Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBTQ+ studies/Archive 5

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBTQ+ studies. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

←

Archive 3

→

"Homosexuality and ..." articles

Article titles such as Homosexuality and religion, Homosexuality and Wicca, Homosexuality and Christianity, etc. are starting really to bother me as they imply only the LG of LGBT(QI...). I'd like us to consider revising the names, and where needed, the content to match, to something along the order of "Sexual orientation and...", "Sexuality and...", or similar. I raise the issue in reference to the religion articles because those are the ones that started bugging me, but I don't mean it to be exclusive to those. In some cases, e.g. Homosexuality and Wicca, the title is quite a misnomer given the amount of discussion of, in that case bisexuality. In others, the title may more accurately reflect the content that is there, but not necessarily where we need it to go to be inclusive of all LGBT. What do you all think? --Aleta 01:59, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

"Sexual orientation and..." sounds right. "Sexuality and..." would probably unnecessarily expand the scope of the articles to include things like masturbation, fertility, puberty, birth control, etc. Fireplace 02:49, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Concur with Fireplace. Sexual orientation and... broadens the term enough to be inclusive without making the scope of the articles too large. Koweja 04:07, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Does that leave out the "T"? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 05:39, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

The articles don't cover the T. I suggest "Transexuality and religion" be separate as a lot of those articles are long enough already WjBscribe 11:41, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

While the Homosexuality and Christianity article doesn't specifically cover T, there are verses in the bible that are often considered to apply to T, discussion of those verses could be added. The only problem though is that such discussion could be considered POV, just as it is POV that the bible condemns homosexuality. --CC Proctor 13:25, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't seem to me that it is necessary to expand the articles to "sexual orientation." It's really not about sexual orientation as a whole — religions generally don't discuss "orientations"; it's more about actions. Besides, what religions condemn heterosexuality? The topic discussed is homosexuality. I would think the only need to call it "sexual orientation and..." would be to include bisexuality. However, since the articles only address the same-sex aspect, the "Homosexuality and..." titles seem apt. — Emiellaiendiay 03:54, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

As I pointed out initially, it's not true in all of these articles that only the same-sex aspect is addressed; bisexuality is discussed in at least one of them. Also, while it may be usually true (?), it is not always the case that behavior only is at issue. The orientation itself may be at issue (whether in approving or disapproving fashion). Aleta 04:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessary to wholesale change article names. Where it's appropriate like the mentioned Homosexuality and Wicca, I say go for it. I haven't combed through them recently but Homosexuality and religion, Homosexuality and Christianity look pretty specific in their scope. If they start addressing the rest of the LGBT community then we should discuss it then. Just my $.02 --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 07:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Getting Involved page

A while back, I suggested we create a Getting Involved page similar to the one that WP:COMICS has. Well, I finally finished it, here it is. I've tried to pitch it to someone who has a vague notion of what Wikipedia is about (as well as shamelessly plagiarised WP:COMICS]] but not much more. Thoughts? Anyone is welcome to edit it. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:15, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

It's brilliant, by the way. If I think of anything I'll add it to the page. — coelacan talk — 21:33, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

The newsletter will be going out in approximately ten minutes. Can I congratulate us all on another good month - we've beaten our recuitment record for the fourth time in a row, elected a coordinator, built another department, designed a recruitment poster etc. Can I ask next month that we get a few more FAs in? They've slacked off a bit recently. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:53, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

...And there is no way I am ever sending out that newsletter by hand again. *flops into bed* Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 00:17, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps SatyrBot can be recruited in future...? WjBscribe 00:49, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the great work Dev920! --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 07:48, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Yep, thanks Dev! :-) And I can't believe you sent all those newsletters manually... Raystorm 18:15, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you both. I like to catch up with what everyone's up to, but I think that's just too impractical now, regrettably. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:17, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Current events - Trans city manager being fired

