or, less charitably, “How to we keep lowly editors from doing what we, the MOS cabal, don’t want them to do?”) We (here) are not a police force. The Manual of Style is nice because we can ensure some good amount of consistency, and avoid arguments over commas and capital letters; it is not here to decide content. (How to refer to people is style; whether to include biographical information is content.)

I would be happy with the smallest guidance possible: “Mere verifiability is not enough to justify inclusion of someone’s deadname”. We only really need to tell editors that when a deadname is absolutely trivial—if it has only been mentioned on a personal blog, or in a footnote of a lesser source—then it does not need to be included. And for those who want to roleplay as cops, they will find that guidance will enable them more than you might think. — HTGS (talk) 02:30, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

The issue is that the consensus of the last discussion was "between two and three". Or in other words, we already have consensus for some rule that is stronger than two and less strong than three. So going with a rule that is vaguer than two simply doesn't work. Loki (talk) 02:48, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I would second Loki here; "mere verifiability is not enough" is weaker than option 2. But HTGS, yeah, I realized based on your comments on the RFC that you'd probably oppose almost any further restriction on deadnames (which is fine!), but I also wanted to properly give you credit for the source of my thought.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:30, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm withdrawing (or at least tabling) this proposal in light of Sideswipe's proposal below, which I endorse.--Jerome Frank Disciple 00:24, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Sideswipe's post-RfC proposal

Ok, I've done a bunch of reading of our policies and guidelines, and have come up with the following:

For a deceased trans or non-binary person, their former name should only be included if the encyclopaedic significance of the deadname is established through in-depth analysis or discussion of the name in high quality sources, or if they were notable prior to transitioning. Introduce the former name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:

• From Leelah Alcorn: Leelah Alcorn (November 15, 1997 – December 28, 2014) ...
  Note: While Alcorn's gender identity is discussed in significant detail in high quality sources about her, her former name is not.
• From Gloria Hemingway: Gloria Hemingway (born Gregory Hancock Hemingway, November 12, 1931 – October 1, 2001) ...
  Note: Hemingway's struggles with her gender dysphoria, and relationship with her gender identity, gender expression, and name are discussed in significant detail in sources about her life.
• From Danielle Bunten Berry: Danielle Bunten Berry (February 19, 1949 – July 3, 1998), formerly known as Dan Bunten, ...
  Note: Berry was notable prior to transitioning.

Notes

This builds upon the wording of the closure, that there is a clear consensus that the deadnames of trans and non-binary individuals are not automatically of encyclopaedic interest. It sets out two inclusion criteria, that the deadname is of clear encyclopaedic significance based on in-depth coverage or discussion in high quality sources, or if the person was notable prior to transitioning. Encyclopaedic significance is wikilinked to the WP:NOTEVERYTHING policy point, and high quality sources is linked to WP:BESTSOURCES. In the footnote, it includes a link to the close of the RfC where there was a clear consensus that deadnames are not automatically of encyclopaedic interest, and then makes it clear that because of this they are therefore typcially considered minor aspects, which links to the WP:BALASP policy point. This has the clear and intentional effect of tying this guideline to both the What Wikipedia is not and Neutral point of view policies.

With regards to the closure, this sets the bar for inclusion of the deadname at a level that is both lower than never (option 3) and higher than sometimes (option 2). It fulfils the consensus that articles should not routinely include the deadnames of deceased trans or non-binary individuals, while also giving specific policy based guidance on what the inclusion criteria are. Finally it gives three clear examples of application of the inclusion criteria. Thoughts? Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:12, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Just noting as the closer that this wording is a reasonable summation of how I read the consensus. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 23:23, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I'd support it! I am curious if this policy would be consistent with the Nashville Shooting RFC, as the sources covering Hale weren't discussing his birth name in depth ... they were just chiefly using his birth name. That said, of course this proposal doesn't have to be consistent with that RFC :) --Jerome Frank Disciple 23:51, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Hope you don’t mind, but I think this version is shorter, simpler and clearer:

For deceased trans or non-binary people, former names are not inherently of encyclopaedic significance, except in cases where the person was notable prior to transitioning. Where useful, the former name may be introduced with "born" or "formerly". For example: …

I don’t see need to spell out that the former name needs “analysis” (and honestly if that were misread it would be an exceptionally odd standard to apply). — HTGS (talk) 02:47, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I strongly disagree: I think the lines about analysis are the key to why this wording works. Wording similar to yours was proposed pre-RFC and discarded for being too vague. Just saying "encyclopedic significance" alone means nothing and will invite arguments.

Furthermore, saying "not inherently of encyclopedic significance" by itself is too vague. The RFC was not about that directly, it was about whether to include former names, and the consensus was "less often than sometimes but more often than never". So we need to include language specific to the question of including the name or not, and not just hint at it. Loki (talk) 02:54, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I really like this wording. I think it's as near to perfect as we're going to get. Loki (talk) 02:50, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I have no problem supporting this. XAM2175 ^(T) 11:11, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

This is close to something I could support. I don't know what "in-depth analysis" of a birth name would look like. It would surely be captured by the more straightforward "or discussion". I would suggest "...included if the encyclopaedic significance of the deadname is established through discussion of the name in high quality sources..." I don't think "discussion" needs a qualifier, as it is inherently a significantly higher bar than mere mention.--Trystan (talk) 13:44, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I disagree, and continue to think that the "in-depth analysis and discussion" wording is crucial to why this wording works. Just saying "discussion" is too vague: the whole point is to provide a workable standard that is between options 2 and 3 of the RFC. Loki (talk) 14:35, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Hatting my own extended inquiry / dialogue with Sideswipe--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:54, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I want to be clear: I support the proposal. I think it's better than the status quo. But I do have a few concerns. I find myself agreeing with @Trystan that "in-depth analysis" of a birth name is a bit of a weird concept. I assume the Gloria Hemingway example is meant to illustrate it ... but was there "in depth analysis" of the name "George"? Or, as the example itself suggests, was there in-depth analysis of Gloria's gender identity and her relationship to that name? (Btw, I assume the proposal means "in-depth analysis or in-depth discussion".) Second, based on the comments that I saw while surveying discussions in preparation for the RFC, my concern is that editors will object to a proposal that ignores the potential for reader confusion. Participants in the 2023 Nashville school shooting RFC were pretty overwhelmingly in favor of inclusion of the name. Was that because Aiden Hale's birth name was subject to significant in-depth analysis? No, what most participants said was that most sources treated "Audrey" as Hale's principal name—only mentioning "Aiden" in a parenthetical (or not at all). I realize I'm defaulting to Hale, but the potential for reader confusion was also repeatedly brought up in the RFCBEFORE. That's why I thought considering what name most sources treat as the person's principal name would make the most sense: To incorporate the book you brought above, @LokiTheLiar:, no one who reads a book called Christine Jorgensen will be confused by that name. But readers who read a few news articles about "Audrey Hale" and then can't find that name in the associated article might be confused.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:47, 8 June 2023 (UTC) Hemingway's relationship with her name is pretty complicated, in no small part because her relationship with her gender identity was complicated. In life she used at least five names; her birth name Gregory, a childhood nickname of Gigi, as an adult in public Greg, post-transition in private Gloria, and shortly before her death Vanessa. The sources on her go into detail about how she presented herself at different stages of her life, and in different venues, along with the names that she used in differing circumstances. I assume the proposal means "in-depth analysis or in-depth discussion" Yes. I'd originally phrased it as ...through significant discussion or in-depth analysis..., but then realised used the word significance earlier in the sentence and wanted to avoid close proximity repetition. I also considered in-depth analysis or in-depth discussion, but felt as though it was too verbose due to the close proximity repetition of in-depth. So Hale is a rather complex and special case in and of itself. As you correctly point out, most media sources about the shooting use Hale's deadname Audrey, instead of his chosen name Aiden. While we could speculate all day on the reasons why the Nashville police and national media have chosen to do this, I think the following quotation from the close My assessment of Wikipedia's rules about this is that we're required to follow the sources for facts. We are not required to follow the sources' presentation of those facts; we're supposed to compose an article in our own words, not crib the wording from the sources. best captures why we use Hale's chosen name over his former name. While I can see the desire to use it Hale's article as part of the barrier for inclusion versus exclusion, in no small part because as you point out in that RfC many editors felt inclusion was warranted based on the volume of sources that use Hale's former name, I think I come back to the American legal maxim of hard cases make bad law. The context behind why so many have chosen to disregard Hale's expressed gender identity make it, on balance, not a great example to use for our purposes. The purpose of a guideline like GENDERID is that it covers the majority of relevant articles, but not all relevant articles. There will always be exceptions to a rule such as this, in no small part because people are complicated. As a community, we've chosen to enshrine such exceptions in the WP:IAR policy, which empowers us editors to disregard a policy or guideline (with a couple of exceptions) if there is a consensus that ignoring it will improve an article. The complexities of Hale's article make it, in my mind, something that is best handled by IAR, because the vast majority of biographies and content that will be subject to this guideline are nowhere near as contentious. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:00, 8 June 2023 (UTC) I see what you're saying! Yeah IAR exists for a reason. And you've definitely clocked that one of the reasons I'm wary is because I started out as a "don't include" vote on that page, and then saw how quickly the tide rushed against me (and ultimately changed my !vote because I thought it'd be better to try to address the spectrum of realistically possible outcomes). I do want to reiterate that I'm 100% a support vote for you ... but I wonder if there's a phrase besides "in-depth analysis ... of the name" that we could use. What you're describing seems to be an in-depth discussion of Gloria's status as trans. As written, I'm not sure the policy restricts itself to individual trans persons who struggle (or perhaps waver) on their identity, right? I'm trying to think of what a more modern version of the Hemingway example would look like (aside from potential de-transitioners). If several sources publish articles specifically on the fact that a person was trans and discussing their transition, would that warrant inclusion under your proposal?--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:17, 8 June 2023 (UTC) If several sources publish articles specifically on the fact that a person was trans and discussing their transition, would that warrant inclusion under your proposal? It would certainly warrant inclusion of text that they were trans and about their transition. It wouldn't automatically warrant inclusion of their former name. For this it comes back to the text in the footnote, the former name is typically considered a minor aspect of the person's life by the broader community. It's not enough for the person to have simply changed their name once, or even several times if for example they were trialling different names to find one they were comfortable with. The name change itself has to be more than a minor aspect of the person's broader life story, which is why I think Hemingway is a good example here. In Hemingway's case, the name she used seemed to be dependent on what she was doing at the time. However regardless of what name she was using, she was still trans. You don't need to know her other names to understand her gender identity on the surface, but knowing her names, and how they were used is actually important for a broader understanding of her life story. Additionally if you read the death section of her article, you'll see that there was condemnation of the media for not using her chosen name in obituaries, and for pathologising gender variance. There's a subtle distinction in there that's easy to miss if you aren't familiar with the fuller story of her life. As for a more modern example, were it not for her being a notable public figure prior to transitioning, I think Suzy Eddie Izzard would be a good one. Like Hemingway, her relationship with her gender identity is complex, having gone through the spectra from transvestite, to transsexual, to transgender, and to gender fluid. As she has gone through her own journey, the pronouns and names she uses have changed with her. Presently, she prefers if people call her Suzy, is OK with people calling her Eddie, and is still using the name Eddie as her public persona. On the addition of the name 'Suzy', she revealed that it's a name she had wanted to be referred by since she was a child. It's the complexities of how Izzard uses her names that would make it reach the threshold of inclusion, had the other inclusion criteria (notable pre-transition) not already been met. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:52, 8 June 2023 (UTC) So your examples are all focused on individuals who have complex relationships with their name, yes? I'm not sure that's captured by your current text. In other words—it's not just about what reliable sources discuss in depth, right? If anything, it seems more about the individual person's preferences/relationship to their name(s). (Or, to illustrate it explicitly—let's say several sources published in-depth examinations of a person's name and the fact that they were trans, but the person had a completely straightforward (non-complex) relationship to their trans identity/name; maybe the person even objected to their deadname getting such attention. Include the name, or no? It sounds like you're saying no ... but I think the current proposal would suggest yes.)--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:55, 8 June 2023 (UTC) it's not just about what reliable sources discuss in depth, right? Yes and no. Individuals with a more complex relationship are the most likely to have reliable sources about them that discuss their names in depth. As such they make the easiest examples to find and use for our purpose here. But they are not the only such examples. As you rightly point out, sources could publish in-depth examinations of a person's name and gender identity, even if the person has a straightforward relationship with their names. If those sources exist on a person, then the existence of those sources would meet the threshold for inclusion and so inclusion could be considered. The test is that there has to be something that raises the change in name above a minor aspect of the person's fuller life story. Sources about the person that discuss their name change in depth would raise the name change above being a minor aspect, regardless of the reason why they are writing about it. Like anything we write about, it is up to the sources to decide whether something is a minor or major aspect of a subject. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:18, 8 June 2023 (UTC) I think I gotcha. I think that's a content-specific test more tailored than "in depth analysis" ... so I'd still suggest modifying that phrase, but unfortunately I'm not sure I can offer a suggestion as to how! Either way, I still think it's better than the status quo.--Jerome Frank Disciple 18:20, 8 June 2023 (UTC) I think the reason you're having trouble is because the tailored content-specific test is in-depth analysis or discussion of the name in reliable sources. Loki (talk) 19:10, 8 June 2023 (UTC) I didn't say otherwise? I said it sounded like the test being described was more tailored than that.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:17, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

"there is a clear consensus that the deadnames of trans and non-binary individuals are not automatically of encyclopaedic interest"... a question about whether birth names or former names are of encyclopedic interest wasn't asked in the RfC referenced, so this assertion (albeit it is in the close) is open to challenge. As with others, I struggle to understand what "in-depth analysis or discussion of the name" would be (The Izzard example is about the person's stated preferences, not about the names themselves; and Izzard was known as "Eddie Izzard" for a long time when notable, so the name would be included anyway; but then what counts as "transitioning"? Has Izzard transitioned? It quickly gets complicated...). And why "high quality sources" instead of standard "reliable sources"? That slants things to academic discourse, where analysing a person's names, to the best of my knowledge, is not common. EddieHugh (talk) 19:46, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

a question about whether birth names or former names are of encyclopedic interest wasn't asked in the RfC referenced, so this assertion (albeit it is in the close) is open to challenge It may not have been directly asked, but the closer certainly assessed that is where the community consensus lies based on the wider contributions to the RfC. It's important to remember that RfCs are not votes. If you want to challenge it, you'd have to challenge it in the close first, as until it's removed from the closure, it is a safe assumption that it is the consensus.

And why "high quality sources" instead of standard "reliable sources"? That slants things to academic discourse WP:BESTSOURCES is policy, and tells us to prefer reputable books and articles. In general we are biased towards academic sources, and that is widely considered to be a good thing. However in this context, high quality sources does not limit this to academic sources, reputably published and well researched biographies are also high quality sources. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:51, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Re: Encyclopedic interest and Sideswipe9th's comment: It may not have been directly asked, but the closer certainly assessed that is where the community consensus lies based on the wider contributions to the RfC.

In addition to seconding that, I would also add that it's virtually a necessary implication of the consensus. Option 1 dictated that the deadnames of deceased trans persons who were not notable prior to transition should never be excluded. Option 2 dictated that they should sometimes be excluded. Option 3 dictated that they should always be excluded. In other words, even option implicitly acknowledged that the inherent encyclopedic value of deadnames was either nonexistent or small enough to be discarded, since it endorsed sometimes excluding such names. And, again, the consensus was found to be between option 2 and 3.

In terms of Izzard and Hemingway, I do think @EddieHugh has a decent point that both were notable prior to transitioning. I wonder if we could find an example of someone who was not notable prior to transitioning but who would fit this bill. That said, I don't think doing so is necessary: Just because they illustrate one reason a name might be included doesn't meant they can't illustrate both reasons.--Jerome Frank Disciple 00:34, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

...implicitly acknowledged that the inherent encyclopedic value of deadnames was either nonexistent or small enough to be discarded... I don't think this follows. A supporter of Option 2 on the second question could quite reasonably be of the opinion that names are generally of encyclopedic interest, and the names of trans/nb people aren't somehow of less interest than other names, but the social mores around deadnames warrant an extraordinary and limited departure from the default practice of including them.--Trystan (talk) 14:37, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough! I mean hey, at the extreme, I guess it is possible that a supporter of option two could have thought that birth names were super important but that social norms were incredibly important, though I don't know if I really saw that sentiment expressed. I also think this might be a little tangential since Eddie was referring to a comment Sideswipe9th made in favor of her proposal, not the proposal text itself.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:46, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

It's not tangential, because the proposed wording claims "A 2023 RfC on this guideline reached the consensus that the former name of a trans or non-binary person is not automatically of encyclopaedic interest". That's questionable. EddieHugh (talk) 11:17, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

Okay, if this goes to an RFC, I'm sure Sides can change it to:

"In a 2023 RFC, editors agreed that deadnames should not automatically be included in an article. As to the deadnames of persons who were not notable prior to transitioning, the closer found "it is clear that the actual consensus lies somewhere between option 2", which said that deadnames should be included according to WP:PLA (considering a majority of reliable sources), "and option 3", which said that such names should never be included."

Easy.--Jerome Frank Disciple 12:26, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm not liking this established through in-depth analysis or discussion of the name in high quality sources wording, since it will lead to tendentious wikilawyering. Under this proposal, the clearly notable deadname of the Nashville school shooter would've been excluded from the article from the get-go, and editors who try to "WP:IAR" to include the name would've gotten reverted and pointed to the MOS. Some1 (talk) 00:21, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Trying to find a compromise that would allow us to include the clearly notable deadname of the Nashville school shooter was, I think, directly part of the point of this wording. I'm not sure why you think it'd be excluded. Loki (talk) 21:26, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I think you're thinking of my proposal, above. Per Sides: The complexities of Hale's article make it, in my mind, something that is best handled by IAR, because the vast majority of biographies and content that will be subject to this guideline are nowhere near as contentious. (collapsed convo above)--Jerome Frank Disciple 22:34, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Sorry to be a downer but I don't like the proposed wording. I would take a different approach and just talking about the increased sensitivity of gender transitions causing a need to have extended privacy concerns that would be longer and more strictly enforced than the normal privacy concerns of non-notable names. So, for example, we could recommend defaulting to the maximum of two years after death instead of sooner, per WP:BDP:

The only exception would be for people who have recently died, in which case the policy can extend based on editorial consensus for an indeterminate period beyond the date of death—six months, one year, two years at the outside. Such extensions would only apply to contentious or questionable material about the subject that has implications for their living relatives and friends...

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 20:59, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Setting the bar to allow inclusion two years after death, in-line with the maximum period from BDP, would be contraindicated where the close of the recent RfC states It is also clear from the responses that always including the prior name, or assuming the prior name is of encyclopedic importance is soundly rejected by the community. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:08, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Although proposing something like that would be in keeping with the recommendations of the closure of previous RfC, which asked related but different questions. EddieHugh (talk) 11:17, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

Why would we not go with the most recent RFC?--Jerome Frank Disciple 12:36, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

I think this is a reasonable way of expressing what there was consensus for, as indeed the closer says above. Ideally, I'd like to find even clearer wording than "in-depth analysis or discussion", but given that we've been trying to find such wording for months (and in a broader sense, years), I think we should avoid letting the pursuit of perfect wording prevent putting decent wording in place. (Perfectly wikilaywer-proof wording probably doesn't exist, anyway.) -sche (talk) 03:01, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

As there doesn't seem to be a clear consensus for or against inclusion, and as discussion has otherwise died down, I've now launched an RfC on this proposal over at the Village Pump. Thanks. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:10, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Clarity

The third paragraph is confusing unless you word it something like this to make it match the phrasing on the second paragraph. That way If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name... is followed by If a living transgender or non-binary person was notable under a former name.... I suggest using that as a base for the extended privacy wording. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 19:22, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I think done!--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:39, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

BTW I sort of see your point about clarity. Perhaps after we resolve this issue, we can work on addressing the clarity overall. It's hard to tell how much work the current third paragraph is doing with its current wording.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:45, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

So a similar attempt at clarifying the language of the second paragraph was attempted back in February of this year. The comment by Newimpartial on 14:28, 6 February 2023 seems of relevance here, due to the removal of the word only in Cuñado's version. The same issue of the old wording setting a limit on inclusion (ie, you can only include if condition is met), whereas the proposed version mandating inclusion (ie, you must include if condition is met) seems to exist with this proposed change. This is something that might need to be discussed in more detail (ideally separately to the discussion above) before a change can be made. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:03, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I definitely wouldn't support removing only, which is a major part of the point of the policy. A lack of notability under the old name is intended to be automatic exclusion; if this proposal intends to change that (which would be a substantive policy change) we'll need another discussion about that specific point and almost certainly another RFC, since I can't see it being uncontroversial. Only in that paragraph is a load-bearing word, so to speak. --Aquillion (talk) 18:40, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Huh. When I first saw the edit, I had the same thought you had @Aquillion:—the omission of only seemed to be significant. But now ... maybe I'm not seeing something I was formerly seeing ... but I'm starting to think that's wrong.

I think @Cuñado: is right that paragraph 2 and 3 present a weird contrast ... oddly, because there's not an explicit contrast even though there should be. That is, paragraph 2, which concerns living persons who were not notable pre-transition, opens with:

If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname),

And, then, paragraph three says:

In the case of a living transgender or non-binary person, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under that name. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly".

And ... having reconsidered the issue ... I now think "only" is redundant. Someone is either notable prior to transitioning or not notable prior to transitioning. We have guidance for both. Saying "only notable prior to transitioning" doesn't add anything, just like saying "only if they were not notable prior to transitioning" wouldn't add anything.

But I think the real reason these paragraphs read awkwardly is because paragraph 3 is actually balancing between paragraph 2, on people who weren't notable pre transition, and paragraph 4, which is dedicated to articles other than a main biography. I think this would be identical in meaning and read a bit better:

If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name. For example:

....

If a living transgender or non-binary person was notable under a former name (a deadname), different guidance applies to different contexts. On the person's main biographical article, their former name should be included in the lead sentence. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:

....

Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent. Where a person's gender may come as a surprise, explain it on first occurrence, without overemphasis....

But here's the issue: I think one often-found implication of the passage is that, as to a person's main biographical articles, the name should only be included in the lead sentence. Now, the current passage doesn't actually say that, which makes this tricky. But if we wanted to be really bold ... I we could just add "only" after "should" in the above sentence. Just a thought--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:01, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I would support that but I'd support a parenthetical saying (and, unless the sources discuss the name change in detail apart from the mere fact it happened, nowhere else in the article). This is to match this change to Sideswipe's proposal above. Loki (talk) 19:15, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, and for that we would definitely need an RFC. (Arguably for this change, too, since it's been discussed before, but my point was that the restatement I suggested matches what's currently addressed in the article.) I'd also say we should probably do separate RFCs for incorporating that text into the discussion of living persons and for Sides's proposal (which is currently on just deceased persons), since Sides's proposal is a follow up on the last RFC.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:20, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

On my proposal above, because (in my opinion) it's largely fulfilling the requirements of the RfC to find a solution somewhere between two options, I was hoping that we wouldn't need an RfC to get it added if there's a reasonable showing of consensus for it here. However if we do need a rubber stamping RfC to get approval for it, then we should keep that one as close to a binary yes/no choice as possible. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:23, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Ah, I figured HTGS's opposition meant we were doing the RFC route. If you'd like to boldly add it (either now or after some more discussion) and see if anyone reverts, I'm okay with that!-Jerome Frank Disciple 19:27, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I'd like more people to get eyes on it first, there's no need to rush it. Consensus doesn't have to be unanimous either. You can get strong consensuses formed without RfCs, even with a handful of objections. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:29, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Agree with User:Jerome Frank Disciple's proposal. I would shy away from making it "only" the first sentence, as I think there are too many situations where that wouldn't apply, like infobox, or background sections. Keep it simple. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 20:46, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Re the "living" vs."dead" debate. Please recall that MOS:DEADNAME, on MOS:BIO, starts very generally:

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise. [emphasis added]

– .Raven  .talk 06:28, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

Right, but Cuñado was just referencing a portion of MOS:GENDERID (same policy) that, currently, is only directed towards living trans persons. The first paragraph discusses which name a Wikipedia article should treat as the person's principal name. There's currently an RFC on expanding MOS:GENDERID to cover when a deceased trans person's deadname should be included.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:07, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

• A follow-up RfC at WP:VPPOL recently closed again as "no consensus", but is again a step closer to finding an actual consensus. So we're in for another round. I urge that the alternative proposals and revision suggestions in that RfC be examined closely, because they indicate the direction in which consensus will be found.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:10, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

IAR & GENDERID

@Starship.paint:: I realize there was a consensus that IAR could apply to edge cases in the RFC, but I—with some hesitation—reverted your explicit addition of IAR [23] because I think it perhaps gives undue weight to IAR. As I understand, IAR always has the possibility of applying to almost every policy (save legal-related policies), yet we don't go around each policy/guideline saying "remember, in edge cases, WP:IAR can be considered". Why here?--Jerome Frank Disciple 13:59, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

@Jerome Frank Disciple: - per the close, Generally, those supporting the stricter wording acknowledge that there will be occasions where additional uses of the former name will be necessary and aren't actually absolutist about enforcement of the MOS. But, I do not trust that all editors of the community will avoid being absolutist in the enforcement. A reminder is warranted so that editors cannot insist on being absolutist. starship.paint (exalt) 14:07, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I guess I have a few concerns, one of which I failed to allude to above:

1. saying that IAR is an option isn’t quite the same as saying the guideline should explicitly reference IAR
2. the supporters who mentioned IAR were discussing the possibility that it be used regarding a name, but your placement suggested it could also apply to pronouns.
3. The name policy had been in place … 2/3 days? I haven’t even seen a genderid debate in that time; I’m not sure how it already has absolutists! But almost every guideline can have absolutists; we still don’t reference IAR on every guideline, right?

-—Jerome Frank Disciple 14:12, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

@Jerome Frank Disciple: - (2) is immediately unreasonable, what I added was … former names may be used … - how does this relate to pronouns? No mention of pronouns was mentioned at all. starship.paint (exalt) 14:16, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

You’re right! Sorry I misremembered—I guess that’s ‘’why’’ I didn’t mention it the first time!! Will strike.—Jerome Frank Disciple 14:17, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

(1) OK so don’t mention IAR. [24] OK? (3) Based on past discussion where some editors treat MOS:GENDERID as a blunt instrument (absolutism), I would think that some editors would continue. starship.paint (exalt) 14:35, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm sorry—I'm not sure we'll agree here. For me, the fact that the supporters said IAR could be applied doesn't mean they supported either (1) an explicit reference to IAR or (2) an explicit watering down of the proposal's language based on IAR. But of course I may be biased here—I am the one who made the proposal! Why don't we see if other editors agree with the change you've suggested.--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:43, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I have asked the closer to clarify. starship.paint (exalt) 14:54, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

The closer was referring to topics 2 & 3 in the quote you pulled. The text you added suggests local consensus to override which names to use to refer to someone, in which I think the consensus is quite absolutist. The only meaningful exception is when the subject expressed a desire to use their former name for past events, which is covered later un the guideline.--Trystan (talk) 14:21, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

@Trystan:, right, but in my original edit summary I quoted the close from topic 1. It says: Some concerns were raised by those opposed about possible scenarios where the new language could be an issue, but those in support rebut those concerns by pointing out that IAR and consensus at specific articles should be sufficient to handle edge case. Have I misrepresented this? starship.paint (exalt) 14:31, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish: Solicit closer’s opinion. You mentioned in finding consensus for Topic 1 that Some concerns were raised by those opposed about possible scenarios where the new language could be an issue, but those in support rebut those concerns by pointing out that IAR and consensus at specific articles should be sufficient to handle edge case. Are the following sentences consistent with what you wrote? (Option A) For edge cases only, former names may be used if a local consensus develops. and (Option B) For edge cases only, former names may be used per WP:IAR if a local consensus develops. starship.paint (exalt) 14:51, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

There are two issues with the wordings. First, there was unambiguous (we're talking passing RFA) consensus for the proposed wording. Not for the proposed wording with a little bit added. The fact that those responding supported despite not having any language dealing with edge cases shows that there is no need for additional clarification. Second, your proposed wordings do not effectively communicate the rarity it which this should take place. Again, an overwhelming consensus supported the change to the guideline feeling that no written stipulation was necessary. This is a pretty clear demonstration that invocations of IAR should be exceedingly rare, which your proposed language does not.

Basically, there is no reason to add this mitigating language based on the consensus I read, and your proposed language does not effectively communicate the nature of the consensus. As JFD notes above, IAR applies to almost everything, and is stipulated almost nowhere. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:27, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish: - acknowledged; thank you for your explanation. starship.paint (exalt) 03:54, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

On the IAR point, we generally don't need to say in guidelines or other policies that IAR applies. It's pretty clear from the text of WP:IAR that it doesn't need restrictions on where it could or could not apply. Any editor, at any time, in any discussion, for (almost) any reason could make a case that IAR should apply and some other policy or guideline should be ignored. It's pretty self-evident from that policy's text.

As for the rest, SFR has largely conveyed my thinking on the rest of this. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:20, 13 June 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, generally, IAR is an action, not a justification; normally if IAR applies, then you can justify it better than saying "I'm just ignoring all rules". Sceptre (talk) 22:44, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

• Agreed with Jerome Frank Disciple; injecting an IAR wink-wink-nudge-nudge here is very inappropriate, and simply serves to undermine the idea that the MoS section in question has consensus at all.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:15, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Ambiguity under PEOPLETITLES

There's an ambiguity under MOS:PEOPLETITLES: "Use titles where they are necessary for clarity or identification in the context, except in the lead sentence of a biographical subject's own article." This could mean either

• In the lead sentence, don't use titles even when necessary for clarity or identification.
• In the lead sentence, you can use titles even when not necessary for clarify or identification.

Largoplazo (talk) 10:52, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Fixed [25].  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:20, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Workshopping a second proposal

Alright, so, the current RFC over at VPP appears to be split about 50/50 right now. While that is a lot of support, it's not looking like it will reach consensus: the current proposal appears to have failed to get the support of almost any Option 2 voters.

Several oppose votes suggest an alternative based off the presence of the name in reliable sources, so I propose:

For a deceased trans or non-binary person that was not notable under their former name, their former name should be included if and only if it frequently appears in reliable sources about the subject's primary source(s) of notability. Sources that merely document the existence of the former name but which could not be used to establish notability (birth and death certificates, court records, social media posts, etc.) are not enough for inclusion by themselves even if they unambiguously are reliable for basic biographic facts.

Names that should be included should be in the first sentence of the lead, introduced with "born" or "formerly".

• From Leelah Alcorn: Leelah Alcorn (November 15, 1997 – December 28, 2014) ...
  Alicorn's main source of notability is her suicide, and the public outcry over it. Her gender identity is mentioned often in news stories about these topics; however, her former name rarely is.
• From Public Universal Friend: The Public Universal Friend (born Jemima Wilkinson; November 29, 1752 – July 1, 1819)... The Friend's primary source of notability is their ministry. In sources about their ministry, the Friend's birth name is often used (especially regarding their early life) even though the Friend had not been notable under that name.

Thoughts? Questions? Revisions? Loki (talk) 03:15, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

More unnecessary instruction creep, more voter fatigue. Perhaps it's time to accept that the current policy is not broken, that there is no consensus to change, and we should just drop the stick and let it go. Mitch Ames (talk) 06:04, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Sorry Mitch, but you're absolutely wrong here. Any proposal is pretty explicitly not creep and there is a consensus for a change because the current lack of guidance is broken, as the recent RfC showed.

The current lack of guidance in this area causes many contentious discussions any time this comes up, some recent examples of which are linked and discussed in the currently running RfC. Simply pointing at the close of the RfC to say that there is clear consensus that a former name is not automatically of encyclopedic interest is not enough, because that provides exactly no guidance on what conditions make the former name become of encyclopaedic interest. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:33, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Mitch, there's explicitly a consensus to change. If nothing else passes, we could literally incorporate the wording of the close into the guideline without further discussion (as there's already a consensus for it) but it'd be quite shoving the exact wording in there. Seeing as the close strongly implied we should hash out the wording in a second RFC, we're trying to do that if possible. Loki (talk) 22:48, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

So I'm not going to speculate on what the outcome from the current RfC will be, because at a fundamental level consensus is not a vote, and any outcome could happen. I don't want to try and prejudge what the closer or closers of the current RfC will find.

When drafting my proposal, I was guided by three sentences. From the overall close Numerically, supporters the stricter interpretations held the plurality, but with insufficient support to overcome the concerns and objections of the other respondents., and from a side discussion on the close If I could have said There is consensus for option 2.8, figure it out, or if I was in a position to create the necessary language, I would have. (said by ScottishFinnishRadish) and The way I was going to handle the near, but not quite reached, consensus for option 3 (what SFR is calling 2.8) was by saying that 3 had consensus, but by footnote or other mitigating language the not completely absolute nature of that consensus should be noted. (said by Barkeep49).

When reading those three sentences together, it was clear to me that whatever barrier for inclusion we set, the community consensus is that it has to be high. However, if my proposal set the barrier for inclusion too high, I think if it frequently appears in reliable sources about the subject's primary source(s) of notability sets it too low. If my proposal is felt to be a 2.9 or 2.95, this is closer to a 2.5.

Where I think this proposal fails is that it doesn't consider these questions from the RfC close Many responses supporting different options specifically called out the difficulty of dealing with a "majority" of sources, e.g. is 50%+1 sufficient? How does a majority take into account emphasis and source quality? To use the language of this proposal when asking those questions, how frequently is "frequently"? Is 50%+1 sufficient? And how does "frequently" take into account emphasis and source quality?

I'm also not so sure about Names that should be included should be in the first sentence of the lead. While it's certainly standard practice across many, but not all biographies of trans and non-binary individuals, I do find myself convinced by what Adam Cuerden has said, in that this will overemphasise the former names. I think this sentence would be better if it was more simply Names that should be included should be introduced with "born" or "formerly", as that leaves it up to the local consensus at the article level to decide where is the best placement location in the context of the specific article.

In terms of alternate formulations for this proposal, I like Trystan's proposed swap of in-depth analysis and discussion from my proposal to is established through discussion of the name in high quality sources. It gives us a higher barrier than just verifiability, and it takes into account emphasis and source quality. I also think that it's important that we should reference back to the close of recent RfC on this, as well as to specific policy points like WP:NOTEVERYTHING, and WP:BALASP, which underpin this guideline. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:11, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Part of my reason for proposing this is that I'm increasingly convinced that the consensus is more like 2.5 than 2.8. If about 50% of people wanted 3, about 25% wanted 2, and the remaining 25% mostly wanted options even more lenient than 2 (which for our purposes we'll call "1"), that actually averages out to more like 2.3. Now, I'm aware that averaging doesn't really work here because every editor's reasoning is unique and because consensus is not unanimity, but for the purposes of getting option 2 supporters on board I think we'll need something that is more like option 2 than option 3. Loki (talk) 22:57, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

@LokiTheLiar I'm curious as to how much that would vary from the option 2 in the last proposal (which used "majority of reliable sources" as a key factor to consider for WP:PLA). I think it's fair to say that the current RFC has pretty bleak hopes—but I'm more of a cynic than Sides. I'm also a bit hesitant to start another RFC very quickly without significant workshopping. The fact is, appeals to the restriction of the last RFC largely fell on deaf ears, and, at the next RFC, any attempt to say that restriction still applies will be countered by people citing the most recent recent RFC and the chorus of voices opposing any change as evidence that consensus changed. We might disagree with them, but I think it's almost bound to happen, and I don't think it's reasonable or smart to expect that some particularly bold closer will disregard those voices.

As to Trystan's proposal, I'm nervous about the "discussion of the name" line. I think it has at least some of the same features that caused some blowback to "in depth analysis" of the name. The problem is that a name, in and of itself, isn't usually something that people discuss. If a reliable source says "the name originated from the Scotland" ... I guess that's discussion/in-depth analysis, but that's pretty rare. Based on the examples provided, it seems like the rule being proposed was closer to "extensive discussion of the person's trans identity", not their name.

I want to re-propose my last proposal, which I updated over time after first introducing it, above. This proposal focuses on the stories that principally identify the person by that name (the Hale example) and persons who had a unique relationship to their name (which could be used to capture people like Public Universal Friend or Suzy Izzard (though Izzard is a bad example since they were notable before transitioning). I'm not 100% on this wording, but:

JFD Proposal

If a deceased transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should similarly[1] be excluded unless either (1) a rough majority of reliable sources principally identify the person by that former name or (2) the person is regarded by reliable sources as having wavered on their use of the name. For example: From Leelah Alcorn: Leelah Alcorn (November 15, 1997 – December 28, 2014) ... Note: Alcorn was not notable prior to transitioning, and the majority of reliable sources principally identified her by her chosen name. From Danielle Bunten Berry: Danielle Bunten Berry (February 19, 1949 – July 3, 1998), formerly known as Dan Bunten, ... Note: Berry was notable prior to transitioning. From 2023 Nashville school shooting: Aiden Hale (born Audrey Elizabeth Hale) .... Note: A clear majority of reliable sources principally referred to Hale by his birth name. ---- [1] This is in reference to the previous paragraph, discussing the exclusion of the deadnames of living trans people who were not notable pre transition.

Regarding the above

• I'm fine leaving out the first sentence portion—if I recall, in the first RFC, I just copied that from the portion on living persons.
• I'm not really concerned about the "majority" issue SFR mentioned in the last closing. We have several policies that use far more ambiguous language (MOS:CAPS says "substantial majority"), and the idea that not saying anything is less ambiguous than saying something is one I doubt (we can't quantify "in depth discussion," either—these things are standards, not rules). Moreover, consider the number of circumstances in which, say, the resolution issue actually would come down to something like "well we have 50% ... but do we need 50.1%?????" There's not a single page I can think of where the sources were that evenly divided. Also, given that the proposal has shifted to sources that principally identify the person by one name (a much higher bar), a lower % is called for (though I'd stress that even this lower % would still capture fewer sources than asking if 50% merely mention the name). After all, if a rough majority principally identify a person by their former name, then, frankly, the name should probably be included, because someone searching for the person would likely be thrown by its absence.

I think the advantages of this proposal are:

1. It's pretty clearly decipherable, so long as we can explain "principally identifies" (which is already something MOS:GENDERID covers per the last RFC), I don't really think there will be any "what does this mean???" comments. Granted, as you noted above, some sources will refer to persons using both names depending on the period of their life the source is discussing, but, in the case of the autobiography you mentioned, there was still a pretty clear "principal" name (per the title), and, as a fallback, we could say that principal means the name most commonly used: no doubt it will be very rare for a source to truly be split 50/50 in discussing a person.
2. It's a higher standard than option 2 from the last RFC, in the sense that fewer persons would have their name included under this proposal as opposed to under option 2. (Which is the only sense that matters, no?) But it's still a lower standard than option 3: we have a real-world example of a person who was not notable before transitioning who would be included with this policy—I think the fact that none of the examples fit that description in the last proposal was ultimately noticed.

--Jerome Frank Disciple 22:42, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Wait, what "discussion of the name" line? Those words don't appear anywhere in my proposal and in fact I specifically avoided them for the exact reasons you mention. Loki (talk) 23:00, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, I—really helpfully—switched to talking about Trystan's proposal Sides mentioned without any indication I was doing so! I'll make that more clear :) --Jerome Frank Disciple 23:02, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

My reading of why Option 3 voters were not happy about that version of Option 2 is the worry that someone could include a former name of a recently dead trans person simply because it was well-documented. The main reason for the "analysis" requirement in the proposal up for discussion, by my reading, is to limit the pool of sources that count towards inclusion to only sources that actually have made some sort of editorial judgement to include it (and not just, like, birth certificates). My proposal also does this, but doesn't have the wording that many oppose voters objected to.

I think that this distinction between sources also includes the other two distinctions we seem to be getting at, namely between people who are clearly trans vs people who are ambiguously trans, and historical trans people vs recently deceased trans people. Reliable sources that use editorial judgement as to whether to mention a former name are much more likely to for historical trans people and for people who were only ambiguously trans, and much less likely to for recently deceased people who were unambiguously trans.

I do have an alternate wording that focuses on WP:PRIMARY vs WP:SECONDARY sources rather than the subject's source of notability, but I slightly prefer this one because I think it ultimately leads to clearer wording assuming people are comfy with the concept of a source of notability. Primary vs. secondary leads to some odd edge cases: e.g. technically Christine Jorgensen's autobiography is a WP:PRIMARY source, and technically an article that quotes Leelah Alcorn's parents deadnaming her is a WP:SECONDARY source, but in this case I'd argue that the WP:PRIMARY source is exercising a lot more editorial judgement as to whether to use the former name than the WP:SECONDARY source is. Loki (talk) 23:54, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

Well I think "principally refer" already takes away the possibility of a merely mentioned name getting through—which I 100% concede Option 2 would have allowed (if a majority of sources mentioned the name).

I'm somewhat thrown by your last paragraph (and maybe that means I don't understand your second). I should say that, in general, I actually think your proposal might be a lower standard than Option 2 (or at least it's amenable to that reading).

All of the proposals (well, let's except half of mine) have essentially been based on two questions:

1. What criteria does a source have to meet?
2. How many / what percentage of sources have to meet it?

Option 2, essentially, said "mention the deadname" and "majority".

Your proposal's criteria is, by my read, "mention the deadname AND not be a primary source" ... and it says that the name should "frequently" appear in sources.

But, first, I'm not sure that there are that many cases where primary sources would have affected the "majority" analysis—perhaps for some lower-profile figures (who I admittedly wasn't thinking of when I wrote it). And, second, I think "frequently" is subject to a wide range of interpretations, perhaps most of which don't require a majority. A lot depends on the "N": If there are 30 sources about a person, and every third source mentions a deadname, is it accurate to say it frequently appears in sources? I'd say probably yes. But that means your proposal would allow use of the former name if only 33% of secondary sources mention the deadname. By comparison, even including primary sources, it's hard to imagine that Option 2 would have allowed that: if only 33.33% of 30 reliable secondary sources used a deadname, you would need to find 10 primary sources using the deadname to get to 50%. Maybe not impossible if an editor were really determined, but still not that likely to actually happen. And it becomes even less likely the more sources that there are.

Conversely, I think my proposal is a higher standard, while still be lower than what was proposed in the last RFC.

The criteria is "primarily refer to the person by deadname" and the frequency is "rough majority". Now, the percentages might vary, but let's say that "rough majority" captures, at the lowest possible end, 40%. (And I think that's ... a quite-low interpretation of "rough majority".) Far fewer sources will primarily refer to a person by their deadname as will merely include or mention the deadname. Additionally, primary reference is a rough proxy for level of focus: Granted, it's a tad over inclusive in terms of what it prohibits, but my proposal absolutely does not capture articles that merely mention a deadname as a curio in passing. Moreover, in part to address the over-inclusivity, there is a second person-based rationale for inclusion: If the person has, themself, wavered on using the name. I think that will speak to Option 2/lower supporters, particularly in regards to their concerns regarding historical figures. (Now, I thought about saying "is regarded by reliable sources as having a unique relationship to their former name" ... but I think that's too ambiguous, based on the responses we've seen.)--Jerome Frank Disciple 01:15, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Because this is a standard for mentioning a deadname, and not using a deadname, I think we ought to go based on sources that mention the deadname. In practice, there aren't going to be that many sources that make an editorial judgement to mention the deadname but never use it in most cases: our standard here is very closely tailored for being an encyclopedia. Most sources I've seen that mention deadnames use them.

But if we're going on sources that mention the deadname, we need to be sure to exclude sources that mention the deadname because they have to. We're trying to import the analysis of the sources here, not just establish that the name exists, so sources that perform no analysis are useless to us.

This is why I think that Option 2 from the previous RFC was not the best. Option 2 wasn't based on those two questions at all; instead it imposed an after-the-fact standard based on what the reader would expect instead of based on anything the sources said (except for the basic fact that the name in question really was this person's former name, which we'd get from WP:V anyway). Because of this, it was both very permissive, and didn't really cut where we'd want a "sometimes" option to cut. Loki (talk) 04:17, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's wholly responsive to the issue of your proposal potentially being more permissive (and, by my analysis, likely to be more permissive in most cases).--Jerome Frank Disciple 12:08, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Cuñado's proposal

I know some people have labeled me "the opposition", but here is a serious proposal that I think will address most of the issues raised so far, and also avoid this section being endlessly litigated. It's a new logical flow to the section.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:57, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Proposed MOS:GID section

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. Any information related to the prior gender of a living person, including former names (deadname), should automatically be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Public figures, where multiple reliable third-party sources have documented the information (See WP:PUBLICFIGURE). When the individual has clearly expressed their consent to share the information, as documented in multiple reliable third-party sources. Given the sensitivity and personal nature of gender transitions, information that could reveal a gender transition should be given the maximum censorship allowed under WP:Biographies of living persons, including continuing to exclude it for 2 years after death by default, regardless of editorial consensus (See WP:BDP). Unless the individual meets one of the exceptions, it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. If you see such information anywhere on Wikipedia, edit the page to remove it and contact the oversight team so that they can evaluate it and possibly remove it from the page history. When removing the information, use a bland/generic edit summary and do not mention that you will be requesting Oversight. When the individual meets one of the exceptions, or two years have passed since their death, information on their gender transition must not be given undue weight or overemphasis. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed in the infobox or background section of the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name should use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. In general, respectful extra mentions of the former name or transition should only be used to avoid confusion. When the living individual does not meet one of the exceptions, there may be some difficulty in hiding the information on gender transition. Avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work should not be used.

I think that's an intriguing proposal, but it seems to be that it's net effect is to: (1) lower the standard for living trans persons, (2) create a 2-year-post-death exclusion rule for deceased persons and then (3) only apply WP:UNDUE post the two-year period, which I think most editors would argue a sentence or single parenthetical never is. The net sum, while a bit harder to categorize, seems like it's not really consistent with the effort to split the difference between option 2 & option 3 from the first RFC--Jerome Frank Disciple 11:55, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by lower the standard for living trans persons. Can you be more specific? Cuñado ☼ - Talk 16:18, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Currently living trans persons are only subject to a pre-transition notability exception allowing inclusion.

It appears to me that you've listed 3 exceptions, including "Public figures, where multiple reliable third-party sources have documented the information". Now, perhaps the next paragraph hedges, but at the very least you're embracing a standard over what was previously a rule—and that expands the instances in which a living trans person's former name could be included, no?

Do you deny that your proposal would be less restrictive than Option 2 from the first RFC?--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:57, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

... information that could reveal a gender transition ... should not be included in any page ... If you see such information anywhere on Wikipedia, edit the page to remove it — That effectively makes it impossible to discuss the matter, if "any page ... anywhere on Wikipedia" includes Talk pages. I know that Talk pages are subject to BLP, but forbidding editors to even discuss the topic (since the existence of any such discussion "could reveal a gender transition") seems a bit extreme. Consider the case where an editor decides that an existing source is not reliable enough, or that there aren't enough of such sources. They are now required to delete all mention of the transition from the article, and cannot even ask about it on the talk page, or give any hint as to why they did it. If I notice the edit and raise the matter on the (article's or editor's) talk page to discuss it, the same editor would then be required to delete my post asking about it, with no hint as to why. Does WP:BRD now stand for Blackout, Redact, Deny? Mitch Ames (talk) 12:13, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

It uses the language from WP:BLPPRIVACY and puts non-notable gender transition along with "personal information such as phone numbers, addresses, account numbers, etc." I agree with your argument that it certainly makes it difficult to edit, but I don't think it's that different than the way the page is currently worded. User:Jerome Frank Disciple interpreted this as lowering the standard for living trans persons. I would support allowing the information on talk pages for the reasons you mentioned. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 16:18, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

puts non-notable gender transition along with "personal information such as phone numbers, addresses, account numbers, etc. There is a fundamental difference between "reveal a gender transition" and "reveal a phone number etc". My actual phone number, address, bank account number is private/personal/secret, but the fact that I have a phone, address, bank account number is generally not considered a secret - it's presumed that everyone has them. However if I were non-publicly transgender, the mere fact that I am transgender is the secret, not just the "details" (male-to-female, female-to-male, something-else) of the transition and my old/dead name.

We could, for example, openly discuss on the talk page whether someone's date of birth (also included in BLPPRIVACY) should be included in their article, without actually disclosing that date. However we can't discuss whether someone's gender transition should be mentioned without implicitly disclosing the fact that there was one. Mitch Ames (talk) 04:40, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

• Frankly, trying to jump the gun and write a new proposal or draft a new follow-up RfC when one is still ongoing is generally not a good idea. As I said in a thread above, the next-round RfC at WP:VPPOL has now closed, again with no consensus, but again with steps toward consensus. But we're not going to get to that consensus if that RfC isn't analyzed in detail, and the next-next round based closely on the revisions and alternative language that people said would bring them to the supporting side.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:25, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Possible error in MOS:JOBTITLE table

@Kornatice: and I split over the capitalization of "Florida governor Ron DeSantis"/"Florida Governor Ron DeSantis". Konatice said it should be lowercased (I think because the official title is Governor of Florida Ron DeSantis), accurately pointing out that the table includes "US president Richard Nixon". But ... while Konatice is absolutely right ... I think the problem is that the table is wrong—not just externally wrong but internally inconsistent.

First, let's start with the text rules, which say to capitalize positions.

• When followed by a person's name to form a title, i.e., when they can be considered to have become part of the name: President Nixon, not president Nixon; Pope John XXIII, not pope John XXIII.
• When a title is used to refer to a specific person as a substitute for their name during their time in office, e.g., the Queen, not the queen (referring to Elizabeth II); the Pope, not the pope (referring to Francis).
• When a formal title for a specific entity (or conventional translation thereof) is addressed as a title or position in and of itself, is not plural, is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article), and is not a reworded description:

Now, it was my thought that the first bullet controlled. But Kornatice—consistent with the Nixon example—reads the third bullet as limiting the first bullet: and thus, we should not capitalize "a formal title for a specific entity ... [that is] addressed as a title or position in and of itself ... and is not a reworded description:". I have to admit, I'm pretty decent at grammar, but that third bullet throws me for a loop. Does "in and of itself" apply to title and position? Anyways ... regardless:

First, I'm not sure that's the rules are internally consistent: note that the first bullet says "President Nixon" should be capitalized ... but "President" is arguably a reworded description (shorthand) for President of the United States.

And, second, I can't help but think that the colon (which I left in) is very important there. The colon proceeds the table. And, notably, there's something a little funny about the table: Every item in the left column—showing capitalization—is not a title immediately followed by a name—it's a title that's the object of a verb."Richard Nixon was President of the United States."; "Theresa May became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 2016."; "Louis XVI became King of France and Navarre in 1774, later styled King of the French (1791–1792)."

On the right column, we get a little more variation: titles that are the objects of verbs ("Theresa May was the prime minister of the United Kingdom.") AND titles that exist independent of the name they precede—not functioning as adjectives but as subjects ("The French king, Louis XVI, was later beheaded."). The only example where a name immediately follows and title function is the "US president Nixon" example. Now, what's weird about this example is that it's also not consistent with the column titles at the top of the table. The left column title is "denoting a title", but the right column title is "denoting a description". But that's a semi-baffling choice of words if the example is correct. In "Florida governor Ron DeSantis" or "US president Richard Nixon" ... both "Florida governor" and "US president" are literally being used as titles ... so it's a little strange to say they're denoting a description instead of a title.

I want to further add that not capitalizing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis would be inconsistent with ... every other style guide I'm aware of? (Not that we're bound by those style guides, just food for thought.) Based on that, I'd suggest modifying that third bullet to:

• When a formal title for a specific entity (or conventional translation thereof) is connected to the subject via a linking verb and addressed as a title or position in and of itself, so long as the title is not plural, is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article), and is not a reworded description:

-Jerome Frank Disciple 02:05, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this analysis is right. I think you've missed an important example: Mitterrand was the French president. This is the example used for the case of not capitalizing an office or title.

I also disagree that the full title for the governor of Florida is "Governor of Florida". It's just "Governor". Same way you'd refer to "Dr. Sigmund Freud" but would in a full sentence say "Sigmund Freud was a doctor". If you say "Sigmund Freud was a doctor of psychiatry" you still don't capitalize it. Nor would you if you were to refer to "psychiatric doctor Sigmund Freud". The title in this case is just "Dr." or "Doctor", and not "doctor of psychiatry" or "psychiatric doctor".

It's the "Florida" that's causing confusion here I think, because "Florida" is itself a proper noun and so is always capitalized. Loki (talk) 04:32, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Uh, I don't think I did! In "Mitterrand was the French president."—the title is the object of the verb ("was"). As such, the first bullet point does not apply to it, and it fits the reword I suggested. The key question here is whether the third bullet point is meant to limit the first bullet point—I think it's fairly clearly not meant to.--Jerome Frank Disciple 12:00, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I disagree that that's the key question here. My reading of this section is that the first bullet point doesn't even apply at all to "Florida governor Ron DeSantis", the same way it would not apply to "psychiatric doctor Sigmund Freud". It only covers titles that are part of the name, not descriptions that just happen to go before the name. Loki (talk) 14:53, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

No, that's not accurate: "when followed by a person's name to form a title" is the controlling description there—note that "considered to become part of the name" is only listed after "i.e." ("that is"). You can't substitute "i.e." for "if and only if". (Also, how is "Florida [G]overnor Ron DeSantis" not part of the name but "President Richard Nixon" is?)