Yksin has been doing a great job with the Steve Stanton article. I'm posting here because I'd like to get more eyes and fingers on it right now. CNN Headline News is covering this story every half hour today, confirming that he is being fired for being trans. It's probably safe to expect that the article will be getting some hits. There might be a "Did You Know" in there somewhere, too. — coelacan talk — 18:34, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Just a little self-tooting my horn

I know this isn't the place, and I have no problem with somebody removing this message, but I was allowed to stand with the obnoxious paparazzi ("Who do you photograph for?" "Wikipedia." "Oh, Wikipedia...do you have some kind of card or anything?" "Not really...." "Okay, sure, go ahead.") and photograph Angela Bassett and her husband Courtney Vance - I am pretty happy about the results, and had to share them. Check out their pages. Dave --DavidShankBone 01:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Great pics, David! You are just a gem, the way you go around taking pics and automatically sharing them on Wikipedia. You have so improved the encyclopedia with your numerous photographic contributions. A great big thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Jeffpw 06:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Classification of transsexuals and Gender identity disorder

... are on the main page this morning in the DYK section. They're a prime target for vandalism so please add to your watchlist! - Alison ^<talk> 16:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

NAMBLA (cringe)

I have removed the LGBT WikiProject tag from the NAMBLA article. Both due to the discussion on that article's talk page, in the RfC on the matter, and the unfortunate phrasing that made the tag format to something like "NAMBLA is supported by WikiProject LGBT studies" (eek). I also saw that a member left the project today over the impression that this WikiProject "supports NAMBLA". Does anyone have any thoughts on this? ~ Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 06:23, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

This comes up all the time and everyone goes 'cringe', myself included. Unfortunately, it does come under the remit of WikiProject LGBT studies. At least in that way it can be monitored closely and studied for POV/vandalism - Alison ^<talk> 06:26, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

May I ask who left today over this issue? Jeffpw 06:29, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