I'm ... quite skeptical of the idea that adding an adjective destroys capitalization but using shorthand for the title does not—certainly I don't think that's reflected in the current rules. For example, the official title for U.S. president is not "President" but "President of the United States". So, substituting "President" for the full title is modifying it. Yet "President Nixon" is capitalized. But, by your rule, if I said "His inability to keep his mouth shut reminded observers of loose-lipped President Nixon" ... president would be lowercased, because there's an adjective before it? (After all, by your rule, per your talk page, "French president Mitterrand" would be lowercased, but French is just an adjective. I think what you're getting at is more that the title shouldn't be capitalized if it's a standalone reference (e.g., He was joined by the French president, Mitterand") ... but that's not use as a title. --Jerome Frank Disciple 15:10, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

• As I understand it… we would write “He was joined on stage by Governor DeSantis” ("Governor DeSantis" being his title)… but “He was joined on stage by Florida governor DeSantis” (“Florida governor” being his job). Blueboar (talk) 17:18, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

  But my point is that is still using governor as a title in a grammatical sense. Perhaps you can say "Florida" is modifying "Governor" and therefore Governor shouldn't be capitalized, but that doesn't really make sense. It's also counter to every other style guide I'm aware of. In fact, I can't find a single news org that does that.

  • PBS: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • NPR: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • New York Times: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • BBC: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • Reuters: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • Newsweek: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
  • Tampa Bay Times: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis

  Of course, we can reject every other style guide ... but why are we doing that here? The only reason that's been offered is that "Florida Governor Ron DeSantis" isn't "part of the name" like "Governor Ron DeSantis" is. ... But that's not a distinction based on any real grammatical concept.

  Further, if the modification rule really does apply to titles that are serving as adjectives (and immediately precede the name), no one has been able to explain why "President Nixon" would be capitalized, even though the official title is President of the United States, and "President" is merely a shorthand modification.

  As the first bullet accurately holds, if the title immediately precedes the name and is not independent of the name, we should capitalize it.--Jerome Frank Disciple 19:07, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

  Honestly, I've stopped fighting this one. Logically, you're right and the rule should be if the title immediately precedes the name, then it's capitalized (Florida Governor Ron DeSantis), but if the title is set apart from the name in some way, then it's lowercase (Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida or the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis). —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 19:46, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

  I appreciate that! For a second it felt like I was taking crazy pills.

  @Blueboar what are your thoughts? I understand what you said is above is your understanding of the policy, but do you think that's right? Or, more specifically, would either you or @Carter Tcr25 object to changing the third bullet to:

  • When a formal title for a specific entity (or conventional translation thereof) is connected to the subject by a linking verb, so long as the title is not plural, is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article), and is not a reworded description:

  and removing the "US president Nixon" example? (which, by the way, is a hyper weird example ... because I'm not sure there's any example of a Wikipedia article saying something as weird as "US president Nixon").

  (Btw: I did consider whether it was okay to limit to "linking verbs": Specifically, I wondered whether "elected president of the United States" would be used with a capital "P" in either our articles or reliable sources. Looks to me like no: see African-American candidates for President of the United States (Barack Obama (D-IL) was elected president of the United States.) or this NYT story ("Joseph R. Biden Jr. was elected president of the United States on Saturday ....").

Stray thoughts

I'll be honestly, I'm usually relatively anti-capitalization, and I'm actually a little bit dubious that this third exception should exist at all—I think "Richard Nixon, president of the United States", is actually superior to "Richard Nixon, President of the United States", particularly given that we would lowercase if using an article like "the". If we ditched the third bullet point altogether ... I think the rule would be far more straightforward: capitalize titles when they immediately precede names. Now, there is some nuance there: JOBTITLES actually doesn't discuss "doctor", but Loki brought up the example of saying "the psychiatric doctor Sigmund Freud said ....": there, the meaning changes if you capitalize "doctor" ("the psychiatric Doctor Sigmund Freud" has a different meaning!). But, and I can't quite put my finger on what grammatical concept causes this distinction ... I realized there is a distinction here: You could start a sentence by saying "Psychiatric doctor Sigmund Freud ...." or you could start a sentence with "The psychiatric doctor Sigmund Freud ...." But you can't do that with Florida Governor without requiring "Ron DeSantis" to be set off by commas: "The Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ...." doesn't work—"the" doesn't make sense there—only"The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, ...." or "Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ...." work. Fortunately, we don't have address this issue.

--Jerome Frank Disciple 21:02, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Agreed (except "capitalize titles when they immediately precede names" should be "capitalize titles when they immediately precede or follow names", since some titles come after) I do think a case can be made for capitalizing "Florida Governor Ron DeSantis"; I don't recall a good rationale for "Florida governor Ron DeSantis"; it's just a modifier preceding a name+title combo, like "former President Jimmy Carter" (or "former-President Jimmy Carter" if you prefer). Similarly, "then-King Edward VIII (later the duke of Windsor)". But maybe I'm forgetting some debate from back-when that did make a case for lower-casing.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:31, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

SURNAME and repeated uses

During Folly Mox's recent (very welcome) RFC on link repetition, which successfully challenged the assumption that Wikipedia articles are read from top to bottom like a regular article (because nobody reads Wikipedia like that) and changed the policy on duplicate links from one-per-article to one-per-section, Bagumba wondered if that change Would [...] trickle over to MOS:SURNAME as well. That question was tabled for possible discussion here.

So, let's have that discussion, because OMG yes it should! (IMHO) A repeated frustration for me, when reading articles, goes like this: (Note: The names are made up, but the frustration is real.)

• I'm reading an article about... some event, something that doesn't have a person as its subject.
• Let's pretend it's an article about the Bowling Green massacre — not Kellyanne's fake one, a real one.
• I'm reading the fifth section of the article, having skimmed over the rest, because... I don't know, because I have the attention span of a gnat on meth? Point is, it happens.
• That section opens, On December 5, 2017, Hall released a statement condemning the attack.

Now, the obvious question here is, "Who the hell is 'Hall'!?" Oh, OK, I go back three entire sections to find out that the article's referring to Georgina Hall, then-Mayor of Bowling Green.

We can do better than that. At least once a section, any figures mentioned in the article should probably be fully re-contextualized. Even if someone does read from top to bottom like a regular article, over that kind of distance it's really easy to forget who these people are, when they're referred to only by their surname. Writing "Mayor Hall" or "Mayor Georgina Hall" the first time she's mentioned in each section costs us little, and makes for more readable articles.

Heck, when something is vital to our understanding of their role — like our fictional Ms. Hall's Mayorship — I'd even consider supporting a policy that it should be included every time they're mentioned. When a person mentioned in an article is relevant solely or primarily due to their position, including that context ("Mayor Hall" rather than just "Hall") each time they're mentioned feels prudent. FeRDNYC (talk) 08:20, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

• Support once per section at a minimum. Weak support for the extension (when something is vital to our understanding of [a person's] role ... it should be included every time they're mentioned), but as guidance rather than hard rule. I agree it's frustrating to find oneself in the situation described as a reader, but I'd be weary of making re-contextualising-on-every-use a solid policy lest it cause articles to become stilted or take on a patronising tone. Better it should be encouraged, but with reasoned deviation permitted. XAM2175 ^(T) 10:15, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

  Yeah, I'm not sure how I feel about the second part myself, it was a 'thinking out loud' sort of addition. While I feel it could be useful as "style advice", at least within the same paragraph you're right that it could read as stilted. So, you'd want to allow some leeway there, and it starts to feel like a bad fit for policy. FeRDNYC (talk) 15:43, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

• Allow but do not mandate - allowing re-contextualizing is fine, but mandating it "at least once a section" is overkill, and would result in excess verbosity. The wording of MOS:DL should probably apply to SURNAME as well (my emphasis here, not in MOS): "... may be repeated if helpful for readers ... at the first occurrence in a section".
  One significant and relevant difference between repeated links vs repeated title/forename is that repeated links do not take up any more space on my screen, and it's relatively easy to ignore the extra colouration of the link, but repeated title/forename does take up extra screen space, and more (unnecessary) words makes it harder to read the text (it's more cognitive load to skip over the repeated title/forename). Mitch Ames (talk) 04:10, 16 July 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. Why would we cater to jump-around readers at the expense of an article that flows without repetition? In an article like Russo-Ukrainian War, we would have to write in full "President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy" in every section, rather than just describing him as "Zelenskyy". That's not unlike describing Jesus in every relevant chapter of the bible, just for people who are jumping in somewhere. Our articles should have internal integrity, flow and readability, and not appear like a series of independent standalone sections cobbled together. WWGB (talk) 05:50, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

  "President Zelenskyy" at the first occurrence in a new section would suffice. XAM2175 ^(T) 08:33, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

  There is more than one president involved in the Russo-Ukrainian War. If a drop-in reader does not know who "Zelenskyy" is, adding he is "a president" is not clarification. WWGB (talk) 12:36, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

• Personally, if someone is mentioned only a few times in an article, and it's non-contiguous, and it isn't just a matter of in-text attribution for a source, I usually re-introduce them, at least briefly, usually including given name. It had never occurred to me that that violates MOS:SURNAME, and no one's ever called me on it, which is perhaps telling in itself. So, allow per Mitch. Which mirrors link repetition across sections: no one has to re-link a term every section (and in many articles that would look absurd); it's just that there's no longer a rule against it. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 02:00, 19 July 2023 (UTC)
• Full name repetition is something I do quite a bit – it doesn't break the flow and it makes what's going on for people like me, who skim and forget names that don't look important (particularly analysts). For mentions that are quite far apart from each other, I might do a title reintroduction. It makes for a better reading experience, it's more accessible, it doesn't throw off the look, would 100% support scrapping the no-repetition guideline. theleekycauldron (talk • contribs) (she/her) 06:23, 20 July 2023 (UTC)
• Generally oppose I understand the motivation as I sometimes read whole articles and sometimes jump into specific questions, but I think that repeatedly introducing individuals with full names and roles interrupts the flow and will generally be unnecessary. If I consider three general situations:

1. The individual is a key character in the article. For example, to understand the Bowling Green massacre example you need to know who Kellyanne Conway is, so it seems reasonable to expect that the reader will read enough of the article that they don't need repeated reintroduction.
2. The individual is notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. Now that we can have once-per-section hyperlinks, we can unobtrusively link to their article without breaking the flow of the text.
3. The individual is not notable in the article or in Wikipedia generally. I can see that such individuals will occasionally need to be reintroduced but I generally oppose changing guidelines to recommend it, as in many cases this is best handled by not referring to the person by name at all: returning to the example posed above, the Bowling Green massacre article doesn't refer to the mayor by name, instead saying, "The mayor of Bowling Green, Kentucky, issued a statement...". --Mgp28 (talk) 11:40, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

• Reluctant weak support. In general, I don't think it's necessary to repeat full name or name and title in most instances, but I'd concede there are times where it may help the flow. I agree with WWGB's concern that we don't have articles that read like they're multiple articles just slapped together, but I think Mitch Ames has a point that we should allow (but not mandate) repetition to a limited degree when it helps the reader. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 12:31, 20 July 2023 (UTC)
• Comment. I'm supportive of the idea of contextualising individuals in later sections for the benefit of people who have not fully read and absorbed prior sections, but I'm not clear on what change is being proposed. The applicable bit of guidance currently reads After the initial mention, a person should generally be referred to by surname only, and then goes on to discuss a lot of edge case exceptions. I'll note that my practise to date has been that if I'm reading an article and come across an individual I don't recognise and have to root around in the upper bits of the article to identify them, I'll usually edit the section causing my confusion to add a very brief descriptor of the individual, unless it would clearly disrupt the flow of the full article, like if they were introduced at the end of the section immediately prior. I don't read this as violating should generally, and can't recall ever being reverted about it.
  I think the change wrought from the MOS:DL RfC actually low key weakens the need for this one, since later mentions of an individual can be uncontentiously wikilinked to their bio through their surname, allowing the reader a quick route to identification. For the examples given above, Mayor Hall and President Zelenskyy are probably how I'd personally handle later section mentions, with or without linking as common sense indicates. So in general I'd put myself on team "allow, but don't mandate", but it would be nice if a specific change to the guidance text were proposed. Folly Mox (talk) 20:18, 20 July 2023 (UTC)
• Allow but do not mandate. This proposal largely makes sense in the context of a person being mentioned as a "side subject" (e.g. mayor of the town the article is about), but it does not make much sense when it comes to inline source attribution. E.g., if the artice near the top has something like "According to Hugh Trevor-Roper (1983), [quote here]^[1], and then 7 sections later we have "Murray Pittock (2010) showed that the assumptions in Trevor-Roper (1983) were based on incomplete research, and left out [various important source stuff]^[23]", this is entirely fine. It's completely routine, and readers understand that "Trevor-Roper (1983)" is a reference to a previously-cited work that can be found in the bibliography of the article. Linking as "Trevor-Roper (1979)" in the later case does not help the reader, as the material in that specific context is about the author's written source, not the author as a biographical subject.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:45, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

GID inclarity

Complementary preferences

After names were explicitly added to the first sentence of MOS:GID, the guideline has become rather confusing; see Talk:Eddie Izzard#Semi-protected edit request on 7 June 2023. Currently it says we should use a name consistent with the most recent expressed gender identity, when I'm pretty sure the intent was that we should use the name(s) the subject most recently identified with. This leads to confusion where, like in the linked thread, it can be argued that because a nonbinary subject approves one masculine name, they can also be called by another name because that is also masculine. Thoughts? -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 10:58, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Pinging User:Actualcpscm who partook in that discussion. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 11:01, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping! I'd like to add some general questions to this:

1. What happens if the most recently expressed partial preferences are contradictory? For example, what if someone expresses preference for she/her pronouns and then expresses preference for an umambiguously male-identifying first name? What pronouns should an article about them use? Really, the question here is: How do editors deal with cases of multiple complementary preferences, and what is the room (if any) for interpretation and extrapolation?

2. How do we separate gender-related name ambiguity from other non-legal names like personas or nicknames? If a trans person who has changed their name was previously notable under a nickname, how do we treat their birth name? Is it appropriate to refer to a trans person by their birth name if their preferred name is a common hypocorism of their birth name? Actualcpscm (talk) 11:14, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

As to the specific examples @Maddy from Celeste and @Actualcpscm brought up: Izzard is an tough case because (as I understand) she personally identifies by one name but professionally identifies by another; she's part of a class of persons who, as Actualcpscm articulately described, have "multiple complementary preferences". I actually don't think this edit addresses those situations, and I don't know that any guidance can? (I mean, I can think of a few things, but none of them would be great or have a snowball's chance in hell of getting consensus.) I think those sorts of issues are going to require page-by-page resolution.--Jerome Frank Disciple 13:32, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I agree that we can‘t account for every edge case of complementary preferences, but I‘d like to „codify“ the need for internal consistency in such cases. The article that triggered this discussion, Eddie Izzard, currently refers to Izzard as Eddie (short for Edward, i.e. a masculine name) in the lead sentence, but then goes on to use she/her pronouns. This accounts for the multiple preferences expressed by Izzard, but I think internal consistency is more important for readability and clarity. The fact that this naming ambiguity even exists is indicative of an ambiguous gender identity, for which I think commitment to one name and pronoun set is more important than following the letter of the expressed preferences in a meticulously literal way. I‘m not sure if this is community consensus, though; I‘m not very familiar with the RfC that resulted in MOS:GID. Actualcpscm (talk) 14:18, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I definitely see your point, and I definitely agree there should be intra-article consistency (and consistency across Wikipedia for one person). My concern is that the individuals preferences will be so unique that they’ll be hard to account for. for example, with Izzard we might craft a guideline that says “prioritize stage names” or “prioritize personal names” (on my phone and am not that familiar with Izzard so sorry if that’s not quite right—just working a hypo here). But how many other modern persons will that apply to? (genuinely asking)—Jerome Frank Disciple 14:23, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

How about something along the lines of this:

„In the case of multiple complementary or contradictory preferences that have been recently expressed, either together or at the same time, articles should use only one set of name(s) and pronouns for internal consistency. Which set that is should be decided on a case-by-case basis, prioritizing the naming convention under which the individual is notable or reported on. [This priority is secondary to the individual‘s preferences and only applies in cases of ambiguity in their preferences.]“

I‘m not quite happy with the wording, but I think you get the idea. Notability and reporting practices are relevant only when the individual has said something like „any set of pronouns is completely fine.“

Basically, IFF the criterion of expressed preference doesn‘t yield a clear result, we default back to standard practices, i.e. Wikipedia sticks to how the reliable sources say it. Actualcpscm (talk) 15:50, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Re. Izzard: I‘m really not sure how to describe the Izzard situation, they have adopted a very complex gender identity that‘s linked to their performances but not exclusive to their stage persona. I‘m really not sure.

Re. Frequency of this issue: I think we‘ll see more and more notable individuals that are gender-nonconforming, and a good bit of them will say „I like he/him and she/her equally“, or something like that. This won‘t be the last time this question comes up, and as it currently exists, MOS:GID doesn‘t account for it. Actualcpscm (talk) 15:54, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

That's a fine point! I'm going to add just a few final thoughts before I let others take over and respond, because I do have some concerns:

1. I'm, personally, a little hesitant about preemptive guidelines ... I generally think it's safer to let an issue appear, see how it's handled on an article-by-article basis, and either capture the standard practice or resolve a split by resorting to the guidelines.
2. I also wonder how often "internal consistency" is going to be an issue in light of MOS:SURNAME.
3. Finally, while currently handled by IAR, I suspect there are going to be a few editors who object on historical-figure grounds.

I do think you're right that this is going to be an issue—there's a related RFC on Talk:Celia Rose Gooding, who, on her twitter profile, listed "they/she" pronouns, and, later, in a tweet, said "I use both she and they pronouns". In that case, the discussion seems to have focused on (1) how to determine Gooding's preference (with most users relying on which pronoun was listed first in the twitter bio) and (2) how to best avoid ambiguity (with many users supporting "she" suggesting that "they" should be subordinated by default). Oddly, few users suggesting going by what most reliable sources used (though perhaps that's because the Twitter announcement postdated most reliable sources about the person, so the question turned on recency).

This all said ... if we were to add a statement capturing what you propose, perhaps we could kill at least a few of the words?

If such a person's most recently expressed identity is unclear (or the person has simultaneously embraced multiple identities), articles should be consistent about pronoun usage and which name is treated as the person's principal name. These determinations should be made on a case-by-case basis.

--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:11, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Just want to point out, at around the time Gooding put out the I use both she and they tweet, their social media profiles listed she/they. At some point after the tweet it was changed to the current order of they/she. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:48, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Oooh I somehow missed that entirely! I need to update my comment on that talk page. Thanks for pointing that out!--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:50, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

I'd mentioned it in my !vote in the current RfC over there, but I guess a bunch of folks haven't read it. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:53, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

You did! Weird—I actually remember clicking on each of the external links you provided, and I very much remember the points you made in the second and third paragraph (the third, especially, led me to address that issue in a parenthetical at the end of my comment) ... I guess I somehow just glossed over the last sentence of that first paragraph?? Sorry about that!--Jerome Frank Disciple 16:56, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Good points! Going through them one by one:

1. I agree, we shouldn't make guidelines for issues that haven't come up yet. However, we're here because there have been cases of ambiguity, and my point was intended as "This will continue to happen into the future, these cases are not unique or limited to a specific time period."

2. I think your proposal resolves this; we're not saying that individuals need to be addressed by their chosen first name, just that there needs to be a consistent naming convention within articles.

3. Historical figures are tricky to figure out because our understanding of gender has changed so much in such a short time. Again, I think your proposed text gets around this nicely.

I'm also quite surprised that reporting in reliable sources wasn't taken into account that much in the RfC you mention, but so be it. If that's what current practice is, it should be reflected accurately here.

Slightly amended proposal:

If a person's most recently expressed gender identity is unclear (or the person has simultaneously expressed multiple identities), articles should be internally consistent with regards to the name that is treated as the person's principal name and the pronouns that are used to refer to them. These determinations should be made on a case-by-case basis.

I'm also pinging @Maddy from Celeste and @ScottishFinnishRadish for feedback. If everyone feels that this reflects current community consensus, I'll go ahead and add it to MOS:GID. Yay policymaking guideline-drafting! Actualcpscm (talk) 16:49, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

If you want to narrow it down a lot, you could just say, at the end of paragraph 1: "Complex and ambiguous cases should be treated on a case by case basis, but articles should be internally consistent as to a person's principal name and pronouns." I'd like to see what others have to say about this, but I don't have a problem with it.--Jerome Frank Disciple 17:12, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Either of these looks good to me. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 16:38, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Implemented with minor changes! Actualcpscm (talk) 12:12, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm not entirely convinced that a clarification along these lines is needed yet. I think SFR's comment below encapsulates why I don't think we need a clarification point like this. If a person choses to use a typically masculine name with feminine pronouns, or vice versa, I don't think we need to second guess it in any way, we just need to follow how they wish to be referred to. Likewise if a person expresses themselves in a typically masculine or feminine way, and wants us to use they/them pronouns, then we should respect that.

Izzard's case seems kinda unique to me, in that she's making a clear distinction between her public and private personas. She's maintaining use of the name Eddie Izzard for her public presence, while elsewhere she would prefer if people refer to her as Suzy. The way I would interpret her most recent statement is that Eddie is remaining her stage name, whereas Suzy is her actual name. Because our biographical articles are typically about the whole person, I lean towards using Suzy as the primary name.

However of the two options put forward so far, I much prefer the shorter version from Jerome as I don't think we need to be as verbose as Actualpscm's proposal. Both broadly convey the same meaning, but the shorter version also allows for a little more wiggle room on what is considered a complex or ambiguous case. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:15, 13 June 2023 (UTC)

I think this is a very different matter from the IAR clarification that SFR was referring to in that comment. This is a much more substantial clarification than "the general principles of reading guidelines apply to this guideline." Importantly, we're not deviating from the RfC consensus here.

Really all we're saying is that articles should stick to one primary name and one set of pronouns, whatever they may be. In the case of someone like Izzard, it could be argued that different sections of the article should refer to Izzard in different ways (for example as Suzy in a Personal life section and as Eddie in a Performances section). I don't think that would be a good idea; as you put it, biographical articles are about the whole person. After Maddy and SFR confirmed that they agree with this clarification in principle, I added it here; what do you think about the wording? Actualcpscm (talk) 11:19, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

Are we sure that there aren't any potential articles on genderfluid subjects where it might be appropriate to use different pronouns in different parts of the article? For any guideline, there will always be complex and ambiguous cases to be dealt with on a case-by-case basis; we can't predict exactly what they will involve. I agree that in general articles should strive to be consistent, but I'm not sure we need to specify it as a hard rule. (Specifying a rule as specifically designed for complex cases makes it very hard to justify any exceptions.) It's not the same, but I am thinking of how articles like Trixie Mattel and Conchita Wurst switch between names and pronouns when describing the drag/real-life personas, and are better for it.--Trystan (talk) 12:55, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

I am convinced by this argument, so I retract my support for either amendment. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 12:58, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think I agree that those articles are necessarily made better by this inconsistency. In fact, it very much clashes with what we mentioned just above; biographical articles are about the person as a whole, not about their stage personas. Of course those personas need to be mentioned and accordingly referred to, but the article itself should be about the actual individual. If I were to rewrite those articles right now, I don't think I'd mix pronouns the way they currently do. However, I'm not sure what the community consensus is on biographies that extensively cover stage personas; I'd like to get some input from other editors. @Jerome Frank Disciple @ScottishFinnishRadish @Sideswipe9th, you have all been very involved in this discussion; what do you think? Should biographical articles that cover stage personas treat those personas as their subject in this way?

I'm reverting the changes I made since they apparently don't reflect current consensus. Let's see how the debate develops. Actualcpscm (talk) 13:05, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't have much to add here, other than I don't often end up editing in these situations so I'm not sure how best to handle it, and the RFC that I closed didn't really deal with this particular wording so I don't have much to clarify on that front. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 11:34, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Proposal to address potential ambiguity re: persons with deadnames that match their current expressed gender identity

While the above section seems to chiefly concern the persons with, borrowing language from Actualcpscm, "complementary preferences" regarding their names, I think Maddy also brought up a semi-distinct issue that can be addressed fairly easily. I suggest we remove "gender" from the phrase "gender self-identification" in paragraph one. I made that edit here, but it was reverted with a "get consensus first" message. I haven't seen anyone oppose, but I figured this separation will give them an opportunity to do so.

The paragraph in question already applies only to those "whose gender might be questioned" (though that could maybe be better phrased). Because "names" was added per the rfc, there was a possibility of some ambiguity: If a trans man originally had a masculine name (but still changed it), should we principally refer to him by his birth name, since that would be consistent with his most recent expressed "gender self-identification"? ... I think almost everyone here would say "no": Given the RFC's thematic focus on deadnaming (and the fact that such a person's birth name would still be a deadname), I think that's the most reasonable understanding of the community's position. Removing "gender" addresses the issue.

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise.

--Jerome Frank Disciple 14:53, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

• That seems reasonable, and the second "gender" in that construction was redundant in the first place. I'm wracking my brain for any negative unintended outcome that could result from this edit, and nothing is coming to mind.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:13, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

  Ok, so what if the person likes to be called Jane or Helen but reliable sources doesn't state the preferred pronoun? I think referring to Jane as she/her would be assuming gender, which is what some in the LGBT+ movement find offensive. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 22:18, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

  We wouldn't be writing about them here at all without reliable sources, and the odds of zero of those sources ever using a pronoun to refer to the person are slim to none. We can entirely reasonably construe from the recent-er RS material what pronoun(s) are appropriate.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:27, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Can we stop misgendering neopronoun users?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

This discussion has gotten quite heated for one in which most participants substantially agree. I'm going to attempt an involved close here before this devolves into something worse. If anyone desperately feels that this should continue, feel free to revert me (just please copy this comment to the discussion itself); but hear me out first.

• There was a strong consensus in the November RfC to generally use they/them in lieu of neopronouns, and to the extent that a discussion like this can serve as a straw-poll of change in consensus, it seems that that remains by far the prevailing view in the community.
• The question of whether this constitutes misgendering is probably a red herring, but regardless most participants felt that it either doesn't at all, or only conditionally does.
• No one has identified any specific articles where they/them is used over the subject's explicit objection. No one seems to be arguing that, in such a case, we must use they/them, compared to an alternative of surname-only or even, potentially, using neopronouns as a one-off case. (A local consensus for the latter seems unlikely as of this writing, but would not contradict the guideline.)
• Concerns about editors' conduct can be raised at AN/I or AE (cf. WP:GENSEX, WP:ARBATC) as appropriate, but I'm hoping that closing at this juncture can prevent that.

-- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 02:18, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

---

The current policy is to use they/them when someone uses neopronouns, which is very confusing because one of the main reasons people have to use neopronouns is that they want a gender neutral pronoun but are uncomfortable being called they/them. I think the policy should be to use whatever pronouns are requested, with the exception of satire. Example of satire: when Michelle Malkin said her pronouns are "u/s/a". Afroswordguy (talk) 09:59, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

So we had a huge discussion about this last year, which is footnoted in the guidance. I would personally also take exception to the idea that not using a person's neopronoun in the running prose of the article constitutes misgendering. Pronouns can be representative of gender identity, but there's not a one-to-one mapping. Folly Mox (talk) 13:20, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

This is the English language Wikipedia. Hence, it should use English words, not phantasy words. Linguistically, Pronouns are a closed word class. Str1977 ^(talk) 20:58, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

This kind of statement baffles me from both the perspective of Wikipedia's mission statement and just overall the entire concept of language and its evolution. Words are not handed down to us from on high, they emerge naturally as people use them, and those words then change over time thanks to linguistic drift.

Just because a pronoun is made up doesn't make it not a real word, for the same reason that just because the word "yeet" is made up doesn't make it not a real word. Words are words because people use them, not because some higher authority decided they are words. IcarusAvery (talk) 23:04, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

@IcarusAvery: True in Engliish, though not in e.g. French, where there actually is a governing body (the Académie Française) that holds authority over the official definition of the language, and is responsible for deciding which words are standard French and which are not.

You're correct, though, that the English language is entirely defined by usage. English dictionaries are reactive, not prescriptive: They document the evolving language after-the-fact, based on usage encountered "in the wild". New words enter the English language the same way every existing word did: when it becomes common usage. There is no such thing as a closed word class — what an utter "phantasy".

(I especially love it when people use the phrase "made-up words", like that somehow makes a word not "real". ALL words are made up!) FeRDNYC (talk) 01:18, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Let's not be silly. I do not believe for one second that you do not know that what is meant is "recently made up words", i.e. MOS:NEOLOGISMS. The objection is to their lack of broad acceptance in the language, not to the fact that someone coined them, because of course everything in language was ultimately coined by someone at some time. You're basically engaging in a fallacy of equivocation and a subtle form of straw man, in attacking a carefully selected meaning of a phrase when everyone here knows that it was not the intended meaning.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:31, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

(Wikipedia's List of language regulators is quite long, and amazingly enough English appears to be the only firm "None" on the list! Though there are surely many other languages that are "None"s by omission.) FeRDNYC (talk) 01:27, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

How do you discern which are satire and which are not? —DIYeditor (talk) 21:31, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

@DIYeditor: how do you discern whether a public figure stating their birthday is satire? (Example of satire: James Acaster on Sunday Brunch.) WP:BLPSELFPUB with a dose of WP:IAR suffices. There's nothing special about pronouns. — Bilorv (talk) 10:53, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

Cisgender gay male ally of transgender and nonbinary people here: To start with, using "they" instead of whatever pronoun a given nonbinary person has prescribed for use for themselves isn't misgendering them. Calling someone "they" instead of "ze" or "ter" or "xe" or any of the other forms that have been proposed over the years isn't misgendering them, it's simply failing to, or refusing to, use an idiosyncratic pronoun. "Ze" doesn't imply a different gender from "they", they both convey that the referent individual falls outside of the male-female dichotomy.

Setting aside that terminological comment: Over the years there were various proposals for nonbinary pronouns. A long time ago I read a claim that the community seemed to be settling on "ze", "zir", "zeir". That seemed great to me. But in the end, the consensus came around to the reuse of the plural pronoun. I've always thought that was dumb, by the way, but that's the reality of it, and in English it's a fait accompli that "they" has become the nonbinary pronoun.

Suppose that in 1950, a self-identifying cisgender man had announced that he wanted to be referred to as "zoom" instead of "he"—expecting people to remember it (and also to remember similar requests from many other people, if self-tailored pronouns were to become the fashion), and being offended if people didn't know or didn't remember or chose to ignore his preference. It would have been asking an awful lot. It would have amounted to his having unilaterally declared, based on his own preference, a transfer of pronouns out of the realm of grammar and, like people's names, into the realm of individual identification. To me, the idea seems impractical and unreasonable.

That being my view in that scenario, it isn't different for nonbinary people. For that reason, I support uniformly using "they" for nonbinary people on Wikipedia. It's the established pronoun for that purpose. If they say they're being misgendered by that, I consider that to be an objectively false assessment of the situation. Largoplazo (talk) 22:12, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't mean to be rude - I'm sure you're arguing in good faith and don't have any malice here - but as someone who was there when using "they/them" pronouns was considered contentious (to be frank, they still are, just not as severely) hearing the phrase "if they say they're being misgendered by that, I consider that to be an objectively false assessment of the situation" feels very much like that old meme "I thought was experiencing transphobia, but thank God I had this cis person here to tell me I'm wrong."

You (that's a general "you", not you specifically) do not get to decide if someone else isn't actually being misgendered. Using "they/them" for someone who you know uses "fae/faer" or whatever is equivalent to and just as bad as using "they/them" for someone who you know uses "she/her" or using "she/her" or "he/him" for someone who you know uses "they/them." You are actively denying someone a part of their identity. If someone uses neopronouns exclusively, those are the pronouns you use for that person.

In the case of "this person uses multiple sets of pronouns, some neopronouns and some more traditional ones" I can see the argument being made to primarily use the more traditional ones (especially using just a single set of them) in formal writing like Wikipedia just for ease of reading, but if Jane Doe over here uses "fae/faer" and no other pronouns, using "they/them" for faer is misgendering faer unless fae comes out and says "I don't personally consider that to be misgendering me" or something along those lines. IcarusAvery (talk) 23:14, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but - no. "They" is a perfectly acceptable neutral pronoun to use in a catch-all capacity. Wiki editors (and people in general) are not expected to remember and recite any esoteric, obscure, and even conjured neopronoun. "They" is, by its very nature, a neutral way to refer to anyone. — Czello ^(music) 23:24, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

More generally, Wikipedia readers cannot be expected to be able to read and understand made-up and non-standard words. That is why MOS:NEO states that neologisms "should generally be avoided". Neopronouns are by their nature neologisms. Singular they is not; it has many centuries of history of usage. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:20, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure WP:NEO should apply to neopronouns, personally, and I think the policy at MOS:NEOPRONOUN may eventually come to be seen as stuffy and behind-the-times. But, that's probably to be expected, as it's an encyclopedia's job to be a little bit stuffy, and relatively slow to react to changes in the world.

(Because, the world is changing, in terms of its views on personal pronouns. It doesn't really matter what people of my generation think. (I'm 48.) We'll all be dead any moment now — on a geological time scale — and many younger minds have very different views on this subject in particular. Those views will likely come to dominate, eventually.)

And TBH, I actually find it refreshing that the world at large — even the older generations, for the most part — have grown to embrace singular "they" as readily and as widely as we collectively have. There was a time, even just 10, 20 years ago, when you'd have had people arguing that the only singular pronouns are "he"/"him" and "she"/"her". All bases are covered by those two, they'd have insisted, and when in doubt just use "he"/"him" because patriarchy. We've already come a long way since then, actually, and only fairly recently. FeRDNYC (talk) 02:14, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

As a principal editor of MoS for over a decade, I can assure you that neopronouns were definitely part of the rationale behind MOS:NEO; they are not excluded for a reason. You're possibly correct that "MOS:NEOPRONOUN may eventually come to be seen as stuffy and behind-the-times"; all of MOS:GENDERID once did, as did several other MoS passages that have since changed (including MOS:POSS and MOS:JR, etc.). They changed when real-world practice had overwhelmingly changed, and these changes were then reflected in the academic-leaning style guides that MoS is actually based on (Chicago, Garner's, Oxford/Hart's, Fowler's). That hasn't happened yet with neo-pronouns and quite possibly never will, because changing the inflectional morphology of a language, including very basic words like pronouns, is extraordinarily difficult to engineer. (It's linguistically very different from coining a new noun, verb, or phrase.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:06, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to echo IcarusAvery and say that misgendering is something that's defined by the individual, not by your personal opinion on what constitutes misgendering. people use neopronouns because they want to be referred to by neopronouns. if they were okay with they/them pronouns then they would use they/them pronouns instead of or in addition to neopronouns. you may not agree that this is the case, but it is harmful to use they/them pronouns to refer to someone who, for example, comes out as a trans woman and expresses that she wants to be referred to with she/her pronouns. she's told you what her pronouns are and intentionally using different pronouns (outside of situations where you would use they/them pronouns for anyone) is probably going to feel like misgendering to her. the same goes for people who use neopronouns.

I would support a proposal to use neopronouns for people who use neopronouns. I understand the reasons we don't do so now but I don't think it ultimately makes sense that we're drawing arbitrary lines about whose pronouns we respect. Tekrmn (talk) 05:21, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

That means "misgendering" under your personal definition – which is clearly not the one in general use in the language, frankly – would be an idiolect matter, and WP is not and cannot be written in idiolects, or readers will not understand the material. This is very closely (via the concept of microaggressions, etc.) tied to the notion that "an attack" or "violence" is entirely defined by the alleged victim. This is a sometimes a useful notion in entirely individual contexts such as a psychotherapy session ("all trauma is trauma", "your feelings are valid", etc.) but has no applicability to more objective contexts like legal systems or encyclopedia writing; you don't get to randomly punish other people for "attacking" or "doing violence" to you that are not more objectively defined as attacks or violence by the community/society in which you are operating.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:15, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

you brought this topic to my talk page, where you said you weren't interested in continuing to engage with me on it. I have no interest in continuing to discuss this with you either, so I'd appreciate if you would not seeking out previous comments I've made on the subject, or otherwise try to continue a discussion with me on it. Tekrmn (talk) 06:56, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

This is a public discussion page. You cannot expect what you assert here to go unaddressed. Discussion and consensus formation does not work that way. There is no "right to speak your mind unchallenged on Wikipedia". And the behaviorial issues I raised in user-talk are completely severable from the substantive matters I am addressing above; they're barely related at all. And you directly asked me to come to your talk page about these matters[26], and even said "if you can clarify why you feel it [Tekrmn behavior in this topic] is any of those things [objections SMcCandlish made to that behavior] I'd be more than happy to consider any insight you might provide"[27]. I did so rather patiently, even identifying exactly which wording came across as aspersion-casting and name-calling, and how to avoid that; but then you just censored the entire thread away without comment. So, this is coming off as just a bit disingenuous, along WP:1HAND lines.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:26, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

you've already addressed the very same assertion on this talk page, without responding to any of my other points and while accusing me of a myriad of logical fallacies and then going on to accuse me of a myriad of bad faith behavior.

your summary of the events is pretty seriously edited. Tekrmn (talk) 17:40, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't see what point you're trying to make. Yes, my editing is usually serious. Yes, I raised a behaviorial point here, and you said you'd rather discuss it in user talk so I took it there, then after offering to engage you did the opposite. (And having said my piece I had dropped the behavioral matter entirely.) I'm now trying to address content-specific matters here, but you're dragging our attention back toward to the behavioral dispute. Is there any kind of point to doing that?  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:52, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

again, a mischaracterization of what happened, but my point is that I'd like you to stop seeking out every possible opportunity to start an argument with me. Tekrmn (talk) 22:01, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying that you’re unable to address SmC’s comments on your “misgendering” statements. —Locke Cole • t • c 23:02, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

there have been points raised about the practicality of using neopronouns when many of our readers do not speak english as a first language, which I found quite compelling, so there's no reason for me to continue this discussion. being "unable to address" another editor's comments is far from the only reason one might not engage with said editor, especially when the discussions have been contentious. Tekrmn (talk) 23:11, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

If you have nothing to add you could simply stop replying? —Locke Cole • t • c 23:16, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

In your argument you conflate the pronoun with the gender. If your analysis is correct, is there one gender to which all people who wish to be referred to as "they" belong, one gender to which all people who wish to be referred to as "fae" belong, and are those different genders? I suspect not. Conversely, if there is a gender (other than male or female) with which multiple people identify and, of those people, some wish to be referred to as "they" and some as "fae", then, since my premise is that they're of the same gender, how can using "they" for someone of that gender who prefers "fae", or vice versa, be misgendering them when both pronouns are in use to refer to people of that same gender?

It's the same as the cis man I put forth in my previous remarks who wants to be referred to as "zoom". He isn't denying that he's male, a man. Therefore, no matter how upset he might get when people go right on referring to him as "he", any argument by the self-identifying male that he's being "misgendered" when he's referred to using the standard pronoun for referring to self-identifying males is counterfactual. Largoplazo (talk) 02:21, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Colloquially, referring to someone using the wrong pronouns, like ascribing the wrong gender identity to them, is an act of "misgendering". It's not literal, since you can't actually gender someone... how would that even work? But in languages (like English) where certain pronouns are traditionally associated with certain genders, pointing to someone and saying, "this man", or using "sir", "he", or "him" to refer to that person, when they don't identify as a male using he/him pronouns, all constitut pretty much the same offense.

How (or whether) that extends to other pronouns that don't necessarily fall into those traditional gender divides — like singular "they" — is a topic of discussion and debate. There's no definitive answer on that, and opinions will vary. But holding up someone your strawman and claiming zoom is wrong or being logically inconsistent simply because zoom's views on pronouns and gendering are different from your own feels like a losing one. FeRDNYC (talk) 07:08, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

(Already regretting not using "strawperson".) FeRDNYC (talk) 07:14, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

If that's what "misgendering" means colloquially, then when you say I'm "misgendering" somebody by using a pronoun that isn't the one they prefer, all you're saying is that I'm using a pronoun that isn't the one they prefer, which is vastly different from what I understand that word to mean, which is to assign them to the wrong gender. The latter is to deny their gender, which is wrong; the former is simply not to go along with an idiosyncratic demand that is independent of gender. Yet your use of that word implies that I'm committing the former. That's a deception. It sounded like you were telling me I was doing something bad, but now you're telling me is that all you're doing is restating what I'd already said using in different terms.

It reminds me of something the comedy writer Alan King once wrote (paraphrasing here): "When my lawyer found out I didn't have a will, he said, 'Alan, don't you realize that if you die without a will, you can die intestate?' He scared the hell out of me until I looked up 'intestate' in the dictionary and found out it means 'dying without leaving a will'. So this genius was telling me that if I die without leaving a will, I'm going to die without leaving a will. That gem cost me $20." (Lawyers' billing rates were much lower in 1961 than they are now.) As in Alan King's story, you used the word "misgender" in a way that implied I was doing something that should be of concern. Then it turned out it only meant that I was doing what I'd already acknowledged I was doing. Basically, this colloquial usage has rendered the word powerless, which is not really a result that you want if you also want to be able to use it to refer to actual misgendering, which I agree is a problem. If people have extended the meaning of the word in that manner, then they've shot it the foot. It should no longer be used in discourse because it can be used to mean one thing while sounding like it means something else. Avoid the word altogether and say what you actually mean. Am I saying we shouldn't feel obliged to memorize new pronouns for people who want to invent them for themselves? Yes. Am I calling a nonbinary person a man or a woman? No. Let's keep that distinction clear. Alternatively, let everyone agree to stop using "misgender" for this new, "colloquial" meaning. It's rhetorically sloppy.

It's like calling anyone who opposes the current policies of the Israeli government (as I do) anti-Semitic. That conflates Judaism, the nation of Israel, and the current policies of the Israeli government into a single thing. I'm proudly Jewish and I support the existence of Israel. To call me anti-Semitic is absurd. To justify it by explaining to me that "colloquially, 'anti-Semitism' is used to mean anyone who opposes today's Israeli treatment of Palestinians" doesn't lessen the absurdity.

My "zoom" example isn't a strawman, it's an analogy that's exactly on point. The rules of rational discourse apply to those of us who are in various non-privileged categories (two of which pertain to me) as much as it does to cisgender male white Christian people. Largoplazo (talk) 11:03, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Using singular-they for people who use recently made-up "pronouns" isn't "misgendering", it's become normal everyday English practice for both indeterminate cases and as a socially acceptable way to avoid neopronouns. It is also the only way our material is going to be parseable by everyone. We cannot expect readers to understand completely random strings like "xe", "hirm", "fae", "tree" (yes, that's a real case), or whatever as pronouns. And writing like we're on our personal Facebook page will just bring the project into disrepute.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:07, 23 July 2023 (UTC); edited to include the obvious "recently", to put a stop to pointless "all words are made up" responses. 02:59, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I'd love to see a source stating that it's normal and socially acceptable to intentionally misgender people.

I don't think it's crazy to expect our readers to comprehend the use of neopronouns if we state at the beginning of the article that the person uses neopronouns. we're not even asking them to be able to use the neopronouns themselves, they only need to recognize that any of the given 3-4 words refer to the subject. if our readers can't comprehend simple word association we have bigger issues.

also not seeing any connection between neopronouns and the linked policy.

I hardly think that following in the footsteps of harvard university (in 2015 for that matter), the new york times, and many other well-respected organizations and institutions would bring wikipedia to disrepute. Tekrmn (talk) 05:49, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't respond to ridiculous straw man fallacies. Try formulating an actually logical response instead of trying to insult my and everyone else's intelligence.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:29, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I directly responded to the points in your comment so I'm unclear on how that's a straw man fallacy. it was not my intention to attack your or anyone else's intelligence, but to point out that your argument that neopronouns are too confusing doesn't bear much weight. I apologize for the way it landed. Tekrmn (talk) 15:54, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Characterizing other editors and external writers as "stating that it's normal and socially acceptable to intentionally misgender people", when what they actually said is that using singular-they is acceptable as a default and as an alternative to neo-pronouns, is a raging straw man, and also a mix of circular reasoning, begging the question, argument from repetition and ipse dixit. The idea that using singular-they broadly is "misgendering" is your own proposition, which you have failed to prove to much of anyone's satisfaction, and just saying it over and over again isn't going to convince anyone.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:32, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

feel free to refer to my answer to this same point that you posed on my talk page. Tekrmn (talk) 00:10, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Done, on the behavioral matters. More source research, on the substance of what you wrote above:

Extended content

NYT doesn't routinely (or even at all so far as I've seen, and I've been looking for some time) actually use neopronouns; they just happened to have published an opinion piece about them [28] (and publishing articles about stuff, whether the publisher agrees with it or not, is kind of what newspapers exist for). Fox News (of course) attacked them for it. [29] NYT strategy has been to avoid using pronouns at all in cases of subjects who use neopronouns (and the publication was predictably attacked for it by activists [30]). Time actually did use neopronouns in one piece (can't find any evidence of later ones) and caught criticism for it, which was reported on by Daily Mail [31] (which says "a co-founder of Wikipedia" was among the critics, which I would guess refers to Larry Sanger since it sounds out-of-character for Jimbo). Irish Times published something similar [32]; I've not run into any major reaction material about it (which kind of surprises me due to Ireland's majority Catholicism). NBC News published some more straightforward reporting on neopronouns and they [33] (and notably used techniques like repeating the surname, and using they, rather than actually using the neopronouns in the publication's own voice). Other mainstream newspapers have published what amount to counter-essays (e.g. [34], [35] (pushback from a civil liberties expert), and this one [36] which indicates push-back within the LGBTQIA+ community itself (though this one is a regional not national paper). A more neutral piece [37] from a regional NBC News affilliate covers the long history of neopronouns, which go back further than people think; the take-away from this is that attempts to institute them since the 19th century have failed. It notably also shows that even close family members of TG/NB people have lasting trouble with pronoun changes. BuzzFeed News does not use neopronouns [38], and quotes AP Stylebook as the "authority" for why: "[Do] not use neopronouns such as xe or zim; they are rarely used and are unrecognizable as words to general audiences." That is certainly the main WP concern. (I don't own the current edition [39], so I don't know if AP has changed on this in the interim.) Speaking of AP, their newswire article here addresses neopronouns without recommending them and says "They are not widely used and are unfamiliar to many people, but they do offer the benefit of grammatical clarity" versus singular-they (but WP editors already have years of practice at using they without producing confusing constructions, so we don't care about that last point, which from a linguistic perspective is extremely dubious to begin with, since there is no basis for interpreting the function or nature of a word that is not recognized as a word!). It also notes that GLAAD and NLGJA both recommend to "use the pronouns that people request" (i.e. probably including neopronouns); this is telling: both are activistic organizations, and AP is defying them, despite otherwise being often over-eager to adopt "progressive" language-reform ideas. This was published after the current edition of AP Stylebook so it probably has not changed on this matter (next edition comes out in 2025 or maybe late 2024). All that said, dredging up competing examples of "what some newspaper or news style guide is doing" is rarely actually useful to do in MoS discussions, because MoS is not based on news style, as a matter of policy (WP:NOT#NEWS, "Wikipedia is not written in news style"). However, exploring this at least demonstrates a few things: mainstream journalism is not broadly jumping on the neopronoun bandwagon, beyond just observing it as a phenomenon, and brief forays into that territory tend to result in controversy (which most news publishers that are not far-right or far-left try strenuously to avoid). On Harvard University: What I'm finding is a short backgrounder [40] on pronouns including neopronouns, which they tellingly refer to as "personal gender pronouns" (i.e., it is a matter of idiolect as I've said elsewhere); but the page's purpose is simply "a reference that provides basic working definitions to facilitate shared discussions"; it is not a policy that Harvard is officially going to write with neopronouns or make students use them. The links on that page that go to other Harvard resources don't help your case; they don't advise neopronouns. The one here says "Commonly used pronouns include: she/her/hers, he/him/his, they/them/theirs" without any mention of neopronouns. Other links there just go to external organizations, most of them activistic about the question. Harvard's workplace inclusivity policy [41] has a section on pronouns, but it does not address neopronouns. Their "Gender Identity and Pronouns" page [42] makes no mention of neopronouns. Their Office for Gender Equity surprisingly has no hits for the word "pronouns" other than staff bios' declarations of particular indiviudals' preferred pronouns [43]. Their "Equity, Diversity, Access, Inclusion, and Belonging" pamphlet [44] mentions a couple of neopronouns, but says nothing that can be interpreted as a policy to use them by the university or to enforce their use by students or faculty. Their Employee Resource Groups subsite, which includes the Harvard LGBTQ+ Faculty and Staff (Queer Employee Resource Group), has no hits for "pronouns" or "pronoun" at all [45]. Their "Creating Gender Inclusive Learning Environments for Transgender and Nonbinary Student" presentation [46] mentions they several times, and mentions the existence of neopronouns without advising anytihng about them (and includes phrasing I think some people here would object to: "non-binary genders (e.g. so-called xenogenders, which do occur albeit infrequently, or neopronouns)". A page on "Creating an inclusive environment for transgender and gender-nonbinary teens" never mentions pronouns [47]. After pretty exhaustive searching, I can find no evidence at all to suggest that Harvard is some bastion of neopronous usage. And as with news style, WP isn't based on some particular academic institution's style anyway, and MoS was not written from any of their style guides (notwithstanding that Chicago Manual of Style is published by the U. of Chicago; it's a style guide for public use, not an internal university style guide).

Anyway, that all took a couple of hours, and I'm going back to working on article content. :-) PS: "if we state at the beginning of the article that the person uses neopronouns" presumes people read our articles from top to bottom like they're reading a book, and we know for a fact from research that this is not true, especially on mobile devices, which now account for over 50% of our usage. We just had an RfC that overhauled our MOS:DUPLINK because of these facts.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:35, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

No one has yet to bring forth evidence that each and every neopronoun maps one-to-one with a unique gender, which is the assumption upon which the charge of misgendering rests. Folly Mox (talk) 07:07, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

"misgendering" is used to denote using the wrong pronouns for someone because mispronouning sounds unpleasant. gender is super individualized, even among cis people. not everyone who uses he/him pronouns is a man and not every man experiences their gender differently. the only thing people who use he/him pronouns necessarily have in common is that they use he/him pronouns. the same is true for any pronouns- an individual feels they fit so they use those pronouns- there's not a one to one relationship between a person's gender and the pronouns they use. it is true that many people experience their gender in ways that are pretty out of the box, which may lead them to use neopronouns. Tekrmn (talk) 16:01, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Saying "they" isn't intentionally misgendering anyone; it's the opposite of that. — Czello ^(music) 07:45, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

To be fair, there are some traditionalists who refuse to use singular they and feel misgendered when they are called "they" rather than "he" or "she". I would still use singular they for such people in cases where I am referring to them generically or when I am trying to conceal their identity, but I think that in cases where one is referring to a specific and known person, known to have such beliefs, it would be appropriate to use "he" or "she" rather than "they".

As for neopronouns: how about, I don't make assumptions about what gender you are and you don't insist that I use a different and unfamiliar dialect of English, with a different vocabulary, than the one I normally speak? Language is a very personal thing, maybe as personal as gender. Imposing it on other people is rude. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:55, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it's called idiolect, and WP is not and cannot be written in it on an article-by-article basis. People with unusual pronoun expectations cannot reasonably expect them to be followed by newspaper writers, TV news anchors, or encyclopedists, because we have an actual huge and diverse audience to deal with. Neo-pronouns are for one's self and one's close circle, who have been informed of them and what they signify. Signification is really at the core of this recurrent and kind of tiresome debate: neo-pronouns signify nothing automatically to anyone, as they are not a part of the learned semi-standardized language; they are idiolect devices that signify something only to a small "inside" crowd. They are thus akin to pet names, nicknames, and other terms of endearment. Things might be different if English adopted a set of near-univerally understood additional pronouns, but this clearly is not going to happen, and even if it did, a large number of TG/NB persons would nevertheless delight in insisting on their own alternative versions anyway. The very fact that some neopronouns were proposed in a rather organized fashion from the late 1960s yet have a) seen nearly no real-world adoption except at a very individual level, and b) led instead to an ever-grown profusion of idiolect neo-pronouns from the 2000s onward, is clear proof of this. (In my own social circle I'm exposed to dozens of neo-pronouns, and notably zero of the people they pertain to are ever offended by a singular-they because all of them are rationale people and quite well aware that there are too many neo-pronouns for anyone to be expected to remember and use them except among their closest circle.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:39, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I think there is already potential confusion for many readers in articles, e.g. where "trans woman" means someone who was born/assigned as a man and may not be a term the reader understands, where "they" maybe be used as both singular and plural when there is an ambiguous referent (this is a major problem on Wikipedia), where "he" or "she" may refer to someone whom the reader does not understand in that sense, etc.

Mightn't neo-pronouns actually be less confusing than ambiguous uses of "they"? —DIYeditor (talk) 17:23, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

No. We resolve this problem where it exists by clarifying the prose. XAM2175 ^(T) 17:38, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

So there is no case where it could be useful to have neopronouns in an article? We need to have a blanket policy against it? —DIYeditor (talk) 17:51, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

The only example I can think of is where we make a one-off mention of their neopronouns. I cannot imagine it would make for a good article for us to use them throughout. — Czello ^(music) 18:09, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Yes. We're already doing the one-off mentioning, and it is sufficient.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:32, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I generally agree with this position, but such a broad generalisation as a large number of TG/NB persons would nevertheless delight in insisting on their own alternative versions anyway strikes me as unnecessarily pointed and derisive. XAM2175 ^(T) 17:37, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish please strike your derisive comment about your fellow editors (myself included). EvergreenFir (talk) 17:44, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I had to read it twice, and do not see anything I'd consider "derisive". Care to elaborate? Otherwise, please strike the false claim. —Locke Cole • t • c 17:47, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@Locke Cole - as highlighted by XAM2175, the comment "a large number of TG/NB persons would nevertheless delight in insisting on their own alternative versions anyway" is derisive. We don't need drawn out versions of calling people snowflakes. EvergreenFir (talk) 17:51, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I think it's a stretch, especially considering there are new/recent users here that appear to be following the letter if not the spirit of WP:RGW and WP:NOTHERE with endless arguments about GENDERID "issues" (I put it in quotes because IMO there is no issue; follow the reliable sources and apply DUE as necessary; most of MOS:GENDERID is wholly unnecessary instruction creep as it is, adding to it is simply going to create even more potential for conflict). Maybe SMcCandlish's comment belongs in an AN/I or ARBCOM discussion, but ignoring behavior and the WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality on display is disruptive to the project. We're not here to change the world beyond providing a free and open source for knowledge. —Locke Cole • t • c 20:22, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I agree that this is an area with many WP:RGW folks. And I myself get annoyed with the pronoun police. But dealing with those editors is part of the "job" as admin and long term editors. That still doesn't give SMcCandlish the right to call me, fellow editors, and the many good-faith editors on this topic snowflakes who would delight in forcing people to use "made up pronouns". EvergreenFir (talk) 21:21, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

There's nothing "derisive" in noting that people enjoy and take pride in their self-identification and activism activities. Pride Month is called that, and is a big fun affair for almost everyone concerned, for a reason. I'll remind you that I'm under the LGBTQIA+ banner myself (I just spent the last two weekend staffing booths at related events!). I don't need censorious "you're not being left the way I insist the left should be" lecturing from other people under the same tent. The far right is on the rise for a reason, and that reason is that the left keeps attacking itself over insipid, doctrinaire, language-policing squabbles, and this topic area is a nasty mire in large part because of that holier-than-thou behavior. PS: Trying hard to find offense in what other editors write is a form of assuming bad faith.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:32, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@EvergreenFir: And I never called anyone a "snowflake" (which is just your dog-whistle way of trying to imply that I'm a rightwinger – your attempt to cast me as some kind of socio-political ideological "enemy" to go after is unbecoming an administrator). I also never said anyting about "forcing people" to do anything. You're making up bald-faced bullshit out of nowhere. It's ad hominem and guilt by association character-assassination nonsense, and you know it.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:32, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Your tone and message in that original comment do not match how 2 other editors have interpreted it. I don't think I am the one trying hard for anything. Regardless, I'm clearly more on your side with the "insipid, doctrinaire, language-policing squabbles" concerns (see my comment below). EvergreenFir (talk) 22:28, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I agree that my actual tone and message don't agree with 2 other editors' personal interpretations. I'm not responsible for how other people bend over backwards to misinterpret things and then to cast people they disagree with on something as ideological "enemies". I will not be browbeaten into self-censoring on a matter like this. Implication and inference are not synonyms.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:38, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: to say that I'm unimpressed by this full-throttle descent into assumptions of bad faith would be a major understatement, and it's a ridiculously overblown response to a simple suggestion of mine that you had incorporated a single potentially offensive line into a statement of opinion that I otherwise broadly endorsed. Please consider the full sentence that you wrote: Things might be different if English adopted a set of near-univerally understood additional pronouns, but this clearly is not going to happen, and even if it did, a large number of TG/NB persons would nevertheless delight in insisting on their own alternative versions anyway.

I suggest that this could be read as you passing judgment on trans and NB people in bulk, because their gleefully coining yet more pronouns would frustrate a resolution to the issue that you believe would otherwise be satisfactory. In such a reading, the actual meaning you've subsequently given – that people enjoy and take pride in their self-identification and activism activities – is entirely absent; replaced by something that can be read as far more derogatory, more of a cheap drive-by shot at a group of which it could appear that you disapprove.

I note with some disappointment that your response to this suggestion appears to echo that which on a previous occasion lead to no small amount of contention within the community and resulted in your publishing this lengthy explanatory essay, in which – amongst a certain number of polemical points on the same lines as your responses above – you do ultimately acknowledge that you failed to consider that your audience might not interpret your writing and understand your meaning and intent as you yourself did.

I would further note that @Locke Cole also appears to have interpreted your original post as being negative in nature, as EvergreenFir and myself did. The major difference, however, is that he appears to believe that the negativity is not only defensible but perhaps even appropriate, and at the very least good enough to act as a COATRACK for his feelings on GENDERID as a whole. That he seems to view such a derisory generalisation as being proportionate in countering what he describes as a [disruptive] WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality from a handful of new/recent users here is somewhat concerning. XAM2175 ^(T) 21:12, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't feel a compelling need to be impressed by what you're unimpressed by. "this could be read as you passing judgment on trans and NB people in bulk ... a group of which it could appear that you disapprove" is more leaping to the worst possible conclusion about what another editor wrote and basically engaging in character assassination to make a point; i.e., it's blatant assumption of bad faith at bare mimimum. I agree that it's "concerning" when people rampantly misinterpret material and bend it to toward their own prejudices; I'm just concerned about more than one editor doing it in more than one direction, while you're only apparently concerned with a single editor doing it in a direction that doesn't agree with your position. I'm more evenhanded in my dismissal of fallacious, word-twisting, and motive-assuming nonsense.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:47, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

All words in English are made up words SMcCandlish, and those that eventually enter the dictionary do so because of their use by others, and not because some body has decreed them to be so. That's not really a strong argument against using neopronouns over singular they. I also don't see the relevance of WP:NOTFACEBOOK here, as we're not discussing an article or user page that's being used as a personal web page or blog.

A stronger argument for or against using neopronouns would be by referring to relevant styleguides. It's important to remember that Wikipedia follows the sources, and doesn't lead the sources. The current edition of the AP Stylebook (sorry, no direct link to this but it is available on Kindle Unlimted) recommends against using neopronouns, and instead recommends using they/them/their. The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage hasn't been updated since 2015, and doesn't appear to include any relevant guidance on pronouns. I'm not able to access the current edition of the Reuters' Handbook. The NLGJA Association of LGBTQ Journalists stylebook states that neopronoun use is acceptable but may require additional explanations due to a lack of familiarity. GLAAD's Media Reference Guide recommends using the pronouns that the person uses, including neopronouns. The Trans Journalists Association style guide recommends using a quick, appositive phrase mentioning their pronouns for neopronouns at their first instance and seems to imply that it's OK to use them. The Canadian Government's language portal recommends use of neopronouns, following the guidance of the individual who uses them, even when unfamiliar.

So it seems the styleguides are split. Some recommend using neopronouns, some don't, and some don't mention them either way. Those that are more LGBT focused tend to have stronger recommendations for neopronoun usage. Back in October 2022 we had a well attended RfC on the use of neopronouns in articles, and my feelings on the use of neopronouns hasn't shifted since then. I am still uncomfortable with using they/them pronouns for folks who use only neopronouns, and I am very sympathetic to the arguments put forward for why we should be doing more than mentioning them and actually using them in our articles. However, while there are instances of reliable sources, like Time, using neopronouns in their articles, and even with my preference for using them in mind, I'm not sure if enough general purpose styleguides recommend their usage yet. This is likely to change over time though, if and when their usage becomes more common. The AP Stylebook is due for renewal some time next year, and I would be interested to see if it has a shift in guidance. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:48, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

These are mostly style guides with no or virtually no influence on MoS anyway, and concluding that "styleguides are split" by including explicitly language-change-activistic ones is rather misleading (it's a lot like arguing that MOS:DOCTCAPS is wrong because it conflicts with Christian (or insert other religion here) style guides). GLAAD is rather overwhelmingly an advocacy organization (hell, at my old activism job, we hired GLAAD's former exec. dir. to take over an online activism role I was moving out of :-). It would be much more relevant to see whether Chicago Manual of Style and other academic style guides in their next editions suddenly start supporting neo-pronouns. Regardless, I think you're misinterpreting the TJA material as more activistic on this matter than it actually is; it is really advising what MoS is also already advising (without any recourse to TJA): to briefly mention their neopronouns. We've been doing that since the early 2010s at least (e.g. at Genesis P-Orridge).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:23, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm a little concerned that you seem to be judging styleguides that allow for or recommend the use of neopronouns as "activistic". That doesn't really seem helpful here.

As for the academic styleguides, you're right, it slipped my mind to include them. For the big three: The Chicago Manual of Style is one I don't currently have access to, but they seem to slow at adopting singular they and generally recommend rewriting sentences to avoid pronoun use entirely so I doubt they have any guidance. If you or any other editor has access though, quoting from paragraphs 5.48 and 5.255 may be helpful here. The 9th edition of the MLA Handbook, for English language writing, states writers writers should follow the personal pronoun of individuals they write about, if individuals' pronouns are known, which seems inclusive though it doesn't explicitly mention neopronouns anywhere. I don't have access to the current edition of the APA Publication Manual, however a supplementary entry on their website endorses use of singular they because it is inclusive of all people and helps writers avoid making assumptions about gender.

That being said, of these three styleguides I would note that some universities and university libararies, like University of Alberta, Indiana University Bloomington, and University of Sydney see all three guides as either being permissive or requiring the use of all personal pronouns, including neopronouns, where the person's pronouns are known. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:24, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

The CMoS material is too much to quote directly. Quite a large block of material. In summary....

Extended content

5.48 says singular they is common but informal and is "only lately showing signs of gaining acceptance in formal writing", but: "When referring specifically to a person who does not identify with a gender-specific pronoun, however, they and its forms are often preferred." Also "In general, a person's stated preference for a specific pronoun should be respected." The section mentions the existence of "gender-neutral" (specifically) neopronouns, without naming any of them, but does not advise for or against them. (That is rather odd, honestly, until one finds a condemnation in a later section, but then it gets weirder, with what reads like an "un-condemnation" a section later). Section 5.255 ("Techniques for achieving gender neutrality") is even longer that 5.48. In summary it advises (as mutual alternatives): omit the pronoun; repeat the noun; use a plural antecedent to eliminate the need for a singular pronoun; use an article instead of a pronoun; use one; use relative pronoun who[m]; use imperative mood ("A lifeguard must keep a close watch ..." – not applicable to WP per WP:NOT#ADVICE); use the phrase he or she "in moderation"; revise the sentence to avoid personal pronouns entirely. Oddly, it never mentions repeating the name (usually surname), a technique we use frequently. Section 5.256 is also fairly long; advises avoiding it, of course ("with very limited exceptions", acknowledging sotto voce that a very small number of TG/NB people prefer the term); says to avoid clumsy constructions like (s)he and (wo)man; says to avoid neopronouns: "Clumsy artifices like ... genderless pronouns have been tried—for many years—with no success. They won't succeed. And those who use them invite credibility problems." Also says anybody and someone often don't work; reiterates that they/their have become common in informal usage but are not fully accepted yet [2016] in formal writing, especially for cases where the gender is unknown (rewrite instead), but here actually advises its use for subjects who explicitly identify with they/them. This passage can also be read as directly contradicting 5.255 in advising again that "such preference should generally be respected", right after mentioning both declared singular-they yet also "or some other gender-neutral singular pronoun". It'll be interesting to see if they resolve this direct conflict of advice in the next edition (but I would not hold your breath; there are outright factual errors in CMoS that have persisted since at least the 12th edition!). If MLA doesn't address neopronouns, then it doesn't. There can hardly be any issue in English usage that is more fraught with debate than this question; to a large proportion of English-speakers, neopronouns don't actually constitute pronouns or English at all. So, if MLA was meant to include neopronouns, it rather obviously would have been explicit about it. The UAlberta thing is not a university style guide, it's a "Community" section blog post by one of their librarians, and is clearly activistic in intent, as is clear from its introduction. And it mischaracterizes the Chicago position, so I don't trust it on the MLA or APA material either without reading them in detail myself. It says "it is always appropriate to use any pronouns for an individual when it is known" [sic] and "This can include common pronouns, as well as newer pronouns (also known as neopronouns)." But we already know Chicago is self-contradictory on the matter and that MLA doesn't address neo-pronouns at all. Of ALA, this piece says that guide says to use they "when referring to someone whose gender is unknown", which is not an endorsement of neoprouns. So, this is clearly not a reliable source on usage, for several reasons; if this person were writing such material at Wikipedia, we would revert their changes as original research that badly distorts the source material. The UIndiana piece is another student-librarian opinion piece, not a university style guide. While it does not appear to directly mischaracterize the advice in major style guides, it leaps to examples of using neopronouns as if they had been recommended by the cited sources, which they were not (and just gives two of them, implying they in particular have wide acceptance, which is not true). It correctly [as far as I know – I don't own the current APA] summarized that Chicago, MLA, and APA admit of sigular-they when gender is unknown, and even gets right that MLA and Chicago both consider it "informal". Anyway, like the other library post, this one is clearly not even intended as a style guide but is a summary (reasonaly accurate in this case but not the other) of other style guides we already consult, so not evidentiary of anything. The USYD material is an actual style guide, not for an entire institution but for "library-created content". It's an in-house booklet. It is also activistic, in aligning with the notion that not using neopronouns is "misgendering", an idea that the community at Wikipedia has clearly not accepted, and which isn't reflected in widespread and growing use of singular-they as a neopronoun replacement across English-language writing. It relies heavily on a UNC-Greensboro piece [48] of uncertain authority at that institution, which is advocacy material of specific (Spivak, etc). neopronouns among the student body. I don't think it's informative for this debate, as it doesn't reflect anything like a broad cultural consensus but is trying to engineer changed local behavior.

 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:48, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Wow, the CMOS stuff does sound like a right mess! I wonder if this was something that was added to piecemeal, with older parts not being updated as newer parts were added.

One elided quote there did stand out to me though; "Clumsy artifices like ... genderless pronouns have been tried—for many years—with no success. They won't succeed. And those who use them invite credibility problems." I find it kinda shocking that such a strong genuinely activistic statement bordering on ridicule is in this styleguide. It's one thing to say something like "genderless pronouns are unfamiliar to most and should not be used in academic writing", but to say that any attempt at using them won't succeed is very gatekeepery, and to say that any who use them invite credibility problems is the sort of statement that would bring a style guide into disrepute.

It's a very different sort of statement entirely than saying "when writing about a person, use the pronouns the person uses". Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:05, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Comment - For the very few biographies where person has neopronouns such as xe/xim, we can handle these on a case-by-case basis. Using they/them is appropriate given that neopronouns are, by definition, novel and not widely adapted. As an encyclopedia, we must make our content as accessible as possible. To avoid using they/them, use the person's surname or moniker. Inclusion of the neopronouns belongs in a prose section. EvergreenFir (talk) 17:49, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Maybe a header template that indicates neopronouns are used in the article and what they mean? I don't see a great deal of harm in this, as long as the neopronouns aren't words that would make writing prose ambiguous or just plain impossible ("the" or such I guess). —DIYeditor (talk) 17:56, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't see why would use esoteric and non-standard English when "they" works just fine. — Czello ^(music) 18:10, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I find "they" confusing in many cases but I may just be old (even though I have occasionally used "they" this way my whole life I guess). It's too bad we couldn't have made a neopronoun to cover all cases of singular pronouns with indefinite gender. —DIYeditor (talk) 18:15, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Our readers generally do not read hatnotes and other header templates, and they're going to be missing from most WP:REUSE of our content, along with other WP-specific templates.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:23, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. A hatnote would likely not solve anything. EvergreenFir (talk) 22:30, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Neopronouns are not standard English, and we're writing for a global audience, where half our readers speak English as a second language. The singular "they" is fine. Using something like "xer" is going to be many times more confusing than using the singular they. GMG^talk 18:22, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Sorry if this has been asked somewhere above and I missed it, but do we have any instance where a Wikipedia article discusses someone who takes neopronouns and has said that they are uncomfortable with they/them? In such cases, it seems reasonable to just avoid pronouns entirely, as is occasionally done with historical figures of disputed gender identity. This is consistent with the current wording of MOS:NEOPRONOUN: This was discussed at the RfC, and AFAIK is the reason we have a "generally" in there. (That section was written mostly by me and RfC closer Red-tailed hawk; I forget which of us added that particular word, but I think we were in agreement there was no 100% requirement of using they/them rather than avoiding pronouns.) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 00:47, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I remember that there was at least one such case, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was. Sorry that's not very helpful. I even remember having (at least twice) done an editing pass on some article to do things like repeat the surname or other noun, and rewrite sentences otherwise to avoid need for a pronoun, but it was several years ago.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:52, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Well what it sounds like is that so far in this thread, no one is arguing that we must use they/them even when someone objects to it. Surname-only is an option, and the global consensus doesn't even entirely rule out using neopronouns in some special edge case. (I could see an argument for exceptions for synopses of fictional works like Provenance where such pronouns are standard in-universe, although I guess that's arguably not covered by MOS:BIO.) So I concur with others in this thread that using they/them in lieu of neopronouns does not inherently constitute misgendering—while acknowledging that in certain cases it might, and can be dealt with case-by-case while still complying with the current guidance. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 02:58, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Agreed (other than with "acknowledging that in certain cases it might"; it would probably be more accurate to say that in certain cases, when reliable sources demonstrate that particular subject has actually expressed opposition to they, to just avoid using it as unnecessary; that doesn't make those who don't agree with this position "misgenderers", an accusation that too many in this thread have been bandying about as if this wasn't a double-WP:CTOP thread). Anyway, see big block of paraphrasing from CMoS above; there are a whole bunch of strategies for writing around the need for pronouns.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:22, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Personally I've never liked surname-only as it generally just leads to bad/clunky writing. I'd probably default to they/them in those instances. — Czello ^(music) 09:38, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

As weird as it's gonna be, I'll say this: it is simpler to use they/them. Not everyone who browses enwiki is gonna be 100% fluent in English, and seeing neopronouns might confuse people who don't have English as their first language. I do agree that it should be mentioned somewhere in the article, though. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 03:06, 25 July 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:TNT on GENDERID

Are you fatigued of talking about MOS:GENDERID? Here is a proposal to rewrite the section, which has languished into a poorly worded, somewhat illogical, and confusing mess. It needs to be clearly aligned with policies, reorganized for clarity, and address the various concerns about a social issue that is central to culture war in the west without pissing off everyone. This reorganization will honestly reduce the churning of numerous RFCs and endless debate. I know this because the ONLY reason I'm here is I glanced at it one day and was surprised at how far it deviated from standard policy, so decided to stick around and work on it. If it is reasonably worded and addresses the concerns of most trans-activists, I think it will stop attracting people to change it.

I appreciate BilledMammal's and Loki's attempts above, but I took the wording from BLP of multiple reliable third-party sources because multiple high quality reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person uses "high quality", and it's not well defined on Wikipedia.

On the question of academics and changing names of older publications, I would guess that such a thorough attempt to expunge the former name would make it drop below the threshold of inclusion. And, well, WP:KISS.

Proposed MOS:GID section

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. Any information related to the prior gender of a person, including former names (deadname), should automatically be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the information. Public figures, where multiple reliable third-party sources have documented the information (See WP:PUBLICFIGURE). Individuals who have been deceased for at least two years, where multiple reliable third-party sources have documented the information (See WP:BDP). Unless the individual meets one of the exceptions, information that could reveal a gender transition should not be used in lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, etc., even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. When the individual meets one of the exceptions, information on their gender transition must not be given undue weight or overemphasis, and editors should always err on the side of excluding it. Former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed in the infobox or background section of the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name should use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. In general, respectful extra mentions of the former name or transition should only be used to avoid confusion. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, there may be some difficulty in hiding the information on gender transition. Avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work should not be used.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:32, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

•  Works for me. Folly Mox (talk) 18:52, 21 July 2023 (UTC)
• Agree with this, though The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed in the infobox or background section of the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. should be clarified: if a name is mentioned in an infobox and/or in an article lead, it should also be mentioned in the body of the article. Additionally, pre-transition names are often included in the leads, to help with readers who may have only heard of a person pre-transition, to avoid confusion (e.g. at Chelsea Manning). This is a relatively minor concern, though, so I would still support this over the status quo. Elli (talk | contribs) 19:13, 21 July 2023 (UTC)
• While I don't think this draft is too bad on a quick read, I don't see any need to rewrite the section. The existing wording, as you note, has been subject to tons of RFCs and discussions before and as a consequence is one of the most heavily workshopped sections in the MOS. The idea that it has some major issue despite all that seems patently silly to me.

I also think this draft misunderstands the purpose of concealing a deadname. The point is not to conceal that someone has transitioned at all, the point is to conceal a piece of information that could be wielded by malicious actors. Wikipedia rarely publishes people's current addresses, and like here the privacy concern is not to conceal that they have moved but to prevent someone malicious from taking advantage of that private information. Loki (talk) 19:23, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

Case of mistaken identity. Folly Mox (talk) 19:15, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

User:LokiTheLiar, I remember us being unable to see eye to eye at some previous RfC on this topic, and your use of the term concealing right here helps me understand your position a great deal better. Folly Mox (talk) 19:37, 21 July 2023 (UTC) OK! I gotta say, I don't remember disagreeing with you at a previous RfC, and so I would really like more detail if you have it. Loki (talk) 19:48, 21 July 2023 (UTC) I remember the exchange being something like: Deadnames are not automatically of encyclopaedic interest. What is this other than a well-dressed WP:RGW? A confusingly-dressed WP:TRIVIA? My understanding now is that I have been seeing the matter presuming not including non-notable deadnames, such that they have to pass some bar of encyclopaedic utility to warrant inclusion, where you have been presuming inclusion, and see the matter of leaving out non-notable deadnames as concealing information. Please let me know if I've misrepresented your position, but that's my current understanding. Folly Mox (talk) 22:35, 21 July 2023 (UTC) Am I supposed to be the blue or the purple here? Loki (talk) 18:07, 22 July 2023 (UTC) On searching the phrase "confusingly-dressed WP:TRIVIA", I have found the reason I don't remember this exchange. And that reason is you're confusing me with someone else, specifically Locke Cole at this previous RFC on VPP. Loki (talk) 18:14, 22 July 2023 (UTC) Oh! Oops, sorry about that! Folly Mox (talk) 19:12, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

• I was just about to start brainstorming a GENDERID rewrite, and I see Cuñado's way ahead of me. Cool! So, first some general thoughts: The more I've worked in the trans/nonbinary biography space, the more displeased I've come with the current state of GENDERID. It was written, it feels, based on a very stereotyped understanding of trans-ness (viz., all trans people are binary and want their one true gender affirmed by having their pre-transition life discussed as little as possible) at a time when trans people were far less visible than they are now, and has since become a Frankenstein's monster of other considerations. Enforcement of it often becomes complicated by the fact that it's not entirely clear what it's supposed to promote: The privacy of living people? The dignity of all trans people? WP:DUE? Some combination of the three, but the current guideline blurs them in ways that have led to people citing privacy in cases where the real argument to make was a WP:DUE one, or otherwise muddling them. This proposal shifts us to a more common-sense-based approach that acknowledges the importance of subjects' dignity and not giving undue weight, while eliminating a bright-line rule for public figures' pre-transition names and leaving things up to local consensus to fill in the blanks (i.e., the way most of MoS works). So I broadly support something along the lines of Cuñado's proposal.
• Now, taking the proposal point by point:
1. I support adding a public-figure exception. The lack of such an exception has led to too many debates over enforcing DEADNAME essentially for its own sake. I suggested something similar above. (I suggested outright replacing notability with public-figure status, but that's probably less likely to get consensus.) On articles like Rachel Levine, there would still be room to discuss whether including a deadname is DUE, and that could be sorted out by local consensus.
2. I support broadening the consent exception from just pre-transition pronouns to all aspect of transition. Out current lack of such an exception is one of the best examples of that stereotyped understanding of trans-ness, and has gotten on my nerves e.g. at Sarah Ashton-Cirillo, where the subject readily discloses her deadname, but MoS currently says I should omit that.
3. I would like to see a note to the effect of "Sometimes some information about a person's transition will be public, while other information will be private."
4. In discussing DUE, I would suggest a note that, especially historically and to an extent still today, generally reliable sources have been known to include details' of people's transitions for reasons of sensationalism, when they were not actually relevant to the subject.
5. In general, respectful extra mentions of the former name or transition should only be used to avoid confusion. — I think I get what you're going for, but this is hard to parse.
6. In the "Articles or other works" bit, there should still be an exception for those who prefer to be referred to by pre-transition names.
7. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, there may be some difficulty in hiding the information on gender transition. — This should be removed entirely. It opens up a lot of questions about what "hiding" means and blurs the line between privacy-based and courtesy-based deadname avoidance, without clear benefit. The paragraph stands fine on its own without it.
8. The last sentence of the penultimate paragraph should be made last overall; otherwise the Juno example doesn't make sense.
• -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 21:30, 21 July 2023 (UTC)
• I appreciate and like much of this proposal. I share many of Tamzin's comments and concerns, but I want to address points 3 and 4 of the exceptions. The broader point of this whole section is that "former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value.
  1. First, (many, if not all) people with pages on Wikipedia are or could be public figures. I wonder if the public figure exemption can become so large as to overwhelm the general principle. (I will note that the term public figure was added [[49]] in 2005 and has never been specifically defined).
  2. Second, I don't quite understand exemption 4. On one hand, this may only apply in a small number of circumstances (the person was not notable under a former name, the person did not speak publicly about their transition, and is or was not a public figure). Still, my question is why should we retroactively (and what value does it provide to the community) to insert a former name on the page (which, in general does not have encyclopedic value)? This additional exemption does not seem to fit with the purpose of this section.
  3. Third, should we add guidance about people whose notablity is due to pre AND post transition? I am thinking specifically of authors or academics who might be notable because of coverage, reviews, or publications that occur before and after a transition?
• --Enos733 (talk) 23:05, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

@Enos733: I think, taken with the subsequent paragraph about how falling under an exception still doesn't guarantee inclusion of transition-related information, exception 4 is reasonable. Your question thus sort of answers itself: If nothing would be added to an article by including the information, then it shouldn't be included, and the proposed rewrite wouldn't mandate inclusion. There would just not be a global rule as to whether to include in such cases (which is the status quo regardless for non-recently-deceased trans people's biographies).

This ties into what might be my biggest problem with GENDERID as stands, which is that it's supposed to be part of a style guide. WP:BLP and WP:NPOV already provide the necessary policy bits (with respect to personal information and due weight, respectively). This guideline works best by giving an interpretation of how those policies apply and then giving general advice on what to do within the bounds of those policies. So really the four exceptions are the four exceptions because they're the four cases where BLPPRIVACY wouldn't apply—and it's only when BLPPRIVACY doesn't apply that MoS' opinion even matters. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 01:17, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

• I have mixed feelings on this. On the one hand, I completely sympathise with a desire to simplify and streamline the text of GENDERID. It's clear from a read of the discussions at MOS:GIDINFO that the guideline was progressively added to over time, and this is reflected in the current state of the text. I would also somewhat agree where Tamzin said It was written, it feels, based on a very stereotyped understanding of trans-ness (viz., all trans people are binary and want their one true gender affirmed by having their pre-transition life discussed as little as possible) at a time when trans people were far less visible than they are now. However, I have some pretty large reservations about what has been proposed here that lead me towards opposing this as currently written. Going through this a paragraph at a time:
  1. First paragraph is fine.
  2. The second paragraph I find objectionable. What exactly does Any information related to the prior gender of a person mean? A plain reading of the sentence seems to imply that where a person was not notable prior to transitioning, but for whom being trans or non-binary is a large and relevant part of their personal identity, we would be unable to say that they are trans or non-binary in our articles about them. This seems to take the scope of the scope of the second, third, and fourth paragraphs of the current text of the guideline, and apply it to all aspects of a trans or non-binary person's gender identity, and not just their former name. I hope I'm reading this incorrectly, because otherwise this seems like it could be used for gender identity erasure of trans and non-binary individuals.
  3. On the exemptions
     1. Exemption 1 is fine as this is the same as what we currently have.
     2. What does exemption 2 mean in practice? What would clearly expressed their consent to share the information even look like in a reliable source? Are there any articles you have in mind where this exemption that wouldn't currently be met by the current text of the guideline? Is there any evidence that you can point to that would suggest this is a more respectful way to handle
     3. Exemption 3 is not a good idea and represents a rather large departure from the current text of the guideline. Because a public figure on enwiki is exceptionally broadly defined of late, this would mean that individuals who became notable after transitioning and/or changing their name would now have their former names mentioned in their respective articles almost as soon as WP:V is met. When looking at just the current examples in GENDERID, this means that we would now be allowed to include the former names of Rachel Levine and Laverne Cox. This would
     4. Exemption 4 is unworkable. This is at least the third time it has been proposed by Cuñado and it has been rejected every single time. It runs counter to the current consensus with regards to the former names of deceased trans and non-binary individuals. At the very least exemption 4 should mirror the text that was added two days ago as while that has issues per the discussion above, notwithstanding any changes that occur as a result of the discussion, as it is closer to the current consensus on this point.
  4. For paragraph 3 I have the same question for information that could reveal a gender transition should not be used as I do for the second paragraph. What exactly does this mean? A plain reading of this would mean that for any individual who does not meet one of the four exemptions, we cannot mention in their article that they are trans or non-binary. As before, I hope I'm reading this incorrectly, because it again seems like it could be used for gender identity erasure of trans and non-binary individuals.
  5. On paragraph 4, I think Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name should use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. is a narrowing of the current guideline? It removes the current exemption where if a person prefers their former name to be used for past events, we can currently use it. I also agree with Tamzin that the respectful extra mentions is hard to parse, and could do with a re-write.
  6. For paragraph 5, I agree that When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, there may be some difficulty in hiding the information on gender transition. should be removed. Tamzin has succinctly covered why it is unnecessary and unwise. The example for this paragraph is fine, as it's taken directly from the current text.
  7. For paragraph 6, this should be condensed back in to paragraph 5. Formatting wise it could look weird for this section to end on a bullet point example, however this entire replacement text would be followed by MOS:NEOPRONOUN anyway so it's not a big deal.
• I realise this is a rather lengthy comment, but it's a rather lengthy proposal. My biggest issue here in general, is that this simplification pass is also including recommendations that depart significantly from both current practice and the current consensus. I would find this easier to support if this was just a simplification pass that otherwise included the current intent of the guideline, and with the departures from current practice presented separately. As a proposal, I think this is trying to do too much at one time, and that's caused at least some of the issues I've mentioned above. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:53, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

  Disagreeing with the changes because they're a departure from the current guideline isn't really a strong position to take? I don't think the intent here was just to rewrite without changing the meaning. Like regarding When looking at just the current examples in GENDERID, this means that we would now be allowed to include the former names of Rachel Levine and Laverne Cox., there is a good case to be made for including the former name of Rachel Levine. We don't need to shoot down any change just because it's a departure from the status quo or past consensus; that does not make any sense.

  Also, anyone who is publicly trans or non-binary would pretty clearly fall under exemption two. The only reason we wouldn't include information on someone being trans or non-binary is if they transitioned pre-notability and don't make that public. For example, someone like Cavetown, before they publicly came out as trans. Elli (talk | contribs) 02:57, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

  Disagreeing with the changes because they're a departure from the current guideline isn't really a strong position to take? It is when the current guideline was formed through a series of strong consensus discussions based on exact wordings (typically RfCs, see MOS:GIDINFO). A proposal to streamline the existing guidance, without changing the scope of it is far more likely to get handwaved through a discussion like this. However a proposal that is fundamentally changing parts of the scope of the guidance, especially in a way that it would alter some rather long standing consensuses, is I'm afraid going to be a lot more contentious. To try and do both a streamline and change of scope at the same time seems foolhardy, given how slow the community as a whole likes to take when updating policies and guidelines in general.

  anyone who is publicly trans or non-binary would pretty clearly fall under exemption two Would they? The exemption states clearly expressed their consent to share the information, which in my experience is actually quite rare in a reliable source. Often you'll see a sentence like "X is trans/non-binary/genderqueer", but not with any clear sign that X actually consented for that to be included in the source. Of course there are times when you'll have an interview where X states "I am...", which could be read as a clear sign of consent, but that is not always the case. Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:08, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

  To try and do both a streamline and change of scope at the same time seems foolhardy, given how slow the community as a whole likes to take when updating policies and guidelines in general. If we're gonna change the scope, might as well do a full rewrite to clean things up. Despite all the discussions, it's clear many aren't happy with the status quo, and it has many issues.

  Looking at the second point more... yeah, this would probably not be as much of an issue if point three dropped the "public figure" requirement (another very nebulously defined term around here). Elli (talk | contribs) 04:29, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

  Despite all the discussions, it's clear many aren't happy with the status quo, and it has many issues Ehhhh. While I could certainly identify a handful of editors in the two most recent RfCs who are dissatisfied with the scope of the current guideline, those seem to be in a minority. I would hesitate on drawing conclusions on the dissatisfaction of the guideline from the editors who are only contributing here, as it would be a form of selection bias. A talk page like being a natural place for those who are either seeking clarification on how to apply a policy or guideline, or those seeking to change a policy or guideline, to congregate.

  "public figure" ... (another very nebulously defined term around here) Yeah, the lack of clarity on how we define a public figure is causing issues in more areas than this. Sideswipe9th (talk) 04:37, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Tamzin's rewrite + clarification in BLPPRIVACY

Trying to synthesize the overall general support for Cuñado's rewrite with the critiques I and others have given, my ideal approach would be this, which I feel better separates the policy considerations from the stylistic ones, allows for local consensus where the latter is concerned, and in relatively few words gives broad guidance for non-BLPPRIVACY-related deadname issues that will still prevent gratuitous usage:

• Add "and former names" to the relevant parts of WP:BLPPRIVACY, and after the line there about verifiability not guaranteeing inclusion, add the line "This includes the former names of living transgender and nonbinary persons, which should only be included in accordance with the principle of due weight". I think there's already a consensus that this is the case; this would just be emphasizing that detail.
• Change GENDERID to say:

  Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources.

  Do not include any information about a living person that would violate WP:BLPPRIVACY. Information about a living person's gender transition (including the fact of the transition itself, any former names ["deadnames"], and medical information) is considered private if the person is a private figure or the information does not appear in high-quality reliable sources, unless the person has voluntarily disclosed this information.

  Even when information about a living person is non-private, or when information concerns a deceased person, verifiability does not guarantee inclusion. Former names are not inherently of encyclopedic value, especially when the person was not notable prior to their transition. Articles must not give undue emphasis to these or other aspects of a transition, erring on the side of exclusion and, where information is included, avoiding unnecessary repetition. Sources that mention such information in passing, or purely for sensationalist reasons, should be given little weight.

  When mentioning a transgender or nonbinary person in a context prior to their transition, use their current name, unless they have a preference otherwise; on articles other than their biography, their previous name can be given parenthetically or in a footnote if necessary to avoid confusion. Citations should generally not be modified, but the person's current name may be given in a note or via piped link. However, in no case should an article link a person to a pre-transition identity if that connection constitutes private information.

  If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering.

  • Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Obviously this would require consensus at WT:BLP too, but first I'd like to get a sense for if this is something people here would support. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 18:56, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Should be made a bit more clear to indicate that including former names is almost always done when someone was notable pre-transition. Good with this otherwise, though. Elli (talk | contribs) 19:04, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Looks like we were drafting at the same time. I prefer the version with a list of exceptions. It really gets muddled when you try to cover all the different conditions in paragraph if/then form. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 23:58, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

On the whole I think this is a better proposal, but I still have some issues:

• Would the addition to BLPPRIVACY not represent a weakening of the current formulation of GENDERID? Currently unless there's an exceptional case, we have a strong requirement not to include the former name, regardless of whether reliable sourcing exists, and that we should treat it as a privacy interest that is separate from and greater than the person's current name. By shifting this to just WP:WEIGHT I worry that this change would allow for the widespread inclusion of deadnames for living trans and non-binary individuals, because there are all manner of sources we consider reliable that nonetheless are trans and non-binary antagonistic and have a tendency to publish former names, often for no other reason than to say "Jane Doe was born John Doe" or vice versa. This is especially so in cases where the individual does not want that former name known.
  If we're going to move that section to BLPPRIVACY and/or BLPNAME, should we not incorporate what the current guidance states with respect to the privacy protections for former names? If we don't include the current guidance, from what I know of the sources, editors would now be allowed to include the deadnames of article subjects like Laverne Cox and Nicole Maines, who are open about their trans status and activism on LGBT+ issues, but for the most part do not disclose their former names or acknowledge their former names. I know above you've said you wish to address a part of the guidance that's preventing you from including Sarah Ashton-Cirillo's former name, and I sympathise with that, but Ashton-Cirillo's open disclosure of her former name is quite rare in my own experiences, both as a trans person, and as someone who edits many trans and non-binary biographies. If we're going to add an exemption for cases like her, then we need to make absolutely sure that it isn't so wide an exemption that it impacts on those trans and non-binary people who aren't open about their former names and do not ever wish to be linked to them.
• I'm still also hesitant over this new clause on public figures. The current discussions over at WT:BLP with respect to BLPCRIME and the scope of public figures for that policy's public figure exemption demonstrate how nebulously defined (thanks Elli) it is. The lines between whether a person is low or high profile after they meet WP:N, or a relevant SNG are incredibly blurry. Until we have a much stronger and less ambiguous definition of who is or is not a public figure, I'm not sure I could support a new exemption on this.
• For However, in no case should an article link a person to a pre-transition identity if that connection constitutes private information. I'd like if we could link or mention outing here, as that better explains the severity behind this requirement.
• My last major concern is the lack of guidance for deceased individuals. While Cuñado's draft brought back a proposal that's been rejected a few times, this proposal doesn't contain any actual guidance for when you can include a former name. Yes it mentions that they are not of encyclopaedic interest per the recent RfC, and maybe we could wikilink that in the text, but it still leaves us in the situation prior to Billed Mammal's recent bold addition where we have no actual guidance for what that means. The placement of the former name aside, and assuming it doesn't change in the mean time, could we at least incorporate the requirement of it needing to have been documented in multiple HQRS and secondary/independent sources with non-trivial coverage of the person? Yes that means were still keeping some guidance on content inclusion criteria here, but I can't immediately think of anywhere else to put it. It doesn't really fit in with BLP, as this would apply longer than BDP.

In summary, this is a better proposal than Cuñado's, but still some big issues that could cause us major privacy problems for living trans and non-binary individuals. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:40, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Revised proposal from feedback

Responding to several comments above:

• pre-transition names are often included in the leads, to help with readers who may have only heard of a person pre-transition, to avoid confusion - There was an oft-repeated concern in the last two RFCs that inclusion of a former name ends up with it in the first sentence with an elevated prominence. Not requiring it in the first sentence is an important part of the compromises going on. It's actual placement is up to editorial consensus, and this draft just says that it doesn't have to be in the first sentence.
• The point is not to conceal that someone has transitioned at all, the point is to conceal a piece of information that could be wielded by malicious actors. - There is certainly a contingent of people who have transitioned and don't want it known that they are transgender. They want to pass as the new gender. For those cases, the fact of transition is a private matter that they don't want pointed out publicly, so we should maintain a higher bar for inclusion, just like the former differently-gendered name.
• I would like to see a note to the effect of "Sometimes some information about a person's transition will be public, while other information will be private." - Added below.
• generally reliable sources have been known to include details' of people's transitions for reasons of sensationalism - Added note below.
• respectful extra mentions... - Deleted below.
• In the "Articles or other works" bit, there should still be an exception for those who prefer to be referred to by pre-transition names. - I changed "under a pre-transition name should use" to "under a pre-transition name may use". I think that wording fits with this being the MOS and offering style ideas. The alternative was to make it more wordy and maybe overprescriptive.
• some difficulty in hiding the information - Deleted below.
• The last sentence of the penultimate paragraph should be made last overall - Moved below.
• public figure exemption - I think the claim of 'public figure' being undefined is bogus. BLP has a section on WP:PUBLICFIGURE and there is the BLP-attached essay WP:Who is a low-profile individual that has a long list of examples and definitions of "high-profile" individuals. A public figure is someone who: has a multitude of reliable published sources, actively seeks out media attention, has given one or more scheduled interviews to a notable media company, is self-promotional... there are more descriptions on that page.
• I don't quite understand exemption 4 - This does two things: it says that the lingering privacy concerns described at WP:BDP should default to the maximum of two years in the case of GENDERID, and it raises the bar for inclusion to the same as living public figures (multiple reliable secondary sources). If a notable transgender person has a biography but doesn't meet any exceptions, their page doesn't mention their former name. Two years after they die, the bar for inclusion is higher than normal facts about their life. The last two RFCs failed to gain support partly because they lacked a coherent argument based on policy and failed to address why the information is excluded and how WP:BDP relates to the question.
• guidance about people whose notablity is due to pre AND post transition - if that means people whose notability post-transition is not enough to pass GNG but pass with coverage pre- and post-? I think that would mean they were not notable prior to transition and is covered.
• The second paragraph I find objectionable... I hope I'm reading this incorrectly - Clearly this is not an attempt at "gender identity erasure".
• I have some pretty large reservations about what has been proposed here that lead me towards opposing this as currently written. - I also disagree with parts of the proposed re-write, but I compromised and drafted something that will satisfy the most amount of people. If there is not consensus for the draft, I'll take it to RFC, where I'm pretty confident it will pass.

Proposed MOS:GID section draft #2

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. Any information related to the prior gender of a person, including former names (deadname), should automatically be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the information. Public figures, where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the information (See WP:PUBLICFIGURE). Individuals who have been deceased for at least two years, where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the information (See WP:BDP). Unless the individual meets one of the exceptions, information that could reveal a gender transition should not be used in lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, etc., even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. When the individual meets one of the exceptions, information on their gender transition must not be given undue weight or overemphasis, and editors should always err on the side of excluding it. Former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Sometimes, some information about a person's transition will be public, while other information will be private. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work should not be used. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 19:22, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

"There is certainly a contingent of people who have transitioned and don't want it known that they are transgender." It's not WP's job to cover over basic facts that are reported in reliable sources. In short, you'll never get consensus for a "conceal that someone has transitioned at all" proposal. It's not WP's job to police the real world, and the fact that being trans or enby in some environments is challenging is simply a fact of life. Someone else higher up the page (in a different thread) objected to language like "person whose gender might be questioned", and I agree it's rather weird phrasing (though I'm not sure what to suggest in place of it; maybe "person whose gender might be unclear to the reader"?). "Third party" is not a phrase we normally use; the stock term is "independent", so use it and avoid confusion. "may be placed in the infobox or background section of the article instead of the first sentence" is wrong, because infoboxes are not for publishing information that is not found elsewhere in the article (see MOS:INFOBOX). I would revise this to "may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence". (This will also fix the obvious loophole problem that people will mistake your original wording for "permission" to editwar to keep something out of the entire lead section. Never leave an exploitable, drama-bound loophole in any policy/guideline wording!)

Much of the rest of the redrafting looks pretty good, but getting the community to accept a total overhaul is going to take another WP:VPPOL RfC, since WP:Writing policy is hard and every word in every sentence of it has the possibility of unintended negative consequences. Hell, just changing one sentence has involved three RfCs that have all failed to come to consensus.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:02, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Above I changed "third-party" to "independent" and used your wording of "may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence".

I'm curious about the "conceal that someone has transitioned at all" comment. I thought the point of this was guide was to address the sensitive issue of how Wikipedia includes details of gender transitions, and the former name is just one part of that. I thought "information related to the prior gender of a person" was pretty clear and broad enough to include a variety of potentially personal information, including medical details. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 23:56, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Well, see above; I just copy-pasted that wording from the rest of the discussion. Without staking out a strong position on every detail, I'll just reiterate that gaining site-wide consensus in this area is unusually and extremely difficult; right now there seems to be a rough consensus forming that deadnames should not be reported in our material at all, even of the semi-recently deceased, unless there is substantial coverage of them in multiple reliable sources. But that's as far as the consensus seems to be brewing. If you want to quite markedly expand this into a principle to completely hide the fact that someone went through a gender transition, you're going to find much, much more push-back against that idea, because it is so much broader a form of information-suppression and source-ignoring. In short, take baby steps. Gain clear consensus for what there is already a rough consensus for, then try moving a bit at a time toward other forms of TG/NB special-protectionism. (If at all. I'm not a big fan of this idea, personally, but I'm honestly telling you how you can go about changing policypages effectively; I've been at this since 2006-ish.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:17, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

That is useful feedback. If you think the main concern is just about the former name being revealed, that would actually simplify the whole thing. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:38, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I think the claim of 'public figure' being undefined is bogus The exact definition of public figure is taking up much editorial discussion over at WT:BLP right now, in relation to the scope of WP:BLPCRIME. A lot of editors are using a particularly expansive definition of it that doesn't entirely mesh with how reliable sources would define the term.

The last two RFCs failed to gain support partly because they lacked a coherent argument based on policy and failed to address why the information is excluded and how WP:BDP relates to the question That doesn't match with the discussions in the most recent RfC. Only four editors, including both you and I, even mentioned BDP. The primary opposition to the proposal, as noted in the closure, was that the barrier for inclusion was set too high. Even in the RfC before that, only 5 editors mentioned BDP, and only two did so in order to oppose a change from the then current lack of guidance. The other three editors who mentioned it supported removing the word "living" from the current text of GENDERID. SMcCandlish's suggestion above that we should be analysing in detail the most recent RfC to figure out roughly where the consensus lies, so that we're not repeating the same discussion and going off on a different tangent altogether, is a good one, and even a quick analysis of it would suggest that a BDP based exclusion criteria is a non-starter.

If there is not consensus for the draft, I'll take it to RFC, where I'm pretty confident it will pass. That would be inadvisable when we have another draft that is being worked on concurrently. It would also be inadvisable given SMcCandlish's advice on in depth analysis of the most recent RfC to try and figure out roughly where the consensus lies. I'm pretty confident that this proposal would not pass at this time, because the community's consensus is elsewhere. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:28, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Sideswipe9th, who do you think these comments were directed at, at Village pump? [50] and [51]. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 22:58, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Though I fail to see the relevance to the feedback on your proposal, I would say that Anomie's suggestion is not congruent with WP:RFCBEFORE, which encourages discussion and workshopping prior to launching an RfC at a relevant venue. Their point on this being a local consensus formed by "a bunch of activists" ss also not representative of the history of discussions on this guideline point, with a lot of the RfCs on the scope and text of GENDERID occurring at the Village Pump or otherwise notified on WP:CENT. The current state of the guideline is very broadly supported by the community consensus.

As for JohnFromPinckney's comment, they are right, there have been a lot of discussions on this recently. However almost all of the sections that John is referring to were stale, with most not having had a comment in about a month, until SMcCandlish added a single comment to each one yesterday. Until those single comments were added, only three (this section, the one directly above on WP:BOLD restrictions, and the discussion on neopronouns were actually active.

Now, back to the feedback on your proposal please. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:10, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

My point was, you are making big claims about consensus of the community, and I think the last two RFCs, which you either initiated or helped initiate, had a biased activist-y setup that was opposed by people on this page (like me) beforehand, but you ignored my feedback, and rather than acknowledge the failure of each of them, you are continuing down the same path.

Public figure I think you're really stretching for a criticism when this explains it and the phrasing is already used in BLP.

That would be inadvisable when we have another draft that is being worked on concurrently. that's not feedback on my proposal.

SMcCandlish's advice yes, they gave me good feedback that I'm trying to figure out how to incorporate. I thought the desire of maintaining the dignity of trans people would include allowing a living (or recently deceased) person the presumption of wanting details of their transition kept private unless they share it themselves. You interpreted my draft as "gender identity erasure", which was a surprise. If this is really about the deadname, then the exceptions could apply to deadname only. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 23:55, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

"the desire of maintaining the dignity of trans people" (which is very, very loaded phrasing) is not inherently a Wikipedia goal, and over-broadly interpreted is even inimical to actual Wikipedia goals, and it was not a consensus conclusion of the community. Rather, it was one of many arguments presented that in small part led to the limited amount of consensus that we've been able to hammer out at all. In short, you're kind of confusing an effect with a cause.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:13, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Oh stop SMcCandlish, you're making me like you too much. I feel the same, but I was trying to articulate a common sentiment that was expressed in the recent RFCs. Like I said, I disagree with several things about my draft but it needs to be acceptable to the most amount of people to pass. For example, Tamzin's response to my draft: This proposal shifts us to a more common-sense-based approach that acknowledges the importance of subjects' dignity and not giving undue weight. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 06:08, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

That's an interesting talk-quote, because I was going to say that the problems with the idea become immediately clear if you change "the desire of maintaining the dignity of trans people" to "the desire of maintaining the dignity of subjects" in general. Subjects' personally defined [search this page for "idolect" for related matters] "dignity" is not broadly an MoS or WP concern, aside from basic notions of human rights and WP:NPOV and (where applicable) WP:BLP policy. The kind of objective "basic human dignity" matters addressed by those policies have very little in common with the vernacular expansion of the "dignity" notion by a certain camp in the LGBTQIA+ sphere and perhaps far-left activism in general. (Search this page also for the phrase "means colloquially" for additional related matters of the hazards of using meaning-expansions that undermine the very concept a term was created for.)

This has much to do with all the push-back at the last several RfC rounds, because the proposals were essentially trying to create a "special class" with protections – that exceed NPOV, BLP, NOT#INDISCRIMINATE, and other policies – that would apply to no one else (and to do it by trying to misuse a style guideline to supersede core policy, which is not procedurally really possible in the first place). The real trick to getting consensus on an improved MOS:GENDERID is going to be staying within the bounds of existing core policy. There's a really fine line between addressing a concern (e.g. deadnaming) that largely or entirely only pertains to a particular class, and carving out a special level of "extra protection" (which equates to extra censorship and extra ignoring of reliable sources, etc.) pertaining to that class.

Going too far the other (broadly generalizing) direction won't work either. I'll even go so far as to say that editors trying to "borrow" the deadnaming idea from TG/NB/GQ subjects and apply it to anyone, ever, who has changed their name and would rather never hear/see the old one again, like the entertainer Teller (see this VPPOL thread) is basically subcultural appropriation of a certain type of wrong that affects the real subcultural class very differently and much more potently, and applying it in an aggradizing way to something else, trivializing the concept in the process. (The "means colloquially" post mentioned above also raises related matters again.) Reminds me of bogus arguments that have been made about "Celtic" indentured servants in early America being "the same as" enslaved Africans, or mockery of satiric pseudo-religions (Chuch of the SubGenius, etc.) being "the same as" attacking someone for being Jewish or Amish or whatever, and several other false-analogy arguments that people make involving a real sociological class with a shared social experience, and something else entirely that is only similar in a superficial way.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:09, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

TNT on GENDERID draft #3

Made a few changes based on conversation above, including:

• "whose gender might be questioned" to "whose gender might be unclear"
• "Any information related to the prior gender of a person, including former names (deadname)" to "A transgender or non-binary person's former name (deadname)"
• "information that could reveal a gender transition" to "the former name"
• "where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work should not be used" to "may be included"
• added footnote in first paragraph

Mainly it was shortened, and reduced in scope to focus on the former name and not other details of gender transition. Feedback is most welcome.

Proposed MOS:GID section draft #3

Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. A transgender or non-binary person's former name (deadname) should be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the name. Public figures, where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the name (See WP:PUBLICFIGURE). Individuals who have been deceased for at least two years, where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the name (See WP:BDP). Unless the individual meets one of the exceptions, the former name should not be used in lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, etc., even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. When the individual meets one of the exceptions, the former name must not be given undue weight or overemphasis, and editors should err on the side of excluding it. Former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:24, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

Some feedback:

• You could probably simplify Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words... to Refer to any person with the name and gendered words... without much of an issue here. A person doesn't need to be trans or non-binary to need or want to say "Hi my name is X and my pronouns are Y/Z".
• I think A transgender or non-binary person's former name (deadname)... would read better as The former name (deadname) of a transgender or non-binary person.... I don't like the weakening though of making it just a privacy interest, as the current version of the guideline states that it's a privacy interest separate from and greater than their current name. Is there a reason for this change?
• As a new clause that isn't in the current version of GENDERID, the public figure exemption needs to be stronger. At minimum that should be something like multiple high quality reliable sources and some extra wording that takes into sensationalism (it's late and I can't wordsmith that right now). There's all manner of marginally reliable sources that include sentences like "Jane Doe was born John Doe", and the sheer volume of those sources alone shouldn't be an inclusion criteria when high quality sources do not do this. I know there's a footnote B somewhat along those lines, but in context it looks like footnote B only applies to individuals who don't meet the 4 exemptions you're proposing.
• Still has the BDP issue. See my earlier comments for why this is unworkable, and SMcCandlish's earlier comments about reviewing the most recent two RfCs in detail to assess for some wording that would better fit where the community consensus lies.
• Are you sure your fourth bullet point is accurate? That change doesn't seem to be reflected in the text.

May have more to say later. It's late and my brain has mostly gone to sleep. Sideswipe9th (talk) 05:50, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to look it over, I incorporated your 2nd and 5th bullets into the draft above. A few comments on the others:

• Refer to any person with the name and gendered words... I have to disagree on this one. I only proposed changing "questioned" (current) to "unclear" because of a comment about the current wording sounding strange. Most people (like 99%) do not state their preferred names and pronouns and there is no ambiguity on their gender, so it makes more sense to start the section saying, in the least offensive way possible, that this is for those whose gender is unclear or out of the ordinary.
• a privacy interest separate from and greater than their current name - I don't know what this means. There is no privacy concern about a person's current name.
• the public figure exemption needs to be stronger - I thought about this for awhile and reviewed several policies. The same wording could be used for this and the deceased example. There is no policy or guide defining "high-quality" sources. The closest you get is WP:RS referencing "high-quality mainstream publications", but I don't think that would work here because it is contrasting those to scholarly sources. Keep in mind my draft phrasing of "multiple reliable sources" is directly from BLP, and the MOS should not be making policy. The best I could come up with from policy is to say "multiple reliable, neutral sources". Neutral is well described in policy and allows the exclusion of low-quality, opinionated, or questionable sources. I think that gets to the spirit of excluding sensational reliable sources.
• the BDP issue - this is a change that I think needs to go to RFC. We won't agree on this talk page.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:51, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Most people (like 99%) do not state their preferred names and pronouns and there is no ambiguity on their gender Hard disagree. One of the first things that is said when you are introduced to someone you have never met (either by yourself or a third party) is your name. In modern contexts, this often also includes your pronouns, if they're not inferrable from words said during the introduction, for example Have you met Jane Doe yet? They're/She's new here and working on X project. And lets not even touch on how many people include their pronouns in their email footers and social media bios.