That would be User:Avazina. See here - Alison ^<talk> 06:33, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree the article should be monitored. But if that means having a template on the NAMBLA article that says, "This article is supported by WikiProject LGBT studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBT related issues on Wikipedia." I just can't be part of the WikiProject, either. Isn't there a way of monitoring them without including them? ~ Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 06:37, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Oppose removing the tag. While I'm not a big NAMBLA supporter (and likewise cringe), it is part of our history, and totally within the scope of our project. I would totally agree to adding something to the explanation= tag, or even adding a "faux" tag that words things better and still keeps it in our watchlist. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 06:47, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It seems that we're in a quandry, because if our project removes the tag from that article out of Political considerations, I would consider leaving the project, myself. I'm sorry you are unconfortable with the tag on the article, but it is most definitely a LGBT issue. Jeffpw 06:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I have always supported tagging the talk page, because I believe the article is within the project's scope. But, this WikiProject needs active members much more than it needs strict tagging guidelines. The editorial dispute over whether or not the article should be in Category:LGBT organizations, Category:LGBT history, or neither, is a general content dispute that involves the larger Wikipedia community, and in my opinion shouldn't be anything that would drive anyone away from this WikiProject. (Take it up with WP:RFC, not WP:LGBT, you know?) But the WikiProject tag? That's LGBTProject-oriented, and that's optional, and if tagging the article is going to result in the loss of productive editors from this project, then the tag should be dropped. The project has an active editor who is not a member, and that arrangement seems to suit everyone fine. Similarly, the project can have an article that is actively monitored without being tagged. It doesn't mean the article isn't a concern of this project. — coelacan talk — 07:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I looked at Avazina's edit summary. What bothers me is the misunderstanding of "LGBT[Project]'s DE FACTO approval". If a member of this project can have this misunderstanding, many more non-members will certainly believe the same. Project scope I don't disagree with. But the project should not appear to be in support of something it doesn't support. If it's misleading, then it's harmful, no matter which article is in question. The mere fact that this tagging is being misunderstood by several editors should be troubling. — coelacan talk — 07:31, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Coelacan, I'm a little surprised that there's such confusion. Perhaps we need to consider rewording the tag if that's a legit option? It seems the tag wording is the problem. Or generate a special tag for it similar to the one used for Saint...shoot, I can't recall who, but we added an explanation as to why the tag was on his article. Either that, or can we develop a "reduced" LGBT tag that simply says we monitor the article (I could see placing something like that on V for Vendetta (film) instead of the full project tag). There are many options here. Removing it for now while we discuss the matter might be ok, as long as we come up with some alternative to add back later. ZueJay (talk) 07:34, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I think this is a case of editors not reading carefully. The tag clearly reads "This article is supported by the LGBT Project", not "This organization is supported by the LGBT project". There's a crucial difference here, and it's not particularly subtle, either. And I do not support removing the tag while discussions are ongoing. Jeffpw 07:38, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm a little surprised by the confusion, but I can grasp it by trying to imagine that I don't know how the project works. And most people don't. There shouldn't be confusion. And I'm tempted to say, "well that's not what the tag means so those people are wrong and they should get over it". But there is such confusion. And I expect it will remain as long as that template, especially with its icon, is up there. There's just a strong psychological correlation that results from that visual. I wonder if the talk page needs to be tagged in any way? There must be ways of monitoring the article that don't involve tagging. — coelacan talk — 07:47, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I believe the consensus of [RfC on the matter] indicates that we should not imply that NAMBLA is an accepted part of the LGBT community. If the tag is not removed from the article, it seriously needs to be reworded. I disagree with Jeff and think that the tag should be removed while this is being discussed. ~ Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 07:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Once again, kathryn, the LGBT Project does not take a position on NAMBLA. Individual members have in dividual opinions, though I believe the vast majority oppose the organization and what it stands for. That said, NAMBLA is part of LGBT history, just as Naziism is part of German history. The article on Nazism is supported by Wiki project Germany--do you think they are advocating that country's return to a fascist, murderous dictatorship? The principle here is exactly the same. Jeffpw 07:58, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Jeff, I believe you are arguing in a perfect world. The fact that people should not misunderstand does not stop people from misunderstanding. I for one know what exactly what the tag means, and I think we should dispense with it because many other people do not. People don't seem to be making the mistake of believing that WikiProject Germany supports Nazism. But for whatever reason, several editors both inside and outside of the project made the mistake of thinking that this project supported NAMBLA. We can't fault people for misunderstanding, and we can't fault Kathryn or anyone for not wanting to be associated with that misunderstanding. — coelacan talk — 08:05, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Intersting choice - Nazism. Just went there and then to Holocaust to see how the various projects word their templates - they do not use the word "support" they simply say it falls within the scope. We have a tendency to read quickly online and not fully understand text all the time and that is what appears has happened here. Just as a I said "might" consider removing while we discuss, not "remove" alone. ZueJay (talk) 08:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Satyr, is it possible to make a template, perhaps {{WPLGBT-monitored}}, that just drops the class-category without adding any other visual? — coelacan talk — 08:08, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps: "This article is monitored by WikiProject LGBT studies. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page." plus the rating. No rainbow flag, just text? ~ Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 08:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a project member, but it is hard for me to see how NAMBLA would not within the scope of the project given how many sources and critics of the gay-rights movement among others attempt to connect BAMBLA to the movement (I think it does also raise interesting issues about the nature of consent and related things that I'm not convinced most of the gay-rights movement is willing to really discuss, but that's my own POV). Regardless, the use of the language "support" is problematic. Why not have the template in all cases just say something like "This article is edit by the LGBT project" or soemthing like that? JoshuaZ 08:25, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea of using the explanation option on the template to give a little note as to why it's there, just like on Talk:Saint George (as SatyrTN suggested). Either that, or change the tag to read "This article falls within the scope of...", but don't remove it. This article obviously qualifies as one this project should be working on. —Mira 08:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