There is no privacy concern about a person's current name. Yes there is. WP:BLPNAME covers the most common privacy concerns over names. As for the rest, consider it as two complementary clauses; a privacy interest separate from their current name and a privacy interest greater than their current name. The first clause is easy, you simply evaluate the privacy concerns separately from their current name. The second clause likewise is pretty straightforward, when evaluating the privacy concerns, you need to do so at a level beyond that at which we would normally include a person's name.

The same wording could be used for this and the deceased example. Maybe, if written correctly.

There is no policy or guide defining "high-quality" sources. Huh, I could have sworn WP:HQRS redirected to a specific section of WP:RS that defined it. That aside, from looking elsewhere I'm not sure if the lack of definition is a problem. The text at WP:EXCEPTIONAL states that any exceptional claim requires multiple high-quality sources, though footnote 4 sadly only gives some philosophical reasons for why we require strong evidence. WP:BLP contains multiple mentions throughout to both "high-quality sources" and "high-quality reliable sources", linking to WP:SOURCES. WP:MEDRS likewise contains mentions throughout "high-quality sources" and "high-quality reliable sources" without definition. The closest we seem to get right now is the WP:BESTSOURCES section of WP:NPOV, but even then it mentions "high-quality sources" without defining it. I question then if this lack of definition for the term is a problem that we need to concern ourselves with. Yes it would be exceptionally helpful if it was defined somewhere, but given that core content policies use the term without defining it suggests that such a definition may not be necessary.

The best I could come up with from policy is to say "multiple reliable, neutral sources". Neutral is well described in policy and allows the exclusion of low-quality, opinionated, or questionable sources. It is, but it's also the subject of considerable and frequent debate at an article level. "Is this source baised against/towards [article subject]?" is the sort of question you'll see variations of frequently, especially in contentious topic areas like gender and sexuality,

this is a change that I think needs to go to RFC Why do we need an RfC to datamine the results of the two most recent RfCs? Why can't we put a pause on the BDP point for now, and just start a separate discussion (either as a subsection or new discussion here, or on a dedicated page) where we can compare notes on those RfCs to find out what people have already said, and from that see if we can distil something that might stand a very strong chance of being accepted? Yes it will take us a little time and effort now, but it will save us a lot of time and effort later, and afford us a fair degree of community good will. Maybe at the end of that process a BDP based clause will be the right option, or maybe it'll be something else that no-one here has yet put forward. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:22, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

In modern contexts, this often also includes your pronouns - no, it almost never does. A person's gender is almost always extremely clear from their chosen appearance and that is expected and understood to be sufficient in nearly all social contexts. A standard that would require people to explicitly say "my gender is male and my pronouns are he/him" would send the vast majority of people (and even more historical individuals) into a genderless they/them category, which is far more offensive and misgendering than anything else.

Pronouns in social media bio are also by no means universal and seem to have reached saturation in uptake. Crossroads ^-talk- 19:16, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Respectfully I think you've misread this chain. Nowhere did I say that a person typically introduces their gender in introductions, only their name and pronouns. I also struggle to see how rephrasing to Refer to any person with the name and gendered words ... that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. would result in sending the vast majority of people...into a genderless they/them category. Perhaps you could expand on why you think this might happen?

The scope of this change is to make sure we're always using the correct name and pronoun, for any biographical subject, regardless of any other circumstance. This is something that we should be already doing for the vast majority of articles. A gender being clear does not negate the necessity to ensure that we're using the correct names and gendered terminology for our article subjects. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:31, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I've already commented on pronouns in introductions so I won't repeat myself on that. We shouldn't open ourselves up to wikilawyering or technicalities. Most people never specify their pronouns. They consciously choose to appear a certain way, are referred to by others with the words that fit with that, and that's it. We don't want an opening for someone to say 'well the person never said she/her is correct, how can we really know?' And if someone thinks pronouns in introductions are necessary, then the corollary of that is most people's pronouns are unknown because they've never specified them. We don't want to go that route, that's not how RS or society works. Crossroads ^-talk- 19:47, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm gonna agree with Crossroads here on the pronouns issue. I dunno if it's 99% of the time but it's definitely far more common for someone to trust others to infer their gender from their appearance (which, to be clear, is usually pretty accurate, which is why people keep doing it) then to explicitly mention their pronouns.

Which is to say, I think the original wording is more-or-less fine. Someone not mentioning their gender does not mean it is unclear, and requiring people to state their gender before we can mention it, even implicitly, causes way more problems than it solves. If someone does say their gender explicitly we should go with what they say, but having a robust default if they don't is not optional. Loki (talk) 20:08, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

While I clearly disagree, I can see that the consensus is not with me on this point, so I shall drop it. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:16, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Responding to Sideswipe9th:

Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear... - I have to agree with others that the scope of this MOS should be clear in the intro. We're talking about a special case and I think the question here is whether "unclear" is better than "questioned".

There is no privacy concern about a person's current name. - I see what you mean now. The examples are of names who are not the subject of articles. As in, suspects in crimes who don't need to be named, names of family members of a notable person, loosely or uninvolved low-profile persons, etc. I think the current wording ("separate from and greater than a current name") just sounds confusing and doesn't really add anything useful. This is MOS/biography, of course the current name will be mentioned.

There is no policy or guide defining "high-quality" sources. - This was one of the sticking points at the last RFC. I agree with your assessment that it is used enough in policies that it can probably be used here safely, but it will have the same problem that you describe defining what is "neutral". I could support either wording but I lean toward "multiple reliable, neutral sources".

Why do we need an RfC? - There is a high level of fatigue on this subject and the reasons seem to be that a local consensus on this page, where gender-activists are overrepresented, will probably not create something that will win consensus at Village Pump. The last two RFCs had a fairly biased setup and seemed to disregard the magnitude of creating an exception to WP:NOTCENSORED in the MOS, without a tie-in to BLP. I would be thrilled to work out a local consensus for a re-write, but I have been described as "the opposition" and even the most basic good-faith contributions have been blocked at every step. Prove me wrong.

Why can't we put a pause on the BDP point for now? - Think of it another way. The last two RFCs tried to extend the censoring of former names to deceased people indefinitely. There was no consensus, BilledMammal's attempt to work something in got reverted, and the MOS went back to excluding the former names of living trans people, leaving the rest to BLP. BLP allows censorship of reliably-sourced information about living people, but the policy does not apply to people confirmed dead, with the only exception for recently deceased, and allows that protection to gradually fade after death, the policy can extend based on editorial consensus for an indeterminate period beyond the date of death—six months, one year, two years at the outside. So given the concern, why would you not support the MOS saying that on this subject, automatically extend to the maximum of two years? Would you rather some cases be six months? Your moonshot to extend it indefinitely failed twice, and anyway, the MOS is not the place to make such a policy.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 22:22, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

The last two RFCs tried to extend the censoring of former names to deceased people indefinitely. This sentence is a perfect example of why we need to review the last two RfCs in detail. While it is true that one of the options in the first RfC would have extended the protections (please stop calling this censoring, it's not censoring) afforded to living trans and non-binary individuals indefinitely (specifically, topic 2 option 3), that was not the case for the second RfC. The second RfC laid out a set of inclusion criteria for deceased individuals that was complementary to the existing guidance on living individuals, and in doing so allowed for the former names to be included when either they met the specific test for deceased individuals, or for individuals whose former names we could include when they were alive.

When I drafted the proposal that lead to the second RfC, I did so after thoroughly reading both the close and the comments made in the first RfC, alongside a side discussion by another editor who was going to close the first RfC. In doing so, I came up with a proposal that the closer of the first RfC thought was a reasonable summation of how [they] read the consensus. With the benefit of hindsight, I clearly made an error somewhere in that assessment, and that the community's consensus set a barrier for inclusion that wasn't quite as high as what I proposed. However making that error does not negate that making such an analysis is a good and necessary thing.

Right now we know three high level things:

1. From the first and second RfCs that there is a community consensus for a change to GENDERID to provide guidance for deceased individuals
2. From the first RfC that the consensus for the inclusion criteria of the former name of a deceased individual should be set to a high level
3. From the second RfC, based on the comments by the closer, that the specific proposal in the second RfC set too high a barrier

What we need to do before we can present any further options on guidance for deceased individuals to a future RfC, is to assess both of the recent RfCs in detail, and from those data points see if we can distil a proposal that would fit with what the community has said in both recent discussions. Both of those recent RfCs were held at WP:VPP, and were exceedingly well attended, so any concerns about a local consensus on this page would immediately be invalid as any proposal we come up with should first and foremost be based on what was said during the broad consensus discussions. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:09, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

The examples are of names who are not the subject of articles. Not quite. See WP:BLP1E and WP:BIO1E, both of which advise us to avoid creating a biography on an individual who is only notable in the context of a single event. It's also inaccurate to say that this is only for criminal suspects. It also covers individuals whose notability is connected to any other controversial or non-controversial event.

The reason why there's two separate wikilinks here is that BLP1E applies only to individuals who are alive (or recently deceased), whereas BIO1E applies to those who are also deceased past the point of BDP. In either scenario, living or deceased past the point of BDP, if a person's notability stems from a single event, we have PAG reasons not to create an article about them. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:29, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

This is looking better. I agree with all of Sideswipe9th's suggestions above, other than that I'll note that going with "high quality reliable sources" may increase resistance to the overhaul, as this phrase and the elevated standard it seems to refer to (but which is not actually defined anywhere) was a sticking point for various people in the last RfC (and probably the one before it, though I don't recall for sure). For my own part, I find "Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the name" to be weird wording that will probably not meet with consensus (both "consent" and "share" are problematic for various reasons); but right this moment my head hurts, and I'm not thinking of a suitable replacement. I would also remove "or mockery" from the second footnote; that appears to be editorializing without any basis sourced so far in these discussions, and any publisher that engaged in outright mockery of TG/NB/GQ subjects would not be one WP considered "generally reliable".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:01, 26 July 2023 (UTC); rev'd. 06:28, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

RE: changing Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the name - how about "Individuals who have shared the name publicly" or something along those lines? Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:56, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Something like that is closer, but I think it's still missing that fact that this is usually a matter of public record and doesn't have anything to do with the subject disclosing something. It may be more a matter of what if anything the subject has said, in published material, about the name and their present relationship to it. But wordsmithing something like this is difficult, and as others have said elsewhere in here, trying to change more than one GENDERID factor at a time is probably a bad idea, because it gives anyone who would oppose one aspect of the proposal a reason to oppose the entire thing.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:17, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

I do think that the bar should be that they've consented for people to reference the name. Janet Mock includes her birthname in her autobiography, but I don't think we should ever include it the article about her on that basis. Tekrmn (talk) 05:25, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

At no point will an article be written based upon what the subject consents for us to write about them. That's just a non-starter out of the gate. WP:DUE and ensuring we use quality WP:RS will be sufficient. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:49, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

thanks for sharing your opinion. do you have any policy or guidelines to support that? BLP:PRIVACY clearly indicates that consent is an important consideration for including personal information, such as a persons name, and the current MOS states that the birth names of living trans and nonbinary people's birthnames are treated as a privacy interest separate from and greater than a current name. we're obviously not talking about living people here, but to me the fact that this concern is "greater than" a privacy interest indicates, among other things, that the need to omit a person's birthname should still apply after their death. Tekrmn (talk) 17:13, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

do you have any policy or guidelines to support that? WP:NPOV (WP:DUE) and WP:RS. —Locke Cole • t • c 17:50, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

At no point will an article be written based upon what the subject consents for us to write about them. Actually the BLP policy already provides several clauses where an article subject can request the removal of information, which would include non-consensual publishing by reliable sources.

Date of births are covered by WP:BLPPRIVACY If a subject complains about our inclusion of their date of birth, or the person is borderline notable, err on the side of caution and simply list the year, provided that there is a reliable source for it. WP:BLPNAME urges caution for article subjects who are discussed primarily in connection with a single event, along with a strong presumption in favour of privacy for the family members of article subjects. WP:BIOSELF states that if an article subject finds that an article contains personal information or potentially libellous statements, they should contact the oversight team so that it can be evaluated and suppressed as appropriate. And yes, per the Foundation's website content that is reliably sourced can still be libellous, especially when it is subject to link rot, and we can be compelled to remove it. And WP:BLPREQUESTDELETE provides for non-public figure article subjects to request deletion of articles about them. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:41, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I see a lot of that being redundant to NPOV/RS, so I have no comment on that. Thank you for cataloging all the ways BLP runs against NPOV for me. I stand by my original statement. —Locke Cole • t • c 17:54, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

If you believe that BLP runs counter to NPOV and given how strong your opinion on this is seems to be, might I suggest that you use this brief list to open a discussion at WP:BLPN and/or WP:NPOVN on this issue? It seems that you might want or need to fix this disconnect between BLP and NPOV first, as this will no doubt be affecting far more guidelines within the MOS and elsewhere than just GENDERID. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:59, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

It is tricky to come up with wording. Maybe, Individuals who have made the name public and not expressed a desire to conceal it. or Individuals who have made the name public post-transition. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 22:47, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

The later is more plausible than the former. Unless the person is living in a country that has an equivalent to a super-injunction, where there is some sort of protection in law that prevents even the discussion of the protection, expressing a desire to conceal their name would likely have a Streisand effect outcome. In other words, it would likely be the same as shouting "don't think about the pink elephant" in a crowd, and expecting the crowd not to think about a pink elephant.

I'm not sure about the later option though. It's certainly better than what's in the draft above, but I'm not sure it's robust enough to clearly differentiate between someone whose former name is known because they're open about it being their former name, and someone whose former name is known because a source has outed them. But I'm still not quite sure how you could reflect that in guideline text. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:15, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Honestly, the best wording would be, People who are cool with it. But it doesn't have the sound of a guideline. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:44, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Personally, I think (as other editors commented earlier) that trying to make multiple substantive changes and also rewrite/reorder some things at the same time is inadvisable, since anyone who opposes any part of that (or just can't track all the changes) seems to be left having to oppose the whole thing—hence past RFCs have been closed with the advice to ask specific questions! In particular, since the just-closed RFC hinged in part on people feeling the proposed wording was insufficiently well defined, it seems unwise to introduce a term we already know is poorly defined ("Public figures", the subject of a huge discussion on BLP at this very moment), especially when one of the widely-held interpretations of it is "everyone mentioned in enough sources that we at Wikipedia are mentioning them in an article", meaning a sizeable portion of editors will read the new text as saying to deadname basically everyone who's discussed in enough sources that we're mentioning them in the first place. (For example, Laverne Cox is a public figure; the new text would seem to allow deadnaming her; I wasn't aware there was appetite for that from anyone but the few folks who want Wikipedia to deadname all trans people in all cases.) Both the allowance of deadnaming "Public figures" and the "BDP" part seem to come out of the blue, since I'm not recalling any widespread clamour to use those as metrics in the many previous discussions of this which have happened (indeed, in the pre-RfC discussion for one of the last RfCs, I got the impression more people felt "deadname people after—but only after—two years" was a poor approach, than liked it). -sche (talk) 07:59, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

100% agree with this. I really just don't think we need to rewrite this section right now. Loki (talk) 15:46, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

I think this is a great start. I agree with everything sideswipe said, I definitely agree that we should scrape the previous rfcs to find the exact exceptions people are concerned about, and I also agree that proposing this whole thing as-is or in some other iteration would be unwise- we should ask specific questions. I also think that there will be pushback on not requiring the deadname to be in the first paragraph, so personally I feel we might just want to remove that part for now since, in my opinion, inclusion is a bigger issues than overemphasis. Tekrmn (talk) 01:28, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Just noticed that there is a resolution by the Wikimedia Foundation accompanying the formation of BLP that says human dignity and respect for personal privacy are both reasons for the policy. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:05, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Problem is, our editors can (and do) disagree on what constitutes “human dignity”.

Is merely mentioning someone’s verifiable deadname in a respectful tone a violation of that person’s “human dignity”? Some will say “yes”, others will say “no”, and yet others will say “it depends”. We could argue that question for years with no consensus. Blueboar (talk) 19:31, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Admittedly, it's not a bad draft, this, but I have concerns about the last two bullet points.

• On the "public figure" exception – for example, in the UK, IPSO guidance often isn't worth the paper it's written on, and doubly so when it comes to trans issues. The IPSO Code of Conduct says that deadnaming even may constitute an unethical practice, but once a RS like the Telegraph prints someone's deadname, even if it's later ruled a breach of the IPSO CoC, the odds of getting an amendment to the source article in the current climate is slim. I also have concerns with how undefined the term "public figure" is.
• On deceased people: I agree that the legal considerations of BLP don't apply upon death, but this is a moral consideration; if Laverne Cox dropped dead now, I think it would be perverse to have people circling like vultures in 2025 to add the name once the two-year limit is up. I think just letting BDP hold here, as vague as it is is a better idea.

Additionally, I think these two points is essentially re-arguing for positions that have been recently rejected at RfC and I would like to see more consensus before these are added. Also, I think the operative word on inclusion of deadnames should be, well, should; I think the exemptions in these areas should be implied and require justification if needed (as part of the BRD cycle or whatever else). Sceptre (talk) 00:42, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

Letting "BLP hold here" means changing the fourth exception to "Deceased" and letting the time range from 2 months to 2 years based on editorial consensus. I have a feeling that's not what you meant. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 22:52, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

TNT on GENDERID draft #4

• Incorporated some word improvements from SideSwipe9th and SMcCandlish
• Changed Individuals who have clearly expressed their consent to share the name to Individuals who have made the name public post-transition. The wording here could still be improved, but shouldn't be over-prescriptive.
• Changed where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the name to where multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name in #3 and #4. I could be convinced that "high-quality" could go here instead of "neutral", but I think this will get the most agreement from the wider community. "Neutral" focuses on excluding low-quality sources and is better defined.
• Expanded second footnote to include Wikimedia Foundation's resolution.

If local consensus is in agreement, I think this change is ready to go on the MOS.

Proposed MOS:GID section draft #4

Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. A transgender or non-binary person's former name (deadname) should be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Individuals who have made the name public post-transition. Public figures, where multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name (See WP:PUBLICFIGURE). Deceased individuals, where multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name (See WP:BDP). Unless the individual meets one of the exceptions, the former name should not be used in lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, etc., even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. When the individual meets one of the exceptions, the former name must not be given undue weight or overemphasis, and editors should err on the side of excluding it. Former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:02, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to once again echo sideswipe and say that proposing another assortment of changes to the MOS is, without a doubt, not going to result in a consensus. we need to go through the previous rfcs to find the sticking points and address them. other editors have agreed with this as well. Tekrmn (talk) 17:55, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to see some examples of how this would be applied as opposed to the present language. One example might be, let us say the person who perpetrated the 2023 Nashville school shooting. Unless I'm missing something, the shooter did not make the name public post-transition, was not a public figure, was not notable prior to the shooting (which the article states was post-transition), and has not been dead two years. Would then that name be excluded, and face the need to gain consensus for addition after two years? If so, is this a different outcome than under the present state of the MOS? Wehwalt (talk) 18:01, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

In my assessment, that person's former name would not be mentioned in the article until two years after death, when BDP no longer applies, then its inclusion would be based on the "multiple reliable and neutral sources", which is a higher bar than normal content inclusion. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

At present, it is mentioned. Is that in accordance with the MoS as it presently stands? Wehwalt (talk) 18:45, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Assuming you mean before BilledMammal's recent attempt, then yes it is. WP:BDP leaves it up to editorial consensus. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 21:35, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I disagree with point #4. IMO, it should say Deceased individuals, where multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name. Editors shouldn't have to wait at least two years to include a notable former name of a recently deceased individual. That just seems like delaying the inclusion of encyclopedic information for the sake of delaying. Some1 (talk) 23:13, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Some1, the two years is a reference to WP:BDP: the policy can extend based on editorial consensus for an indeterminate period beyond the date of death—six months, one year, two years at the outside. If we say "Deceased individuals, where..." then it would become a range of time case-by-case based on consensus. The suggetion here is to default to the maximum privacy range of two years in the special case of former transgender names, so it isn't re-hashed on every page. With that background, do you still think it should change? Cuñado ☼ - Talk 23:55, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Based on the answer[52] to Wehwalt's question above, leaving things up to editorial consensus is better than default[ing] to the maximum privacy range of two years. Personally, I don't think a re-write is needed; MOS:GENDERID as it presently stands is fine as is. Adding a sentence about living transgender and non-binary people who are open about their former names/who have made the name public post-transition would be a nice addition to the MOS though. Some1 (talk) 00:40, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I suggest changing the introductory sentence to Refer to any person who is transgender or non-binary, or whose gender might be unclear... Otherwise, the implication is that all trans/nb individuals have an unclear gender, which I don't think is the intention.

The became a parent has always annoyed me, as it feels very awkward. I suggest had a child as the more natural recommended text.--Trystan (talk) 19:02, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

"Had a child" could be misleading. That expression (in the singular) generally refers to a biological female giving birth, rarely someone fathering a child. In the example "Jane Doe had a child" strongly suggests that Jane gave birth to a child, which presumably is wrong, in the context of the example. Mitch Ames (talk) 23:46, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm open to alternative formulations, or removing the example entirely. My dislike of the wording is that it recommends replacing weird drafting with weird drafting. It implies that writing about trans people will be more problematic than it is, because it places an undue emphasis on biology in a way we don't for cis people. I don't think an article would be likely to say Sean Connery fathered a child or Sean Connery became a parent, but it could well say Sean Connery had one son, without any implication of him giving birth.--Trystan (talk) 16:45, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I still think there are problems with how the exemptions are written. The way it naturally reads is that all four exemptions are equivalent, while in reality they are not. I don't think there is any concerns with the first two (notable prior to transition or self-declared). However, the others are not as clear cut. As I mentioned before, we do not have a good definition of a public figure (as who is or is not a "public figure" is based on a specific moment of time, while we are an encyclopedia), and second, I believe there remains a tension in the fourth exemption between names are not "automatically of encyclopedic value" and well, after two years, our tolerance for "contentious or questionable material" eases so editors who may be eager to expose the deadname can find a source or sources to connect the individual to a non-notable past.

So, my preference is closer to a two tiered approach to the exemption - a blanket exemption for the first two categories and a strong "May be exempted" (or similar language) for the other categories. --Enos733 (talk) 21:19, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

If it's relevant two years after their death; it's probably relevant during their life as well. If multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name, there should have to be a good reason for us to not do so. Elli (talk | contribs) 21:36, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Edit - I changed the fourth exception in the proposal to Deceased individuals, where.... I think it was actually in the interests of people trying to exclude former names, but it was perceived as the opposite. Now the privacy provided to living individuals extending after death would range from 2 months to 2 years depending on the case and consensus. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:25, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree that it was in the interests of exclusion on paper, but IMO including an explicit time limit like that invites attempts to game the system. One particular one I could easily see is the mentions of "individuals" being implicitly read as living individuals only, which would put deceased individuals as having no protections until two years after their death. (I don't think this argument would win a discussion but I definitely anticipate it being tried.) Loki (talk) 19:47, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Loki's proposed draft

Some of the discussion on the previous drafts appears to be going in circles. Repeated objections to the third and fourth points have not been reflected in previous drafts. So, I've written my own draft with some of the changes that have been repeatedly proposed, as well as fixing some other weaknesses I noticed in previous drafts:

Proposed MOS:GID section draft #5

Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. A transgender or non-binary person's former name (deadname) should be considered a matter of personal privacy and removed, with the exception of: Individuals who were notable prior to transition. Individuals who have said post-transition they are okay with having their prior name disseminated. Deceased individuals whose name was used or mentioned in multiple reliable sources that exercised some editorial judgement, however slight. When the individual was notable prior to transition, the former name of a transgender or non-binary person should be included somewhere in the lead of their article to avoid confusion from readers who are unaware of the individual's transition. Usually it should be included in the first sentence, but in some cases where the risk of confusion is low, it may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article, to avoid giving it undue prominence. After this one time, it should not be mentioned again. When the individual has consented to have their prior name disseminated, or a deceased individual's name has been included in multiple reliable sources, it can be mentioned in the same situations that any other name could be. However, be aware that former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value, and therefore the name still should only be included if there is a compelling reason to do so. Do not give the former name undue weight or overemphasis. If the appropriate weight is ambiguous, lean on the side of mentioning it as infrequently as possible, up to and including not mentioning it at all. In either case where an exception applies, articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnotes. When the individual does not meet one of the exceptions, the former name should not be used in lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, etc., even in quotations, even if a reliable source exists. Avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Specifically, I've:

1. Rephrased the second bullet: "making the name public" is IMO not a good description of what we mean here.
2. Deleted the previous third bullet about public figures. IMO it's redundant with the first one, so the only practical effect would be to incorporate the significant issues around defining a "public figure".
3. Deleted the two-year requirement on what had been the fourth bullet about deceased individuals, as the consensus arrived at for deceased individuals in the previous RFC did not refer to any such time limit, and there were significantly more objections to such a time limit than support.
4. Significantly rephrased the sourcing requirement on the bullet about deceased individuals to pull in an editorial judgement requirement, and added a footnote explaining further.
5. Added some extra explanatory text in the previously second footnote.
6. Broke the paragraph about what to do if an exception applies into separate paragraphs about the notability exception and the other exceptions. These exceptions are not really parallel, as they're motivated by entirely different concerns: the notability exception is a real exception to a strong privacy concern motivated by a specific strong encyclopedic need, while the other two exceptions instead establish any privacy concern that still exists is not very strong. The previous paragraph as worded would have, oddly, made the notability exception a lot stricter than it had been, as it encouraged exclusion of the name entirely.
7. Moved the paragraphs about if the exception does not apply nearer to each other, just for flow reasons.

Loki (talk) 05:33, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I think the issue of public figures is misunderstood here. I applied BLPPRIVACY to this guide, and there is a privacy exemption for public figures. This is not the place to debate whether BLPPRIVACY is correct, and it's not the place to make policy. The brief discussion at BLP was misrepresented on this talk to suggest that it's a questionable phrase. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 15:31, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Respectfully, I think you misunderstand the problem with the public figure question as it applies to BLPPRIVACY. For our project, an individual is either meets our notability guidelines and may have a page written about them (or not). We look at individuals over the context of their entire life (and, potentially, their legacy after their death). A public figure, by contrast, is a momentary thing. Someone may or may not be a public figure at particular moments of time (as recognized in the last paragraph of the essay on Who is a low-profile individual). So, even if we could agree on whether an individual is (or who is not) a public figure (which could be subject to walls of text), we should not explicitly state that once a public figure all verifiable aspects of one's life are now encyclopedic (as Loki mentions in the footnotes to the draft). So, all I see with the public figure exemption is a loophole to drive a truck through since it could be argued that many, if not most, individuals we consider notable could be public figures (See most elected and appointed officials, entertainers, athletes, journalists, business owners, influencers...). - Enos733 (talk) 16:00, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Respectfully, I think you're missing the point as well. Someone who seeks public attention has a different level of personal privacy protection under BLP. In the case of public figures... BLPs should simply document what these sources say, there are additional protections for subjects who are not public figures, and names of family members who are not also notable public figures must be removed from an article if they are not properly sourced. Without BLP, we would always include former names if properly sourced. Because of BLP, we require a higher bar for inclusion. The justification for removing the former name is for personal privacy, and we can't use the MOS to create a more restrictive policy. An elected official is a public figure, and if they have a former name that is documented in numerous reliable and neutral sources, it should be on Wikipedia. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 16:45, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree that people who are high-profile individuals have a different level of personal privacy. That said, people may be high-profile individuals at certain parts of their lives. An athlete may be a high-profile figure during their peak playing years and a low-profile individual at other times. Recognizing that once notable = always notable under our policies and guidelines, it is not equally logical to say that once a public figure = always a public figure. But creating an explicit exemption means that once a public figure = always a public figure in terns of what material may be included. - Enos733 (talk) 18:36, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Do you have an example? I can't think of how this could be a problem. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:50, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Imagine a CEO of a large Fortune 500 company who transitioned before becoming notable. Ostensibly a public figure, with lots of influence, the individual does not want their deadname (or even their transition) to become public. Under your draft, the name can be shared when "multiple reliable and neutral sources have documented the name." As Loki mentions in the footnotes, an editor who knows and wants the deadname to become widely known can search for the deadname and find a couple local stories, perhaps as a child the CEO won a spelling bee and was in the local paper, and because there were a couple reliable sources, the name is now able to be added to the CEO's page. - Enos733 (talk) 21:58, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Do you have an example? Consider pretty much any actor who retires. During their career, when they are appearing in film or television frequently, or press junkets promoting their latest production, they are unquestionably public figures. But after they retire, unless they stay otherwise active in public life by transitioning to another role, they stop being public figures. Sure you might hear from them once every so often, typically when one of their well loved productions has an anniversary, sequel, or reboot, but are they still a public figure when they're living quietly at home?

For an actual example, consider Peter Ostrum. In 1971 he starred as Charlie Bucket in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. After that, he retired, and as our article states in the lead "became reluctant to speak about his one starring role". Was Ostrum a public figure in 1971, when the film was released? Absolutely. Was he a pubic figure after that when he became a veterinarian however, or got married? No. Aside from some interviews over the years, and giving an annual speech at a non-notable school in New York state, he largely seems to stay out of public life. Or consider John Deacon. Between 1971 and 1991 Deacon was a member of Queen, writing many songs for the band, and appearing at countless concerts and music venues. After the death of Freddie Mercury however, Deacon started to withdraw from public life, before retiring from the music industry in 1997. Since then, aside from giving a couple of interviews, Deacon has avoided publicity. Was he a public figure during his decades with Queen? Yes. But since retiring? No, very clearly no.

Being a public figure is not a once-and-done thing. The WP:LOWPROFILE essay, as limited as it is on an actual clear definition, states clearly in the last section that the high/low profile status of an individual changes over time. BLPPRIVACY and BLPPUBLIC likewise adapt over time, with respect to a person's status. A person who becomes a public figure has the same reasonable expectation of privacy up until the point at which they become one as any other low profile individual. Likewise a person who was one and ceases to be one, has the same expectation of privacy after the point at which they retire from public life. However, even when one is a public figure, there are still aspects of their personal life that they have (or should have, tabloids notwithstanding) a reasonable expectation of privacy over. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:58, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't see anything in WP:BLPPRIVACY or WP:PUBLICFIGURE that would mean a former name of a public figure is automatically not a privacy concern (even if we can source it). Would we publish the address of a public figure, even if sourceable, simply because they're a public figure? Obviously not (and in fact WP:BLPPRIVACY specifically instructs otherwise).

The exception, as I read it, is for current full names that have been widely published by reliable sources, not former names (and this guidance isn't specific to public figures either). There's no instruction about former names other than the instruction for miscellaneous personal info (which is to say, it should be removed). Loki (talk) 19:36, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

So, on the whole I think this is definitely more solid than the other drafts we've seen so far. There's a few bits though where I think some clarification and tweaks would be helpful.

On exemption 3, what does exercised some editorial judgement, however slight actually mean in practice? How do you define a source that has exercised editorial judgement? Is this something as general as the source publication having an editorial policy and team, or is it something else entirely? Do you have any examples of this in practice so we could see what it looks like?

In paragraph 3 the proposal states When the individual has consented to have their prior name disseminated. I'm concerned that this doesn't properly differentiate between someone who acknowledged their former name once or twice when first coming out, and someone who later distanced themselves or otherwise refused to acknowledge their former name. Would this not lead to the inclusion of deadnames that we currently exclude because they were not notable under that name, like for example Nicole Maines (see this November 2020 RfC for why we currently exclude the name)? Or are we seriously considering consent for dissemination a one-and-done thing that cannot be revoked at a later date?

In paragraph 4, the proposal states articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name.... Is that not softer than the current guideline? The current guideline text is a lot more definitive, use their current name unless they prefer to be credited under their former name for past events. The implication that I get from the text in the proposal is that using their current name is optional in all cases, whereas the current text is optional if the person prefers it. To better fit with the current text, I think this would be better phrased as something like articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name should use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnotes, unless they prefer their former name be used for past events (changes in italics). Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:55, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

For exemption 3, I mean basically the same thing as WP:BLPPRIMARY means. Honestly, I probably should replace it; I just wasn't aware of it at the time of writing the draft. (My one remaining qualm is that it's a BLP policy and this is explicitly about dead people.)

For paragraph 3, I'm not sure of the distinction you're trying to get at. Reading the RFC, it seems the supporters are trying to argue that Maines' former name should be used because she has said it publicly, which is the exact distinction between "made public" and "consented to have disseminated" that I'm trying to get at with the wording change.

For paragraph 4, I was just copying over Cuñado's wording. I'm fine with that amendment. Loki (talk) 23:34, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

On exemption 3, you could maybe replace it with some sort of reference to WP:NOR#Primary for deceased individuals. A court transcript, or some sort of public governmental record is no more or less a primary source whether the person is alive or dead. I'll reserve judgement until I can see your replacement, but I would urge some sort of consideration towards source quality here, as well as source quantity when you're redrafting. The first of the two recent RfCs mentions concerns about both source volume and source quality in its closure.

On paragraph 3, the distinction is I'm trying for is, is the consent for dissemination something that's done once and is otherwise irrevocable? Or is it something that can be withdrawn in the future? If a person gave an interview shortly after coming out saying something like "my former name is X", but at some point after that interview being published they withdrew that consent and otherwise never acknowledged the former name, would we still include it? If they contacted the original source publisher, and the publisher agreed to remove it because they no longer consented to it being disseminated, would we not include it?

I guess I'm deeply uncomfortable with this new inclusion criteria, because it would result in the inclusion of the deadnames of many trans people that we currently exclude for privacy concerns, as they changed their names prior to becoming notable. With the exception of rare cases, like Sarah Ashton-Cirillo or Caitlyn Jenner, who are pretty open about their former names, most trans and non-binary people are not. Deadnaming, as the article lays out, is generally regarded as harmful, and most trans or non-binary people do not ever wish their former names to be known or mentioned. I would honestly see a change along these lines as a step backwards, as it would allow for the routine inclusion of names that, for the most part, our article subjects do not wish known. I'm reminded of what Laverne Cox said in 2019 when she remarked on IMDB including her deadname prior to changing their policies; "the ultimate insult", yet any of the changes presented so far by Tamzin, Cuñado, or yourself, would allow for us to start including her former name. That is something that, until this set of TNT proposals, I'm not sure the community has even discussed anywhere, let alone recently. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:29, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

The wording is "consents" not "has ever consented". I'm really not sure why you think this is a real possibility. Loki (talk) 04:09, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

After this one time, it should not be mentioned again. There is no consensus on how often a former name can or should be mentioned,[53] so that sentence should be removed. And if the person was notable prior to transition, the former name should be in the lead sentence and bolded, as the MOS currently advises, not floating around somewhere in the lead unbolded.

The third paragraph wiki-links to WP:WEIGHT twice... I would simplify that paragraph to say When the individual has consented to have their prior name disseminated, or a deceased individual's name has been included in multiple reliable sources, it can be mentioned in the same situations that any other name could be. However, former names are not automatically of encyclopedic value, and should not be given undue weight or overemphasis. If the appropriate weight is ambiguous, lean on the side of mentioning the name as infrequently as possible.

I would change "have said post-transition" to "expressed post-transition". I would get rid of the first sentence from footnote B as I don't think it's necessary to single out books and newspapers; 'reliable sources' is already mentioned. I would also remove the first sentence from footnote C since that seems more like an opinion rather than a fact. Some1 (talk) 23:56, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Also strongly disagree with After this one time, it should not be mentioned again as it's in clear violation of how leads are supposed to work. There should not be content in the lead that is not also contained in the article body, and this goes for names as well. Elli (talk | contribs) 01:23, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes. And there's weird wording in some places, like "avoid confusion from readers" (try "avoid confusing readers"), etc.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:02, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

should not be mentioned again is very clearly how the guideline works now, so no, I'm not removing that. You'd need a strong consensus of editors to overturn that. Mentioning the former name only in the lead is how every article about a trans person notable before transition on Wikipedia is currently worded. See for instance Chelsea Manning, whose deadname we mention once in the lead and thereafter only in quotes, or The Wachowskis, whose deadnames are mentioned in the lead and thereafter only in quotes.

It's also required by the current text, which starts out by insisting that we refer to any person by their most recently expressed name and pronouns, before adding an exception in the case of trans people who were notable before transition which only applies to the first sentence of the lead of the article about them. The general rule applies after we're done with the mention required by the exception, so after that point we can only use the name and pronouns they prefer. Loki (talk) 04:23, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

is very clearly how the guideline works now The current MOS doesn't require that a former name be mentioned once, only in the lead. For example, Caitlyn Jenner and Elliot Page's former names are included in the lead, but also in the Early life section of their respective articles. At least for deceased trans or nonbinary people, there's no consensus for including language about how often a former name can/should be used, see the RfC from two months ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1158982243#Topic_3:_How_often_to_mention_deadnames?_(MOS:GENDERID_3rd_paragraph*) Some1 (talk) 11:33, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

Use of "Rabbi"

Should "Rabbi" be used in running text (here, for example)? Or just the individual's surname, as is the norm? I strongly assume it's the latter and that the recommended action is to remove "Rabbi", just wanted to confirm and check to see if there's been any discussion regarding this already. Mooonswimmer 17:05, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

MOS:REVEREND says no to "Rabbi". "In general, honorific prefixes ... should not be included... In particular, this applies to: ... styles and honorifics related to ... clergy ..." Mitch Ames (talk) 03:59, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

Yep.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:46, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that MOS is intended to cover the case of "Rabbi". "Rabbi" is not like "Her Majesty" or "The Reverend" or similar two word titles; it's a lot more like "Doctor". Furthermore that section links to a part of the MOS specifically about Christian clergy.

That being said, I agree that the overall rule not to use honorifics in running text applies here. I just disagree that that specific section, which says honorifics for clergy should not be used at all, applies to rabbis. Loki (talk) 02:17, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

So MOS:DOCTOR or MOS:SURNAME, instead of MOS:REVEREND. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:31, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree. In running text, the surname is generally sufficient without honorifics. Wehwalt (talk) 05:04, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

Why do you think that rabbis are exempt from a guideline that applies to clergy? It's like "Father", "Pastor", and "Reverend" without the "the". And we don't use "Doctor" either. What the word is unfortunately linked to doesn't override what the guidelines says and isn't an indication that Wikipedia has special rules that applied to Christian clergy only. Why would it? Largoplazo (talk) 10:53, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, MoS would definitely not intend something to apply to clergy of a particular religion only. If the material needs to be adjusted to include titles like rabbi and imam then let's do it and put this to rest.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:33, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

I think it is exactly like any of those honorifics considering it is capitalized. Uncapitalized though, I get a little vague. "According to rabbi [first] [last]" seems a bit like "according to engineer [first] [last]" or "according to philosopher [first] [last]". —DIYeditor (talk) 13:54, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

Sure; there are times also that mentioning someone is a doctor or professor or pastor is also contextually relevant.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:06, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

WP:BOLD restrictions on the use of deceased transgender or non-binary persons birth name or former name

I've WP:BOLDly added the following to MOS:DEADNAME:

For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple high quality reliable and secondary sources containing significant coverage of the person.

I understand that some editors will want stricter restrictions than this, and I understand that some editors will want looser restrictions than this. However, I believe the former group will consider this an improvement over the status quo, and I believe the latter group will recognize that if this went to RfC it would get consensus.

Hopefully, this is an acceptable compromise that will allow us to avoid yet another RfC, at least for now. BilledMammal (talk) 05:03, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Is there precedence including the wording " "high quality" reliable sources"? I mean, reliable sources are reliable or not. I don't know since when not including the birth name of a notable person who is an article is considered a good encyclopedic practice. Maybe it is actually a thing and I simply don't know about it. But why only give this exception to transgender or non-binary? I think if anything such guidance should be for everyone if it is good guidance. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 05:16, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

There is absolutely a quality level difference in reliable sources, despite them being reliable in general. On the side of news, the Daily Dot is nowhere near the level of the New York Times. Significant coverage of a topic in the latter is worth far more than the former. Silverseren^C 05:20, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

There is no consensus in the reliability of the Daily Dot, actually. Although there are some sources considered high-quality, a source in general is considered reliable or not. It can be high-quality in some contexts but not considered reliable in others, as in WP:MEDRS. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 05:30, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

We definitely don't want to include this merely because someone finds the name recorded in a library catalog entry or something like that. It should be central to the notability of the subject, not merely incidental. In that sense, I support the spirit of BilledMammal's attempt. But I strongly oppose pushing GNG-based definitions of SIGCOV into non-GNG parts of our guidelines. We should use that only where it is appropriate in some (not all!) notability guidelines. More general wording like "central to the notability of the subject" would be a better way to go here. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:21, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

central to the notability of the subject The issue with that is I'm not certain what it means; at least WP:SIGCOV is somewhat well understood. BilledMammal (talk) 05:24, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

I disagree. SIGCOV means whatever the people arguing at AfDs want it to mean. Often it means "I want to include this subject so I will count this churnalism consisting of a press release with the serial numbers filed off as SIGCOV" or "I don't want to include children's fantasy novels so I will rewrite SIGCOV to disallow the sorts of content that are typically included in reviews of those novels so that I can argue that they do not have SIGCOV". It is too politicized and too frequently gamed in ways that have nothing to do with what we want here. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:33, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

I know there have been very extensive discussions about this gender topic but I still fail to understand how come in an encyclopedia the transitioning of a person is not a major piece of information to be included, and that includes their former names. I am not very versed in trans philosophy but I am guessing it is an issue of privacy. Usually that's the realm of living people though. What's the rationale about providing extra limitations for alternative names of trans and non-binary deceased people exclusively? Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 05:43, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

I would interpret "high quality reliable sources" as being limited to WP:GREL sources; "reliable sources" would include WP:MREL sources.

I think if anything such guidance should be for everyone if it is good guidance. Personally, I would have no objection to expanding this to all bios; if reliable sources don't consider a name relevant, why should we? BilledMammal (talk) 05:24, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

You are moving the goalposts. "Reliable sources" and "SIGCOV" are not the same thing. A source can be reliable despite being non-independent of the subject, or despite only sourcing one small factoid above the subject. (I would argue that, in cases where the factoid can only be sourced in this way, it is not particularly central to the notability of the subject. But for non-controversial information (not deadnames) these non-central claims can still be helpful in building out an article to a more complete length. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:36, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

This response was to Thinker78's comment where they said Is there precedence including the wording " "high quality" reliable sources"? I mean, reliable sources are reliable or not. My understanding of their comment was that it was focused on a different aspect of the paragraph than what your comment was focused on; if I misunderstood their comment I apologize, but I am certainly not moving any goalposts. BilledMammal (talk) 05:39, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable. Regards, Thinker78 (talk) 05:56, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Second version

David Eppstein has now reverted, saying Some restriction like this may be appropriate but pushing your SIGCOV-fetish into MOS goes too far.

To try to address this, I've changed the wording to:

For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple high quality reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.

This still requires that the source contains more than a passing mention, but it omits the reference to SIGCOV that David found so objectionable. BilledMammal (talk) 05:26, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

As said above, I agree with the spirit of your proposal: we should only include deadnames if we have some evidence that they are a significant part of the biography, not just something incidental that we happen to find barely-adequate sourcing for. What I am opposed to is not that, but the way you worded it in terms of something that properly belongs only in our notability guidelines. This is better, but I'm still concerned: we have some classes of people (for instance academics) for whom notability does not rely on the existence of high-quality reliable secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of those people. If such a person happens to be transgender (I know of multiple notable examples, not all of whom say anything about that in the article) are we to be entirely forbidden from mentioning it? Even if, for instance, much of their academic publication record happens to be under their deadname? In that case it would, I think, be central to their notability, but in a way different from the sort of sourcing you are imagining to exist, which might not exist at all. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:31, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

WP:NACADEMIC is not a guideline that I have a good understanding of; JoelleJay, I understand you do have a very strong understanding of it. Perhaps you could comment on how this would interact with that guideline and, if you agree it would interact as David describes, recommend changes to address that? BilledMammal (talk) 05:44, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

I think David's point about academics not receiving the type of biographical significant coverage that would provide sourcing on a trans person's birth name is accurate (and perhaps he should have participated in the aforementioned RfCs and in the ones that decided deadnames can never be mentioned in living transpeople's articles if they weren't notable pre-transition). However, I would argue that in cases where much of their academic publication record happens to be under their deadname, our guidance already licenses mentioning the deadname because the individual's notability is unlikely to be derived wholly from post-transition publication. In most NPROF evaluations, notability is far more a cumulative measure than what we use in any other guideline; in my opinion, if someone could not have established an NPROF pass without pre-transition publications, the deadname is DUE even if they wouldn't have met notability criteria before adopting their new name. But if their publication record was strong enough to pass NPROF post-transition and it was too weak to pass pre-transition, then exclusion of the name may be warranted according to the RfC close. JoelleJay (talk) 06:05, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

As an example, I don't think we mention Lynn Conway's deadname (although she certainly passes GNG as well as PROF), because her most significant publications were post-transition. Another class of subjects who do have significant coverage, but about their works and less commonly about their personal lives, is book authors. If we think someone is notable per WP:AUTHOR, because they have in-depth published reviews of their books, we should still probably not use a review that happens to mention a deadname as an excuse to include that deadname. On the other hand if many of their reviewed books were published under the deadname, then we probably should mention the deadname even if we don't have in-depth biographical coverage beyond the reviews. Again, what's important is that it's central to the notability of the subject, not what kind of sources we have. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:14, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank you both. Perhaps if we reworded the paragraph to:

For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple high quality reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person, or if the person published multiple reviewed works under the name.

I'm not sure multiple reviewed works is the correct line to draw, but we can work on that; would anyone object to the general principle? BilledMammal (talk) 06:47, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Like I said below, I sort of do; I think it would be much more elegant to just incorporate the notability guideline we already use for living people rather than carving out exceptions for every little local notability guideline. Loki (talk) 14:25, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

much of their academic publication record happens to be under their deadname So this is an interesting point. Many academic journals, such as everything published by Springer Nature, SAGE, Elsevier, Wiley, PLOS.one, now allow for names to be changed on previously published works without any corrections note being added to the paper. This is in line with the current COPE ethics guidance on name changes, which states that correction notices for name changes are not appropriate in all circumstances however, particularly in the case of transgender, non-binary, and/or gender diverse (hereafter shortened to “trans”) authors because of the potential trauma caused by the continued circulation of their previous names and the risks to which disclosure of their gender identity subjects them.

Accordingly it is far more likely going forward that any academic who meets NACADEMIC for works published prior to their name change, that those works will only ever contain their current name. For the question of If such a person happens to be transgender (I know of multiple notable examples, not all of whom say anything about that in the article) are we to be entirely forbidden from mentioning it? I would ask back, how are we going to verify the name change through an academic's publication record if their publication record for the duration of their career only contains papers published in their current name, even for works published years or decades prior to changing it? Sideswipe9th (talk) 15:29, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Let me give a hypothetical to better illustrate this. Lets say we have an academic who is currently called Jessie Smith after changing it some time in 2022/2023. Jessie has been publishing for the last ten or twenty years, primarily or exclusively in one or more of the journals I mentioned above. We have an article on Jessie because they meet NACADEMIC#1, and that article is in their former name. And we have no high-quality reliable secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of Jessie .

At some point in 2023 after Jessie changed their name, they request that their previously published papers are updated with their new name. The journal(s) comply with the request per their name change policies and leave no record of Jessie's former name. As such every paper written by Jessie in the last ten or twenty years contains only Jessie's current name. How do we proceed? Jessie's former name is now unverifiable to the current version of the sources we previously used to verify their name (ie their publication record). If it's considered to be encyclopaedic interest that we include that person's former name, how do we do so in a way that does not breach WP:V given that all of the sources we could have used only contain Jessie's current name? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:05, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

You are missing something. We do not base academic notability on having publications. We base it, most commonly, on the impact of those publications, as measured for instance by citations. Those citations are in other works that are not going to retroactively cite the same publication under a different author name; they will use the name under which they found the publication. So new citations will go to the new name but old citations will remain under the old name. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:15, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Those citations are in other works that are not going to retroactively cite the same publication under a different author name That's not entirely true. If you check the policies I linked all of them cascade changes through DOI metadata to update citations in the works of other authors. Now if you're looking only at a print or PDF copy of the journal or paper, that was printed or generated at the time the paper was originally published or at any point prior to the name change, then that copy will obviously contain a citation to the person's former name. However if you're looking at the same journal or paper, either through the journal's website, or a PDF copy that is generated after the name change, then the citation in the paper will contain the new name only. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:17, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

FWIW I prefer to WP:SIGCOV version to this version, but like both, with one caveat.

I don't think we need to specifically address the situation of academics, and relatedly I feel like trying to carve out specific exceptions for every special notability guideline is a clear case of rules creep. Rather than either of these we should just incorporate the notability guideline we already use for living people, so:

For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under their former name or if their former name is documented in multiple high quality reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.

Almost all academics who published significantly under their deadname are going to be notable pre-transition. There may be a few exceptions who published only very insignificant works pre-transition, and in those cases I don't see why we'd need to mention the deadname. Loki (talk) 14:24, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

So I have a different concern than what David has stated. I think saying their birth or former name should be included in the lead sentence (emphasis mine to highlight objectionable point) is too strong, in that it mandates inclusion if the criteria is met. The May/June RfC closed with a consensus that there is a consensus against using the former names of transgender or non-binary people, living or dead, except when of encyclopedic interest or when necessary to avoid confusion. Also, there is clear consensus that a former name is not automatically of encyclopedic interest. and the community believes that, for the most part, the prior name should not be used.

Taking those points in mind, I would prefer if we tweak this to may be included, as this would still provide guidance for what the inclusion criteria is without mandating inclusion if that criteria is met. I realise this is different than what I suggested for the just closed June/July RfC, however for that version I felt as though the inclusion criteria was high enough on their own that they would cover this. Sideswipe9th (talk) 14:52, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

It's not should be included, it's should be included ... only if. Or to rephrase, should only be included if.

Also, honestly, the MOS should provide some positive guidance for when a former name should be included. May be included feels very much too weak to me. By the rejection of the "never" option in the previous RFC, we've already agreed that there are some cases where we should include a previous name. And if we're going to have those cases, I want to know what they are rather than having to argue about it every time. WP:IAR is still a thing for really extraordinary cases but I don't want to have significant ambiguity about the typical case. Loki (talk) 15:57, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

The current version is should be included...only if [the conditions are met]. In other words, we are mandating inclusion when condition is true. In programming language that is if (A == true || B == true) { /* include name /*} else { /* exclude name */ }. Even if we move the only earlier in the sentence, we are still mandating inclusion by saying should only be included if [conditions are met], because the emphasis is on the should and the conditions. It does not allow for a local consensus to form for exclusion of the name, if the conditions are otherwise met, short of invoking WP:IAR.

Conversely by saying may be included...only if [the conditions are met] we're not mandating inclusion. We're still providing the same set of positive inclusion criteria for when a previous name could be included, while also leaving it open within the letter of the guideline for local consensus to form around exclusion of the name should that be felt necessary based on the circumstances specific to each article. The only significant change is that we stop just short of mandating inclusion. In my mind, that isn't weaker, because the same criteria for inclusion must be met before a name can be included. It just allows for a little more editorial judgement on whether or not inclusion of the former name would or would not improve the article. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:18, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

But I don't want more editorial judgement. What you're calling "editorial judgement" I call "content disputes". The clearer the guideline is about this, the less likely we will have a content dispute on the talk page every time this situation comes up.

I'm not against arguing on the talk page; that's how Wikipedia works. But I am against arguing on the talk page for cases that should be trivial. Loki (talk) 16:42, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

should be included in the lead sentence IMO, notable deadnames of deceased trans people should be included in the lead, but non-notable deadnames of deceased trans people should be in the Early life section (if they have one). Some1 (talk) 18:55, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, on reflection I more or less agree with this. Maybe just delete the bit about where exactly to put it. Loki (talk) 21:06, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Now that I think about it more, BilledMammal's addition to the MOS as currently worded is actually pretty decent. Basically, if the name is documented in multiple high-quality reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person then it should be included in the lead sentence. Any former names of deceased transgender or non-binary persons' that don't meet that criteria can still be included in the article, just not in the lead. That's my interpretation of that one sentence anyway. Some1 (talk) 22:49, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

FWIW, that's not how I interpret it nor the consensus that generated it. The way the equivalent guideline for living trans people has been interpreted is that you either include the name in the lead or you don't include it anywhere.

Maybe the section does need a little rewrite, because I admit that's not super clear from just the text. Loki (talk) 04:05, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Second revert

SnowRise has now reverted this, saying I'm sorry BM, but 1) this is substantially the same language advanced at the recent WP:VPR discussion, with massive community input, that failed to gain consensus. And 2) GENDERID is about the last MoS section where WP:BOLD is well-advised, especially in these circumstances. Please wait a while and attempt another go at consensus if you wish, but this feels like an effort to back-door in non-consensus language, and feels borderline TE, IIAH.

I'm not certain if I can address these by adjusting the proposal, but I hope I can convince you that they are inaccurate.

For #1, I believe the language diverges significantly from the language used at the recent VPR proposal; the VPR proposal required extensive coverage of the name, an impossible standard, while this requires that the name be included in sources that focus on the subject.

For #2, I am hoping that I can come up with a compromise that will let us proceed without needing further drama. Regarding the comment about borderline TE, I note that I strongly opposed the VPR proposal, on many grounds. I don't believe any of those grounds apply to this proposal. BilledMammal (talk) 02:42, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Fix ping: User:Snow Rise. BilledMammal (talk) 02:43, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I've WP:BOLDly reverted the removal. Far as I'm concerned, we have a clear consensus for some wording to this effect from the previous and highly attended RFC. While that RFC didn't agree on specific wording it did agree we should add some wording to this effect, so any change that removes all language that addresses the case of deceased trans people is against consensus.

(FWIW I also view this wording as basically the minimum viable wording.) Loki (talk) 03:16, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I think that's a highly problematic choice Loki, and you might be buying yourself some trouble with that bold reading of the consensus, which I think did not reflect the closer's interpretation. I'll also note that a number of people, admins included, thanked me for that edit, which I made on procedural rather than partisan grounds. You might be chewing off some trouble with what could be considered an edit warring edit on a policy page; that change has already been reverted twice before your own re-insertion, and BRD applies as much to policy pages as anywhere, especially where the related RfC involved nearly a hundred community members and the majority opposed. That said, it's your skin and best of luck. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 03:30, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

With all due respect here, we already went through the WP:BRD cycle and seemed to be pretty clear on keeping the new language before you popped in and reverted the change without discussion. So I think your revert is on considerably shakier ground than mine, if it comes to that. Loki (talk) 18:22, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't you really appreciate how BRD works. 10 days is not enough time to establish a "status quo" version. Nor was I the first person to revert the edit. BilledMammal inserted an edit that dubiously defensible as a WP:BOLD edit to a policy (I mean style page technically, but think with the heaviness people ascribe to this issue, we can safely call it a policy determination), in light of the recent "no consensus" result at the RfC, which rejected substantially the same language. Now I believe BM was acting in good faith in doing so, but it was a questionable call, and beyond a shadow of a doubt, when that edit was reverted, they should have come here to discuss. Instead they chose to edit war an (again, substantially similar) version into the policy/style guidance. That is out of process, so I reverted it.

At that point, BM did what they should have done from the start: came here to discuss. Now you've again introduced the language, rather than allowing that process to take place, which is absolutely edit warring. You say that the previous RfC greenlights this, because it suggested there may be consensus for "something like this", but the more recent (and larger) RfC was held to address just that question, and to determine whether to add similar language to that which you are edit warring to introduce here. That discussion resulted in no consensus, with a substantial majority strongly opposing it. So clearly you do not have consensus here; "we went through the BRD cycle already" means nothing in terms of validating your preferred approach if there was no consensus at the end of that process. So if you really think you are on "solid ground" here, I think you may want to review some policies: WP:EW, WP:CONSENSUS, WP:BRD, and WP:TE, because to my eye you are in various levels of violation of each of them.

And I'm genuinely telling you this out of a friendly motive to spare you trouble. I don't care enough about this issue to fight you on this and don't have the time if I did. I have no intention of reverting and getting caught up in an edit war. But I am concerned that you and BM are on the edge of getting yourselves an unflattering variety of community attention. Whether you see it or not, you are way out on a limb here, and somebody could easily have taken you to ANI just based on your conduct so far, let alone what you may do next if someone else reverts you (which seems likely to me).

You should be discussing--or for crying out loud, just letting the issue lay dormant for a while. A week even, so the community can digest the previous discussion and contemplative consideration of the next proposal can take in feedback from the last RfC and draft something that more of the community can get behind. If you haven't noticed it from the numerous comments in the last RfC, the community's patience is ebbing around the ceaseless runs at this page, with every rebuked proposal spawning two more, like the heads of a hydra, and almost all of it coming from the same small circle of editors. Patience is almost out, I believe and now you are taking the most aggressive possible posture by edit warring the content in right after the RfC rejected very similar language. You're sitting on a powder keg smoking, and whether you believe me or not, it's your and BM's rear ends that would most benefit from hearing what I am trying to tell you. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 21:47, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Now I believe BM was acting in good faith in doing so, but it was a questionable call, and beyond a shadow of a doubt, when that edit was reverted, they should have come here to discuss. Instead they chose to edit war an (again, substantially similar) version into the policy/style guidance. That is out of process, so I reverted it.

Just a quick correction; the second version I added was modified to address the other editors concerns (replacing "significant coverage" with "non-trivial coverage"), and I opened a discussion about that version above at #Second version. I don't think it is accurate to characterize that as edit warring. BilledMammal (talk) 00:22, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I understand that. And honestly, BM, I wish I wasn't in a position to have to characterize it at all; I don't think you are looking to frustrate process, so I would have been happiest to say nothing more here, except to respond to your inquiry when I could. You already know I think you should have discussed the addition before making it to begin with, given all the context, and once it was reverted you were definitely required to discuss. The "I adapted it according to the feedback I got in the reverting edit, so it should be alright to repeat the disputed edit with those changes, right?" reasoning for not taking the issue to the talk page per BRD is a grey area in the absolute best of instances; in circumstances where you certainly know the edit is on a controversial topic, the 'D' in BRD is hard stopping point, where discuss before you edit--not something to be handled in your edit summaries after you go ahead and add the disputed content again. BRD and WP:EW are very clear about that.

But all that said, after the second revert, you did the proper thing and tried to open a line of dialogue here. I wish Loki had seen that step for the necessary and helpful one that it is, rather than stepping in to proxy/tag-team the edit back in for a third time. In doing so, they definitely took the whole thing unambigously into edit war territory, and I hope you don't get dragged along into any disruption or oversight that results. I wish you both good luck in disentangling the matter, really, but I'm gonna also be blunt that the overall approach here so far has been suboptimal and I think likely to be viewed as TE if this ends up at ANI or ANEW. So if somebody reverts Loki, I urge you both not to continue to try to force the language back in. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 03:11, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I really don't like all these WP:ASPERSIONS, and I think if your only argument is that we're reverting you and you don't like it, that means you have no actual argument for excluding that content. I was nowhere near 3RR (I haven't edited this page at all in over 24 hours) and I reverted you to restore text that was status quo and had consensus.

The basic fact of the situation is that we have an RFC with a very strong consensus for language like this. We don't currently have an RFC with consensus on specific wording, but there's no reason to think we'd need that: consensus on the talk page should be all that's necessary. And this wording had that. So reverting it was inappropriate: if you object to it, you need to come in and discuss. Loki (talk) 03:46, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

"I really don't like all these WP:ASPERSIONS, and I think if your only argument is that we're reverting you and you don't like it, that means you have no actual argument for excluding that content."

First off, no one is casting WP:ASPERSIONS at you: that policy is not in any way about someone describing easily verifiable actions you actually undertook.

Second, there is no "we" here; I was reverted precisely once--by you. The chain of events was this: BM made a WP:BOLD edit, and another editor reverted them. BM made minor corrections to the edit and then re-introduced it again. I felt this change required discussion, so I reverted again. BM then brought the matter here as they almost certainly should have done before the first edit, given the context of the multiple RfCs and ongoing dispute over the language and which they beyond question were required to do before introducing the edit a second time. And then you blew in and, instead of lending your support to BM in discussion here, as you should have, you instead re-introduced the edit again. That's edit warring. I'm sorry, it just is.

So please don't try to bootstrap your position with this "we are reverting you" comment that completely misrepresents the chain of events and how relevant policy applies here, dragging BilledMammal into your conduct. Your edit is more unfair to them than anyone else here: they were discussing at the point you decided to continue the edit war: now if you get your butt dragged to AE, ANI, or ANEW, they are likely to be brought along for the ride. That's not really fair to them, so again, I strongly encourage you not to revert again if the language is removed by another party (and I assure you, it won't be me). Lastly, my argument is not that WP:IDONTLIKEIT. My argument is that you are violating WP:BRD, WP:EW, and WP:TE. And you are.

"I was nowhere near 3RR (I haven't edited this page at all in over 24 hours..."

If you need someone to explain to you the difference between WP:Edit warring and WP:3RR, and that the former does not require (and in fact rarely involves) the latter, then you really, really do need to read the relevant policies before making any future reverts. Edit warring is not about specific metrics in terms of numbers of edits over a period of time: 3RR is just a rule of thumb to warn people when they probably are edit warring. It is sufficient to establish EW, but not required. The point is that you were out of process, and there was ongoing discussion on the talk page. You aren't meant to be reverting under those circumstances. Please, really, read the policy: I'm not making any of this up, I promise you.

"...and I reverted you to restore text that was status quo and had consensus."

If you think that "status quo version of the page" can be constituted by a change to policy that 1) was forced into the page the same day a second RfC closed with "no consensus" (where the two discussions involved well over a hundred community members), 2) was reverted almost instantly, and 3) was introduced into a major area of controversy and significance, merely because nobody reverted it for ten measly days, you really need to stay out of controversial policy areas until you undertand what "status quo version" means on this project. Because this is not it, my friend.

"The basic fact of the situation is that we have an RFC with a very strong consensus for language like this."

Yeah, and then you had a more recent and even larger RfC which found no consensus for language even more precisely similar to the language you are edit warring to include here. And in fact, a significant majority opposed it in that discussion. You have not met your burden for attaining consensus to include this language. And I'm not the only one telling you this: literally every other person engaging with BM here in this thread other than you has said as much. Even one of the primary advocates for the need to make GENDERID protections more robust has said as much. You should be discussing until you get that consensus. Why does this seem so controversial to you? This is standard process.

"We don't currently have an RFC with consensus on specific wording, but there's no reason to think we'd need that: consensus on the talk page should be all that's necessary."

Except you don't have that, or anything remotely like it. BM introduced the edit and only then came to the talk page to discuss. And that's this thread here and there unambigously not consensus here to include the language. If you see that consensus...well, I honestly don't know what to tell you, I don't think [[WP:IDONTHEARTHAT|think I can reach you on this if that's the case.

"So reverting it was inappropriate: if you object to it, you need to come in and discuss.

The policy is BRD, not BRRD. You and BM are advocating a WP:BOLD addition to an important piece of policy language. When you get challenged on that, you seek consensus before forcing the language in, not the other way around. And no, again you are not "defending the status quo version". If you think you get to override all the voluminous community discussion and enforce your preferred version of a hotly debated piece of policy language merely because you happened to clear a week and a half without someone reverting that version (especially considering it was actually reverted by a third party almost immediately after it was first added, and was EW'd back in)...well, then good luck with that.

And with that, I'm done here. I can't be any more clear about the relevant policies and despite your belief that I am particularly attached to one version over the other here, I'm actually not: I reverted BM's WP:BOLD edit for procedural reasons. And whether you believe it or not, my initial comments here to you were meant primarily to warn you of potential fallout from your actions and for no other purpose: that's why they were phrased as they were. Now you seem unable to hear that and just dig yourself deeper and deeper into convincing yourself you have policy and consensus on your side here. But bluntly: if you believe that, you have some serious deficits in your understanding of both, and you're on a collusion course with ANI if you edit war further. I won't be the one to take you there, or to argue with you about any of this further, but I'm also done being the one trying to spare you that outcome. Good luck. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 05:25, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, and then you had a more recent and even larger RfC which found no consensus for language even more precisely similar to the language you are edit warring to include here. The proposed wording here changes the requirement from a deadname itself receiving multiple pieces of SIGCOV to the deadname being mentioned in multiple pieces of SIGCOV. Most opposes were specifically opposing the former wording rather than opposing the whole idea of restrictions on deadnaming dead transpeople (which had already received consensus in the earlier RfC where deadnames in this context were deemed to be "not inherently encyclopedic" and "must be avoided to some undetermined extent"). JoelleJay (talk) 06:02, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Which you and I may very well agree is a significant change. It certainly addresses a major concern for me. But neither you, nor I, not any small clique of editors gets to just assume that all those opposers would change their !votes and support the version here, based on our own idiosyncratic reading of their reasoning. All manner of confirmation bias could get imputed by such an approach, which is one of numerous reasons why consensus generation on this project does not operate in that fashion.

I'm not saying we necessarily need another RfC, but some sort of much more robust, broad community discussion here was due before adding in this language. And once it was challenged, it definitely needed to stay out until a significant consensus was reached to include it. None of that happened here, and it's a problem. It's actually going to cost support for this possibly feasible compromise version, if the lack of respect for process keeps up, mark my words. Loki has presumed that I and everyone cautioning them to back off from forcing the changes in is diametrically opposed to the addition, but that's not what's going on here. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 06:41, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi again, BM. There may very well be some merit to the argument that there are significant operative implications to the distinctions you are making between the wording of the recently closed no consensus proposal and your own wording, but I'm going to strongly stick by my assessment at least as far as saying that it is similar enough to what the community just failed to authorize that a WP:BOLD edit to introduce it into the policy was not the way to go here.

As to whether I can be personally won over by your argument, I think those issues are complex and nuanced, and I want to give it some thought before engaging. I just burnt out much of the little remaining capacity for such thought (mired in sleep deprivation as I am at the moment) with my last few edits here; I'm well late for an obligation; when I get back, I have to somehow rally and get my mind focused enough for several hours of intensive work (actual work) tonight; and I'm into an intimidating couple of days immediately after! And when I do login next I am engaged with a couple of other fast moving community matters. All of which is my way of asking for patience with regard to my reply: without, I hope, feeling that I am dismissing your views or not prepared to engage with them! I'll be back to this as soon as I can be. Let me at least say for now that I do recognize that your proposed edit was goodfaith: I hope the TE did not imply otherwise. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 03:24, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Concur with SnowRise. We just had another RfC come to a failure of consensus on language like this. While it made some steps closer to consensus than the RfC before it, what it means is that we need to workshop another proposal and get consensus on that; much of the discussion on this page is workshopping such a proposal. Let's not short-circuit that more productive endeavor by editwarring to inject something that doesn't have a consensus for it.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:13, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah I agree with both here. As I've said in another discussion below, we really should be analysing in detail (beyond just the remarks of the closing) both of the recent RfCs to try and distil where the community consensus actually lies. It'll take time, as both recent RfCs were lengthy, but it'll have a better result overall. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:18, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

If people insist I'll run an RfC on this wording, but it seems to be a waste of time - I struggle to see anyway that this proposal won't receive consensus, given that in the previous RfC many who opposed the wording there expressed support wording like what I have inserted. BilledMammal (talk) 01:28, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

We're not asking you to run an RfC on this wording. Both SMcCandlish and I are saying that we should analyse the two most recent RfCs before making any proposal on this point. After undertaking that analysis, it may be that your wording is a fair and reasonable interpretation of where the community consensus lies, and it may not be. Right now, without having done that analysis, we simply do not know.

If we do that work now, then any proposal we take further will have a much higher chance of being accepted, in no small part because we can refer to that analysis when presenting the new proposal. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

If editors require formal consensus for an proposal, then they are asking the editors supporting that edit to either drop the proposal or to run an RfC. I believe that consensus is behind this edit, based on my analysis of the previous RfC and the support expressed for this option among those who opposed that proposal, so I will chose the second path if formal consensus is deemed to be required here. BilledMammal (talk) 01:38, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

based on my analysis of the previous RfC and the support expressed for this option among those who opposed that proposal This is the first time you've alluded to having done an analysis of the previous RfC. As such, could you elaborate on this please? How did you reach the text of this proposal? Where there any other alternative formulations were considered and ruled out during the analysis, and if so what were they and why were they ruled out? Beyond the specific questions that were asked in each RfC, are there any proposals that your analysis would consider doomed from the outset? Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:45, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

I've previously alluded to such an analysis when I said given that in the previous RfC many who opposed the wording there expressed support wording like what I have inserted, and I believe I've alluded to it elsewhere as well. I reached the text of this proposal by considering the discussions during that RfC, and found that JoelleJay's suggestion was particularly convincing to editors involved in that discussion and so heavily based my proposal on it.

Beyond the specific questions that were asked in each RfC, are there any proposals that your analysis would consider doomed from the outset? I could think of dozens, but I don't think it is very useful to discuss doomed proposals unless someone actually proposes them.

In the end, my position is that this is a proposal that is all but certain to receive consensus if brought to a formal discussion (I understand that some editors will want stricter restrictions than this, and I understand that some editors will want looser restrictions than this. However, I believe the former group will consider this an improvement over the status quo, and I believe the latter group will recognize that if this went to RfC it would get consensus.), and I proposed it on that basis in the hope that we could avoid yet another formal discussion - but as I said, if editors insist on it needing to receive formal consensus then I will open an RfC on it. BilledMammal (talk) 01:58, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

In the end, my position is that this is a proposal that is all but certain to receive consensus if brought to a formal discussion I would like to agree with this, however I need evidence to do so. I ask because there's at least one other competing view on how to interpret what was discussed at the RfCs. While I'm opposing that one currently, I have to ask why is that one a less accurate reading of the community consensus than yours? Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:05, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Also, why JoelleJay's suggestion, and not Trystan's? If you considered Trystan's suggestion in the evaluation, what lead to your discounting of it over JoelleJay's? I know we discussed it at the time, but the closer did seem to imply a reference to it, even if they did not specifically name it. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:10, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Before addressing that "competing view", I think it would be helpful to better explain my view. When reading that discussion I found that most editors, including those who opposed the proposal, didn't believe that deadnames should always be included. Reading the specific arguments I found that the most common objections were focused on including it when reliable sources had not done so, among both editors who supported and opposed the proposal. I also found that when such an alternative was raised it received relatively broad support.

I don't think that Cuñado's view competes with this; their view is broader and deeper, but it doesn't conflict with what I have said here, and indeed their proposal includes a section that is almost identical to what I propose (Individuals who have been deceased for at least two years, where multiple reliable independent sources have documented the name).

Regarding Trystan's proposal (is established through discussion of the name in high quality sources), the primary reason I didn't base it on that was that there was no chance it could be implemented as a WP:BOLD edit; it is almost identical to the proposal rejected in the previous RfC, it shares the issues that proposal had, and it was opposed by too many editors in that discussion including myself. For those reasons I also don't believe it would receive consensus even if a formal RfC was opened on the topic, and I suspect that even opening an RfC on that topic would be controversial and invite accusations of tendentious editing. Further, if we are going to open another RfC on this topic it shouldn't be for yet another highly controversial proposal; it should be one that most of the community can get behind and produce a clear consensus for. (Regarding the closer's reference, I read that as referring to all the alternatives, including JoelleJay's, but reasonable minds may disagree.) BilledMammal (talk) 02:28, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

FWIW, I also oppose another RFC, at least so soon. Every time we do one, it takes a month to resolve a binary question about a specific wording, when the issue is that we need to craft a wording that people will agree to. As such, if we keep jumping the gun on these we're just going to annoy people with RFC after RFC on not-quite-perfect wordings of this guideline.

We saw this at the previous RFC where it was clear that many people objected to a single specific phrasing, but it was impossible to change that phrasing by the nature of the format. If we'd just pinged people to a discussion here, we could easily have fixed the objection on the first day instead of having to wait thirty before proposing anything else. Loki (talk) 03:53, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

The closure of the previous discussion was clear

The closer specifically stated: "Several comments argued that a variance on the proposed change would be far more preferable (and obviously could be the subject of a subsequent RFC), but consensus doesn't clearly support that version (yet)." and "Of course, further discussion/consensus can (and probably will) help address these points and/or alter wording.", but going in and trying to push through these changes via a discussion that preceded that one is out of process, and this is getting to be a tiresome way of seeing BilledMammal and other editors joining him conduct business on here. Those controversial changes should never have been made without discussion, and I am reverting them back to the status quo. Just because they didn't get noticed for 7 days is no excuse. Huggums537 (talk) 06:22, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

• Question - The proposed change states that the former name “…should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only…” etc. Am I correct in thinking that this change applies ONLY to the lead sentence and is intentionally NOT addressing the question of whether a deadname should be included at some later point in the article (such as in an “early life” section)? Blueboar (talk) 11:55, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

  Yeah, that wouldn't make any sense per MOS:LEADNOTUNIQUE. Our articles actually need to make sense without the lead being present at all (since we have no control over WP:REUSE of our content).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:09, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  I agree with Smc, if there is consensus for inclusion, it should be consistent for the whole article, and not just the lead. I've often felt that implementing special rules for the lead were just back door gateways to getting them introduced as a concept for the whole article anyway... Huggums537 (talk) 00:25, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  That was not the intent; see below for an updated draft. BilledMammal (talk) 01:51, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• "Didn't get noticed"? I opened a discussion publicizing the changes at the same time as making them. BilledMammal (talk) 01:51, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  Okay, I stand corrected about that. My apologies. SnowRise has pointed out in another comment that David Eppstein reverted the post less than 20 minutes later so I guess it did get noticed, and my facts were not accurate, but that would also indicate that neither was the claim Loki made it went unchallenged for 7 days so... Huggums537 (talk) 02:29, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  It went unchallenged for 7 days. BM made the requested changes and re-added it within 10 minutes, and David Eppstein thereafter dropped his objection. David Eppstein's objection was a narrow one about incorporating WP:SIGCOV into other guidelines.

  This whole discussion is literally just above. You can read the whole thing very easily. Loki (talk) 18:47, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Updated draft

For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple reliable and secondary sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.

I've updated this version to address comments made above. If there are no further issues with it, I am hoping we can get an informal consensus to include it rather than wasting more community time with an RfC; do any editors both oppose this change and believe there is a chance it wouldn't be approved in an RfC? BilledMammal (talk) 01:54, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

I like this change, FWIW. Loki (talk) 04:25, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, that seems to work.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:07, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

@Snow Rise and Huggums537: Any opposition to this? BilledMammal (talk) 15:59, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

This seems perfectly reasonable to me and has my personal support; I don't think I would have included the parenthetical as I think it might muddy the waters a bit, but even so it is viable language. That said, I think you're still taking an imprudent tack and imperiling the longterm stability of the addition if you introduce this back in with even the unanimous agreement of just the six users in this thread, given the larger context here.

So my strong advice to you is to be scrupulously pro forma and package the language together with the general GENDERID overhaul being contemplated below and discuss it as a part of that proposal. Since that proposal is meant to be an overhaul of the entire MoS and BLP wording regarding individual gender identity, I think that makes sense, and I doubt Cuñado, Tamzin, Sideswipe9th, SMcCandlish, and the others would object to that. I don't know if they plan to present their TNT/reboot proposal in RfC format (I think it would be advisable, but I don't know), but even if you just got the additional support of those participating in that thread, it would be better than the level of support we have right now.

Let me reiterate that I do not think I am being needlessly BURO about this: I think this is the smart thing to do to enshrine your hard work into policy with clear community support. Best of luck, however you approach it, and please consider this a formal request to ping me to future discussions / !votes on the matter. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 16:34, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Leaving aside my concern about this being too low a bar, there's one small change from this proposal below that might be worth implementing. Swap ...multiple reliable and secondary sources... to ...multiple reliable and neutral sources.... This will implicitly avoid the issue of biased and sensationalistic sources, while also maintaining some degree of source quality per the rest of the text. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:52, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

While Sideswipe9th warmed me up to the idea of using the phrase "high-quality sources", I think "multiple reliable and neutral sources" is the best overall, emphasizing the avoidance of low-quality rather than promoting high-quality sources. I don't think the source being "secondary" is the main concern.

The main issue I see is that this phrasing is introducing a major policy change in the MOS. You can't take lightly that we are talking about violating WP:NOTCENSORED with an MOS guideline and without clear justification. This wording might not even fly at BLP because that policy is about living people (or RDP) only. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:07, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm way more worried about primary sources than sensationalistic sources personally. Sensationalistic sources are usually not reliable. In the cases where we allow them, if the Telegraph and the Times of London publish someone's deadname, then I think there's at least some argument for including it, especially if you were to take as a given that those sources are reliable for trans issues (which I think is the actual issue here).

But I really want to avoid the situation where someone digs up someone's birth certificate or college admission records and says that therefore that means their deadname must be included. That's a real concern for a large majority of deceased trans people: their deadname is often documented somewhere and establishing a strong line between "sourceable in theory" and "this is what the news actually calls this person" is IMO a bigger concern for me. Loki (talk) 18:57, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

How about something like ..multiple reliable, neutral, and secondary sources..., which combines all three and that way we avoid both the primary source and sensationalistic source issues entirely? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:22, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Sideswipe: I would strongly argue for not including "neutral", per my comment below. It drastically conflicts with what we mean when we typical speak about "neutrality" in terms of sourcing on this project. It would almost certainly invite endless entrenched debates about whether this or that source is truly "neutral" in its treatment of an article subject, and because there would be no objective editorial test for resolving that question, every dispute of the application of wording would become a quagmire of original research.

Furthermore, I feel like it would almost certainly tank the proposal if and when it went before the broader community. I don't think it's useful and only muddies the water. Again, per the below, the major change that the proposed wording brings is actually at the back of the sentence. That's the part that should be protected if you want this proposal to heighten the burden, even a little. A highly subjective and value-laden term like "neutral" (that already has another very different and more pragmatic meaning on this project, with regard to sourcing) should be avoided if it is going to imperil the much more useful bit. Just my twopence worth. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 22:40, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I dunno. When we talk about neutral sources, generally we're speaking about the second paragraph of WP:BIASEDSOURCES and NPOV#Bias in sources. Yes RS uses a different definition of neutral versus NPOV, but it's something that we already discuss and somewhat define in both WP:RS and NPOV. To answer the point about there being "no objective editorial test", accounting for source bias is something that we already have to do, especially in contentious topics like this, when assessing whether or not some piece of content represents the NPOV on a given subject. Yes discussions on it can be contentious at times, but no more so than any other discussion. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:05, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, look, I realize that this subject has already seen it's fair share of contention, and I'm not looking to further inflame discussion, but in my opinion what you are suggesting flies directly, diametrically in the face of WP:NPOV; we are not meant to be judging or evaluating the conclusions of sources in any way (whether that pertains to bias or factual accuracy or any other element of their claims) in individual cases; we faithfully and accurately report them (through summary or attribution) with WP:DUE respect for the WP:WEIGHT given claims have, and without stamping our own perspectives on top of them. The closest this project ever gets to utilizing editor perspective in judging the worth or bias of a given source's perspective is when we deprecate a source: usually for blatant lack of proper internal editorial controls and/or a long and exhaustive history of objectively misrepresenting the facts. And even that is invariably a contentious affair and requires a large community consensus.

What we do not do is insert ourselves into the judgment and evaluation business of the content to be found in sources, whether for supposed "bias" or any other purpose. That is expressly, precisely, unambiguously, the thing WP:NPOV tells us we are not meant to do. So long as a source has WP:RS status and has not been deprecated for a specific purpose, it is acceptable to WP:verify facts and, in the case of nuanced issues, provide it's share of WP:WEIGHT.

And putting aside the fact that what you are proposing is nothing short of the precise inversion of the normal NPOV process, and the exact opposite of the normal emphasis we give to word "neutral" when discussing sources, I just think you could not be more wrong about the level of WP:disruption introducing such an adjective into a description of sources in a policy/style page (any policy, let alone this particularly contentious bit centered at the epicenter of the American culture war in particular) would have. It would enable endless subjective, POV-oriented fighting. "Neutral" according to whom? Based on what idiosyncratic standard? The entire point of NPOV is that it takes our perspectives as editors out of the analysis, and moves the test to the objective standard of how many sources say a certain thing (and in what particular ways and with how much consistency).

This language would do the exact opposite and actively encourage editors to argue from the basis of their own value judgments. It would open the floodgates of subjective analysis and functionally un-resolveable bickering. It's not at all like our normal processes. As contentious as the discussions that flow from WP:V and WP:NPOV/WP:WEIGHT can be, they do at the end of the day come down to a test that is external to our own perspectives--though some people just rationalize their own perspectives through selective reading of the sources even then. What you are suggesting would be an entirely different animal; an incentive to allow POV pushing through the back door of arguing the virtues and perspective of the sources themselves.

Lastly, I don't think this language has a WP:SNOWBALL's chance of passing community scrutiny. It adds very little of functional use to the statement and would almost certainly make the proposal dead on arrival. And the proposal's useful language is elsewhere in the sentence: "...containing non-trivial coverage of the person.". I strongly urge that we don't endanger the potential benefit of that wording (and our best chance yet to fashion together a community consensus at last here) for a highly irregular use of a term that already has a distinct and more or less polar-opposite meaning in policy. I very much respect your effort to bring the disparate sides of this issue together here, but adding this word is a terrible, terrible idea. I'm certain of it. Much better to stick with "secondary" which has a precise, actionable, applicable meaning under existing policy that directly aligns with what we want it to say here.SnowRise ^{let's rap} 23:51, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

we are not meant to be judging or evaluating the conclusions of sources in any way (whether that pertains to bias or factual accuracy or any other element of their claims) in individual cases Yes we are. Part of our role as editors is in figuring out what the neutral point of view on any given topic is, and NPOV straight up tells us that A neutral point of view should be achieved by balancing the bias in sources based on the weight of the opinion in reliable sources (emphasis added). There is no way to determine whether an article is or is not NPOV compliant without assessing the sourcing used against all of the reliable sources on the topic and accounting for their biases in doing so.

Lastly, I don't think this language has a WP:SNOWBALL's chance of passing community scrutiny. That's fair, and I'm not going to belabour this any more than I already have. I've made a suggested tweak that I think would improve the draft and whether or not that tweak finds consensus prior to bringing this forward (if necessary) is not something I'm going to lose sleep over either way. But please, don't say that NPOV tells us not to do something that it explicitly tells us to do. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:30, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Except the section you are selectively quoting doesn't tell us to do what you are suggesting we urge in this policy language: it tells us to do exactly the opposite. Here's that same section but with the several contextualizing sentences you omitted before the sentence you quoted:

"A common argument in a dispute about reliable sources is that one source is biased, meaning another source should be given preference. Some editors argue that biased sources should not be used because they introduce improper POV to an article. However, biased sources are not inherently disallowed based on bias alone, although other aspects of the source may make it invalid. A neutral point of view should be achieved by balancing the bias in sources based on the weight of the opinion in reliable sources and not by excluding sources that do not conform to the editor's point of view." (emphasis added)

What you are suggesting in this context is to omit sources from consideration of what is essentially a WP:weight determination. That is not what the quoted section of the policy is telling us. Again, it's the exact, polar opposite: what NPOV tells us to do is to do is to cover all major views, and you evaluate the bias only for purposes of WEIGHT and for presenting all the major prevailing views. You don't judge the bias for purposes of throwing out sources you personally do not find "neutral", which is what you are suggesting we should suggest here: disregarding entirely, in a given context, based on a given editor's (or group of editors') personal feelings about their bias. I don't want to give offense, but I think you are clearly reading what the policy urges utterly and completely backwards if you think it supports the suggestion we should be ommitting sources we personally judge as "biased".

And it's meaningful here. Look, Cuñado is absolutely, 100% completely correct above when they say that the major reason getting community consensus for this proposed wording is going to be tricky is because it violates WP:NOTCENSORED. It manifestly does. If any small group of editors is to actually get past that enormous burden, they have to face that reality head-on. Trying to finagle it past the community won't work: instead, one hell of a WP:IAR argument has to be made here. It has to be argued that the dignity of these encyclopedic subjects warrants this obviation of a usually very ironclad rule. It's the only feasible strategy. And it's gonna take a lot of really convincing rhetoric. Every word of the proposal and the support argument has to be tight, and I can't think of anything that would sink the effort faster than trying to use the word "neutral" in a way that is such a massive reversal of how it is meant to apply to such situations. It will instantly turn virtually every veteran editor who would otherwise be on the fence about this proposal against it, because it will feel either terribly disingenuous or like the proposing editors just don't understand the very basics of a pillar policy. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 01:43, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I tend to agree that the former version is preferable. "Neutral" in this context is far too subjective, and is only going to invite ambiguity and conflict, I think we can almost certainly predict. That said, in my opinion, this is actually by far the lesser impactful phrase in the sentence. Technically any fact cited in article should be supported by reliable sourcing, and we already have policies cautioning to use primary sources with extreme caution. The addition in this proposal that is really doing the heavy lifting is "...containing non-trivial coverage of the person." That's also the language that most substantial increases the burden here, and it's also likely to keep out the kinds of primary sources that you are concerned with, as I read it, because these sources contain no real substantive "coverage" but rather just routine clerical data. But I don't necessarily think we need to drop the "secondary" either; I'd argue it is much more useful, clear, and functionally dispositive than "neutral". SnowRise ^{let's rap} 22:34, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I largely agree with SnowRise and Loki on this; we need the secondary aspect to exclude primary sources - while most won't be WP:SIGCOV some, like a school report card, would be - and the "neutral" aspect is likely to introduce conflict. Even without such a requirement, I vaguely recall someone arguing that the BBC was not neutral on this topic. BilledMammal (talk) 22:41, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

If the sensationalist media thing really is a concern, my proposed change would be to sub out multiple ... sources for a majority of ... sources or at least a plurality of ... sources. As written, the standard is just two reliable secondary sources, and while in cases where there isn't a lot of coverage I think that's fine, in the case where a subject has received a lot of coverage and most sources don't use the former name, just two sources may not really be a convincing argument to use it in practice.

The argument for that clause is "we should follow the sources", and if we're going to do that then we should follow the sources the same way we normally do, namely giving the greatest weight to the greatest number of sources. Loki (talk) 04:15, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

(Oh, that all being said, I also believe the BBC is not neutral on this topic, because the entire British media is not neutral on this topic. The BBC is not the worst among them, but it's also not the best: they've put out at least one blatantly bad article about trans issues, and more relevant to our reliability policy were very reluctant to issue corrections even to obvious factual mistakes in said article.) Loki (talk) 04:22, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

You had already mentioned two of the worst sources we otherwise consider generally reliable earlier in this discussion; The Times and The Telegraph. The Times in particular recently hit a new low when they included the former name of a recently killed trans teen earlier this year. But the British media's transphobia issues are a discussion for another talk page. Sideswipe9th (talk) 04:27, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

You're not exactly covering yourself in glory with the sources-I-disagree-with-are-not-neutral discussion.

I think Snow Rise convinced me that the "reliable and neutral" is probably not the best wording, but now I'm pondering whether multiple reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage might be a winner (without "secondary"). WP:RS already has significant guidance, including "Prefer secondary sources", "Context matters", "News organizations", or "Biased or opinionated sources". It catches most issues by using that with "multiple" and "non-trivial coverage". Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:44, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

I would disagree with that, because I don’t see any circumstances where we would want to use primary sources for this. BilledMammal (talk) 05:52, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

the entire British media is not neutral on this topic If the entire media of a major nation with freedom of the press is not neutral on this topic then I would suggest no media is neutral on it, which does demonstrate the issue with adding a “neutrality” clause.

I don’t think majority or plurality will work; plurality because there are only two options, to include or not to include the name, and thus no option will ever have a plurality, majority because determining a majority is difficult and can result in flip flopping if the count is close, and because using “majority” in related proposals has been opposed for reasons that are likely to apply here. I think it’s better to keep it simple and get at least something in; if we find that something is too weak we can look at tightening it then. BilledMammal (talk) 05:52, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

The case I had in mind was when a person has released it themself and doesn't mind sharing it, thus removing the privacy concern. That sharing would mostly be primary sources, like a blog. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:11, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

The issue is that national media of other major nations (such as the NYT or WaPo) as well as international media such as the AP and Reuters are all neutral on this issue. There's a very large and noticeable difference in the UK media position on this issue because of how it fits into UK politics that has been commented on by other reliable sources. So for instance, CNN's commented on the issue, as have the CBC, Insider, and Al Jazeera. The US version of the Guardian even condemned the UK version's stance on trans issues. Loki (talk) 06:33, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Reading through much of the above leads me to suggest "multiple, secondary, reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:50, 8 August 2023 (UTC); clarified: 05:01, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

"...non-trivial coverage of the person", let us hasten to specify, in accordance with BM's proposal. Let's stay out of the headlights of the major source of opposition in the last RfC as much as possible. I doubt even swapping out "significant coverage" for "non-trivial coverage" will provide enough change to keep those same users from !voting the same way if it comes to it, if the standards is still tied to how much prominence the name is given. Better to focus on a standard that allows the incidental use of the name in sources, but at least underlines a need for that usage to appear in multiple, secondary reliable sources that are actually focused on the subject. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 00:34, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Right-oh.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:01, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Addition to filter

Hi, I've noticed there's a filter or something called "possible MOS:ETHNICITY violation" in Wikipedia's code. How does it work? Does it for example avoid edits consisting in the removal of demonyms from an article? If so I'd like to propose an addition. But firstly I'd like to know what does it do. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 21:45, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Those tags are applied by edit filters, and the best place to discuss them in general is at the Wikipedia:Edit filter noticeboard, to request a new/expanded filter post at Wikipedia:Edit filter/Requested. Note that while the workings of most of them are public there are some that of necessity that need to remain private for WP:BEANS reasons (this is unlikely to apply to one that tags MOS violations though). Thryduulf (talk) 00:05, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, I'll start a thread there. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 09:25, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Proposal to split MOS:GENDERID from Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biography

Split Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biography#Gender_identity to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity. Currently the topic is a WP:FORK between the two. Being a subtopic in MOS:Biography perpetuates forked discussions, forked manual-of-style-guidance, prevents LGBT+ communities and other stakeholders from using the "watch" feature and accessing this policy discussion, and floods disinterested wiki policymakers with a high-barrier-to-entry inaccessible discussion. We already have about 100 conversation threads identified for this and it is unsustainable to center them here at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Biography. I fail to recognize negative consequences of this proposal; if anyone sees any then please state them.

Proposal -

1. Replace {{Further}} {{Further|Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity}} with {{Main}} {{|Main|Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity}}
2. Summarize this topic at Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biography#Gender_identity in 3-5 sentences - no great detail here
3. Future development and discussion go to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity
4. Shortcuts now go to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity including
   1. MOS:GENDERID
   2. MOS:GID
   3. MOS:DEADNAME
   4. MOS:NB
   5. WP:GENDERBLP
5. Similarly, merge Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Identity into Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity, because it is another WP:FORK of the same topic

• Support as proposer. Bluerasberry (talk) 15:12, 2 August 2023 (UTC)
• I would take it a step further… and remove it from MOS space entirely. That happened because originally it simply discussed pronouns (which was a style issue)… but it has grown well beyond that. The issues we have been wrestling with for the last few months are far more than style issues… there are mostly content issues: focused on relevance, Verifiability and reliability, Neutrality, and a host of other things. I would suggest a separate WP:GENDER guideline. Blueboar (talk) 16:20, 2 August 2023 (UTC)
• Support: the large majority of discussion on this talk page is about this one guideline and that strongly suggests to me that it deserves its own page.
  In addition, I agree with Blueboar that MOS:GENDERID is really not a style guideline, it's a content guideline with style implications. It bears more relation to WP:BLP than to the rest of the MOS. So I wouldn't oppose breaking out the parts about excluding names for privacy reasons to WP:BLP or a subpage, and leaving the MOS parts for how to properly word things given those content restrictions. Loki (talk) 19:22, 2 August 2023 (UTC)
• Support I can see good reasons for a simple split. The amount of discussion on this guideline, not just the current discussions on amendments and rewrites, but also discussions on how to interpret and apply it to relevant content are pretty lengthy and frequent. Separating this out would allow for those discussions to occur without impacting on other discussions here relating to MOSBIO.
  I also find myself agreeing with Loki and Blueboar, GENDERID has grown beyond a simple style guide into something that touches upon inclusion criteria, neutrality, privacy of biographical subjects. There is a strong argument here for making this or elements of this either a standalone guideline or policy in its own right, or integrated into the policy or guideline they are founded upon. If this finds consensus, I would still be minded to leave behind transclusion of the style related aspects (ie, use the most recent name and gendered terms for the person), as those are truly style related issues, and can be considered separate from content inclusion issues. I'd prefer a transclusion though than a summary, only because that means we only need to update it in a single place should the style text be amended in any major way. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:52, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

  To restate succinctly why I think we've reached the point where this needs to be split off into its own stand-alone guideline. When GENDERID was first added to MOSBIO in something resembling its current form it was a style guideline with content implications; use the name and pronouns the subject uses; if they weren't notable prior to changing their name, don't include the former name. As time progressed, the guideline was amended to and added, and in its current form I think it's more accurately described as a content guideline with style implications; use the name and pronouns the subject uses; if they weren't notable prior to changing their name, don't include it; don't detail name and gender presentation changes in other articles unless pertinent; paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to avoid deadnaming and misgendering in quotes.

  MOSBIO on the whole a style guideline, with some minor content implications, which typically amount to "don't give undue weight" (see the sections on bad nicknames and sexuality). However because GENDERID is now a content guideline with style implications, and is typically enforced as such at dispute resolution and behavioural noticeboards (AN, ANI, AE, BLPN) it's clear that it has outgrown this guideline. That alone is sufficient reason to me to split it off into its own guideline.

  Finally, on the arguments that this split would result in local consensus or ownership problems, frankly in my opinion that isn't a reason to not split, nor is it one I can find that's supported by policy or guideline. If there is a policy or guideline that supports not splitting, could it please be linked? Editors who are fearful of such a situation would be able to watchlist it just as easily as the stakeholder groups that Blueraspberry has mentioned. Likewise there are well established mechanisms to prevent and challenge local consensuses, like RfCs and notifications to relevant noticeboards or WikiProjects, and WP:CENT, which are designed to stop such a thing from occurring. The option to use a contextually relevant mechanism will remain open regardless of whether future discussions on the guideline occur here, on a stand-alone guideline page, or some other venue like VPP (the forum for the two most recent RfCs). Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:52, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• I'm inclined to support, particularly the idea that this should be split out and separated from the MOS. That said, I worry that a move to this guidance mainly residing at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity (or wherever that page moves to) might incidentally downgrade most of the guidance from guideline status to explanatory essay status. If the resulting page is a guideline page, I'm all for it. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 01:06, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose in part because the material is short and isn't really suited to being an entire guideline page, in part because orders of magnitude fewer people would be watchlisting it, leaving much more room for mischief, and in part because a separate page on this would be highly likely to develop WP:LOCALCONSENSUS problems, including the probable formation of a WP:OWN-attempting WP:FACTION. This material is much safer in a major guideline page with over 700 watchers, over 100 of whom are actively engaged in keeping this page sensible.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:06, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Similar grounds to SMcCandlish.--Wehwalt (talk) 04:42, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per SMcCandlish. The proposal is explicitly made because the status quo prevents LGBT+ communities and other stakeholders from using the "watch" feature. I am not sure whether there are other stakeholder communities this could be referring to, and if not, then the question remains that once this change is made, would there will be appropriate balance in resultant discussions, instead of a local consensus? starship.paint (exalt) 04:59, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per SMcCandlish. This is a topic of discussion that needs as much sunlight on it as possible. Stifle (talk) 08:25, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Nothing is preventing certain communities and "other stakeholders" from watchlist-ing this page or participating in discussions here. SMcCandlish raises good points, particularly that a separate page would develop WP:LOCALCONSENSUS problems, including the probable formation of a WP:OWN-attempting WP:FACTION. Some1 (talk) 11:57, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  I think the issue of local consensus can arise wherever the guidance is located, but making it a stand alone guideline under WP:BLP (rather than an MOS page) would lessen the chance. Blueboar (talk) 16:12, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Anything other than making it policy and making it clear that WP:NPOV does not mean that we have to deadname people just because reliable sources do is a complete waste of time. As long as people use WP:NPOV as an argument for deadnaming any MOS on the matter is completely meaningless. -- Random person no 362478479 (talk) 12:22, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  FWIW it's already the case that WP:NPOV does not mean we have to deadname people. That's always been a losing argument whenever I've seen it, which is very rarely. I much more often see arguments based off WP:NOTCENSORED among people who want to ignore this guideline. Loki (talk) 00:48, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  FWIW it's already the case that WP:NPOV does not mean we have to deadname people. If it's WP:DUE, then it does. If there are losing argument[s], then it's because you're witnessing editors willingly choose to violate the non-negotiable status WP:NPOV enjoys and it's a shame because our ability to cover topics neutrally is a deeper concern than helping someone trying to stop a streisand effect (or put a genie back in a bottle, etc, etc) over something that not all of society agrees with (as evidenced by reliable sources). Of late, the arguments for change are boldly running straight through WP:RGW and are disruptive with the non-stop proposals/threads/debates and it grows tiring. If someone had told me 3-4 years ago I'd be on Wikipedia arguing about transgender topics, I'd never have believed them. And yet here I am, because apparently we're trying to change Wikipedia from being a follower of sources to being an encyclopedia that picks and chooses which reliable sources to ignore or acknowledge. And that's the most dangerous thing to come out of this to me in my decades of being here. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:09, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  Could you explain please, why you think a person's name (or in this case former name) is a point of view on a topic? And how a name could a dispute? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:13, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  From WP:DUE: Undue weight can be given in several ways, including but not limited to the depth of detail, the quantity of text, prominence of placement, the juxtaposition of statements, and the use of imagery. And I don't think it's a point of view (and it doesn't really matter what I think here), our sources do. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:23, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  That doesn't really answer the question, and opens a few more. Our sources don't have a concept of what we define to be a neutral point of view. They have their own criteria and reasons for including or excluding content, just as we do. Despite this, you're asserting that including or not including the deadname of a trans or non-binary person is a point of view on that person, so I return to my original question, how is a person's name a point of view?

  Just because our sources include a piece of information doesn't mean we have to include it (see WP:VNOT, WP:NOTEVERYTHING, WP:NOTNEWS, WP:INDISCRIMINATE). A piece of information must have encyclopaedic value before it can be included in any article. Now if you want to make an argument that the former name of a trans or non-binary person (living or dead) has encyclopaedic value, then by all means make that argument. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:31, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  You asked Why [do] you think a person's name (or in this case former name) is a point of view on a topic?, I cited the exact wording from WP:NPOV that addressed your question. As to the rest, I'll leave you with WP:RGW which addresses what's happened here far better than I'm capable of. —Locke Cole • t • c 14:57, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  You've stated what you think, but I was asking why you think it. I want to understand why you think a trans or non-binary person's deadname is a point of view, as NPOV defines it. Or perhaps, based on this reply, why you think our sources believe the former name is a point of view, and not a factoid (as in the CNN definition of it being minor trivia) about the person. If our sources believe, as you assert, that a person's name is a point of view, could you perhaps cite a relevant style guide or editorial policy that elaborates on this? Sideswipe9th (talk) 15:19, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  Oh, you misunderstand. I don't think this, WP:NPOV says it. And you apparently can't understand that. If you think something as integral as how we identify someone in an encyclopedia article is simply a factoid, you'll need to let the folks who came up with WP:AT and the various Wikipedia naming conventions that their work was all for nothing. But this is all basic writing: who someone is (their name) is as important as what they've done, where they did it, and the why of what happened. This is all very academic. I won't be re-quoting NPOV since apparently the words don't mean anything to you, but it's all right there. —Locke Cole • t • c 15:54, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  AT, and the various naming conventions deal with an article subject's name, and with a few exceptions will typically follow WP:COMMONNAME. Name changes of article subjects are one of the major exceptions to the article naming conventions for why we might break with the historical common name for a subject. And that policy point, alongside GENDERID is why our articles about trans and non-binary individuals always use the current name of the article subject, and not their former name. However, we're not discussing article titles and naming conventions, we're discussing content inclusion or exclusion.

  The NPOV policy covers points of view on a topic. The purpose behind it is that we describe disputes, and not engage in them. As DUE states, neutrality requires that our articles fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in those sources. Ordinarily when we discuss DUE, we are asking and answering questions like "does [insert label] apply to this article/?" or "what does current academic research state about this topic?" or "is this theory disputed and by whom?" This is so that whenever we're answering those questions, we're always following whatever the mainstream view on a topic is.

  The logical leap that I can't understand is why you're asserting that the former name of a person is a point of view, as that is in no way clear from the text of the policy. The only places in NPOV that actually use the word name are WP:POVNAMING and the paraphrasing of Jimbo Wales' 2003 mailing list post about naming the prominent adherents to a significant minority viewpoint. The questions that I've been asking have been to try to understand this logical leap you're making, because it is not an obvious one from the text of the policy. In other words, there is some base assumption that you are making here when reading the policy text that I am not, and it is one that I would like to understand. Based on your most recent reply, the only way I can think of that your interpretation makes sense is if you believe, or you're asserting that our sources believe, that a person cannot ever change their name, and that the act of changing names is a dispute that we cannot engage in. Is that the case? If that is not the case, would you please elaborate on what non-obvious base assumption you are making, because again, it's not obvious from what you've been saying or quoting? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:41, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  WP:DUE: Undue weight can be given in several ways, including but not limited to (emphasis added, the "several ways" provided are just a sampling and not an exhaustive list) the depth of detail (a name is a "detail" that sources may go into depth on, omitting such a detail when reliable sources report it runs afoul of DUE) [...] the juxtaposition of statements (our sources may list a "deadname" near a subjects current name, deviating significantly from that would again run into NPOV concerns). —Locke Cole • t • c 05:25, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  Ok, so why is that encyclopaedically relevant? To pick another characteristic for a moment, if the majority of our sources said something like "X had curly red hair" or "Y spoke with a Scottish accent", is that something that NPOV would compel us to include in our articles? How do you balance that against other policy points like WP:INDISCRIMINATE and WP:5P1? Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:15, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  If lots and lots of sources highlight the fact that someone has/had curly red hair, that fact is obviously considered a significant trait for that person. It would be UNDUE for Wikipedia to omit it. The same is true for former names. We can quibble over how many sources are needed, and about the quality of those sources… but… eventually it comes down to: if enough sources all highlight a fact about a person, that fact should be considered encyclopedic and worth including in our article about that person. Blueboar (talk) 16:31, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  NPOV isn't just about points of view; it's also about aspects. See WP:BALASP and WP:DUE. BilledMammal (talk) 16:33, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  This is true but IMO irrelevant. If lots of sources said what a BLP subject's current address was, we still couldn't include that information. That's not a WP:NPOV matter, because neither WP:NPOV nor WP:V require us to include information no matter how well it's sourced.

  Rather, if we do include information we need to include all significant points of view about it in proportion to their prominence in reliable sources, but we always have the option of just not including it at all, and there are many polices (WP:NOT for instance) that instruct us to not include some information sometimes. Loki (talk) 19:22, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  We can include a BLP subject's current address, and often do so. The article on Donald Trump, for example, states that he resides at Mar-a-lago. WP:BLPPRIMARY only forbids the sole use of primary documents for the purpose of identifying a subject's address. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:25, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  WP:BLPPRIVACY says articles should not include postal addresses, e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, or other contact information for living persons. Loki (talk) 03:07, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  There are a few rare cases where WP:NPOV overrides that aspect of WP:BLP. For example, Donald Trump and Jeremy Hunt. BilledMammal (talk) 03:12, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  I am not saying that WP:NPOV does mean that we have to deadname people. Personally I think that is a bizarre interpretation of what a point of view is (and conflicts with a whole host of rules and guidelines, including, but not limited to the ones listed by Sideswipe9th). But WP:NPOV is used to argue for deadnaming. Of course most people just go with "reliable sources do it so we have to do it" without giving any policy rationale. And unfortunately I don't share you optimism that it is a losing argument. -- Random person no 362478479 (talk) 20:15, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• Move out of MOS. I also agree with Blueboar and LokiTheLiar that much of MOS:GENDERID is about content not style and should be part of WP:BLP, not MOS. And yes, I do think that it should be restricted to living or recently dead people. The same rules should apply equally to all people, regardless of gender or gender identity. But even if we have different rules for trans etc people, it should still be a content guideline, not a style guideline. Mitch Ames (talk) 12:59, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  It actually is a bit of BOTH content and style… but that just highlights the need for it to be on a page of its own. Blueboar (talk) 16:21, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  Lots of bits of MoS have elements of content guideline to them; that's not a good rationale for such a split.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:22, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per SMc. I support it in principle, but it's not a simple split as we'd be effectively elevating it from a MOS guideline to either a guideline or a policy. And that makes the NPOV/DUE conflict even more important to resolve. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:27, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Comment I posted this invitation to comment to Wikipedia:Manual of Style, WP:Feminism, WP:LGBT, WP:Women, WP:Men, and WP:Gender studies. These were stakeholder communities that I imagined might have opinions. If anyone else knows of others, then invite more participation. Bluerasberry (talk) 19:17, 3 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose as proposed, but really agree with Mitch Ames and others that the best solution would be a short section in BLP (perhaps based on proposal #4 above) to decide on content exclusion, and leave the MOS for style tips. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 20:08, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

  I previously proposed this, which I believe would incorporate the principles into BLP in an appropriate and consistent manner. BilledMammal (talk) 01:50, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose; this will reduce the number of eyes on this section and I do not believe that is a positive change. There are also WP:CONLEVEL issues with this proposal; it will either upgrade Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Gender identity to a style guideline, or it will downgrade Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography#Gender identity to an essay. Which one will occur isn't specified, but either way a split discussion lacks the CONLEVEL to do so. BilledMammal (talk) 01:50, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  this will reduce the number of eyes on this section — I don't think the number of watchers should affect where a guideline goes. It's either about content or style (or both, as Blueboar pointed out), and its location in the guideline/policies structure should be dictated by its scope, not by how many people chose to watch it. Anyone can watch or subscribe to anything - we don't hide our policies and guidelines. If anything, it should be easier to find and watch if it is in a sensible place, matching the scope of the guideline/policy. Mitch Ames (talk) 02:15, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• Support as second preference to moving out of MOS per Blueboar. This needs it's own page that deals with both the content and style issues, the former can and should be summarised at WP:BLP, the latter can and should be summarised here, with both pointing to the specific page for more detail and precision. Thryduulf (talk) 13:52, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

  That is something I could support. -- Random person no 362478479 (talk) 20:09, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per SMcCandlish; it's not necessary and it shunts it off somewhere with less scrutiny. Crossroads ^-talk- 00:01, 5 August 2023 (UTC)
• Extremely strong support for alternative proposal to move this out of Manual of Style altogether. I've seen discussions as to whether revision deletion or oversight is acceptable for violations of this guideline, and while I can understand that sort of thing on BLP grounds, I cannot accept it on MoS grounds. The Manual of Style – Style! – is a guideline, not a policy, that discusses how to write, not what to write, and the idea that MoS violations should be deleted/oversighted is extremely WP:TROUT-worthy. As for other places where the MoS dictates what content is allowed, those should also be pruned down; I'm not so sure why, for example, relevant portions of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Video games should be treated differently from Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Content guide. See also Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Words to watch, which notes that [t]here are no forbidden words or expressions on Wikipedia and focuses on avoiding the loss of information (MOS:SAID is a good example of this). -BRAINULATOR9 (TALK) 23:48, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

GENDERID in BLP

Based on the consensus that seems to be forming around the split, here is a proposed wording for a paragraph in BLP, so that the MOS is for style and not making content policy.

Proposed paragraph for WP:BLPNAME
For the special case of the former name of a transgender or non-binary individual, it is reasonable to assume they would not want the name disseminated, and it should be removed unless the person was notable under the name, they made the name public post-transition, or they are a public figure. Any inclusion must be supported by multiple reliable and neutral sources.

Proposed MOS:GID

Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person should only be included if the person was notable under the name, they made the name public post-transition, or they are a public figure (See WP:BLPNAME). The former name must not be given undue weight or overemphasis. It may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. When the former name or gender is not included in the article, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 21:16, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

• I would suggest that we NOT change any existing language at this point… but merely MOVE the existing guidance to a new WP:GENDER page. Once people get used to it being consolidated at a new location we can discuss changes. Go one step at a time. Blueboar (talk) 21:52, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  Perhaps I'm missing something but I don't see where there's consensus to take anything out of the MoS.--Wehwalt (talk) 21:55, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

  Yeah, consensus that seems to be forming, whaaaat? No jumping the gun, please. Crossroads ^-talk- 00:24, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  The "consensus that seems to be forming" is opposition to splitting this material out of MoS. And as Blueboar says, trying to change the material in the process of proposing a different split is just asking for opposition. We already know from all the discussion prior that there is considerable opposition to phrasing like "they made the name public post-transition" (which is a rephrasing of the same idea behind "clearly expressed their consent to share the information"), because these are matters of public record that are not dependent on what the subject themselves did/said.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:14, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

• While there certainly are a few comments supporting moving parts of GENDERID into BLP, I don't see anything close to a consensus or even an emerging consensus. I also don't see anyone in the above discussion having mentioned the public figure changes that are part of this proposal. Once again I agree with the points that Blueboar and SMcCandlish have made, either move the guidance or change the guidance. Don't do both at the same time. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:22, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  But policy opponents will likely assume that a proposed move is motivated by a desire to make changes under more friendly circumstances, so there's sort of a linkage. Wehwalt (talk) 18:03, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  What is amusing is that I have the exact same concern about leaving it here (“hidden away” as a section within a “Style” guideline). By promoting it to its own guideline, I would expect that any proposed changes would be spotted sooner, and can be discussed by a wider selection of the community. Blueboar (talk) 18:42, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  This page has 773 watchers at present. A new page would, by default, start with 0. There's also the matter of what status it should have if it's moved out of the MOS. I would support an essay, but I would oppose any attempt to enshrine this as guideline or policy while the NPOV conflict remains. —Locke Cole • t • c 18:04, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  There's also the matter of what status it should have if it's moved out of the MOS. That's easy. GENDERID is already a guideline, and is regularly enforced as such at both content and behavioural noticeboards. As such any move to a stand alone location would, at minimum, also be a guideline to keep parity.

  while the NPOV conflict remains While this has been going on, I've re-read every formative discussion on the text of the guideline (ie those that were on the text of the guideline or lead to changes of it, and not application of it). In doing so I discovered that NPOV concerns have been raised by a handful of editors in total, across the hundreds contributing to the various discussions. The views that you're expressing do not seem to be representative of the broader community consensus on this. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:46, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  GENDERID is already a guideline It's a style guideline and part of the manual of style. It is not a traditional content guideline. As such any move to a stand alone location would, at minimum, also be a guideline to keep parity. This would not be parity, but a promotion by fiat unless it was accompanied by a community conversation that showed support for such a promotion. The views that you're expressing do not seem to be representative of the broader community consensus on this. NPOV is non-negotiable, whether a community of editors supports something is irrelevant. If you want to split it off and promote it, you'll need to address these issues or face the reality that it will likely fail. —Locke Cole • t • c 20:29, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  WP:NPOV is non-negotiable; however your particular interpretation of NPOV is very much negotiable. It seems to be a very small minority, in fact.

  Like it or not, all interpretation of policy on Wikipedia is determined by consensus. If you really want to settle the issue, we can take it to an RFC. But if not, nobody has any obligation to WP:SATISFY you or your decidedly minority interpretation of WP:NPOV. Loki (talk) 01:24, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

  This policy is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus. I'll note that WP:SATISFY is an essay. We'll go with the policy here. But we won't be sacrificing our neutrality on the altar of WP:RGW just because a vocal minority (the small group here) wishes it so. The community decided the principles of NPOV are above consensus decision making, and likely rightly so if the conversations here are any indicator of how quickly some groups are willing to set aside our neutrality in the name of "feeling good" or some misguided desire to "respect" people in a way that society (and more importantly, our sources) have not. There is genuine real-world progress to be made on these issues, but Wikipedia cannot be the "leader" of change that some here seem to be pushing. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:19, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

  NPOV is indeed policy, but what NPOV means in any given scenario can only be determined by consensus. You seem to be (nearly?) the only person here who thinks a person's name is a point of view, and thus the (nearly?) the only person who thinks including or not including a person's former name is something that is of any relevance to NPOV. This is exactly the same way that reasonable editors may disagree about whether an actor should be primarily referred to by their stage name or their real name, but that disagreement is not an NPOV matter. Thryduulf (talk) 21:43, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

• Comment - While the majority opposes the specific proposal by Bluerasberry, there are five comments that suggest moving the content guideline to BLP would be an improvement. Considering the hurdle of getting agreement for a new exception at BLP, I think my proposal is about the best you can get. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:24, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  There is a difference though between simply moving part of the existing guideline to BLP, which some editors do seem to support above (though not yet a consensus), and moving part of the existing guideline while adding to it, which no-one other than yourself seems to support.

  We could very easily make a proposal here that just replicates the existing inclusion guidance into the relevant portions of BLP, and that otherwise does not contain the new public figure and "made the name public post-transition" exemptions. Simply moving the existing guidance without any significant change to scope is a far easier thing to "sell" to the community than moving it and changing it at the same time. Sideswipe9th (talk) 16:58, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  If you propose that we move to BLP to exclude all former names unless they were notable under the previous name, it would fail. I think even my proposal might fail for the opposite reason you're saying, due to being overly censoring. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:34, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  If you propose that we move to BLP to exclude all former names unless they were notable under the previous name, it would fail. Outside of IAR, we already exclude all former names unless the person was notable under the former name. Moving the relevant parts to BLP for something we already have a long standing consensus for and have been doing routinely for years is much easier to do than adding wholly new exemptions or moving and adding new exemptions.

  The problem with this proposal is that it's trying to do two things at once. Move part of the guidance to BLP, that is already enforced as though it were part of BLP, and add a new exemption. As multiple editors have said now, those need to be done separately. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:52, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Draft RFC

I'd like to get feedback on this proposal before taking it to VPP. Assume a preamble and option to oppose all.

Option 1 - Expand MOS:GENDERID to deceased
Add this paragraph to MOS:GENDERID: For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.

Option 2 - Move content restriction to WP:BLPNAME with normal privacy exceptions, and revise down MOS:GENDERID

Add this paragraph to the end of WP:BLPNAME: It is reasonable to assume that a transgender or non-binary individual would not want a former name disseminated, and it should be removed unless the person was notable under the name, it has been widely published by reliable sources, or it may be reasonably inferred that the individual does not object to the name being made public. Revise MOS:GENDERID to remove content restrictions and other cleanup: Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person must not be given undue weight or overemphasis. It may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. Added back in:Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent. When the former name or gender is not included in the article, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Option 3 - Move content restriction to WP:BLPNAME with only exception for notability, and revise down MOS:GENDERID

Add this paragraph to the end of WP:BLPNAME: It is reasonable to assume that a transgender or non-binary individual would not want a former name disseminated, and it should be removed unless the person was notable under the name. Revise MOS:GENDERID to remove content restrictions and other cleanup (same wording as Option 2): Refer to any person whose gender might be unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources. The former name of a transgender or non-binary person must not be given undue weight or overemphasis. It may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote. Added back in:Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent. When the former name or gender is not included in the article, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. In rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided (e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover), the quotation or work may be included. Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

Cuñado ☼ - Talk 19:18, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

I've some thoughts on the phrasing of options 2 and 3, but have an immediate question on the format. While option 2 and 3 are clearly mutually exclusive, due to the conflicting nature of what they'll respectively add to BLPNAME, is option 1 supposed to be mutually exclusive to 2 and 3? Or will this be the sort of RfC where you could !vote "option 1 and 2" or "option 1 and 3"? Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:22, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

The question of deceased individuals can't go in BLP because it is about living or recently-deceased persons. I (personally) think it also can't go in the MOS, but considering that the last two RFCs came close to doing exactly that, then option 1 is there. I think to expand the exclusion of deadnames to deceased individuals you need to figure out a policy/guide that makes sense and run a policy RFC to do exactly that, or create a new one. Would it help to include in the preamble that option 1 can be combined with other options to enshrine an MOS-based policy about past-RDP deadnames? Cuñado ☼ - Talk 19:35, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Would it help to include in the preamble that option 1 can be combined with other options Perhaps, though that particular clause might just be better handled as a separate RfC, or as a separate question within one overall RfC. I'm not entirely sure that the drafting of that text has reached a conclusion yet and I wouldn't want to pre-empt it by placing a non-final version of it in here. The alternative would be to wait until that process and this process has finished and we have finalised text for all of the options/options. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:43, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

If I'm reading this right, wouldn't options 2 and 3 remove large chunks of the GENDERID guidance without moving them to any other page? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 19:28, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Please add a 4th option: “Move/Promote the current text of MOS:GENDERID to a stand-alone WP:GENDER ISSUES guideline page - without any changes. (Changes can be discussed separately, at a later date.)” or similar language. Blueboar (talk) 19:34, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Thoughts on the phrasing of options 2 and 3. Beyond the text that's moving to BLP, and the excising of the examples, there's also some key elements of the existing version of GENDERID that have been removed entirely. I'm using del and ins tags below to (hopefully) highlight the differences a little more clearly.

Refer to any person whose gender might be questioned unclear with the name and gendered words (e.g. pronouns, man/woman/person, waiter/waitress/server) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise.

Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent. Where a person's gender may come as a surprise, explain it on first occurrence, without overemphasis. Avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent).The former name of a transgender or non-binary person must not be given undue weight or overemphasis. It may be placed later in the lead or elsewhere in the article instead of the first sentence, to avoid giving it undue prominence. In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current name as the primary name (in prose, tables, lists, infoboxes, etc.), unless they prefer their former name be used for past events. If they were notable under the name by which they were credited for the work or other activity, provide it in a parenthetical or footnote on first reference; add more parentheticals or footnotes only if needed to avoid confusion. Articles or other works that were published under a pre-transition name may use their current name as the primary name while describing the work, while crediting the prior name in parentheticals or footnote.

When the former name or gender is not included in the article, avoid confusing constructions (Jane Doe fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Jane Doe became a parent). If the former name appears in a quotation, the article may need to Paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering, except. Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person. in rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided, as where there is a pun on the notable former name, etc.(e.g. pun, rhyme, album cover) the quotation or work may be included

• Critic X said "Juno needs a fine [actor] to play its pregnant teenage star, and [Elliot] Page has shown [himself] to be the perfect [man] for the job." involves many bracketed changes, so is better paraphrased: Critic X argued that portraying the pregnant teenage lead in the film Juno required a fine acting talent, and said that Page had proved perfect for the job.

In source citations, do not remove names of authors, or references to former names in titles of works. If the author is notable, the current name may be given, for example as "X (writing as Y)". Do not replace or supplement a person's former name with a current name if the two names have not been publicly connected and connecting them would out the person.

Some of the insertions and deletions are where sentences have been moved about, or subject to some minor word changes that don't significantly change the meaning. However there are several sentences that I'll now highlight separately that have been removed entirely

• even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise
• Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent.
• In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current name as the primary name (in prose, tables, lists, infoboxes, etc.), unless they prefer their former name be used for past events.
  • Note while some of this text has been moved, there is a significant change between use their current name as the primary name and may use their current name as the primary name
• In source citations, do not remove names of authors, or references to former names in titles of works. If the author is notable, the current name may be given, for example as "X (writing as Y)".

I'm very concerned that once again we're looking at a proposal that radically alters the scope of the current version of GENDERID while also moving or rewording portions. It's one thing to move portions of the guideline to BLP and make small textual changes to accommodate the move, while keeping parity with the current scope of the guidance. It's another thing entirely to reduce the scope of the guidance, while moving portions of it to BLP. Until the text of the guidance that will remain as part of GENDERID in options 2 and 3 maintains parity with the current scope of the guidance, this option cannot be brought forward to an RfC. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:21, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

I have made a good-faith draft to clean up the section and accommodate moving content restrictions to the policy page. The specific examples you brought up either do not "radically alter" the scope or are wordings already discussed on this page. For example, Tamzin previously commented, In the "Articles or other works" bit, there should still be an exception for those who prefer to be referred to by pre-transition names. Which resulted in the change to "may use their current name" addressing works published under pre-transition names. In another example, even if it does not match what is most common in sources is redundant and unnecessary. You have the right to oppose all of my efforts, but you can't insist that it cannot be brought forward to an RFC with specious complaints. Due to this topic having a history of WP:GAME and WP:ADVOCACY by WP:ACTIVISTs (as noted in numerous RFC comments) I don't expect 100% agreement on this page but I welcome any feedback to make it a better proposal. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 21:23, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

The feedback I'm giving is the same feedback that SMcCandlish, -sche, Loki, Tekrmn, Blueboar, and I have given you already at multiple stages throughout these discussions. Stop trying to do two things, move/rewrite GENDERID, and change the scope of GENDERID at the same time. Either propose a split that otherwise keeps parity with the existing guideline with some minor textual changes to accommodate the split, or propose an amendment that alters the scope of the existing guideline. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:26, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Sideswipe9th et al. Trying to make multiple changes at the same time is all-but guaranteed to result in no consensus for any of them and possibly even consensus against all of them. You stand a much higher chance of getting consensus for both if they're discussed one at a time, so pick which you think is the highest priority and discuss only that. When discussion of that has concluded and consensus reached on a change, then return to the other matter. Thryduulf (talk) 23:03, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

You're suggesting running two RFCs? How many people have been commenting like this or this, ready to put a lid on all the GENDERID discussion? And these complaints about my revision are an example of why it's helpful to incorporate a cleanup into a single RFC. My cleanup has already received generally positive comments from less-active editors. The only scope altering is to move inclusion criteria to BLP. I'll respond to each of Sideswipe9th's points here to show what I mean:

Removed: even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise - this is redundant to the "Refer to any person" in the previous sentence, and the "unless they have indicated a preference" is just obvious. It could be included, but it's a question of style and quality of writing, not scope of guideline. Even though it's not my preference, I can put it back in to build unity.

Removed: Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail changes of a person's name or gender presentation unless pertinent. - 1) this is MOS/BIOGRAPHY and it's talking about outside of biographies, 2) it's in scope for removing in the spirit of moving content criteria out of the MOS, 3) also obvious given many relevant content policies.

Changed use their current name as the primary name to may use their current name as the primary name for pre-transition publications. This was not my idea but I was incorporating a recommendation from Tamzin: In the "Articles or other works" bit, there should still be an exception for those who prefer to be referred to by pre-transition names. Nobody opposed this until now. As I've been reading hundreds of RFC comments over the last 3 months, proposing drafts and soliciting feedback, I'm trying to get the best version forward. Similarly, the change in the first sentence from "questioned" to "unclear" was a result of feedback from Jerome Frank Disciple and SMcCandlish on this page.

Removed: In source citations, do not remove names of authors, or references to former names in titles of works. If the author is notable, the current name may be given, for example as "X (writing as Y)". This is poorly worded and the section has become a bit bloated. See WP:KISS. If you think it's important, please propose a better wording. This is a style example and has absolutely nothing to do with scope. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 00:16, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

It could be included, but it's a question of style and quality of writing The content that refers to is part of the Manual of Style. It makes sense for style guidance to be a part of that text.

this is MOS/BIOGRAPHY and it's talking about outside of biographies Per the first paragraph of WP:MOSBIO This page sets out guidelines for achieving visual and textual consistency in biographical articles and in biographical information in other articles. All biographical content, regardless of whether it's in a biography or any other article is subject to MOSBIO.

Nobody opposed this until now. I cautiously opposed it on 24 July. However that is separate to the reason I'm opposing it now. The reason I'm opposing it now is because it represents a significant departure from the current scope of the guideline, by adding a new exclusion criteria to GENDERID. We should not be launching an RfC that alters both the scope and location of the guideline at the same time. Do one of those two actions, and do that one action well. Now if it was only that change of scope that was being discussed, I would be somewhat more inclined to support it, but I still think it has issues that require further wordsmithing.

This is poorly worded and the section has become a bit bloated. Possibly, and given the widespread shift in academic journals with regards to allowing for silent retrospective name changes for trans and non-binary authors this might even be (partially) outdated. That said, removing it again represents a significant change in scope of the guideline, in this case by removing guidance on how to handle source author name changes in citations. However saying this is a style example is again irrelevant, because this is referring to content that in options 2 and 3 will be remaining in MOSBIO. And as I've said above, MOSBIO refers to all biographical content and not just biographical articles. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:59, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

even if it does not match what is most common in sources. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise - If I hear wider support that this is important I'll include it. Again, not a scope change.

the first paragraph of WP:MOSBIO - you win! I'll add it back in to the MOS text.

may use their current name as the primary name - nobody opposed this particular change until now, and the change was in drafts #2,3,4, and 5 above. The link you gave of you opposing it is just some general opposition to Tamzin's draft (#5). Perhaps some wording along the lines of "...unless they have a preference otherwise" would be in order, but I don't think it is very consequential whether we use "should" or "may". The proposal is clear that we assume privacy concerns unless the individual says otherwise, so that would override the "should". If I hear wider support that this is important I'll change to "should".

In source citations, do not remove names of authors, or references to former names in titles of works. If the author is notable, the current name may be given, for example as "X (writing as Y)". - Please propose a better wording. Both sentences look like they were formed by committee. To me at least, it's not clear what situation it's trying to address, or whether the "author is notable" refers to the new or former name. Try writing like you're explaining it out loud.

I realize that I should not have used the phrase "style" in my last comments because this is the manual of STYLE. I was talking more about style of writing the guideline, not style guidance. As in, each person has their own style of writing. I'll try to be more clear. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:03, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Agreed with Thryduulf and Sideswipe. This RFC is trying to do too much in one question. "What should be the wording added to the guideline for deceased individuals?", "Where should the guideline be?" and "Should we have extra exceptions other than notability?" are three different questions that should all be asked separately. It'd IMO be fine to ask those three different questions at the same time but they are three different questions and should be asked separately. So for instance:

Question 1 - Wording for deceased individuals

Which of the following paragraphs should be added to the guideline on referring to trans people? For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person. For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources. lorem ipsum dolor sid amet None of the above

Question 2 - Location of the guideline
Where should the main guideline on referring to trans people be located? MOS:GENDERID, a subsection of MOS:BIO, where it currently resides A subsection of WP:BLP Its own separate guideline page, with references from MOS:GENDERID and WP:BLP Split between MOS:GENDERID and WP:BLP, according to whether each section pertains to style or content

Questions 3 and 4 - Exceptions

Which of the following reasons should require mention of a trans person's former name in the lead of their article? (You may select more than one.) The person was notable under their former name The person is currently a public figure The person was a public figure at some time after transition but are no longer The person has said, in a way we can source reliably, that they are okay with their former name being mentioned Which of the following reasons should allow mention of a trans person's former name in their article? (You may select more than one.) The person was notable under their former name. The person is currently a public figure. The person was a public figure at a previous time (but #1 does not apply i.e. they were a public figure after transition) The person has said, in a way we can source unambiguously, that they are okay with their former name being mentioned

Loki (talk) 04:18, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Given how many contentious MOS:DEADNAME debates we have had recently, I would strongly encourage any RfC we have to be simple, and to propose something that is all but certain to receive consensus.

I don't believe Questions 2, 3, or 4 meet this definition; Question 2 in particular, as a proposal to change the level of this guideline, should be a standalone debate.

When we do hold Question 4, I would also suggest The person's former name has been widely published by reliable and secondary sources, based on WP:BLPPRIVACY

For question 1, I would suggest we have a single wording to propose, as a support/oppose option. Trying to give multiple options will make the debate more contentious and less likely to find any consensus; I would suggest For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person. However, I am still hoping we can avoid an RfC on that question. BilledMammal (talk) 04:43, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

I think Loki's proposal is actually doing more things than mine was. My proposal really only has one main fork: should we add a deceased exception to MOS, or move content criteria to BLP? Due to the inability to agree on this talk page, there is a second fork of whether the BLP move should be limited to notability only. Loki's question 2 would be a disaster by asking a question of where policy should go without specific wording, resulting in more (likely failed) RFCs in the future. Keep it simple. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 17:12, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

What Loki's proposal is doing is more clearly delineating the change aspects of your proposal. Your proposal's option 2 is implicitly asking questions 3 and 4, because it contains text that incorporates those questions (ie the new public figure exemption). If Loki's proposal seems to be doing too much to you, this might perhaps give you insight into why I've been opposing your proposals, because by my reading yours and Loki's proposal have the same overall amount of change to the guideline. The differences are in the presentation. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:26, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

For question 1, the lesson we should learn from the first of the two recent RfCs is that too many options makes determining consensus difficult. Ideally we should have one reasonably robust option that we're asking a yay/nay on, as that will result in the clearest consensus either way.

For question 2, we do seem to have at least three mutually exclusive options here; split part to BLP while keeping the rest in MOSBIO, elevate all to a standalone guideline, or no change. I'm not sure we can pare that down any further than that. RfC formatting wise, that could be asked akin to the three question format of the first of the two recent RfCs, where we have one RfC tag and asking multiple independent questions. But I do fear that in total we might be asking too much at once. While I do agree with Cunado that question 2 would benefit from more concrete wording in principle, the way that I'm reading Loki's proposal here is that it's more of a draft formatting/structural proposal on how to present and ask the generalised questions, than one that has the specific phrasing for any given question or option in place.

For questions 3 and 4, those maybe need to be standalone RfCs. They're wholly new exemptions, and both the phrasing and location of the finalised text would be highly dependent on the outcome of question 2. I'd worry that asking this, alongside the question on splitting/moving GENDERID, would come across as too much simultaneous change by the broader community. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:21, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

FWIW I am also okay with simply skipping Questions 3 and 4. I don't think there's really much cause to ask those right now. I included them because I was making my version of Cuñado's proposal, and Cuñado's proposal included those questions. Loki (talk) 18:38, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

Personally, I think the questions are distinct enough that I would trust the community at VPP to be able to parse them without much impact on the outcome of any one proposal, but, at the same time, I don't see any harm in staggering them either. However, I would suggest a different order of operations:

• Question 1: It's the simplest inquiry, has fairly streamlined language at this point, and I believe it is something the community can get behind at this point. Let's try to get the benefit of inertia from the start.
• Questions 3&4: I actually think it maybe makes sense to run these concurrent with Question 1, as they really should be considered in tandem insofar as each contains language that will impact the others. I also think that this approach runs the least chance of fatiguing the community's remaining reserves of patience for proposals in this area. But we can always try them back-to-back; it's possible that one of Question 1's proposed wordings have hit enough of a sweet spot that the support will be overwhelming and that the mood surrounding this cluster of disputes will turn much more positive in light of finally having a consensus.
• Question 2: I agreed with Cuñado that a serious discussion about where this wording ultimately goes is important (and honestly, there's strong arguments for all the variations, imo), but I really do think it can and should wait until we iron out the actual language. Besides, the discussion about the language itself will heavily inform the pragmatics of determining what will go where.

So, either Q1, Q3 and Q4 ---> Q2. Or Q1 ---> Q3 and Q4 ---> Q2. But I do think the community can handle all four at once if it came down to it. What has held up the previous proposals has been less procedural hitches and more a lack of preparation at the front end, I suspect (no offense intended to anyone who worked on those proposals, but we've just had a very healthy amount of discussion dialing the current proposals in, further informed by the previous discussions. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 02:26, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

• I don't think we should combine "moving the guideline" and "modifying the guideline"; those are two completely separate things and should be totally separate unrelated RFCs. The bare minimum requirement for any move RFC should be that the overall guidelines will not change as a result of any options in it, and such an RFC should clearly state at the top that no change to the substance of the guideline can result from it regardless of outcome; if it's impossible to do that for one reason or another then the guideline shouldn't be moved. "We should cut it it fits in slot XYZ" isn't a good reason to change a guideline that has received as much input, discussion, and consensus-building as this. If people want to tweak, trim, or otherwise alter the guideline that should be a totally unrelated RFC that does not discuss moving it at all - trying to combine everything into a single do-everything RFC for something with as much history and complexity as this is doomed to failure. And if people want to cover the same material elsewhere or incorporate this elsewhere, that can be done without substantitive changes here. --Aquillion (talk) 21:33, 11 August 2023 (UTC)
• I confess to some confusion. What are questions 3 and 4 "exceptions" to? Are the lists of four items meant to be exhaustive? What is a "public figure"? How does "public figure" differ from 'notable' in the Wikipedia sense? EddieHugh (talk) 17:08, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

  This is specifically supposed to be a rephrasing of Cuñado's RFC wording. So I don't have a great answer for you on the public figure question. Questions 3 and 4 are supposed to be exceptions to the general rule not to use/mention a trans person's deadname. None of these lists are necessarily exhaustive, feel free to suggest things. Loki (talk) 18:43, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

RfC at VPP

RfC has started at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#RfC on GENDERID in BLP. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 18:53, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

And quickly procedurally closed as premature because the discussion above is still ongoing and the RFC posted was the version that has been rejected by everyone who has commented on it. Thryduulf (talk) 21:42, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

But this is a good time for a page break anyway: is a proposal nearing ready?

I'd like to suggest that Loki's presentation of the issues, divided among three potential proposals, looks to have a the requisite levels of simplicity and clarity to my eyes, and has taken the feedback of the above discussions into account, regarding what we can predict from the last two RfCs and how ambitious the new proposed wording can be while still standing a decent chance of capturing community consensus. The advocates for increasing the privacy protections of trans individuals as biographical subjects have adjusted their approach, and I am hopeful that those with strong NOTCENSORED conerns among the respondents of the next RfC at VPP will also give some ground in light of / as a result of the extra level of preparation and tailoring that went into this language.

As such, I'd like to read the room and see if we are good to go on this in the coming week or so, pending some additional tweaks to the precise language? (For example, do we want to leave the inquiries of Q3/Q4 open-ended as they stand now or propose precise language?) If there is support to propose this soon, I think the following timeline is most advisable:

1. We ask Q1 at some point in the next week. The OP should foreground the fact that this will be a series of RfCs but that they will be held in series in order to not confuse respondents, overwhelm this page with feedback from what is already likely to be a large and involved discussion, or tax the community's patience on these matters unnecesarily. We let this first RfC run its course at VPP for 30 days and hopefully get a timely close with a clear consensus.
2. Repeat the process with the complimentary (and I think clverly presented) wording of Q3 and Q4. The results of this discussion should, by a combination of the responses to each question, create a sense of the range of acceptable commentary about deadnames in relevant articles. Wording can then be drafted for the policy with close fidelity to the outcome. The only concern I have here is that with a two-part inquiry, each of which allows for four options, we may not end up with a clear consensus. However, it's possible we will and even if we don't the feedback may be of substantial help moving forward. Given the complexity of the issues involved, and the foregoing disputes, I think this is a reasonable way to present the inquiry for this cluster of issues and get useful community input. Again this should run for the full 30 days, needless to say.
3. Once the language is dialed in, if we have remainign appetite for it and a strong consensus here that the matter should be pursued further, we can discuss a third RfC for purposes of re-distributing the resulting language of GENDERID between BLP and MoS sections.

I appreciate this puts us potentially more than three months out before all of this gets resolved, but there seems to clear consensus above not to run all of these inquiries concurrently, and that may well be for the best (and ultimately save a lot of time and effort) in the long run. Incidentally, my thanks to everyone for pulling together and trying to meet in the middle after a tumultuous start to this series of discussions. Thoughts? SnowRise ^{let's rap} 01:59, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Loki's suggested structure and with your suggested sequencing and timing with two caveats

1. I'd consider waiting a week or so between each part (maybe more if discussion was intensive up to or beyond the 30 days) to further mitigate against fatigue and reduce conflating of issues.
2. I would avoid starting it until at least a full day or so after the ANI discussion about Cuñardo has concluded.

Regarding the actual options, I'm not completely sure I am happy with the language of all the options yet (I need to do more thinking), but I don't think we're far off. If others agree with the structure and sequencing then we should focus energy on the wording of Q1 for now, especially as feedback from that may inform later options. Thryduulf (talk) 02:17, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

All good points, I think. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 07:05, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

Yep to all of that.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:40, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I like this schedule with Thryduulf's suggestions, and Loki's structure. Assuming we're all not exhausted, we'll have the time while Q1 is running to get the wording sorted for questions 3 and 4.

On the wording of the amendment for question 1, I'm still concerned that the barrier for inclusion is too low with respect to the consensus established by the first RfC. It's not enough of a concern to say "we can't launch the RfC yet", but it is enough that I think there might be a slightly better text we could use. There's one editor who I'd like to hear from on this, who has contributed to earlier parts of this discussion but not on this specific issue, but I'd like to check with you all if it's OK to notify them. Is there any objections to asking that person for an opinion here? Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:16, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm curious who you mean but it doesn't matter for me, I'm fine with asking them. Loki (talk) 02:33, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

If they contributed to the broader series of discussions already, at any point, I see no reasonable grounds for objection to notifying them, if being pro forma about canvassing / soliciting input is your concern. And in a more general sense, the more perspectives, the better is my general rule of thumb. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 06:01, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah it's mostly a canvassing concern. I didn't want people to ask "why are you pinging that one editor", and didn't want to cause any fuss if anyone had any objections. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:45, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Which editor are you referring to? I'll probably be fine with notifying them; in general though I don't want to make the proposal any stricter - I want something that will receive consensus, and if in practice we find issues with it we can use those issues as evidence towards strengthening it through a future discussion. BilledMammal (talk) 06:06, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

In terms of strictness, the RFC we're following up came to the consensus that the rule should be more permissive than "never" but more restrictive than "Principle of least astonishment / majority of sources" and so I cannot agree to presenting options outside that range. My preference would be include somewhere between 2 and 4 options that represent different points within the range, which gives the best chance at community consensus. Regarding pings, I have no objection to pinging someone involved previously in this discussion as long as they have not since been topic banned. Thryduulf (talk) 10:40, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

My preference would be include somewhere between 2 and 4 options that represent different points within the range, which gives the best chance at community consensus. I would strongly oppose that. We have tried multiple ambitious RfC's, and they have done nothing but exhaust community patience. We need to run with a single conservative proposed wording, that is guaranteed to get community consensus. My wording has broad acceptance, even if some editors think it is too strong, and others thing it is too weak. Let us use that, and if down the line we find it is not strict enough we can look at a modifications to address specific issues that are raised. BilledMammal (talk) 12:44, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm with Thryduulf on this. If we present a single option – already knowing that some object to it as too much and others as not enough – then that is simply a recipe for everyone who doesn't agree with it to the precise letter to !vote against it, for reasons that are actually antithetical to each other. Present the range of options, and consensus is much more likely to settle on one of them (statistically speaking, most like in the middle of the range, which might very well be the version you want to run solo anyway).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  12:51, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

In addition to what SMcCandlish says, those of us discussing things here are not necessarily representative of the community as a whole so what we like may or may not mesh with what the broader consensus us. Also presenting a single option will almost certainly be perceived by some as an attempted fait accompli (even though that is not the intent) and will get opposition on that basis alone (even if the same people would pick that option from a list). Thryduulf (talk) 13:04, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Also presenting a single option will almost certainly be perceived by some as an attempted fait accompli (even though that is not the intent) and will get opposition on that basis alone (even if the same people would pick that option from a list). Honestly, I doubt that - most policy proposals have a single option with editors !voting either "support" or "oppose", and I've never seen anyone oppose a proposal on that basis.

If we must include multiple options - and again, I strongly argue against doing so, as multiple option RfC's are far more likely to result in "no consensus" than single option RfC's - I would suggest the following, keeping in mind that any proposal has to be less restrictive than the one most recently rejected by the community:

1. For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.
2. For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is widely documented in secondary and reliable sources containing non-trivial coverage of the person.
3. For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in at least one secondary and reliable source.
4. For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name should be included in their main biographical article only if the name is documented in multiple secondary, reliable sources.

BilledMammal (talk) 13:34, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Why "is documented" rather than "has been documented"? If a news source gives the information and then the news source is changed to exclude it, doesn't that set things up for arguments, especially if there are archived copies of the source giving the information? Wehwalt (talk) 14:03, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't recall why I worded it that way; I didn't have an intention of having it speak on modified news articles. I don't have a strong preference either way. BilledMammal (talk) 14:07, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Best to avoid side issues, I'd say. Or, if there's a feeling we should be governed by sources changing, address it directly. Wehwalt (talk) 14:11, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I'll see if others have a preference, but if they don't, or if they also prefer "has been documented", I'll switch over to that. BilledMammal (talk) 14:44, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I didn't really read the wording that way either, but also I prefer "is documented". The reasoning for adding this language in the first place is that we're trying to suss out whether sources think that it's OK to use this person's former name. So if they change their mind, that's relevant. We're not just looking for proof as to what the name actually is. Loki (talk) 16:30, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Loki. There are multiple reasons a source might remove a name, and all the ones I can think of are relevant to whether we include the name or not (although we wont always follow suit, we should be considering it). Whether a source has ever used the name is relevant to verifiability, which is obviously an absolute prerequisite for even discussing inclusion, but whether it currently does matters more for whether we should. Especially as one of the reasons for a source no longer using a name is because it was incorrect (this is very unlikely for someone who was notable under a previous name but plausible for someone like Brianna Ghey). Thryduulf (talk) 16:46, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Agreed with Thryduulf here. We got a consensus on the first RFC, which had multiple options, and didn't on the second with one option even though it seemed to have consensus while being drafted, so I don't think multiple options is the barrier to consensus BM thinks it is.

If you think the guideline should be changed but favor permissive wording, then you'll tend to !vote for that if there's an option for that, but against restrictive wording if that's the only option. And vice versa. Loki (talk) 13:57, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I find myself agreeing with BilledMammal here. The problem with presenting more than two options is that you can very easily get into a situation where one of the options has the plurality of support, but not the majority of support. This happened most recently with second question of the first RfC, where "never" had the plurality of support (or in the words of someone else who was closing it there was a near, but not quite reached, consensus for option 3), but not enough overall to gain consensus. This is why in the second RfC the barrier for inclusion was set very high, as it was to try and respect that consensus, but clearly that failed because it was too high.

If we're set on presenting multiple options, then we should present as few variations as possible to try and minimise the chances of that situation of plurality but still non-consensus from happening again. Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:04, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

That being said, what if we're looking at this the wrong way around. Instead of presenting several finalised (or mostly finalised) options to the community and asking them to pick one, we instead take a leaf out of a fill-in-the-blank questionnaire. We start with the common base text, eg from the 4 options listed above For deceased transgender or non-binary persons, their birth name or former name should be included in their main biographical article only if... and then present a series of options that complete the sentence, eg multiple, reliable sources, multiple, secondary, reliable sources, multiple high-quality reliable sources. Editors then contributing to the RfC can then chose which combination of options how restrictive or non-restrictive they feel this part of the guideline should be.

Or do we think that would that get too messy for a closer to determine consensus on? Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:14, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I actually considered that option, but I'm pretty sure that it would reduce the chance of a consensus being produced to around zero as we - and the closer - can't assume that just because someone supports an option is a specific context that they support that option in all contexts. For example, they might support "multiple high-quality reliable sources" when those sources aren't required to include "non-trivial coverage of the person", but that doesn't mean they will support "multiple high-quality reliable sources" when those sources are required to include that coverage.

As such, the effect of it will be to produce dozens or hundreds of different options, and the likelihood that any of those options will find majority support is minimal. BilledMammal (talk) 23:30, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah that's true. Even if you keep the number of options to fill in the blanks small, you can still get a large number of permutations. And as you say, cross checking becomes troublesome unless people are explicitly saying "I support options A/B/C or B/C/E or ...". Sideswipe9th (talk) 23:52, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Honestly, this is one of those cases where each side has a hold of the Stick of Truth with a good argument. There are statistical advantages and risks for deadlocks in both approaches:

• Too many options absolutely can dilute support to the point where even a closer making reasonable adjustments for context will not be able to find a single conclusion they can judge as definitely endorsed by consensus. Technically nothing stops the supporters from endorsing more than one option (usually), other than their own reasoning about which options are definitely ill-advisable. But with even the remaining proposals they may view as permissible, they may incline towards a Goldilocks principle and !vote (or at least endorse most strongly) only a subset, or one. At the same time, remember that you're going to have, in a discussion like this, a certain number of people who will be opposed to all options on principle.
• On the other hand, a straight up or down, binary vote has it's own set of pragmatics that also pull up and down. Yes, it's much easier in these cases for two sides to get entrenched. And you're definitely going to lose some people in terms of support for the specific chosen proposal who might have been on board for one of the alternatives. But at the same time the support you do have is generally rowing a little more uniformly in the same direction with their arguments and the weight of their support.

The thing is, one of the advantages of our methodologies on this project is that there is enough flexibility built into our communal discussions that if someone someone sees the alternatives anyway (and some definitely will in a discussion of the scope of involvement this one will probably be), they can always adjust their feedback accordingly, and you can actually end up with a closer reasonably making consensus conclusions that weren't even included in the original proposal. So in the final analysis, all the 'vote' running statistical pragmatics, process constraints, psychoscial factors, and game theory that might be applied to the different options might play a smaller role than one might think.

Nevertheless, we have to decide on something, and I think I'm inclined to say keep it on the lower end here. Or at least, let me say this: I know I can support the first wording we have for Q1 right now. I'm not sure what advantage we get from offering the second variant, honestly. Because here's the thing: it's the lesser-strict option (i.e. the one with the larger burden for the person wanting to use a deadname). But interestingly, because of the the way the last discussion shook out, I think it's actually going to appeal more to the on-the-fence community members who previously had concerns about right threshold/burden of proof here.

Because the significant majority roundly rejected "significant coverage of the deadname itself" as a standard. And "non-trivial coverage of the person" sounds a lot more tame than that by comparison. And most of the respondents there will not have been privy to this intervening series of drafting discussions. Their frame of reference will be either as as someone with the last proposal most fixed in their memory, or entirely new to the discussion. So with regard to many of the respondents, I would suspect this wording is going to demonstrate just how much the needle has moved towards the middle for this proposal. Meanwhile, the second option / alternative wording of Q1 is paradoxically less useful to those who want stricter requirements for using the deadname, and yet at the same time less likely to appeal to the editors who are skeptical of the need/advisability of tightening those provisions. So including it seems unlikely to change the result (people will either !vote for Q1-1, or reject a change outright.

That's not to say that there's not some alternative wording worth offering up here. Per the start of this post. It may be worth splitting the difference between the two arguments here and offering a proposal with two options (well, three really:Add language A, add language B, or no change). But until we see a decent offering (and it was hard enough to arrive at this one, let's remember), I can't see the wisdom of supporting that approach blindly. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 17:31, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

As I'm not seeing any objection, Trystan I was hoping you could give your opinion on the barriers for inclusion listed in in this reply, and the quoted text in this reply. With respect to the two most recent RfCs, are any of these options either too high or too low of a restriction? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:53, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping. I haven't had the opportunity to stay on top of the recent discussions on this issue, so I don't think I have anything useful to contribute at this stage.--Trystan (talk) 18:37, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Trystan that might actually be a benefit here, as it would be useful to hear what someone who hasn't been following this discussion closely has to say about the current selection of choices that will be brought forward to an RfC shortly. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:22, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

• The big problem here is that the last RFC closure asked us to find a compromise between “never” and “sometimes”. But that is an impossible task … because anything more permissive than “never” IS “sometimes” (and anything more restrictive than “sometimes” IS “never”). So we keep going in circles. Blueboar (talk) 14:11, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

  If you're looking at it as a ternary of always/sometimes/never, then yes you're right. But if you're looking at it as a spectrum, there are degrees that are more restrictive than sometimes and less restrictive than never (eg "almost never"). Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:46, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

RfC on complex gender identities

How should complementary or complex preferences with regard to gender expression and identity be handled? This applies to article subjects such as Conchita Wurst or Trixie Mattel, where the article contains information both on the person and their stage persona(s), as well as to articles like Eddie Izzard, where the subject's expressed identity does not clearly indicate how they should be referred to under MOS:GID. In such cases, should the article text:

A. Refer to the subject with only one set of pronouns throughout the article

OR

B. Refer to them variably?

Note relevant discussion in the GID inclarity section above. Actualcpscm (talk) 10:34, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

• There is no single “right” answer to this question. A LOT depends on the expressed desires of the subject of the article… which means we often have to figure it out on a case-by-case basis. Blueboar (talk) 12:06, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• I also feel this is something needing to be thrashed out on individual talk pages. There has been a lot of discussion that can help with guidance on this page and elsewhere.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:10, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• Hard cases make bad law GMG^talk 12:14, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• Agree with Blueboar. This isn't the sort of situation where a one-size-fits-all rule can be crafted without creating more problems than are solved. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 12:55, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• I agree with the above people that this is something that needs to be dealt with on a case by case basis, not with a wholesale policy change. (Summoned by bot) I dream of horses ^{(Contribs) (Talk)} 13:15, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• (Summoned by bot) There is no single “right” answer to this question. A LOT depends on the expressed desires of the subject of the article… which means we often have to figure it out on a case-by-case basis, per Blueboar but in general, refering to someone variably within an article is a recipe for confusion IMO. The drag artists (Conchita Wurst and Trixie Mattel) have some justification since the articles are ostensibly in the name of the character, rather than the artist, but even so, the articles seem needlessly confusing, both whether the article itself is actually about a performer, or the drag persona they created and in the use of pronouns (the character or creator could be referred to by name throughout). Pincrete (talk) 13:32, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
• Case-by-case, follow the reliable sources, lather, rinse, repeat. Do we really need this RfC? Where and with whom did you decide how to frame the RfC question? — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 10:13, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
• I'm sure this is asked with the best of intentions, but... Please please please, not another GENDERID RfC. This is not urgent. The wiki is not burning down. The trans/nonbinary biography space does a pretty good job self-regulating and does not need RfC after RfC on style rules. Give people some time to breathe. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 02:43, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

  Agree I don't keep my pronouns in my sig like Tamzin, but anyone who met me in my thirties or forties would attest that "complex / complementary gender expression" would apply to any bio of me were I somehow most unwelcomely to pass WP:N. So, I claim an "inside view" of this topic, and with that perspective I ask please take a break. I cannot remember a time there were not at least two concurrent pronoun and/or deadname RfCs running in fairly public venues.

  I see nowhere established an inability of talkpage conversations to handle this corner case. Further, and kindly, I claim that unambiguously [gender]-identifying first name is a fallacious construct. To step outside this culture for a moment, whenever one of the teachers I worked alongside in China would hear from another teacher the name of a student they didn't know, the first question was always "boy or girl?" Leaving aside the obvious gender-binary cultural blinders, even the idea of an unambiguously gender-identifying first name is unknown is some settings.

  And for a counterexample from Western culture, one of the easy ways people in our department at grad school used to suss out whether some student was actually familiar with the secondary literature or had just read a few articles here or there would be to bring up Michael Nylan, now the most prominent active Han dynasty historian in the Western world, and see if the student misgendered her based on assumptions about her first name.

  I'm sorry this got rambly and ranty, and I appreciate that the people initiating these RfCs are doing so in good faith to protect and respect notable people who are similar to me in a vulnerable way that makes us visible minorities wherever we go. But what I'm feeling instead is that the image being presented to the wider Wikipedia community is that trans people are delicate to the point we need a constant flow of RfCs to head off any possible affront no matter how minor or unintentional. When people address you with the wrong pronouns, you remind, forgive, and have patience. It takes a while to learn, but people are learning. The ceaseless pushing on these topics is a road to resentment, not consensus.

  Apologies for the feelings. It's been a wholeass week over here. Double apologies to everyone who has their pronouns tattooed on their knuckles and gets tilted about pronouns on the daily (although I doubt the person I'm thinking of reads anything in the Wikipedia_talk: namespace). Folly Mox (talk) 04:36, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

  "I see nowhere established an inability of talkpage conversations to handle this corner case." Yep. We already have a WP:MOSBLOAT problem, and MoS should not get new rules added that are not frequent sources of reader confusion or editorial in-fighting.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:34, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

• Reiterating what's already been said, we should handle these on a case-by-case basis. I beg that we do not have another RfC. Like Tamzin and Folly Mox, this has a personal connection for me. I'd not claim to have complex / complementary gender expression, rather I have a "don't give a fuck" approach which means I don't mind any personal pronouns. But even in that, the same issue arises as described by Actualcpscm. I don't think we have enough BLPs that would require us to create a uniform policy and AFAIK we've been able to self-regulate well enough. EvergreenFir (talk) 06:30, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Determining Nationality: Is duress a factor?

MOS:ETHNICITY covers several useful situations for how to refer to the nationality or ethnicity of a biography subject in the lead section. However, there is no guidance on whether duress can be a factor in determining a person's nationality. At Talk:Sergei Bortkiewicz, there is currently a riveting discussion regarding how to refer to Sergei Bortkiewicz' nationality and/or ethnicity in the lead section. Even if these questions are mooted by other factors, the question of duress may still relevant to many biography subjects who have lived in the middle of geopolitical conflicts, especially if they lived in occupied territories. @Mzajac raises an interesting concern regarding Bortkiewicz: "His own comments have to be interpreted in his cultural and historical context: in the Russian empire one could get in serious trouble for publicly acknowledging Ukrainian as a separate national identity so it wasn’t done, and the name Ukrainian wasn’t universally used as an ethnonym until after the revolution (in Austro-Hungarian Ukraine, Ukrainians had referred to themselves as Rusyns, Rusnaks, or Ruthenians). This coloured the way people from there referred to themselves and others, and the way the rest of the world referred to them."

To what extent can duress be a factor in determining a person's identity? 169.156.16.220 (talk) 23:35, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

To what extent can duress be a factor in determining a person's identity? No extent, because that requires WP:OR. Instead, we should just follow the sources; if the sources describe Bortkiewicz as Russian, we describe him as Russian. If the sources describe him as Ukrainian, we describe him as Ukrainian. If the sources are conflicted, we reflect that conflict. BilledMammal (talk) 23:49, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Duress doesn't really apply to Bortkiewicz since he was living in Germany for most of his life. But as @BilledMammal said: we should trust sources that they are able to acknowledge every factor while determining subjects nationality, we shouldn't do that ourselves. Marcelus (talk) 06:05, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

I concur with BilledMammal and Marcelus.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:37, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

The issue isn’t duress, it’s colonialism. Bortkiewicz grew up in imperial Russia where everything Ukrainian was either denigrated as low peasant culture, or appropriated as Russian. He was from a landlord family of foreign ancestry. Why would he ever associate himself with Ukrainianness?

And of course, these prejudices were exported to Western academia by Russian émigrés, and are still only partially addressed,[54] so his connection to Ukrainian culture is only now beginning to be examined, as evidenced by sources that I quoted from in Talk:Sergei Bortkiewicz#Edit war regarding Countries of Bortkiewicz’ Heritage.  —Michael Z. 15:10, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

It is entirely possible that the academic RS consensus on Bortkiewicz's identity is about to change, but until it does it's not up to us as Wikipedia editors to jump the gun. At most it may be reasonable to omit content relating to Russian identity if it is connected to outdated scholarship, but purporting new content about connections to Ukraine in the absence of sourcing is OR._signed, Rosguill ^talk 15:14, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

And (not looking specifically at the sources in this case) if only Ukrainian sources describe him as Ukrainian and other sources describe him differently, like it currently happens a lot, this situation should be mentioned in the article (rather than saying 50% sources so, other 50% sources so). Ymblanter (talk) 16:13, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't think we can automatically treat sources as WP:BIASED solely because of their nationality. That would lead to problems for eg. Arab–Israeli conflict. Or, for another example, would we require that every source about the Vietnam War published in the United States or written by an American attribute that fact? The fact that sources from region X tend to say Y is something we could attribute to a secondary source observing that fact, but putting a bunch of sources together and using attribution to say it seems like it could lead to problems. --Aquillion (talk) 17:09, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

We have a lot of situations when Ukrainian sources say something and all (or almost all) other sources say smth else. And the proponents of Ukrainian POV bring these sources en masse and demand changing the text of the article. We need to learn how to deal with such situations. Ymblanter (talk) 18:25, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

[citation needed][citation needed][citation needed][original research]

Now lecture us about Russian sources.  —Michael Z. 02:40, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

The sources I cited in the discussion linked above are published by:

1. The New Criterion, New York NY[55]
2. Roman & Littlefield, Lanham MD[56]
3. Orpheus Publications, Harrow, Middlesex, UK[57]
4. Doubleday, New York NY[58]
5. Alfred Publishing, Van Nuys CA[59]
6. R. Glier Kyiv Institute of Music, Tchaikovsky National Music Academy of Ukraine, Kyiv[60]
7. Notes Muzyczny, Academy of Music in Łódź [61]
8. University of Nebraska – Lincoln.[62]

So what is it we need to learn how to deal with?  —Michael Z. 02:58, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm strongly inclined to agree with the general sentiment Michael is expressing here and the points raised by Aquillion. I'm not going to challenge Ymblanter's subjective read of this particular corpus of sources in this particular context, because that is an exceedingly difficult or outright impossible thing to do in most circumstances, and even if you accomplish it, you may not convince the other party. But I will say that our policies are very obviously, directly, and deliberately design to have us avoid introducing meta-analysis of the sources unless an WP:RS compliant source can be found supporting it: ideally with attribution.

That said, attribution can be used to operate in the other direction as well: if you have a concern about the balance of sources along some criteria, attribution is the one way you can flag that. You just can't get too extrapolative/OR/SYNTH about how you describe things in doing so. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 04:42, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

That said and returning to the OP's original question, I'm in agreement with BilledMammal, Marcelus, Rosguill and SmMCandlish above: just map to the sources. Implications of duress or cultural suppression or appropriation are WP:extraordinary claims (that can really only come in the midst of controversial issues) that must meet a high burden of sourcing. Mind you WP:BIASED does tell us to present all significant viewpoints, but you still need at least one or two high quality sources for such observations of purported systemic bias. But you can reasonably, briefly, and neutrally point out any very obvious (and easily verifiable) connections between the sources and let the reader draw their own conclusions. Again, just don't get excitable with the wording. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 04:42, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

As I mentioned above, I am making a general point. I did not even look at a specific corpus of sources in this case, and it might very well be that the Ukrainian point of view is prevalent in the sources for this specific issue. Ymblanter (talk) 12:07, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

It’s not a “Ukrainian point of view” that Bortkiewicz was from Ukraine (except in that the musician from Ukraine literally wrote this fact about himself). On the contrary, there is a POV pushed in the original discussion, the baseless or distorted assertion that Ukraine “wasn't even existing at that time.”  —Michael Z. 13:56, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Although I originally opened the topic to discuss the limited topic of duress, this section has clearly blossomed into a healthy discussion about the proper application of MOS:ETHNICITY to the broader question of Bortkiewicz' nationality/ethnicity. Several users have weighed in here supporting the general concept that the lead section should guided by WP:RS, to prevent WP:NOR or WP:SYNTH. At Talk:Sergei Bortkiewicz, multiple WP:RS each were raised identifying Bortkiewicz as Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, and Austrian.

I cannot take seriously Marcelus' argument that multiple sources describing Bortkiewicz as "Ukrainian-born" or listing "Ukraine" next to his name do not consider him Ukrainian.

Similarly, in response to Michael's arguments for rejecting the sources that facially identify Bortkiewicz as Russian, I'm concerned this would risk committing WP:SYNTH or WP:OR. Even if Michael's claim that anyone who was born and grew up in Ukraine was Ukrainian were valid, this would not answer the question of whether Bortkiewicz was also Russian, which the WP:RS clearly answer in the affirmative.

Previously, I suggested the compromise solution of omitting both Russian and Ukrainian references in the first sentence, based on the potential conflict between sources and the Copernicus example in MOS:ETHNICITY, but that didn't seem to gain support. I am also convinced by BilledMammal's point that the sources should reflect conflict, if any. Thus, I have edited Sergei Bortkiewicz to note in the first sentence that he was Ukrainian as well as what was previously listed, with multiple WP:RS each to indicate his Ukrainian, Russian, Austrian, and Polish identities. The citations allow the readers to make their own informed decisions about Bortkiewicz' identities.

(Also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 14:14, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I did not reject sources that identify Bortkiewicz as Russian. I did say (somewhere) that it is better say exactly what that means, that he was a subject of the Russian empire. This is what some recent sources say is better (I’ll provide a reference if I can find it).  —Michael Z. 15:15, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I think the body should definitely be improved to describe the identities in more detail, including his statements about his identity, and the ethnological interpretation of his music. The lead would not be the right place, to avoid MOS:LEADCLUTTER. However, the content should be specific to Bortkiewicz. If we have two sources that identify Bortkiewicz as Russian, and a third source that says that "Russian" at that time meant subject of the Russian Empire (generally and without specificity to Bortkiewicz), then WP:SYNTH might incorrectly follow the form, "Bortkiewicz was Russian[source 1,2], which means that he was a subject of the Russian Empire[source 3]."

(Also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 15:39, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

This discussion is already going on: Talk:Sergei_Bortkiewicz#Edit_war_regarding_Countries_of_Bortkiewicz'_Heritage, there is zero reason to start another one here. Everybody who has interest in the topic is free to join the discussion there. Marcelus (talk) 19:29, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

This page frequently hosts WP:RFC regarding disputes about the application of MOS:BIO. You yourself have raised some important points on Talk:Sergei Bortkiewicz regarding the proper application of Wikipedia policies. It is important that these pressing points be discussed by the broader Wikipedia community, instead of just a Talk page. (Also used 50.169.82.253, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 134.192.8.17 (talk) 21:19, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to put in a plug here for just omitting nationality from the first sentence when it's complicated and not very relevant to the person's notability. In fact I'd even be good with omitting it (from the first sentence) just whenever it's not very relevant to the person's notability, complicated or not. Whether that's the case for Bortkiewicz I haven't bothered to form an informed opinion on, but I'd like to challenge the apparently popular assumption that we should always or almost always lead with nationality. There's plenty of time to discuss it in the body of the article. --Trovatore (talk) 18:56, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to hear more perspectives on this. I'm not closed to the idea of removing both "Ukrainian" and "Russian" from the first sentence, although I believe that only including "Russian" and not "Ukrainian" is neither supported by consensus nor by references. At the moment, I'm quite convinced by the argument of BilledMammal, that the article should reflect any conflict between sources. I don't see much of a conflict: only one source says Bortkiewicz was not Ukrainian, and none say he was not Russian. This does not seem inconsistent with a claim that he was both Ukrainian and Russian, and this claim seems well supported by references. While Copernicus is precedent for how MOS:ETHNICITY need not be included for someone whose ethnicity/nationality is disputed, I don't see any similar standard for not including a complicated nationality. If someone has four different ethnicities/nationalities and all four are well supported by sources, and all four are WP:NOTABLE, I think all should be included. But I'd like to hear from others on this point.

I think the Johnson dissertation and the Levkulych paper, and the Polish language source provide the best arguments for the notability of each of these ethnicites/nationalities: they were notable because they heavily informed Bortkiewicz's music, which itself was notable. (Also used 50.169.82.253, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 134.192.8.17 (talk) 23:01, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

I only learned of this discussion now; it would have been very helpful, not to mention a welcome sign of goodwill, had IP user mentioned they were going to take the Bortkiewicz discussion elsewhere after failing to achieve their aims at the article talk page.

Some points:

• "Duress" isn't a credible excuse for why Bortkiewicz self-identified as Russian and not Ukrainian. As has been mentioned before, his stated being Russian after leaving Russia, when he was no longer in danger of official reprisal. Even had he remained in Russia/the USSR, the notion of official reprisal for asserting one's nationality isn't as clear-cut as others make it here. During the Soviet period, expressions of nationalism were encouraged by authorities, so long as they did not threaten the integrity of the Soviet state. Levko Revutsky, Boris Lyatoshinsky, Viktor Kosenko, among many others, not only were allowed to assert their Ukrainian identity, but were allowed to thrive because of it. In the case of Revutsky, his being Ukrainian even ended up being a professional advantage during the nominations for the 1940 Stalin Prize. The committee ultimately booted Sergei Prokofiev's Alexander Nevsky from the short list in favor of Revutsky's Symphony No. 2 because they needed more non-Russian nominees. All of these composers were highly regarded and were honored by the state.
• His nationality, whatever it was, ultimately played no part in his notability. These certainly did not secure him lasting fame in his lifetime, nor did it prevent him from being practically forgotten by the musical mainstream in Russia, Austria, and Ukraine until the late 20th century. Bortkiewicz also did not appreciably influence or participate in the musical history and development of infrastructure anywhere, much less in Ukraine, unlike the aforementioned composers who are crucial figures in the ongoing history of Ukrainian music.
• That he used Ukrainian music in his own work does not make him Ukrainian. If that were the case, then Colin McPhee would be "Indonesian", not Canadian; Béla Bartók "Romanian" and/or "Turkish" instead of or in addition to being Hungarian.

The best compromise would be to omit all mentions of nationality in the lead. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 01:56, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

A formula I've used occasionally for subjects whose current nationality is non-obvious is to omit the nationality from the first sentence, but then later in the lead to list the relevant nations for major life phases like "Born in Argentina and educated in France and Switzerland, she works in Germany as..." —David Eppstein (talk) 02:10, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that is a very good technique and should be used more. (I've seen a few places where both at once are being done, though, which is clumsy. E.g., Alex Pagulayan "is a Filipino-born Canadian professional pool player. Pagulayan was born in Cabagan, Isabela, Philippines and was raised in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2012, Pagulayan became a citizen of Canada and now resides in Toronto."  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:21, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

That would be a sensible choice elsewhere, but I don't think it would work here as editors with a nationalist agenda would likely try to game this one way or another.

The main problem is that Ukraine, in the sense of an independent polity, didn't exist at the time of Bortkiewicz's birth. Adding to the confusion—and frustration to nationalists on both sides—is that notions of what it meant to be Ukrainian and Russian were a lot more ambiguous and fluid back in Bortkiewicz's time than today. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 03:01, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Wow. Why not just name the bad-faith editors instead of casting aspersions widely to show you have no trust in the discussion and poison it?

I don’t know why that would be a particular main problem. Plenty of independent polities didn’t exist throughout much of history. Somehow we manage to label Bach and Beethoven German before 1866 and Vivaldi Italian before 1861, and Ghandi’s not even “British.”

The question is about “notions” in current sources, not in Bortkiewicz’s time.  —Michael Z. 03:33, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Why do you keep derailing discussion by accusing others of attacking you and Ukraine? I even forgot about you until now. Furthermore, nobody here or at the other discussion was maligning Ukraine. The only person who kept bringing up outdated terms for it that are now considered derogatory was you. So please take my word: I neither hate you, nor am I trying to attack you or Ukraine, whether directly or by implication.

Getting back on-topic, Vivaldi, for example, was ethnically Italian, spoke Italian, contributed to the development of Italian music, and was referred to as Italian by sources in his time and since. Sources are clear that Bortkiewicz was born in what was then Russia and that his ethnicity was Polish, but arguments for his Ukrainian nationality, on the other hand, did not appear until well after his death. As I mentioned above, "duress" cannot be the reason he self-identified as Russian even after leaving Russia; even had he remained, the cases of Revutsky, et al, prove that assertions of Ukrainian identity were celebrated and encouraged in the USSR. (Since Bortkiewicz never returned there, however, this is besides the point.)

Bortkiewicz himself neither ever identified as Ukrainian, nor had any ethnic connection to Ukraine. So the grounds for him being Ukrainian, aside from being born in a territory that 114 years later became Ukraine, are a lot more debatable. If anything, the situation here is more like trying to refer to E. T. A. Hoffmann as Russian or Béla Bartók as Romanian simply because their respective birthplaces eventually became Russia and Romania. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:02, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Now you’re making up false accusations. Please take them back.

And you’re indulging in a straw man argument, or maybe several. I’ll repeat what I said before: the article should say Bortkiewicz was from Ukraine. Since that meets the definition of a Ukrainian, it could use that term to say it, but it would be better to be specific.  —Michael Z. 04:09, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

And Immanuel Kant was from Russia because even though he never identified as such, spoke the language, or was in any way directly involved with its culture or history, his birthplace is located in what is today Kaliningrad. Doesn't that meet the definition of a Russian? —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:17, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

MOS:ETHNICITY does not support the claim that just because someone is from a region, that person should be referred to by the demonym of that region. Review the guidance on the usage of British vs Scottish/Welsh/English/Irish, and Spanish vs regional demonym. The course of action in that case is to consult reliable sources that refer to the person using those particular demonyms. (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 04:34, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

The only two sources raised that claim Bortkiewicz was Russian were Grove (2001), and Johnson (2016), both long after Bortkiewicz died. If you found fault in the recency of the sources claiming his Ukrainian nationality, the sources claiming his Russian nationality would be weak for the same reason. Claiming Bortkiewicz was Russian because he was born in Russia would be impermissible WP:OR, which is the same thing I said to @Mzajac about the claim that Bortkewicz was Ukrainian because he was born in Ukraine. (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 04:16, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

For one thing, The New Grove is "only" the largest reference work on music in any language. For another, whether anyone likes it or not, Bortkiewicz's birthplace was internationally recognized as being an integral part of Russia at the time he was born. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:23, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

You’re not citing your sources, but I suggest newer ones than 1877.  —Michael Z. 04:36, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Grove has many editions from many years. The citation in question was from 2001.

Schwarz, Boris (20 January 2001). "Bortkiewicz [Bortkievich], Sergei [Sergey] Eduardovich". Grove Music Online. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.03637. Retrieved 12 January 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)

(also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 04:40, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes. A lot of articles are preserved in new editions if they are believed by their editorial board to still be authoritative and accurate. The article about Igor Stravinsky by Stephen Walsh, for example, is still in use. Your gripe isn't with me, but Oxford University Press. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:54, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Where am I not citing sources? I was the first and, for awhile, the only user at the Bortkiewicz article to cite an actual source. Until I started editing the page in January, the article lacked citations entirely. That I didn't add more was simply because The New Grove is one of the most respected sources on music in any language and that I'm not personally invested in Bortkiewicz enough to exhaustively expand and improve the article as I do for subjects that actually interest me. And The New Grove article is from 2001. Not new enough? —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:51, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Grove, or at least the edition provided was published long after Bortkiewicz's death, which means that it falls to your own criticism of recency. MOS:ETHNICITY does not support the claim that just because someone is from a region, that person should be referred to by the demonym of that region. Review the guidance on the usage of British vs Scottish/Welsh/English/Irish, and Spanish vs regional demonym. The course of action in that case is to consult reliable sources that refer to the person using those particular demonyms. 50.169.82.253 (talk) 04:37, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, you're just in luck then because I have a number of articles clipped from Newspapers.com and ProQuest from Bortkiewicz's lifetime wherein he is referred to as Russian. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:56, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

One minute before I opened the new topic here, I wrote in Talk:Sergei Bortkiewicz: "I am consulting Wikipedia Talk:Manual of Style/Biography for an opinion on whether duress can be a factor in determining the nationality of a biography subject." (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 02:49, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Your wording implied that you merely were referring to the MOS for guidance, not opening a new RfC which is what you did here. Regardless of what you meant, you should've notified editors in the other talk page that you were opening this; that you didn't is a bad look. The fact that you also attempted to WP:WL @Marcelus (by "weaponizing policies, guidelines, noticeboards ... with the goal of deprecating an editor rather than of resolving a problem") also does not reflect well on your intentions. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 03:16, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure why I would merely read a talk page. People consult talk pages by opening new sections and participating in discussions.

If you're concerned that my report violated Wikipedia policy, please contact the administrators. It didn't, and there's nothing else I can say. (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 03:49, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Again, whatever wording you chose, it would have been a welcome gesture of goodwill had you informed involved editors that you intended to open a new RfC. You chose not to, which is as I said a bad look, especially after you gained no consensus that favored your edits at the Bortkiewicz talk page.

Unless a user is unambiguousItalicly vandalizing mainspace, I'm not interested in reporting anyone. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:11, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

The consensus for my edit came from you. I mentioned that here and you did not respond. I'm further confused because you again confirmed your position that you don't want either Russian or Ukrainian nationality or ethnicity to be mentioned in the lead. So why do you continue to contest that my edit, which resulted in neither Russian nor Ukrainian identity being mentioned in the lead, was without consensus? (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 04:26, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

As flattering to my ego as it would be, my say so alone does not make consensus. Clearly there was at least one other editor who wanted to include "Ukrainian" in the lead and another who wanted "Russian". Moreover, there should have been a formal RfC process initiated with unbiased proposals and explanations explaining them. This was not done.

And as the edit history shows, I did not revert you. I trimmed your citation overkill, removed one of your sources because it was a children's book, and added better source needed tags because at least one other user pointed out problems with them, but I did not remove your edit that stated Bortkiewicz was Ukrainian. Although I did not revert you, the fact that another editor did indicates that consensus had yet to be achieved. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 04:43, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Your description of WP:CONSENSUS is not accurate. Consensus can be assumed in the WP:SILENCE of disagreement. Before I removed "Russian", no one expressed disagreement with this change. Even though WP:CCC, consensus existed at the time of my edit. My edit did not affect any occurrences of "Ukrainian". It's quite counterintuitive for you to now be upset that I made a change that you wanted, and that you evidently still want. If this process of gaining consensus is so paramount, I find it quite puzzling how four times (diff, diff, diff, diff), you removed "Ukrainian" and placed "Russian" into the article without ever seeking consensus for this change. (also used 134.192.8.17, 169.156.16.220, and 167.102.146.19) 50.169.82.253 (talk) 05:03, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

You cited an explanatory essay that explicitly states: "This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines"... —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 05:05, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

The point, "Consensus can be assumed if no editors object to a change.", is in WP:CONSENSUS. I recall that you accused me of WP:WL. That's an essay. 50.169.82.253 (talk) 05:22, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I certainly did. Which is one of the reasons I did not take you up on your offer to report you, because I don't confuse explanatory essays with policy. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 05:40, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I really don't think this two-editor pissing match, about a content dispute at an article, needs to continue on this guideline talk page. Most of this is turning to behavioral complaint, which belongs in userspace or at a noticeboard.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:53, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree, what's more it's a WP:DISCUSSFORK by the IP user. Marcelus (talk) 07:51, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I got sucked into this rabbithole topic by User:Mzajac/Michael's comment, because Bach and Beethoven and Vivaldi get rather less controversial anachronistic ethno-nationalities in the lead paragraphs, while Mozart and Haydn get into historical/pseudohistorical and politicized Godwin-converging Talk battles. There's even a Nationality of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart article (entirely SYNTH imo). If you browse the archives of any such bio's Talk page they raise the same basic points: nationality, ethnicity(s), language, citizenship, residence, and self-identification are all different concepts that may vary in different contexts at different times in the subject's life. An appropriate RS may indeed cover such a topic in some detail. But if it's only mentioned as a throwaway line in a bio -- "Bach was born in X. The precocious young German did Y." -- is that really a suitable source that a historian has staked out a position on the subject's ethnicity, especially if the historian provides no footnote for that singular nominalization? I hear way too often the entirely false mantra that "an RS is an RS". Tldr: maybe editors here who say it suffices to adhere to reliable sources are correct, but I have yet to see editors consistently understand what reliable sources are, especially when tribal lines are being drawn. If something like duress is even remotely an issue, then I'd be shocked if editors ever agree to put any positive ethnicity or nationality anywhere. SamuelRiv (talk) 04:38, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

bolding of "sir"

Per MOS:BOLD, "The most common use of boldface is to highlight the first occurrence of the article's title word or phrase in the lead section." However, the guidance at MOS:SIR is, "The title is placed in bold in the first use of the name." In cases when the title of the article does not include the honorific, this is contradictory; not knowing that MOS:SIR even existed, I've been conforming articles to MOS:BOLD.

I'm not clear why "sir" should be different than any other honorific in terms of the use of boldface; shouldn't it only be in bold when it's part of the article title? If in fact it's the consensus that "sir" is an exception, shouldn't MOS:BOLD be updated to reflect that? ~TPW 15:04, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

It should not be treated any differently from other titles and honorifics, whether pre- or post-nominal. This is a WP:POLICYFORK that needs to be fixed.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:26, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

You're forgetting that the person's full name is always bolded even when their full name doesn't feature in the article title. Nicknames and other common names by which a person is known are also bolded in the first paragraph. So are former names. So this does not stand up to scrutiny. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:28, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I appreciate the good-faith assumption that I am forgetful, but that's not it at all. Most titles are not placed in bold, except when they are part of the article title. In other words, they are not considered "part of the full name" unless the consensus is that the article title include it. I'm just trying to understand why the guidance and MOS:SIR appears to contradict that. Do you know of other specific guidelines or policies that would shed light on this seeming contradiction? ~TPW 16:16, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Bolding the Sir seems to be a continuation of bolding the MOS:FULLNAME? For example, for the article title Winston Churchill we have bold text Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill. Equivalently, in the article Ruth Westheimer includes Karola Ruth Westheimer and later Dr. Ruth. An alternative route to the same result is that Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill and Dr. Ruth are both redirect pages.

In either case, I think it would help for MOS:BOLD to include this, but I think it should encompass the bolding of all full name variations, not just the title Sir. Mgp28 (talk) 15:28, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't see anything at MOS:FULLNAME that refers to titles; that would suggest that titles are not placed in bold as a matter of course. For Churchill I'd not put the "sir" in bold for that reason. Dr. Ruth, however, is in bold as an alternative name redirected to the main article pursuant to MOS:BOLD. Paul McCartney does not have a redirect from Sir Paul McCartney, on the other hand, and I'm trying to understand why bold of that title is appropriate regardless. ~TPW 16:22, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Sorry I was unclear. I didn't mean that the guidance at MOS:FULLNAME mentions titles. I meant that if we're bolding full names then it seems reasonable that some titles will end up included in that. Andrew Lloyd Webber's Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber would look strange if we unbolded the "Baron". Other examples of titles that are bolded include Mother Teresa's (among others) Saint Teresa of Calcutta.

As an aside, Sir Paul McCartney is a redirect. Despite having brought up redirects in my first reply, I now think it's unwise to focus too strongly on that justification because misspellings are also redirects and we would never use that as a reason for bolding. Mgp28 (talk) 16:34, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh, I somehow missed that. Still getting used to the way search terms pop up in the newest interface, I guess. ~TPW 16:50, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

As for what seems reasonable for inclusion, maybe it would be appropriate to request comments on that, but I don't think I could come up with a concise enough request quite yet. ~TPW 16:52, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps something along the lines of "In what circumstances should a title be considered as part of a person's full name?"

I don't know if there can be a strict rule. It would probably need to be some combination of the title's permanency (e.g. not jobs / elected offices) and WP:COMMONNAME. There's also issues of article titles. For example, popes' articles tend to have "Pope" in the title, so that'll be bold regardless of whether we say Pope is part of their name. Redirects opens up even more, e.g. should Princess Grace be bold?

I know there have been extensive discussions about article titles for UK monarchs and their consorts. Bolding in those articles seems mostly to be just the article title. I don't know how broad those discussions have been. Perhaps evidence of a broad consensus already exists in those discussions and we don't need to re-open it? Mgp28 (talk) 17:20, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Striking half of my reply. If it's in the article title it's bold so why did I suggest opening disputes that won't change anything? Mgp28 (talk) 17:24, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I found a better example: the lead of August Thayer Jaccaci refers to "Captain August Thayer Jaccaci, Sr." The "captain" is not in bold. Should it be? Why, or why not? If not, how is it qualitatively different than "sir," in articles that do not include the title in the article name? ~TPW 20:14, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Captain Tom Moore has "Captain" in the article title, then starts Captain Sir Thomas Moore. I have no idea... Mgp28 (talk) 20:53, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Because captain is a rank, not a title. They are entirely different things. When someone is knighted they are referred to as "Sir Whatever" for the rest of their lives. Effectively, it does become part of the name (and can, incidentally, appear on passports and other official documents as part of the name). Taking this opposition to bolding titles to its logical conclusion, it would also lead to the ridiculous situation where Sir John Smith, 1st Baronet was referred to as Sir John Smith, 1st Baronet in the first line, whereas Edmund Affleck was referred to as Sir Edmund Affleck, 1st Baronet. Both are baronets, but only the first needs to be disambiguated by his title. Presumably under this thinking, Winston Churchill would appear as Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill. And if not, why not? -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:32, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

I tend to follow the same line of thinking as Necrothesp. "Sir" is not the same thing as "Captain" is, it effectively used as part of the name. --Jayron32 13:11, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

All I ask is a demonstration that this practice is consensus, to allow me to read through that discussion, or, in the alternative, reliable sources supporting the asserting that "sir" is part of a name, which would certainly be helpful in achieving consensus now. ~TPW 13:17, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

This has been discussed endlessly in the past. Periodically someone comes along and asks why we do it. It's explained to them. A few people (usually those who don't like titles) object. It goes round and round for a bit. Debate peters out. Then some other person reignites it... -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:55, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

I fear there was more context in my head than in what I wrote. For whatever it may be worth, the bold in the first line of the Captain Tom Moore article matches my preference. In a series of unhelpful comments, I made a suggestion to TPW, deleted it on the basis that article titles are always bold, then found counter-examples. Given that I'm perfectly happy with the status quo it's probably time for me to step away but I do think it would be reasonable for MOS:BOLD to include (or point to) guidance about bolding of people's names. Mgp28 (talk) 16:42, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps it wasn't clear from my last comment that I am not interested in reigniting a past debate if consensus was reached at that time. I ask again if someone could provide me a link to that discussion. ~TPW 18:28, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Previous discussion: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography/2023 archive § Remove bold for honorific titles in lead sentence, Mitch Ames (talk) 00:25, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

Much obliged, thank you. ~TPW 14:40, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

After reviewing the last thread on this (thanks for that, @Mitch Ames), I have a clearer understanding of why no one has pointed to consensus; none has been achieved. In that thread, at least, some editors expressed distaste for the idea. The arguments were largely based on vaguely-defined distinctions among "titles," "honorofics," and "pretitles." It appears that some of the editors participating at that time weren't clear on what any of those mean; I am similarly in the dark. There were also suggestions that anyone questioning this practice must be opposed to titles, although no evidence of that assertion was presented. ~TPW 14:52, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

In all of these sorts of discussions I'm aware of, there has repeatedly been an assertion along the lines that "Sir/Dame becomes part of the name", which is a very confused argument. It fails to distinguish between the actual name (which pre-existed the honour, and may survive it – I saw in the news only a few days ago that King Charles stripped someone of a knighthood), versus something later added in front of the name that is conventionally (not invariably) used along with it. This odd "titles and names are distinguishable" argument appears to be the primary if not sole backing of the "we should boldface Sir/Dame in the lead" stance. Observing how logically weak this position is, is not in any way an "IDONTLIKEIT" take, as True Pagan Warrior repetitively suggests. We have guidelines that call for extremely minimal use of boldface, and abiding by them is also not IDONTLIKEIT nonsense. If anyone is triggering I[DONT]LIKEIT concerns, it's the other side of the coin, arguing for Sir/Dame in bold simply because they "like" it one sense or another (e.g. it appeals to their traditionalist sense of propriety and deference). The very notion is also against the spirit of MOS:SIGCAPS (which is rooted in WP:NPOV policy): Wikipedia does not do special typography to try to force a sense of importance-signification into the brain of the reader. Doing it with excessive boldfacing (or unwarranted italicisation, or SMALLCAPS, or use of colour fonts, or any other typographical trickery) isn't any better than doing it with everyday over-capitalization of things that are not normally capitalized.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:39, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

First name mononym

We're having a discussion at Sia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) about if/how to introduce per MOS:LEGALNAME why we refer to her as Sia throughout the article. She has not changed her legal name to her mononym. This is similar to the examples in Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Biography#Subsequent_use: Aaliyah, Selena, and Usher; where only Selena has an introduction, "known mononymously as Selena" in the first sentence.

Is there a general consensus to prefer an introduction over none? - Hipal (talk) 20:58, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

See also Madonna. Like Usher, this is a Good Article. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:11, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Prefer the introduction, since it makes things clearer for readers (not everyone is an avid follower of Western pop culture), and is better for WP:REUSE of our content.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:27, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Discussion about the redirect category {{R from deadname}}

There’s currently a discussion going on at RfD regarding the redirect {{R from deadname}}. One of the potential outcomes is the creation of a new rcat.

During the discussion so far, an editor has raised potential BLP concerns, so it would therefore be good to hear the opinions of editors experienced in this area. I’ve linked the discussion below — any editor who wishes to take part may do so.

 Courtesy link: Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 September 7 § Template:R from deadname

All the best, ^user:A smart kitten_meow 09:29, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

Fictional characters known by initials - what qualifies as the "preferred style for their own name" ?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Moved to Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Writing about fiction#Fictional characters known by initials - what qualifies as the "preferred style for their own name" ?

 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:03, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

---

MOS:INITIALS

WP:Requested moves has consistently interpreted the "Initials" section as also applying to names of fictional characters.

An initial is capitalized and is followed by a full point (period) and a space (e.g. J. R. R. Tolkien), unless:

• the person demonstrably has a different, consistently preferred style for their own name; and
• an overwhelming majority of reliable sources use that variant style for that person.

In such a case, treat it as a self-published name change. Examples include k.d. lang, CC Sabathia, and CCH Pounder.

Would the "preferred style for their own name" for fictional characters be the owner's name for the character? Examples:

1. Owner: E.T. for E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, style followed in secondary source
2. Owner: C.C. for C.C. (Code Geass), style followed in secondary source
3. Owner: MJ for MJ (Marvel Cinematic Universe), style followed in secondary source
4. Owner: JD McDonagh for JD McDonagh, style followed in secondary source
5. Owner: O.B. for Ouroboros "O.B.", style followed in secondary source
6. Owner: K.K. Slider for K.K. Slider, style followed in secondary source
7. Owner: B.A. for Knights of the Dinner Table#Boris Alphonzo "B.A." Felton, style followed in secondary source

starship.paint (RUN) 13:37, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

• I would support the above in adherence to key content policies, when we adhere to the owner's name of the character, we satisfy WP:V and avoid WP:OR, and we are less likely to run afoul of WP:NPOV because sources tend to follow the official name as the WP:COMMONNAME. However, if the official name differs from the most widely used name in reliable sources, then the official name would not qualify for the exception. starship.paint (RUN) 13:40, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

  There is absolutely nothing like a "key content policy [to] adhere to the owner's name" of anything. Quite the opposite. See WP:OFFICIALNAME and MOS:TM. And WP:V and WP:OR and WP:NPOV are satisified by doing what a large majority of independent reliable sources are doing, not what is found in a primary source. Making up your mind based on a movie poster or a title card that the trademark holder must be upset about spacing or dot placement in a name just because they style it one way and we and various other publishers style it another way is OR by definition. Bending over backwards to satisfy trademark holders' stylization demands is entirely a POV exercise. And V is dependent on independent secondary sourcing.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:58, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

• WP cares most what independent sources are doing, not (per MOS:TM) what the trademark holder prefers, when it comes to any style questions. Fictional characters do not have feelings that can be hurt and preferences that can be offended, so the "self-published name change" idea (or anything else derived from WP:ABOUTSELF) cannot apply to them. This initials stylization stuff is pretty much arbitrary, so there's no particular reason not to just follow MOS:INITIALS's default of "J. D. McDonagh", except in a case where a style like "JD McDonagh" is pretty close to universal in independent reliable sources. However, some of the above are not initials, but two-letter acronyms/initialisms, including E.T. and C.C., so the question about them would really be whether to remove the dots. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a work title, so we'd generally be inclined to leave it alone (unless "ET the Extra-Terrestrial" was well represented in sources, too), and thus to write the character as "E.T." to agree with the work title. As for C[.]C[.], I dunno. If the indepdendent sources near-univerally write it as "C.C.", then we would, too. But if they sometimes use "C.C." and sometimes use "CC", we would probably use the MOS:ACRO default of "CC". PS: Googling around, I see some highly speculative claims the C[.]C[.] character actually has an original human name in her backstory, that also has initials of "C. C." (though they can't decide what that name actually is), so that case might be futher complicated/debatable. But only weakly because of lack of any definitive and reliable sourcing at all. Expecially since the human name is not the source of the acronymic CC code name, but just an [alleged] fictional coincidence.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:58, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
• BTW, this really is a matter for WT:MOSWAF; it has nothing to do with MOS:BIO.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  13:58, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

  I moved the entire discussion over there, with all comments, since it's just completely off-topic here.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:03, 30 October 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.

Ethnicity

It seems that the ethnicity section needs more elaboration. There are missing gaps in the policy; how do we reference people that lived in empires? How do we reference people that lived in abstract geographic regions in past times when no political entity existed? It wouldn't make sense to remove any ethnic/geographic reference from the lede.

Checking a number of Wikipedia biographies reveals this inconsistency: Niccolò Machiavelli, Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo Galilei would be Florentines instead of Italians; Thomas Aquinas would be Sicilian instead of Italian; Jesus would be Roman instead of Jewish; Aristotle would be Chalcidian/Macedonian instead of Greek; Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Johannes Kepler and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz would be "Roman Holy Empirer" instead of German; Maimonides would be Almoravid instead of Sephardic Jewish; Saladin would be Abbasid instead of Kurdish; Muhammad would be identified as having been born in the Hejaz instead of being Arab.

A new paragraph should be added along the lines of: "Persons who lived under empires and persons who lived in abstract geographic regions in pre-modern times, can be referenced by their ethnicity or by mentioning the geographic region if this supported by a majority of sources as a notable identification." Makeandtoss (talk) 14:34, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Maybe. Or maybe we should say not to apply ethnic labels to them, since that's primarily a modern concept.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:13, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It’s neither a modern concept nor is it our job to apply any labels; we take what reliable sources have described them to be. Makeandtoss (talk) 17:24, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

The word dates to 1765–75, which is well within the Modern English span. But yes, of course, follow the preponderance of usage in the source material.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:39, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Modern word doesn’t mean modern concept. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:22, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

You claim, It wouldn't make sense to remove any ethnic/geographic reference from the lede. Uh, why not exactly? For my money there's entirely too much emphasis on this nonsense. Editing on bios of fascinating figures is dominated by arguments over their nationality or other sorts of identity. Give it a rest. It just doesn't matter that much, and it's fine to leave it out when it isn't clear. --Trovatore (talk) 17:56, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. When it's known, it's usually helpful to say where someone lived (e.g. was this an Ancient Greek philopher or a Roman one? Or Egyptian?), but material (often speculative and based on iffy primary sourcing) that delves into alleged ethnic origin is very often better covered in the article body, with sufficient WP:DUE balance.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  19:16, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Sure, when it’s controversial its better to be elaborated in the body. But when it’s not controversial, I see no problems in specifying this in the opening paragraph if supported by a majority of reliable sources; as is currently the case in majority of biographies as demonstrated above. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:31, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It's one of the first pieces of context one would be curious about. Readers are used to biographies starting with that. As long as it corresponds with reliables sources, this should be included. If reliable sources only say where the person was born, or lived, or became famous, then we can stick to just that. If it gets into WP:NATIONALIST bickering then yeah it is a waste of our time. —DIYeditor (talk) 19:23, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, the identification by reliable sources should be used in the opening paragraph. If controversial it could be discussed later in lede. My point is these things should be elaborated so that the policy is applied consistently across Wikipedia. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:34, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

When nationality, residency and citizenship information aren’t available, which is often the case in pre-modern times, something needs to be used to contextualize the subject at hand; and this is the case as seen by a large number of Wikipedia biographies I cited above. A greater conflict will occur if these ethnic references are removed. What I am proposing is to elaborate how this identification could be handled by relying on reliable sources. It definitely matters what context this historical figure lived through; especially if reliable sources have given them due weight. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:27, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It matters a little bit. It doesn't matter nearly as much as some editors seem to think. --Trovatore (talk) 19:32, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It very much matters to me to know for example that Jesus was a Jew living under the pagan Roman Empire; it provides important context. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:36, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

There is a significant contingent of editors who think nationality (and similar characteristics) matter more than they do. They do not matter that much. --Trovatore (talk) 19:48, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

They matter a little enough to deserve a one word mention in the opening paragraph, I don’t think that’s giving these labels that much importance. Makeandtoss (talk) 21:29, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Aristotle would be included in a list of "Greek philosophers" in any reference or scholarly material, would he not? Just stick to the sources. —DIYeditor (talk) 19:25, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Exactly, he would be. However the policy doesn’t specify this. It says we should use citizenship, nationality or residency and says that we need to remove ethnic references. What I am proposing is allowing ethnic references if supported by reliable sources. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:28, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

• If the question is “should we mention this person’s ethnicity somewhere in the article?” I would say, “yes… assuming we have sources to support it, we should”.

However, if the question is “should we highlight this person’s ethnicity by mentioning it in the lead paragraph?” I am much more dubious. The lead paragraph should focus on what makes the person notable, and often (but not always) ethnicity plays no part in that. Blueboar (talk) 20:16, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Yes, exactly. We can talk about lots of stuff in the body of the article, as long as there are good sources. The first paragraph, and especially the first sentence, needs to be more focused. --Trovatore (talk) 20:20, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

And how would you reconcile that with the reality on the ground, that the majority of articles and editors have given the opening paragraph in the lede, at least a brief mention of their ethnicity? Makeandtoss (talk) 21:27, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Some of it is just inertia and should stop. Some of it is from nationalists, identitarians, or identity-politics advocates, whom I'm going to oppose. And some of it is reasonable — politicians, generals, etc are likely to be persons for whom these things speak directly to why we want to read about them. --Trovatore (talk) 22:07, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

You imply the people who disagree with you are doing some kind of WP:ADVOCACY but isn't the same true of your position? Why do you want to change the "inertia" on Wikipedia and elsewhere which is to describe a person's nationality in the beginning of their biography? Britannica generally does so especially of more recent people. De-focusing on national or ethnic identity is an agenda. How does it serve Wikipedia, its pillars, its goals, or its readers other than to promote your worldview? —DIYeditor (talk) 22:47, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

No. Opposing misuse of WP for advocacy purposes is not magically an "equal but opposite" form of advocacy, it's following our policies, even when we might actually agree, off-site, with what is being advocated.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:10, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

The position that biographies, particularly of people who were alive when modern countries existed, should not start with identifying the nationality, is quite a bold position, and seems to be ADVOCACY. Again, Britannica describes Alan Turing as a "British mathematician". Of course, Catherine of Aragon is not given an ethnicity or nationality which would be harder to justify. For the average person, the first thing they categorize people by after gender is probably nationality. That's the first question they are going to have about the context for a biography article about anyone who has been alive in recent history. Whether Aristotle is "one of the most important ancient Greek philosophers" or "one of the most important philosophers of ancient Greece" is not a difference worth arguing over, what is important is that it is established up front.

I think you are right, it is not an equal but opposite situation. The advocacy is this novel idea that a biography shouldn't start with nationality if it is possible and appropriate to the person in question. I think if we just stick to the sources, we are going to find most people described with a nationality if possible. For people who predate modern countries indeed a more nuanced treatment may be appropriate, but it should still be in the lead. —DIYeditor (talk) 23:42, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

For example, from a stub I have been working on, is this an improvement? Is it important? —DIYeditor (talk) 23:53, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Yes, removing the "Italian" claim is an improvement, because "Italy" as a nation-state and "Italian" as a concept (other than a vague geographical one that didn't correspond to any political or cultural boundaries), did not exist until much later, with the 19th-century Unification of Italy. Calling Ferrara "Italian" is a terrible anachronism. She was Mantuan, which is not an ethnicity but a geographical specifier and a politico-cultural one to some extent (one temporally limited, like being Pictish). The "from Mantua in modern-day Italy" is perfectly adequate and reasonable, without breaking actual history to pander to racialists/identarians. What we call "Italy" now was back then a patchwork of kingdoms and principalities and whatnot, with a bunch of different languages spoken (some of which still survive as minority languages). For similar reasons, Bridei son of Beli should not be referred to as "Scottish".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:04, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Ok I think we agree there. It is a worthwhile distinction. I'd support something like this being in the MOS. —DIYeditor (talk) 00:06, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

How to craft the wording is open to some question, though.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:08, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Switching for example from Italian to Florentine and Sicilian at Niccolò Machiavelli, Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo Galilei will set off a huge conflict between editors, especially when no reliable source can be attributed for this label (or if minority do). Although I agree that modern identities should not be imposed on the past, however, this is my opinion, and in no way does that mean reliable sources agree (i.e. original research). I would say we stick to what the majority of reliable sources use. Makeandtoss (talk) 12:22, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Then according to MOS: ETHNICITY, Adolf Hitler should be listed only as German and not Austrian-born German (even though that is exactly what he is) as he is listed. Also, he renounced his Austrian citizenship in 1925. Zapho653 (talk) 22:59, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

There's a different relevant guideline MOS:BIRTHPLACE:

Birth and death places, if known, should be mentioned in the body of the article, and can appear in the lead if relevant to notability...

—Bagumba (talk) 00:11, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

Then it should go for everyone who was not born in the same country they were raised. For instance, the Young brothers (especially George, Malcolm and Angus) are all cited only as Australians instead of Scottish-born Australians (as they were all born in Glasgow), or the Van Halen brothers, who were Dutch-born Americans (who were born in Amsterdam and raised in Nijmegen), but are only listed as Americans. Or is that irrelevant in their case? Zapho653 (talk) 13:27, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

You would need to establish consensus to change that, as it currently says to mention it if relevant to notability —Bagumba (talk) 13:32, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

Understood. But just to be sure, in Hitler's case, is there any consensus saying that his birthplace is relevant for his notability for him to be listed as Austrian-born German? That is all I want to know. Zapho653 (talk) 13:36, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

That's a question to ask at Talk:Adolf Hitler. WT:MOSBIO isn't really for arguing out the details of every individual bio article, or there would be thousands of threads on this page.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:13, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

"in modern-day [x]"

I found this discussion via "Margherita Gonzaga, Marquise of Ferrara", which I'd arrived at from a search for the term "in modern day Italy". It seems to me that using "modern-day" (or "modern day", or simply "modern") in this way often leads to absurdities. Earlier today I learnt that "Capsian [neolithic] culture was concentrated mainly in modern Tunisia"; previously, that "Etruscan was the language of the Etruscan civilization in modern day Italy", and that the Third Punic War "was fought entirely within Carthaginian territory, in modern northern Tunisia". Elsewhere, I learn that the Gothic language was "preserved and transmitted by northern Ostrogoths in modern-day Italy".

I'm old-fashioned, and quite British, but is it really acceptable to use "modern" or "modern-day" like that? There are no Ostrogoths in modern-day Italy, the Third Punic War was not fought in modern Tunisia, and the Etruscan civilisation died out long before modern Italy was thought of. Margherita Gonzaga was born in Mantua, and Mantua is now in Italy, but she wasn't born in modern Italy, or in modern-day Italy. Doesn't the Manual of Style have anything to say about this? Jean-de-Nivelle (talk) 23:37, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

It's a common locution meaning "a place that today is (in) X". Largoplazo (talk) 01:01, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I understand how it's being used. I just wonder why it's being used in that way, and whether it should be. Jean-de-Nivelle (talk) 08:51, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I don't see any reason why it shouldn't be. It's being used that way because language evolves, words get compressed, and long phrases are collapsed: "taxi" instead of "taxicab" or, before that, "taximeter cabriolet", for example. Similarly, if someone uses the word "nice", we don't worry about the fact that the word used to mean, not "pleasant", but "stupid" or why its meaning evolved. We just use it with the generally understood meaning it has today. Largoplazo (talk) 11:59, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I do understand that language evolves. I suppose my question (and thank you for helping me refine it) is this: has this usage evolved to a point that it can now be considered encyclopaedic? My own instinct is that it hasn't. Britannica, for example, is much more careful in its use of the construction. But I'm old-fashioned. Jean-de-Nivelle (talk) 13:13, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

In any case where something confusing has resulted from poor writing, like "Capsian Neolithic culture was concentrated mainly in modern[-day] Tunisia", just rewrite it to make sense. This is not rocket science. "Capsian Neolithic culture was concentrated mainly in what today is Tunisia". Likewise, this kind of rewording would fix every single bad example given above. There is not cause for some "new rule" here. Just WP:BEBOLD and fix it.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:11, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I'm not arguing for a "new rule", and note that I've "fixed" most of the examples I gave above. But I don't want to waste my time "fixing" problems that aren't generally regarded as problems, which is why I asked the question. I've been looking for a more appropriate place to ask, but this will do. "In what is now Italy" or "in what is today Italy" seem more appropriate (to me) in nearly every case, but this use of "modern" is common enough that I wonder if it's acceptable to other readers. What's intended by it is generally fairly clear. In the case of Italy, we could also argue that "Italy" has a geographical sense as well as a political one, and that Mantua was in Italy, if not in Italy, when Margherita Gonzaga was born there. But that's not the case for every country. Jean-de-Nivelle (talk) 08:51, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Sure, I'm just saying excercise your own judgment when there's not a rule about it. I've seen plenty of "modern [Foo]" cases that were not confusing, but the ones highlighted above clearly had potential to be. It's more likely to be confusing when some action/event is the subject, and seems to be implied to have taken place in modern times. But there's no issue with writing "medieval Ossory (modern Kilkenny and western Laois)".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  08:58, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

If you are going to distinguish between Italy (geographical region) and Italy that is going to need to be clearly linked with no sneaker links from "Italy" to something else. Maybe it would be better to say "on the Italian peninsula" in that article? I made the edit to Margherita Gonzaga, Marquise of Ferrara for illustrative purposes in this discussion, there are two other similar articles I've made of her female relatives (Paola Malatesta and Margherita Malatesta) which are now in two variations (bringing the total to three variations) of how to describe it. I don't think it's that important of an issue as long as you don't equivocate on the meaning of "Italy" or use it in a confusing or potentially inaccurate manner. —DIYeditor (talk) 22:33, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

"Italian Peninsula" also has an article. My own inclination would be simply to describe Mantua as being "in what is now Italy". Or perhaps we could use "Italian city-state": Margherita Gonzaga ... was a noblewoman of the House of Gonzaga from the Italian city-state of Mantua. Jean-de-Nivelle (talk) 10:44, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

Mantua was always in Italy. Just because there was at the time no sovereign state called Italy (or, indeed, Germany) doesn't mean the terms weren't used for the areas now occupied by those countries. There is absolutely nothing wrong with saying Mantua was in Italy, even if referring to a time before the sovereign state existed. And linking Italy is unnecessary per WP:OVERLINKING. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:32, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

(ec) ExactlyThere are tens of thousands of articles on Italian subjects predating the Unification of Italy, and there is absolutely no reason not to do what the vast majority do, which is just to link to "Italy". Italy was was a well-understood cultural area from Roman republican times, let alone during the Renaissance, with pretty trivial differences as to the area the term embraced. RS use the term constantly without feeling the need to explain anything. There's no point linking to geographical articles like Italy (geographical region) or Italian Peninsula. Really there's no reason for a link at all, as Italy is well enough known. Tunisia and Germany, even France, are rather less simple cases. Johnbod (talk) 13:41, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

How about this for Caterina de' Medici, Governor of Siena. Or should she just be "Italian" since she had a Mantuan title by marriage? Actually I think "Tuscan" is the most correct in this case? My reason for suggesting it was because Catherine de' Medici is described as Florentine (linked thus). —DIYeditor (talk) 23:54, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

"Tuscan" would make more sense than "Italian".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:41, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Two Examples, and Comments

First, I agree with User:Makeandtoss that the ethnicity section needs clarification. That is evidenced, among other things, by two disputes that I am mediating, and I don't usually mediate two disputes about the same class of issue at the same time.

One of them, Marco Polo, really does involve whether you can refer to medieval Italians as Italians, and the specific questions are:

• 1. Can persons born on the Italian peninsula between 476 AD and 1860 AD be referred to as Italian?
• 2. Can persons born in the Republic of Venice between 697 AD and 1797 AD be referred to as Venetian?
• 3. Can a person be both Venetian and Italian?

I think that the answer to all three questions is yes. In particular, Italy was a geographic region, and a part of the Roman Empire, long before the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed. I think that we need a statement to that effect somewhere, because the issue keeps coming up.

The second dispute is more controversial, and has to do with Sergei Bortkiewicz, a composer who was born in what is now Ukraine, which was part of the Russian Empire at the time. Since blood is being spilled as I write this, we clearly need to be ready to deal with disputes about persons born in what is now Ukraine. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:43, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

The historically accurate name should be used. GiantSnowman 17:59, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

User:GiantSnowman your statement to use the historically accurate name is useful but inadequate. Both Italian and Venetian are accurate for Marco Polo, since Italy was a defined geographic region even when it was not a nation. In the case of Sergei Bortkiewicz, how do you define historical accuracy? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:59, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Except Italian is not "accurate" in this case because it has multiple meanings, and the most common one in readers' minds is the present nation-state of Italy. "Italian" in such a case is confusing and ambiguous at best, and even directly misleading. "Italy was a defined geographic region" in Marco Polo's time is even debatable. We certainly can't have an across-the-board expectation that every reader agrees with this, much less an assumption that each understands that our article means "Italy as a geographic region not a nation-state". There was not even an Italian language in that era, but a continuum of related Italic languages (some of which still separately survive). The idea that what we now call Italy had a consistent culture throughout it and that people living in it thought of themselves as Italians is highly questionable and not something anyone has proven with reliable sources. So applying such a label to Marco Polo is not appropriate. It makes much more sense to say that he was from the Republic of Venice in what today is Italy.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:43, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

'Italy' did not exist when Polo was born. So saying he was born in Italy - regardless of what any sources might say - is inaccurate. GiantSnowman 10:05, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

@Robert McClenon: I am only surprised how a discussion about this hasn't been opened here before. They should be able to be referred to as Italian if its supported by majority of reliable sources; while Sergei should be referred to as whatever most RS claim (without contradicting he was Russian Empire citizen). My line of thinking is as follows:

So to identify the problem: it is the presence of conflicting ethnic identifications and the raging disputes around them.

The possible solutions to this: we leave it for editors to decide amongst themselves (an original research disaster as currently seen by the raging disputes and the obvious bigger problem of inconsistency across Wikipedia as evidenced by my examples above); or simply using what the majority of reliable sources have said. The latter option is simple, straightforward and to the point.

The sentence to be added as part of the only solution: "Persons who lived under empires and persons who lived in abstract geographic regions in pre-modern times, can be mainly referenced by their ethnicity or the geographic region only when this supported by a majority of sources as a notable identification." Makeandtoss (talk) 18:03, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Something like that could work. It defaults to the "use the historically accurate term" position that GiantSnowman just posted and which I also argued in the thread above (and which I regularly observe to be our general practice; we don't call Julius Caesar an Italian, but a Roman), while leaving room for this default to be overridden by sourcing. More specifically, that should only happen when a preponderance of modern, independent, reliable sources use not the historical term we would default to but agree on another alternative term. If they don't largely agree on a particular alternative, then our default should still apply, even if it is not found in the majority of sources (if chaos reigns, then it will be our chaos, not one of competing external chaoses). Needs a little other wordsmithing, like "is" missing between "this" and "supported", and "notable identification" not really meaning anything concrete. That's not how we use the word "notable". But the germ of the right idea is in here. PS: On Marco Polo, I would think it would be "Venetian" not "Italian", which is in at least some senses anachronistic as well as unhelpfully (for that time period) vague.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:40, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

We don't call Julius Caesar an Italian because the majority of RS call him a Roman. Similarly for Marco Polo, a quick Google search reveals that he is more referred to as Venetian rather than Italian. I stress again that we must follow RS, like we do for anything else on Wikipedia, rather than leave this to original research and thus apply it inconsistently across Wikipedia as it is the case currently. And to stress, we are currently talking about ethnic identification in the opening paragraph, which doesn't negate the fact that conflicting identities could be elaborated elsewhere in the body. Ex: Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant... And in the body: Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant, but a number of sources have also referred to him as being Italian. Makeandtoss (talk) 19:47, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

I entirely agree that the answer to all three questions is yes. However, we don't need to say "Venetian and Italian" (any more than we need to say "English and British"). "Venetian" is fine. Stick to RS, per usual. -- Necrothesp (talk) 08:16, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

@Necrothesp: That's precisely the problem, sticking to RS isn't highlighted in the guideline, which states instead that any ethnic identification must not be included in lede, and thus leaving us with countless of raging disputes. Makeandtoss (talk) 10:18, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

Some of these people might only be included in a book on e.g. Italian subjects and never described in a particular RS as being from the sovereign state they were born in. —DIYeditor (talk) 10:22, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

@DIYeditor: Again, also the problem lies here. If we identify people using the sovereign state they were born in, then Jesus would be a Roman and not a Jew. He was indeed a Roman citizen, but the notable identification is that he was a Jew ethnically, and that is only because this is what most RS have used. However, this rationale is not specified here in the guideline, and leaves raging disputes. Makeandtoss (talk) 10:47, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

Going by consensus across RSs seems like a good rule of thumb. I think there can be a false consensus due to what I described with some sources being more general and only making a passing or brief mention of the person whose information is being cited, even if when mentioned as the primary subject they might be called something else. —DIYeditor (talk) 11:19, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

"Going by consensus across RSs seems like a good rule of thumb." Again, this is the current situation, and has failed to stymie disagreements. The policy needs amendment. Makeandtoss (talk) 11:22, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

Jesus was not a Roman citizen. In the provinces of the Roman Empire, Roman citizenship was the exception rather than the rule. Roman citizens who were put to death were not crucified. That is why St. Paul was beheaded while St. Peter was crucified. What this illustrates is that the modern concept of citizenship may cause confusion when we try to apply it to earlier times. That is, of course, why we are here, and why this discussion is complex. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:32, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough but St. Paul is not called a Roman citizen either, rather a Christian apostle. Again, my argument remains the same: usage of what majority of RS are reporting. Makeandtoss (talk) 09:34, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Proposal for the adoption of a new rule regarding anachronism

I started a Village pump (proposals) discussion regarding the problem of anachronism in the articles, considering that the articles are uneven in this regard. If there are sources that speak differently about a historical person, I don't think we can use that argument alone ie only RS argument. Because with the will of most editors and some sources if there are any, we can have anachronistic information in the article. Thus, for a certain Roman emperor, we could put information in the article that he was the Italian emperor. The key problem is that we do not have any guidelines regarding anachronism in the articles. If you want to discuss this problem, feel free to join. Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Rule_that_will_cover_anachronistic_informations_in_the_articles

Mikola22 (talk) 07:21, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

The discussion at Village pump (proposals) has largely fizzled out. In my opinion, it was in the wrong forum. Mikola22 did not specify what they wanted to do about "anachronisms", so that their idea was a partially baked idea rather than a proposal, and should have been at the Idea Lab if anywhere. I think that if there are any remaining issues that need to be addressed (and I think that they are), they can be addressed here. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:22, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

I proposed to adopt a new rule concerning anachronism in articles. The only place for that procedure is Village pump (proposals). And in that sense I presented the proposal there. Mikola22 (talk) 05:53, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

You presented a proposal to present a proposal, and the community was not interested. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:42, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Do we want to discuss further? Do we have consensus? Has this discussion fizzled out?

Is there agreement that the MOS can be left alone? Do we need to formalize anything, such as that we should state what the majority of reliable sources say? Robert McClenon (talk) 04:52, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Majority of reliable sources can say that someone is Italian even though he lived in the Roman Empire and the Roman era. So most of the sources in this case mean nothing as an argument. As far as I know, the information in the article must be presented in a time context, at least as far as the biography of famous people is concerned. Mikola22 (talk) 06:02, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

The specific case of medieval Italy

A specific question that recurs from time to time has to do with people born in the region of Italy between 476 AD and 1860 AD, who are often referred to as Italian, but also often the subject of arguments because there was not an Italian state. Should we specifically discuss either a rule that this characterization should be avoided, or that this characterization is permitted? Robert McClenon (talk) 04:52, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't think it's just a problem of medieval Italy. This is problem of all European countries, historical peoples, etc. What I know from experience is that information in articles must be presented in a time context. This would mean if Italy as a country existed only from 1860 AD then from that year we can talk that someone is Italian. Mikola22 (talk) 06:19, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

The issue here is that there is often overlap between the names of modern political states, and the names of geographical area in which they exist. It is not anachronistic to talk of “Germany”, “Italy”, “Ireland” (etc) in a geographical context - even for periods prior to the formation of the modern nation states of the same name. Similarly, “German”, “Italian”, “Irish” (etc) can refer to ethno-geographic peoples as well as citizens of modern political units.

Context is important. When you say “Florence was one of the most influential cities in Italy during the Renaissance” it is understood that you are using “Italy” in its geographic context and not its modern political context.

There are limits, however. While it is not anachronistic to say that Normandy was an important region of medieval France, it would be anachronistic to say that Julius Caesar invaded France and defeated the French. This is because “France” and “French” are not used in an ethno-geographic sense in relation to Caesars’s time frame. Blueboar (talk) 17:53, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Minor consolidation merge

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Trademarks#Minor consolidation merge - Idea to merge a line-item (about stylization of stage/pen names) out of MOS:INITIALS (where the one of the examples is only semi-pertinent anyway) and into MOS:TM, leaving behind a cross-reference to MOS:TM from MOS:NAMES.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:22, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

Death cause parameter in infobox

Quite a while I posted on the person infobox template talk page to ask about this. I checked back again just now and saw my attempt at a discussion disappeared but an identical one is there now from another editor. Someone suggested to try here. The template doc says to only include this parameter when "the cause of death has significance for the subject's notability." However, it appears this is inconsistently enforced and honestly it seems extremely objective and in some cases difficult to prove. The prime example is Michael Jackson. Can we honestly and truly say one of the best selling and most popular artists of all-time's cause of death had significance to his notability? The death itself, absolutely. But the actual cause? Not necessarily. He's the only one I can come up with that's a good example but I'm sure there's others. People like Tupac Shakur, John Lennon, that were murdered and had their legacies live on partially due to how they died makes sense. Elvis had his for the longest but it was recently removed (I've since added it back). I'm looking to either change this silly having "significance for the subject's notability" rule or make it a little more clear as to what exactly this means. There's a single editor I will not mention by name that has been on a tear over the last couple of years of removing death cause parameter, sometimes for articles that have had it up for years (like Elvis).--Rockchalk717 05:52, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Initials derived from names with "Jr."

MOS:INITIALS reads:

With initials, it is not necessary to spell out why the article title and lead paragraph give a different name. For example, H. P. Lovecraft has that title, H. P. Lovecraft appears in his infobox, and his lead sentence just gives Howard Phillips Lovecraft ... was an American writer ..., without "explaining" to the reader what "H. P." stands for.

Would this also apply for people with "Jr." in their name, for example, D. J. Hayden, whose full name is Derek Sherrard Hayden Jr.? —Bagumba (talk) 08:10, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

I don’t think MOS:INITIALS is relevant since he is known as “D.J.” and not “D.S.” … This example seems to be more a case of an initialized nickname than a true use of initials (at least I assume that “D.J.” stands for “Derek Jr.”) (Blueboar (talk) 12:21, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

My main question is whether "D. J." should be presented in the lead sentence or not. And whatever is decided, does it warrant some mention in the MOS? —Bagumba (talk) 12:49, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Should likely be in the lead sentence, since it's what he's best known as but is not instantly apparent from what his full name is (especially since "DJ" or "D. J." is also used occupationally/avocationally, from "disc jockey"). Edge cases like this nearly never need new MoS line items (WP:MOSBLOAT!) since they don't come up often, aren't a subject of recurrent "stylewarring", and are easy enough to figure out from the existing rules after a short discussion).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:57, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

MOSBLOAT: For the record, it did come up here with edit summary Don't need to add DJ here if it's obvious where it comes from. —Bagumba (talk) 00:29, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Well, it's not obvious where it comes from. Even my 95% sure assumption that it's from "Derek Junior" could be flat-out wrong, and he could have picked up the nickname from DJing at parties.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:04, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

"<first-name initial>. J." is common for people named "Jr.". However, I only came to know this later in life, and I'm guessing a lot of readers might not even be aware of it. —Bagumba (talk) 05:36, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

And it might be largely an Americanism; I've learned the British "Juniors" typically drop the Junior after the death of the father rather than treating it as lifelong and indelible part of their name.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:48, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Even its use in the first place is an Americanism; in British English it is incredibly rare. Indeed giving the child the same first name as the father (or mother, I guess) is itself considered somewhat naff and almost never done. MapReader (talk) 17:41, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

Go with MOS:QUOTENAME: Derek Sherrard "D. J." Hayden Jr.? Largoplazo (talk) 13:01, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Cleaner markup: Derek Sherrard "D. J." Hayden Jr. .... But it would probably be more appropriate to go with: Derek Sherrard Hayden Jr., best known as D. J. Hayden, ..... What we have here is an unsual case where someone is habitually called D. J. as short for "Derek Junior", so it's really a form of hypocorism (as WP broadly uses that term, to include shortenings), not a nickname like "Spanky" or "Killer", so it really doesn't belong in quotation marks as a nickname.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:53, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

...case where someone is habitually called D. J. as short for "Derek Junior", so it's really a form of hypocorism (as WP broadly uses that term, to include shortenings), not a nickname like "Spanky"...: I think many might stumble on the nuance between a nickname and hypocorism to determine whether to quote or not, or simply mix this up with MOS:INITIALS. —Bagumba (talk) 00:51, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Doesn't much matter, because someone else will clean it up later if they care, and it's not hard to remember anyway: if it's not something kind of silly like "Thunderman" or "Cheeks", or a weird half-descriptive half-praising phrase like "Wonder from Wolverhampton" – i.e. if it's not an actual nickname in the usual sense, as opposed to a simple name-shortening like "C. C." or "Beth" – then don't put it in scare-quotes.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:48, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

• Just throwing out there that Robert Downey Jr. is often nicknamed "RDJ". BD2412 T 18:30, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

  That's in the same class "JLo" and "WinRy" and "JenLaw" - shortenings made up by fans and sometimes the intertainment press but which aren't generally used by the subjects themselves. Sometimes called "nicknames" anyway, but really a different class of things, and probably not encyclopedic except in some cases to mention but not to use in Wikipedia's own voice.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  22:27, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

"MOS: SURNAME" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect MOS: SURNAME has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 December 5 § MOS: SURNAME until a consensus is reached. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 04:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Minor overhauling

I've done one of my periodic "guideline overhaul" jobs [63], that should not result in any substantive changes (no new style rules or deletion of or meaning change to existing rules), but with a lot of cleanup:

• Took the scattered and hard-to-find material on when exceptions are made and put it into a section, "Unusual exceptions", with the existing examples plus some new ones (actual cases, not made-up).
• Improved cross-referencing to various other guidelines & policies.
• Fixed a number of markup/code errors.
• Normalized the cross-referencing style.
• Patched up the Genghis Khan example to use a footnote at its own example location instead of commingled with the page-wide footnotes about the guideline.
• Various markup consistency tweaks.
• Replaced one or two bad examples (pages that have since moved, etc.), and fixed some other links.
• Added a couple of anchors and shortcuts.
• Cleaned up links further, so that we are not linking to shortcut targets (those are for editorial convenience not for trying to educate new editors what is what and where it is), but without spamming a visual "Wikipedia:" all over the page when "WP:" will do.
• Trimmed some redundant or blathery wording.
• Cleaned up headings to be more readable in the code by moving anchor spans inside them to the end of the heading instead of the start; also removed a case of a template used inside a heading.
• Minor copyediting for clarity and grammar.
• MOS:LISTGAPS repair.
• Semantic markup.
• Normalized to a single dash style per MOS:DASH; went with spaced en dashes since it strongly dominates throughout the MoS pages, over unspaced em dashes which are harder to read.
• For post-nominal punctuation, I changed "If discussion cannot determine which style to use in an article, defer to the style used by the first major contributor" to instead read "... the style used in the first post-stub version of the article to include a post-nominal", since this is actually how we do such things, the original wording wasn't actually logical for this kind of case (major contributors for years could have been editing an article before any post-nom was added to it), the revised wording doesn't confuse anyone into thinking some particular editor has more say in the matter (historically a frequent confusion about "first major contributor" wording, despite WP:OWN policy), and it is more consistent with most other *VAR provisions' wording (any stragglers in this regard should be revised).

I don't think any of this will be controversial, but of course feel free to raise an objection if I've broken something (or just go fix it).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:37, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Nothing wastes more editor time than WP:JOBTITLES

Just look at this talk page. Look at the archives. JOBTITLES is constantly discussed. Not even people familiar with MOS understand it. Alternatively, pay attention to Wikipedia:Main Page/Errors: the most common point of contention there is capitalization because mere mortals cannot wrap their minds around what JOBTITLES is trying to say. It is absurdly convoluted, to the point that it does not reflect either academic and journalistic usage or government usage.

To illustrate, this mumble is the only correct way to capitalize per MOS:JOBTITLES:

John F. Kennedy was President of the United States. He was the president of the United States from 1961 to 1963. Before he became president, Kennedy served in both houses of the U.S. Congress. The President served at the height of the Cold War. In 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated.

We will all be spared the eyesore of apparently random capitalization as well as the incessant questions about the intention of MOS:JOBTITLES if we just adopt the style that is almost universally used in academic and journalistic writing, namely:

John F. Kennedy was president of the United States. He was the president of the United States from 1961 to 1963. Before he became president, Kennedy served in both houses of the U.S. Congress. The president served at the height of the Cold War. In 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated.

Only capitalize job titles when preceding the person's name. That's it. No "when not in plural", "when not preceded by a modifier", "when not a reworded description" and all those other conditions that make MOS look like a computer code. Just do as academic and journalistic style guides do.

So, to spare us yet another unproductive discussion about this, I beg your answer to two questions:

• Would a proposal to simplify JOBTITLES have a chance of succeeding or are we stuck with this horrid halfway that none of us actually likes?
• How would one go about officially proposing a change such as this one in the most clear, succinct manner?

Thanks and bear with me. Surtsicna (talk) 19:47, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

A proposal like this could probably grow legs, since the section in question has mutated over time into a palimpsestuous mess. I think workshopping it here and seeing what the general reaction is will be a good first step. If it comes to a local consensus, I think I would propose it at WP:VPPOL, because the change would affect a wide swath of articles. For my part, I'm in favor of the idea, because I agree the current system is complicated and confusing and produces text that might be reader-confusing (at least as to whether any rationale is at work); WP, like Chicago Manual and various academic-leaning publishers has a default-toward-lower-case or "downcasing" position across the board already; and we have too much of a MOS:BLOAT problem with tiny nitpicks being added all the time instead of sticking to general principles and not making exceptions unless a need for one seems overwhelming.

That said, there are apt to be some tweaks and codicils, e.g. some titles come after instead of before names, so it's really a matter of the title being directly attached to the name, fore or aft. (But then people will argue about whether a comma makes a difference, as in "John James Jingleheimer-Schmidt, Baron" versus "Baron John James Jingleheimer-Schmidt". So, we'll have to settle that. I'm not sure there are lot of other complications; "Kennedy was the 35th president of the United States" but "when President Kennedy was". And "according to Queen Elizabeth II" and "when the queen wrote". One of our confusing practices is writing "king" or "duke" when refering to such a position in the abstract but "King" or "Duke" when used as a stand-in for a specific person's name. While the practice is certainly attested elsehwere, it's arguably not helpful to the reader in any way, and just leads to needlessly distracted readers wondering why the case keeps changing.

One bit of advice: When proposing such changes, it is good to do to a {{tqb}} of what the current guideline wording is, and another showing what the proposed wording would be, so people don't have to try to compare text in two different browser windows and whatnot.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:33, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

Demanding consistency via one size fits all simple rules is superficially attractive but cannot work. And using only super-famous job titles like PrEsIdEnT oF tHe Us or qUeEn Of EnGlAnD (random capitalization chosen to avoid bias in favor of any specific capitalization) as your starting examples is a really bad way of matching how job titles are used more widely. Job titles like "Florida Photonics Center of Excellence (FPCE) Endowed Professor" must be capitalized, for instance; no source uses any other capitalization. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:04, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, there are always wrinkles like named endowment chairs. Though "no source uses any other capitalization" by itself is not always a good argument. No independent source, among many independent sources using any other capitalization would matter, but what would not matter would be whether non-independent sources like to capitalize something, or when there are nearly no independent sources to examine, or hardly any sources at all to examine.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:07, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

Um. Basic logic. If "no source uses any other capitalization" then it is also automatically true that "no independent source uses any other capitalization". Also, why the fetish for independence in this context? Sources can be reliable for matters like "what is the job title of this organization's employee" without being independent. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:30, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Because internal sources have an overwhelming tendency to capitalize everything to do with the company (or school, or whatever it is). From job titles down to "Staff Break Room". They are not reliable sources for English-language norms, even if they are valid primary sources for someone's job title being "assitant custodian" versus "assitant janitor".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:58, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

FWIW - I try my best to abide by WP:JOBTITLES, even though I disagree with its lower-casing preferences. IMHO, we should've stayed with capitalising. But, I doubt the community will choose to return to those days. GoodDay (talk) 16:36, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

• JOBTITLES will continue to be a time sink no matter what we say… because someone will always disagree with it, no matter what we say. The capitalization rules vary depending on a) the style guide you prefer, b) when you went to school (I grew up at a time when it was standard to capitalize almost most job titles, but today that is considered over-capitalization). Personally, I just want it to be consistent within an article. I’m not overly concerned if one article capitalizes where another does not. Blueboar (talk) 17:21, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

I understand what you mean. Unfortunately, correctly applying JOBTITLES leads to internal inconsistency. See my examples above. The correct application of JOBTITLES leads to capitalization that must seem entirely random to a casual reader. Surtsicna (talk) 18:10, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

And a side concern is that various editors do care about consistency across articles on such matters, both for reducing recurrent editorial strife about them, and for presenting content that doesn't stylistically veer all over the place from page to page, for the reader. But anyway, having a simpler MOS:JOBTITLES, even if like most style rules it's ultimately pretty arbitrary, is surely preferable to the current complex mess. It is correct that someone will disagree with it no matter what it says (this is true of pretty much every style rule anyone has ever written, here or elsewhere), but we can at least in theory reduce the number of things to object to, while also just making it simpler. PS: I share Blueboar's generational experience, but am nevertheless in favor of downcasing. Just because I was taught to do something in 7th grade doesn't mean it was a good idea at the time much less that it remains one in 2023. Lots and lots of what was taught to us in elementary and secondary schools was nonsense, and we need to not hold onto it as if it's somewhow precious. This stuff is not religious doctrine or a core element of cultural identity.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  19:17, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

if you want a simpler MOS, how about: never use capitals for any purpose ever. there. done. simplicity is not always best. there is a reason we went from having a single case in classical latin to using mixed cases in modern languages, and that reason is that capitals convey a certain amount of extra information, lost from intonation in spoken speech. information like: this is the official title used for a certain job and not merely the colloquial meaning that the same words would have if they were lower case. "Head Doctor" means the chief physician (or would, if anyone actually used that as a job title). "head doctor" could be a low-level psychiatrist. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:36, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Which of the two capitalization styles shown in the sample paragraphs in my opening comment do you prefer? Surtsicna (talk) 15:45, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Neither. They are both far too repetitively worded. The capitalization is a secondary issue that calls attention to the problem but is not the real problem. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:32, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

The capitalization is the issue we are discussing here. You can find these styles of capitalization in a four-paragraph section but having four-paragraph samples here would not help illustrate the issue or the proposal. I am quite sure that this is clear to you, so I am left with the impression that you do not wish to address the issue. That is fine as well. Surtsicna (talk) 16:45, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

To put it more bluntly, your examples at the lead of this thread are bad examples. One can get the same haphazard-capitalization effect in any sentence crafted to use a proper noun and the corresponding improper nouns in close alternation. For instance, "Lotus cars are cars made by Lotus Cars. Lotus Cars is named for the lotus flower, and Lotus cars are named for their manufacturer, Lotus Cars." Getting that effect does not mean we need to change our capitalization rules for corporations and the brand names they manufacture; it means we need to not put prose like that into our articles. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:51, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

In none of those instances is the word "president" a proper noun; and the problem highlighted here is the difficulty of interpreting JOBTITLES's random (and elsewhere unattested) capitalization instructions even for short text such as the Main Page blurbs. Surtsicna (talk) 17:00, 7 November 2023 (UTC)

Unhelpful snarky silliness like "how about: never use capitals for any purpose ever. there. done." just short-circuits meaningful discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:59, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

This is what consistent rules that are consistent with the linked articles would look like:

JFK was the president of the United States. He was elected to the office of the President of the United States. (Note that President JF Kennedy should not be confused with President of Ireland JF Kennedy or the president of Kennedy, Ireland, which maybe exist at some point.) On his best days as president, President (of the US) Kennedy wore silly hats with his crayon-drawn personal presidential seal on them {not the official seal of the president of the United States or the Great Seal of the United States -- but the one emblazoned on his pajamas nonetheless}. The first lady that JFK married became his first lady for his presidency, First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, who would be seen to embody the Office of the First Lady and the public role the first lady of the United States should take.

I agree with the suggestions for simplifying the existing rules, which would be in line with a few style guides. But a lot of capitalization will still look weird and inconsistent since in the end we're at the mercy of the articles. SamuelRiv (talk) 12:15, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

We're not at the mercy of our own articles. No one is expected to read and memorize MoS or any other guideline here before editing. Our guidelines and even several of our policies exist primarily as reference works for later cleanup (and for settling disputes). Articles that don't comply with guidelines should be gradually edited to comply with them. WP:CONTENTAGE is not a factor; a article that has for a long time been non-compliant is not magically immune to conformance cleanup. And a non-trivial frequency of non-comformance isn't a factor either. A very large number of editors over-capitalize all sorts of things because of a feeling they are "important" (MOS:SIGCAPS behavior, and often MOS:DOCTCAPS and MOS:SPORTCAPS in particular). It's easily the no. 1 style error I fix in articles, and I'm sure others have the same experience. But this is not a rationale to delete MOS:CAPS or alter it to permit a whole bunch more capitalization of things that are not proper names.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:45, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I wish we had stuck with using 'uppercase', fwiw. But, enough editors wanted to go 'lowercase', so that's the result. GoodDay (talk) 16:42, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

It's not just about something like random editorial whim; we have a general principle at MOS:CAPS: "only words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in a substantial majority of independent, reliable sources are capitalized in Wikipedia", and the rest of the style guidelines that involve letter case have to descend from that, or we end up with a WP:POLICYFORK. The real-world fact is that capitalization of these things varies widely by publisher, and use of the capitalization is decreasing in more and more publications over time, especially when the title is not directly attached to a name. So, this necesssarily means our default is to lower-case them except when attached to a name, a circumstance in which the dominant practice in English usage remains to capitalize them.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:45, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

JOBTITLES simplification proposal

Following on the suggestion above to workshop specific reivsion ideas, and drawing on Surtsicna's sound idea to "just adopt the style that is almost universally used in academic and journalistic writing", I will propose [this is workshopping, not an RfC!] that the way to fix MOS:JOBTITLES to be easy to remember, and more importantly to produce less reader-confusing results, is to simplify it down to something like:

... They are capitalized only in the following cases:

• When they are directly attached to a person's name (with no modifiers, including an ordinal number or a definite or indefinite article, and no intervening interpolations, including punctuation), and are not descriptive re-wordings.
  • Even then, do not capitalize them if they are commercial jobs (chief operating officer) or are non-unique, non-administrative governmental roles (sherrif's deputy, building inspector, but Chief of Police, Minister of Finance).
• When a title is used to refer to a specific person as a substitute for their name during their time in office ... [keep existing examples].

Then eliminate the third extant bullet point and the table that follows it, this material being almost the entire source of confusion and strife. (Honestly, I think the second item, about use of a title as a name substitute, could also go, but some people are probably in favour of retaining it.)

Also remove the now-redundant "Even when used with a name, capitalization is not required for commercial and informal titles ...." sentence below the list. Alternatively, keep this line but remove the simpler but stricter indented sub-bullet from the proposal above.

If we used this replacement material in the sectional introduction, we could possibly also pare down the material that follows into more concise sets of examples of what to do and not do, and spend less verbiage on covering various types of titles. But the main point is eliminating the material causing confusion and impractical complexity.

The current wording, for comparison

Offices, titles, and positions such as president, king, emperor, grand duke, lord mayor, pope, bishop, abbot, prime minister, leader of the opposition, chief financial officer, and executive director are common nouns and therefore should be in lower case when used generically: Mitterrand was the French president or There were many presidents at the meeting. They are capitalized only in the following cases: When followed by a person's name to form a title, i.e., when they can be considered to have become part of the name: President Nixon, not president Nixon; Pope John XXIII, not pope John XXIII. When a title is used to refer to a specific person as a substitute for their name during their time in office, e.g., the King, not the king (referring to Charles III); the Pope, not the pope (referring to Francis). When a formal title for a specific entity (or conventional translation thereof) is addressed as a title or position in and of itself, is not plural, is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article), and is not a reworded description: Unmodified, denoting a title Modified or reworded, denoting a description Richard Nixon was President of the United States. Richard Nixon was the president of the United States. Richard Nixon was a president of the United States. Nixon was the 37th president of the United States. Nixon was one of the more controversial American presidents. Mao met with US president Richard Nixon in 1972. A controversial American president, Richard Nixon, resigned. Camp David is a mountain retreat for presidents of the United States. Theresa May became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 2016. Theresa May was the prime minister of the United Kingdom. Theresa May is a former prime minister of the United Kingdom. Louis XVI became King of France and Navarre in 1774, later styled King of the French (1791–1792). Louis XVI was a king of France. Louis XVI was the king of France when the French Revolution began. The French king, Louis XVI, was later beheaded. Even when used with a name, capitalization is not required for commercial and informal titles: OtagoSoft vice-president Chris Henare; team co-captain Chan. The formality (officialness), specificity, or unusualness of a title is not a reason to capitalize it. Note that for "president of the United States" or "prime minister of the United Kingdom", the name of the country remains capitalized even when the title is not, as it is always a proper noun. When writing "minister of foreign affairs" or "minister of national defence", the portfolio should be lower cased as it is not a proper noun on its own (i.e. write minister of foreign affairs or, as a proper noun, Minister of Foreign Affairs; do not write minister of Foreign Affairs). [Subsections follow on various title/role types.]

To be clear, this proposal would completely eliminate the weird "half-way" provision that is confusing people, the notion of capitalizing:

"When a formal title for a specific entity (or conventional translation thereof) is addressed as a title or position in and of itself, is not plural, is not preceded by a modifier (including a definite or indefinite article), and is not a reworded description".

This is something many people have had difficulty parsing, and there is no question that the results are confusingly inconsistent for readers. The long-contentious examples like:

"Richard Nixon was President of the United States", "Theresa May became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom", and "Louis XVI became King of France and Navarre, later styled King of the French"

would all become lower-cased to match:

"Richard Nixon was the 37th president of the United States", "Theresa May was the prime minister of the United Kingdom", and "Louis XVI was a king of France".

It would also eliminate the confusing conflict between:

"Richard Nixon was the 37th president of the United States" style and (still common in our articles on people with peerage titles) "Richard Walter John Montagu Douglas Scott is the 10th Duke of Buccleuch" style.

All of this would also be consistent with our move to writing, e.g., "president of the United States" at the article on the title (President of the United States), moving "List of Lord Mayors of London" to List of lord mayors of London, etc., etc. (though there are a few straggler articles still at over-capitalized page titles).

This would mean writing "Micaela, countess of Paris," instead of the style "Micaela, Countess of Paris," that presently dominates in articles on people with nobility titles, due almost entirely to the preferences and activities of WikiProject Royalty and Nobility (and technically against the guideline even as it currently stands). If we didn't want that result, then "including punctuation" in the above wording could be replaced perhaps with "other than a comma conventionally placed between the name and the title". But I think it would actually be better to use lower-case here for increased consistency and less confusion potential. It will be weird to have text like "Foo Bar, 7th Baron of Elbonia, met with Baz Quux, the prime minister of Kerblachistan", which also has the WP:NPOV problem of treating people with noble titles as somehow better and more important than everyone else, even when their notability and relative social stature are actually lesser that those of the other, non-ennobled, party.

This proposal is obviously moving in the direction of less not more capitalization, because this site (like Chicago Manual of Style and others) is "down-casing" where possible, using lowercase as the default which should only be diverged from when necessary. In particular, the guiding principle here is the lead of MOS:CAPS: "only words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in a substantial majority of independent, reliable sources are capitalized in Wikipedia." All of our guideline sections that apply capitalization need to descend from this principle and not contradict it. Consequently, WP should not be capitalizing titles except when they are directly attached to names as if they've become part of the name, because that is the only situation in which usage across English-language writing consistently applies capital letters to them, and even that is becoming less common with corporate and low-end governmental role titles. (And the argument can maybe still be made to keep things like "the Queen" when Elizabeth II is the specific referent.)

PS: It used the wording "directly attached to a person's name" rather than "followed by a person's name" to account for cases of titles (mostly from other languages) that are post-nominal in position. It is not a reference to constructions like "Micaela, countess of Paris" which has a parenthetical title divided from the name by a comma.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:35, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

The form "US president Nixon" & "US president Richard Nixon" always was a toe banger for me. I'd of thought "US President Nixon" & "US President Richard Nixon" would've been the correct form. Nevertheless, I support your proposal. GoodDay (talk) 04:45, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

One might suggest axing the "modifiers" clause, but that still wouldn't result in capitalization here since "US president" isn't the actual title but a "descriptive re-wording" (or in the original material, "reworded description"), like "French king". There seems to be a general understanding that conventional truncations like just "President" are treated as if the full title. There might be a "devil in the disamiguation details", though. A modifier might be added to the entire title+name phrase to distinguish two or more people of similar titles, e.g. "the first meeting of Scottish Queen Mary and English Queen Elizabeth I", but that would surely be better rewritten in other wording ("of Scots", "of England"). That "of" style would seem to work for president and PMs and premiers and such, too. Maybe address it in a footnote?  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:21, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

A footnote would certainly be the solution. GoodDay (talk) 15:49, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps you could explain how this proposal would affect academic job titles, as in sentences like (current capitalization): She is Marjorie Roberts Professor of statistics and chair of the Department of Statistics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and a professor in the National Center for Supercomputing Applications. In this case the Marjorie Roberts Professorship does not appear to be attached to the department of statistics, hence the choice to use lowercase for the first "statistics"; the second "professor" is just an ordinary English-word job title hence lowercase. I'm hoping the answer is no intended change to this capitalization, but you can see that "Marjorie Roberts Professor" is a job title, is not grammatically attached to the person's name in the sentence (as the name does not even appear), and yet is capitalized. A literal reading of this proposal would seem to imply that in such sentences we should write "marjorie roberts professor" instead, a nonsensical outcome. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:27, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Well, the proposed changes above wouldn't seem to affect this at all. There appears to be a consenus (not just here but in the real world) that named endowment chairs like "Marjorie Roberts Professor" (which, yes, does not include "of statistics") and "Alfred Fitler Moore Professor of Telecommunications" (there are several AFM professorships that do have "of [Something]" in them) are proper names. They're more like awards, while simply being a professor at, and a department chair at, the university are job titles. If this needs to be addressed somewhere, it should probably be in "#Academic or professional titles and degrees" a bit lower down. Suprised it's not in there already. Maybe we'd probably need to note that WP would not refer to this person as "Marjorie Roberts Professor Bo Li", but maybe that would already be obvious enough since we wouldn't do "Professor Bo Li", either. (As for "the Department of [Subject] at [Institution]", that should only be capitalized, per MOS:FIELD, when it's the actual department name, and sometimes it's not in various cases I've seen, but just a descriptive phrase for something the real name of which might be "College of [Subject]" or "[Memorialized Person] [Subject] School", or "Department of [Subject1] and [Subject2]" or whatever.) — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:01, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Two comments:

1. There's still going to be confusion about which "high-end" roles are entitled to retain capitalisation when attached to a name. The idea that a chief of police is somehow better and more important than a chief executive officer seems contrary to the NPOV position you are advocating.
2. Suggesting lower case for substantive titles (which are traditionally comma-separated after the person's name) is likely to be a blocking point.

Rosbif73 (talk) 07:40, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I knew there would be wrinkles, which is why to workshop this instead of just launch a !voting RfC. In the same order:

1. I'm just trying to reflect where sources are leaning and where consensus is likely to lean. Governmental job titles of an administrative nature are generally capitalized in sources, commercial ones (even "chief executive officer" and "executive director") increasingly are not, and more generic job titles like "night-shift manager" and "animal control officer" increasingly are not regardless of sector. But it does result in a conflict and potential NPoV issue, I guess.
   • Maybe we'd need to suggest capitalizing or lowercasing them consistently in the same construction?
   • Maybe the change from "capitalization is not required for commercial and informal titles" to "do not capitalize them if they are commercial jobs" was too much?
   • And I suppose re-integrating the bit about "informal titles" like being an amateur sport team co-captain is worth retaining; I missed that.
2. I suspected that it could be, especially with regard to British subjects with nobility titles. But it's worth talking about, and at least seeing what rationales pro and con might emerge. If there would be no budging toward writing "Infanta Elena, duchess of Lugo", then:
   • Maybe substantive titles is clear enough. But given the complicated definition of "to be distinguished from a title shared among cadets, borne as a courtesy title by a peer's relatives, or acquired through marriage", having a specific rule about STs in particular might be too much complication, of just the sort we're trying to avoid here.
   • We might could go with something like "post-nominal titles conventionally separated from the name by a comma" and just live with the fact that a form of interpolation has slipped in (but is distinguished clearly from using a comma to separate different clauses, as in "Barack Obama, president through January 20, 2017".) Not sure if this would result in capitalization of some other kind of post-nominal, comma-separated title we'd rather was not capitalized.

 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:01, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Firstly, I appreciate the work you've put into this proposal. The topic is a longstanding sticking point, and you've given it the attention it requires.

I do have a query – does the first bullet effectively prohibit capitalising titles after a person's name, and would it therefore be clearer to state that explicitly? I'm struggling to think of an example of a title attached after a person's name which isn't modified. A.D.Hope (talk) 22:11, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Well, see a bit above for some discussion of "substantive titles" of nobility and possibly some other classes that are comma-separated.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:26, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe I've missed something, but could all three bullet points not be condensed to something like:

• They are capitalised only when used as a proper noun, i.e. when they directly precede a person's name without intervening punctuation.

That would lead to Pope Francis, President Biden, and Admiral Nelson, but 'Francis, the pope', 'Joe Biden, president of the United States', and 'Felipe, the king of Spain'. This could also solve the issue of which titles deserve to be capitalised, since the titles which can be placed before a name are also the ones which tend to be capitalised anyway. A.D.Hope (talk) 09:33, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

See above about post-nominal substantive titles; while some of us might like to see them lowercased ("Felipe, king of Spain") it is unlikely that anyone from WP:ROYALTY will go along with it. And if we've learned one thing through years of MoS and RM agony, it is that Wikipedians will ever, ever agree on what "proper name" means (in part because there are conflicting linguistic and philosophical definitions, and in part because of a very common misunderstanding that anything capitalized [in whatever someone is used to reading] is a proper name and that all proper names are capitalized. It would also confuse the title with the name (which is definitely a proper name) that the title is attached to, and probably further the nonsense argument that a title juxtaposed with a name "becomes" a new unitary proper name unto itself.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:48, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Sorry if I'm stating the obvious, but the policy as re-written by you mandates 'Felipe, king of Spain' as there is an 'intervening interpolation, including punctuation' between the name and title. A.D.Hope (talk) 10:58, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, and someone pointed out an objection, and I've acknowledged the objection and suggested two potential revisions paths in response to it. I'm getting the impression you didn't actually read the thread but are just responding to points in isolation. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:13, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

My suggestion is not related to the objections raised above; my original comment is a direct response to your proposal rather than a continuation of the earlier conversation. A.D.Hope (talk) 10:16, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Okay. It's noted in conjunction with the similar comment above; next draft will try to address this with something like "or a post-nominal title conventionally separated from the name by a comma", since the odds of a consensus against capitalizing substantive titles is very low.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:39, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Would that be added to the first or second bullet point? A.D.Hope (talk) 23:46, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Likely the first; the bit about "no intervening interpolations, including punctuation" would seem to have been an over-simplification.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:12, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Sincere thanks, SMcCandlish, for taking this up. I strongly believe that we should propose removing the second point as well. Surely we have had enough of this neither-here-nor-there attempt at a style. We should take the opportunity to go all the way towards matching this guideline with well-established modern practices. "The Queen" vs "the queen". "The President" vs "the president". "The Professor" vs "the professor". "The Bishop" vs "the bishop". Wikipedia is the only publication that I know of that makes an exception for titles "used to refer to a specific person as a substitute for their name during their time in office". This produces text that looks internally inconsistent. We have "the queen" in one sentence and "the Queen" in the next for reasons that are unclear even to most editors, let alone readers. I also find it jarring to have to use "the King" when writing about a historical figure when all the books I am citing use "the king". I do not think we have a valid reason to retain this. Surtsicna (talk) 20:36, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

The style is actually pretty common (perhaps more common in British writing, and less common than it used to be), but I'm not aware of a style guide that specifically enumerates it. Then again, I have not gone looking for it yet, and while I don't have a huge style guide collection any longer, I do keep some major ones around (and there are various of them online now), so it might be worth looking into to see what they say. Personally, I would like to do away with the 2nd bullet and stop capitalizing such things, but here I'm trying to massage into shape something that will actually pass consensus muster, and that probably is ultimately going to boil down to removing the material everyone hates and leaving the rest of it alone (at least in a first pass) even if some particular subset of editors hate it. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:26, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

It is fairly common in British English to capitalise certain offices when they're effectively proper nouns. Fowler goes into it:

Titles of office-holders. In certain cases and certain contexts these are virtually proper names of persons: HM the Queen, the Prime Minister, the Archbishop of Canterbury. The extension of this principle depends on the context: the President (of the USA, of Magdalen College, Oxford, etc.). Similarly, the Bishop of Hereford, the Dean of Christ Church; and in a particular diocese, the Bishop, or within a particular cathedral or college, the Dean (referring to a particular individual, or at least a holder of a particular office: the Bishop is ex officio chairman of many committees). But in contexts like when he became bishop, the bishops of the Church of England, appointment of bishops—such instances are better printed in lower case, and the same applies to other office-holders.

The rule is essentially to capitalise when the title unambigiously refers to a single person or office. It's worth noting that Fowler also says:

Apart from certain elementary rules that everyone knows and observes, such as that capitals are used to begin a new sentence after a full stop, for the initial letter of quoted matter (but see punctuation), and for proper names like John Smith (with rare exceptions like the idiosyncratic e. e. cummings) and those of the days and months, their present-day use shows wide variation from one publishing house to another, and even within the pages of the same book, newspaper, etc.

This is borne out in practice, with the BBC and gov.uk capitalising:

• A new photo of the King and Queen with the Prince and Princess of Wales at Buckingham Palace has been released.
• The new Bishop of Lincoln has formally been installed in his post at a ceremony at the city's cathedral.
• The Chancellor of the Exchequer is the government’s chief financial minister...

...and the Guardian and some academic books not:

• The king, whose father was born in Corfu...
• The king was then described as a man of great goodness...

A.D.Hope (talk) 09:03, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

A.D.Hope, I do not think that this capitalization is more common in British English than in US English. Rather it appears that in both the US and the UK, as well as in other English-speaking countries, government websites and government-affiliated media capitalize titles, obviously out of deference, while academic publications have not done so for over half a century. But interestingly enough, the BBC only capitalizes titles of Brits; US presidents,[64] foreign kings,[65][66] and foreign clergy[67] apparently have to contend themselves with lower case. Obviously Wikipedia should neither be seen as deferring nor as preferring. Surtsicna (talk) 15:44, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, all of that, exactly.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:39, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Personally I'd be quite happy to use lowercase for all titles except when directly preceding a person's name (e.g. President Macron, Pope Francis, Sir Winston). It will simplify the rules considerably, and if Fowler is anything to go by even the style guides admit capitalisation is largely arbitrary, so we may as well set our own standard. A.D.Hope (talk) 18:10, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

One thing with your third example is that it refers to the office itself, not the office title in substitution for someone's name. So for example there is a president of the United States, and there is an elected office known as the President of the United States. Also when I said in my previo0us post that we defer to articles (and their sources), I mean in particular that they guide such capitalizations, as in the case of the first lady, which despite having an official office, still does not have her office title capitalized in official publications (except as attached to her name, so e.g. "the first lady of the United States is First Lady Jill Biden.")

I support breaking down the convoluted grammar rules, but there should be some good examples of how to give deference to sources as established in our main articles. SamuelRiv (talk) 15:57, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

"there is a president of the United States, and there is an elected office known as the President of the United States" is one of the notions that has been the most contentious and which has caused the most confusion. It has proven difficult to write in a way that consistently follows this distinction, readers generally do not understand it (it just looks like random, inconsistent typographical chaos to most of them), many editors do not agree that the distinction exists (as a typographic matter), and off-site usage of English doesn't consistently support such a typographic distinction. That's why the thrust of this proposal, whatever other revising it may need, is deletion of the bullet point about this alleged distinction and the huge, confusing list of examples that follows it.

I have no idea what "how to give deference to sources as established in our main articles" is supposed to mean. Our style manual is informed by external style guides and by demonstrable patterns of usage that are overwhelmingly consistent across English, but we are not in any way obligated to adopt a particular style just because particular newspapers or other publishers are fond of it, and most especially not when we have years of discord and confusion resulting from doing something along those lines. If what you wrote has something to do with whether some title/role is "official" in some way (or officially named a particular way, or officially style a particular way with capital letters in specific places in governmental or other non-independent source material), that's a primary-source matter, and we do not defer to assertions in primary sources about official names and mandatorily use that exact string that stylization of it (see MOS:TM, WP:OFFICIALNAME, MOS:DOCTCAPS, etc.).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:39, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

This is why I gave the example of the seal of the president of the United States versus the Great Seal of the United States, the former of which I would not have guessed was not given some formal title. Whatever debate there was over capitalization has already happened in its article/talk space, and that should be respected elsewhere. And for something like a president or sheriff, referring to the office means referring to the office, not the job, so I don't see how any confusion an editor would have would be typographical and not semantic.

For the MOS you might clarify that you get elected or appointed or hired for a job, not an office (or vice versa -- that would indeed be an MOS decision). Thus "Andrew Jackson was elected the 7th president of the United States. He increased the relative power of the office of the President of the United States. He also left the office of the president of the United States in the White House (the Oval Office) in a pigsty that the cleaning staff absolutely did not appreciate." SamuelRiv (talk) 14:43, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Original-research opinion that doesn't seem to be based on anything. Most sources I've familiar with (and I have a history as a professional activist in US politics) treat "the Office of the President of the United States" as a proper name (and not meaning "the room, the Oval Office, in which the president works", of course).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:33, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure if you mean something synonymous with the Executive Office of the President of the United States. I was referring to the elected office as a government institution and unit of power, which may or may not (you would know the convention) have the word "office" in something like "the elected Constitutional office of the President of the United States" capitalized. (For these examples I've been specifically trying to not name a specific bureaucracy called the "Office of X", but rather an institution in the abstract.) (And again, the first lady example I gave is notable because it has a official bureaucracy called the Office of the First Lady, but per the convention of our article the institution of the first lady of the United States is not capitalized.) SamuelRiv (talk) 00:10, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

SMcCandlish, I understand the desire to change something rather than nothing. I would suggest asking the community whether they would support a) removing second point, b) removing third point, c) removing both second and third point. That way there is a good chance that either or both would be dealt with. Surtsicna (talk) 15:44, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe, but my instinct and experience in MoS RfCs that would affect a large number of articles strongly tells me to approach this one major change at a time. We'll see, though. This is all still in a workshopping phase, the main point of which is to identify conflicts with other practice, loopholes, exceptions, inclarities, and other problems that need to be addressed before opening any RfC at all. Maybe there really is sufficient disapproval of writing "according to a letter from the Premier", with "Premier" standing in for a specific officeholder's name, to include it, but it would complicate the proposal, and increase the likelihood of anyone not patient enough to parse it all in detail to reflexively !vote "No change". Cf. recent failure of the ISBN formatting proposal at VPPOL to come to a clear consensus; that unhelpful "I'm confused, so change nothing!" reaction is exactly what happened.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:39, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

If we are looking for a single incremental change, I would be much more inclined to support removing the second point (when a title is used to refer to a specific person as a substitute for their name...). "The king met with the pope..." isn't how I personally would style it, but looks quite natural to me. If I am understanding the current proposal correctly, it would mandate "Louis XVI became king of France and Navarre in 1774, later styled king of the French," which I find borders on confusing. Our current guideline already requires, "The Parliament of Ontario consists of the lieutenant governor of Ontario and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario," on the questionable conclusion that the definite article indicates "lieutenant governor of Ontario" is merely a description and not the proper name of an office. I think there is a lot of room to improve the third point, but oppose getting rid of it.--Trystan (talk) 20:09, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Then how would you improve it, in a way or in ways that counter the growing concern that it is not only confusing to try to understand and abide by, it produces confusing output for all the readers who've never read the rule and the big table of examples below it? The idea that this material is reparable at all seem fairly dubious.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:39, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Plot twist, SmcCandlish 😄 Surtsicna (talk) 06:44, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

My suggestion would be to more closely adopt the approach used in the Chicago style. That would get rid of points 2 and 3. (Chicago does allow for “the King” in BrE, but I won’t argue for it here.) The major exception Chicago carves out is to capitalize noble titles when given in full. I think that would address a common point of contention here. I would also get rid of the justification wording about common nouns, as it is debatable and just encourages justifying a departure from the style. The rule is always going to be somewhat arbitrary and that is fine. That would leave us with:

Possible wording

Offices, titles, and positions such as president, king, emperor, grand duke, lord mayor, pope, bishop, abbot, prime minister, leader of the opposition, chief financial officer, and executive director should be in lower case: François Mitterrand, president of France. They are capitalized in two cases: A title is capitalized when followed by a person's name, i.e., when the title can be considered to have become part of the name: President Nixon, not president Nixon; Pope John XXIII, not pope John XXIII. Noble titles are capitalized when not abbreviated: the Prince of Wales; Prince William; the prince; William, Prince of Wales.

I think the nobility exception is justified both by common usage and the need for clarity. (William is undoubtedly the Prince of Wales, but I would argue Llywelyn ap Gruffudd was the last prince of Wales.)

I don’t think it will be possible to get rid of all exceptions and complexity, but as a general rule I think the above would be much simpler to apply than what we have. It has some aspects I don't personally like (like the lower case LGs I mention above), but nothing that I can't live with.--Trystan (talk) 16:07, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It's funny you mention the Prince of Wales, because both the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and the Encyclopaedia Britannica use '[Name], prince of Wales'. I think that just goes to show that, outside a few universal examples such as days of the week, capitalisation is largely arbitrary. A.D.Hope (talk) 17:26, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

What are "LGs"? Llywelyn ap Gruffudds? I'm going to repeat that language like "when the title can be considered to have become part of the name" has previously caused great confusion and strife, and we need to stay far, far away from it. Something like "A title is capitalized when immediately followed by a person's name, without any interpolations" is sufficient and precise.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:29, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I would be fine with that. "Without any intervening words or punctuation" might be a little more accessible language. LGs are lieutenant governors.--Trystan (talk) 16:43, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Oh, right. And "without any intervening words or punctuation" sounds good. Reads well, whatever.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:19, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I am uneasy about the "noble titles are capitalized when not abbreviated". It complicates matters, which is the opposite of what we are trying to achieve. What should be lower case per the present JOBTITLES becomes upper case according to that proposal ("He became a prince of Wales", "He was the last prince of Wales" → "He became a Prince of Wales", "He was the last Prince of Wales") while simultaneously what should be upper case per current reading becomes lower case ("the Prince" → "the prince"). Moreover, it will lead to discussions about what is an abbreviated title. Is "king of the United Kingdom" an abbreviation of "by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of His other Realms and Territories King, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith"? It also does not lead to a style more in line with modern academic practice. I believe that point #1 should be a sufficient exception to the general "use lower case" rule. Surtsicna (talk) 09:30, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

• I do appreciate simplifying the guidance on capitalizations… however, I am getting a little worried that we are oversimplifying. Blueboar (talk) 17:56, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

  Well, this is just a Gedankenexperiment stage, the purpose of which is to figure out what might break and how before launching something for anyone to !vote on. It's still all rough draft.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:08, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

MOS:GIVENNAME needs an entry for Meitei names (Manipur)

MOS:GIVENNAME clearly overrides Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography#People with the same surname (currently MOS:SAMESURNAME), but we don't have an entry to recommend usage for the Meitei people, typically from Manipur. See Talk:Licypriya Kangujam#First name/second name where it's unclear what to choose. Any advice, preferably based on good sources, would be welcome. Boud (talk) 19:43, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Something I said over there that is actually more relevant here: MOS:SAMESURNAME probably needs some clarification, like a footnote that says something like For non-Western cultures that have different namving conventions, substitute for "surname", in "use just the surname", whatever portion of the name would be conventionally used in that culture for references to a person in a semi-formal register. [examples here] For some specifics, see Culture-specific usages. "Culture-specific usages" = MOS:GIVENNAME a.k.a. MOS:PATRONYMIC. And obviously that section needs expansion to cover more cultures (possibly even a split-out to a sub-page after significant development; back in 2018, I loosely proposed centralizing this sort of thing at what is now WP:Categorization/Sorting names, or having some kind of shared transclusion or something between that page and an MoS page – see Wikipedia talk:Categorizing articles about people/Archive 10#A point needs clarification into guidance instead of non-guiding observation (and tacit approval) of conflict) – but in several years there has been no progress yet in this direction. It would take significant RS research.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:35, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Sure, I sort of realised that without saying it so neatly. Here's the same thing with a few minor corrections and adding one example. For non-Western cultures that have different naming conventions, instead of "surname" in the recommendation "use just the surname", use whatever portion of the name would be conventionally used in that culture for references to a person in a semi-formal register. [For example, Abiy became prime minister in 2018, per the Eritrean/Ethiopian convention; other examples here] For some specifics, see Culture-specific usages. Boud (talk) 19:36, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Seems good, though it would be nice to have an additional example.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:27, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Talking about a person’s “former” gender

There is a disagreement at Talk:Isla Bryson case § Reverted edit over the language we use to describe a person’s pre-transition gender: “while a man” or “when she was a man” or similar, vs “while presenting as a man” or similar. While this is both an ideological and a personal question, it seems that it might be helpful for the MOS to either proscribe or permit such wording.

…Alternatively, if we don’t feel like wading into that quagmire, it might be nice to guide editors towards using language as is used by the subject themselves, or, where no evidence is found, to avoid either philosophical attitude, as seems to be the interim solution at that article (and the one I personally think works best). — HTGS (talk) 04:30, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Most trans people, but certainly not all trans people, will describe themselves as having always been their post-transition gender and just not realizing it earlier. Is it worth putting this in the MOS in general? I would say probably not, but my personal inclination is definitely to lean towards it until proven otherwise. Loki (talk) 04:54, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Also, like @LokiTheLiar said above, "but certainly not all trans people" oppose the idea of a "former" gender; some may embrace it. Therefore, I don't think it's correct to universalise here, but go by how sources generally refer; taking it with a pinch of salt, especially British media. Zilch-nada (talk) 05:21, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

I understand that this is a very controversial topic and I shall try to be careful with my speech here. The sources used universally employ language such as "while still a man" to describe this:

• • "Bryson, 31, was convicted last month of raping two women in the Glasgow area while still a man known as Adam Graham" - The Sunday Times https://archive.ph/20230212180036/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/isla-brysons-mother-says-rapist-should-never-have-been-held-in-womens-prison-w2wpxgqtl
  • "A transgender woman has been found guilty of raping two women when she was a man." - The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/24/glasgow-court-convicts-trans-woman-of-raping-two-women-before-her-transition
  • "Isla Bryson was convicted last month of raping two women – one in Clydebank in 2016 and one in Glasgow in 2019 – while still a man known as Adam Graham." - The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/feb/28/trans-woman-isla-bryson-jailed-raping-two-women
  • "Isla Bryson raped two women when she was a man" - Belfast Telegraph https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/uk/estranged-wife-accuses-rapist-of-transgender-sham/1406606772.html
  • Transgender woman found guilty of raping two women while a man - STV https://news.stv.tv/west-central/transgender-woman-isla-bryson-guilty-of-raping-two-women-in-clydebank-while-a-man
  • "Isla Bryson was remanded to Cornton Vale women's prison in Stirling after being convicted of the rapes when she was a man called Adam Graham" - BBC News https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-64413242
  • "Transgender rapist Isla Bryson jailed for eight years for attacks on two women when she was a man" - Sky News https://news.sky.com/story/transgender-rapist-isla-bryson-jailed-for-eight-years-for-attacks-on-two-women-when-she-was-a-man-12821513
  • "...who was convicted earlier this week of raping two women when she was a man" - The National https://www.thenational.scot/news/23278119.nicola-sturgeon-trans-rapist-isla-bryson-wont-jailed-womens-prison/

The issue I don't think is necessarily with the language of "while still a man" but the logic behind it. The article makes no reference to this person previously being a man, only with limited references to "assigned male at birth". Now, I am fine with this usually as I understand that many trans folks prefer to be acknowledged as their post-transition gender, as mentioned by @LokiTheLiar above. However, the nature of this news, in which the police report described the crime in question as being committed by a male, and indeed the abundant sources cited above referring to "while still a man", leads me to believe that I think that the logic of "former gender" should be considered in some circumstances, particularly in such circumstances of abundant sourcing. That's my two cents. Zilch-nada (talk) 05:19, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Like Sideswipe said several times in the original argument that prompted this, the wording of sources doesn't dictate our wording. That's why we have the MOS. Loki (talk) 06:14, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, but I'm not talking about the wording, but the actual logic employed in the sources; that is eschewed here. Zilch-nada (talk) 06:20, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

What logic? The language is clearly different, but how is the logic different? Loki (talk) 15:06, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

The idea of a "former" gender, which this talk is about. Zilch-nada (talk) 16:02, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

"language as is used by the subject themselves"

• This case is much more complicated as it is revealed that this particular person "decided to transition while awaiting trial for rape" and has been described by politicians such as Nicola Sturgeon (who is generally pro-trans) as "faking it". Basically, why does - in this particular case - the rapist - who clearly has very bad intentions - have a greater say over police, the media, mainstream political opinion, the courts, and the prisons? In other cases I can absolutely support the fact that someone has transitioned, but this is clearly more complex than that.

The police say that the crime was committed by a man yet the article makes no reference to them as a man; reference to them as a man is even more scarce when we avoid "either philosophical attitude", which, as the article currently stands, has precisely one reference; that they were assigned male at birth. Zilch-nada (talk) 06:46, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

• Remember that (as with all of our guidelines) this MOS begins with a statement that common sense should be applied and that occasional exceptions can exist. We can’t (and don’t need to) account for every possibility where an exception might be made. We just need to reach a consensus as to WHY, in a specific article an exception is appropriate, and then make the exception. Blueboar (talk) 12:57, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

It'd be easiest just to write "before his/her/their [gender] transition". Largoplazo (talk) 13:42, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Is "when she was a man" seriously scary to you people? What's wrong with it? It's abundantly sourced. Zilch-nada (talk) 16:04, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Because it's redundant, when we already say that the crimes she was convicted for happened prior to her transition. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:16, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

"prior to her transition": yes, when "she" was a man. Jesus Christ. Zilch-nada (talk) 00:08, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

If I understand your meaning correctly... I don't think it's appropriate to put she in scare quotes like that; WP:BLPTALK applies even to people who have done terrible things. In context it also seems like it might be a bit uncivil towards trans editors. --Aquillion (talk) 05:08, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Weird accusation. The article uses "she"; that's fine. But I'm not respecting a rapist in talk - I have mostly used the term "they" -, nor am I even remotely suggesting to misgender the average trans person. Nonsense. Zilch-nada (talk) 05:21, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, while you can feel however you wish about them, we're required to maintain at least a bare modicum of decorum even when discussing people who have committed serious crimes. As I said, BLPTALK doesn't contain an exception that allows us to insinuate uncited accusations against living people just because they've done unrelated bad things. No matter how you feel about their actions, putting scare quotes around their gender on talk (which obviously goes beyond just misgendering them and makes a serious insinuation that you haven't backed up with any sort of source) is still completely unacceptable. --Aquillion (talk) 10:00, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

Not all "transitions" deserve equal respect - a view clearly espoused by the police, the prisons, politicians like Sturgeon, etc. etc.; that's how I'll refer to this "person" in talk. Is me putting scare quotes around "person" insulting all "persons"? Give it a break. Zilch-nada (talk) 10:05, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

It'd be easiest just to write "before his/her/their [gender] transition" Yup. And that is what the article says, specifically prior to Bryson's gender transition. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:16, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, my thinking is that that's just obviously neutral wording - no one doubts that Bryson transitioned. Describing it as a "former" gender is taking a clear position on the "underlying logic", as Zilch-nada, the main proponent of using that language, seems to concede above; whereas I don't see how the alternative wording contains any ideological implications. I don't think the simple existence of sources that use that wording is sufficient (especially since the sources also use phrasing like "before transitioning", including in some of the ones linked above.) That said I'm not sure the MoS needs to be too prescriptive, especially since - how often has this come up? It seems to be one dispute, on one page, which is a WP:ONEAGAINSTMANY situation, where the outcome it's obviously headed for seems to be the one a hypothetical MOS change would encourage anyway - that is to say, it seems like our existing policies and guidelines are handling it fine. Since the core issue is WP:IMPARTIAL, I suppose something about "former gender" or constructions of that nature could be added to WP:WTW somewhere, as a heads-up to people who might not understand the relevant implications, but that page is already glutted beyond the point of usefulness, and I think everyone in this discussion understands the implications already anyway. --Aquillion (talk) 05:08, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree very much with your last few sentences about WP:WTW, as the logic of "former gender" should not be prohibited outright, only generally discouraged, and used when abundantly sourced. In this case it is abundantly sourced, and so that's why I'm arguing for its usage. Zilch-nada (talk) 05:23, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm not even sure we'd need any addition to WTW to be honest. An insource search for "formerly a man" has only two hits of relevance to this topic. One for a biography where it's quoting verbatim from a newspaper in a footnote, and the other in Piers Morgan about a social media spat between Morgan and Janet Mock where the phrase was used as a quote. Everything else there is unrelated. The related "formerly a woman" search has one case of an article whose language needs updating, and one translated quote from 1403. Everything else there is mythology or fiction. Related searches on phrase variations also seem to bring up very little of interest. Sideswipe9th (talk) 05:33, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

I would agree with you if not for how the Bryson case was reported. Because this case has seen dozens of mainstream news sources employ this logic, even if it is logic that has previously been scarce, as you say. Zilch-nada (talk) 05:37, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Do you understand though why I described the reporting by UK media as sensationalist when looking at those search results? It is entirely out of the norm for this topic area. Sideswipe9th (talk) 06:03, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Just because something has scarcely been said before does not mean that it's current usage is in any way sensationalistic. Like I've said, much of the press is of high-quality broadsheets, the BBC, and papers of record, none of whom are ascribing their own logic of "former gender", but reporting descriptively on what police, the courts, and the prisons have said. Zilch-nada (talk) 06:10, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

"The wording of sources doesn't dictate our wording" is right, so various sources using wording that might be insensitive doesn't mean we can't do better. But also right is "I don't think it's correct to universalise here". If MoS were to address something like this at all (and an isolated dispute that is not part of an established, long-term pattern of such dispute at many articles, typically resolving a single, codifiable way, is not cause for MoS to do so – see WP:MOSBLOAT), it could not be with a one-size-fits-all approach that imposed wording that would not suit various trans or enby persons. There is already too much over-generalizing assumption going on throughout this topic area. I would think that "before his/her/their [gender] transition" would generally work, and agree that wording like "former gender" and "when they were a [wo]man" seems to be asserting something socio-political about gender questions. In some cases "when they identified as a [wo]man" could work, but only in some cases, and only when we have specific information about how they actually identified (if we don't have it, e.g. for some WP:BLP1E case where the subject is not someone extensively interviewed or self-publishing about such matters, the assumption would basically be WP:OR).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:24, 17 December 2023 (UTC)