It is within project scope. The nature of this particular article's subject is such that it impedes calm decision-making processes for many people. I do not expect the "explanation" parameter is obvious enough for this case. The primary reason for the template is to assist in tracking. That can be accomplished by simply adding Category:B-Class LGBT articles, without the graphic or anything else to provoke misunderstanding. — coelacan talk — 08:41, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Two words: Neville Chamberlain. Jeffpw 08:44, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

That's got to be some corollary of Godwin's Law. Seriously, what do you want that Category:B-Class LGBT articles doesn't accomplish? — coelacan talk — 08:59, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

How could it possibly be a "LGBT B class article" if it is not part of the LGBT project? And the next demand will be that it is removed from that category as well. Jeffpw 09:13, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Neither I nor Kathryn are suggesting that the article should be removed from the project. Only that the template is misleading in this case, unnecessarily so. — coelacan talk — 09:17, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

With all due respect, Coelacan, perhaps Kathryn should answer that for herself. If that is indeed so, then it looks like sleight of hand to me, done solely for image purposes to improve our PR. I don't mean to be combative here, but I truly feel it is wrong to remove the project tag. maybe I should make a little list of all the articles this project covers that offend me, and which I feel give this project a bad name. For instance, do we as a project really support the idea of deliberately infecting ourselves with AIDS? That article certainly presents us in a wonderful light. Shouldn't we remove the tag from that, too? Jeffpw 09:30, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I believe she did.[1] And keep in mind that these concerns are coming from outside the project as well. Non-members, self-identifying as straight, have complained on that talk page about the project tag. For whatever reason, nobody's making the mistake of thinking that the template means the LGBT project supports bugchasing. Yet that mistake is being made here, repeatedly. I can't explain it. But I think that rather than acknowledging that this misunderstanding is a problem, you are simply saying that it shouldn't be a problem. I agree. That doesn't alleviate it though. — coelacan talk — 09:39, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually in her second comment on this page, I interpret it to mean she wants the article completely out of the Project. The diff you provided showed a modification of Alison's comment made by Kathryn. In any event, please see the new tag. Comments? Jeffpw 09:45, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Just curious, since I posted my support of the new article tag it has changed again. I felt the first change gave greater protection and distance for LGBT members, which has been a concern of mine. We Gays, Lesbians, Bi's and Transgendered persons have enough problems being perceived by society as perverts and sexual deviants; NAMBLA (albeit a dead organization now) has done enough damage to encourage the persistence of that perception by society. The last thing the LGBT Project should do is anything that might further encourage that perception. While I do understand that neutrality is the expected goal of any wiki editor, there are visitors to wikipedia who don't participate in editing and simply browse the various pages for information. The one thing we don't need is for any of them (or others) to miscontrue the intent or scope of the LGBT Project and conclude that the members subscribe to the more extreme aspects of the LGBT world. I don't think that a detailed and specific disclaimer in article tagging, when it becomes necessary, would be problematic to the LGBT Project's editing neutrality. In short, I preferred Jeffpw's first version of the new tag, but that's just my opinion. --Avazina 23:27, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

arbitrary break

(indent reset) The diff I linked was her most recent word on the subject. Anyway, I've changed the template to read "within the scope of" and added emphasis to your changes on the Talk:NAMBLA page. As I said earlier, I don't think the explanation parameter is going to be quite enough; the flag itself carries particular connotations and is very powerful psychologically as a visual cue. I still think that dropping the category alone is the best route. But I'd rather let this one sit while others chime in. I think America is going to bed now. Let's pick this up later. I'm going to go work on Steve Stanton for a while. — coelacan talk — 10:04, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

While America sleeps others awake. I think the template (for ALL articles) should be carefully worded to preclude the possibility of it being seen either as an endorsement or a condemnation. The problem is not with this or that article, it is with an overly effusive template. Haiduc 11:59, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

This American is just getting started on hir day and may not have had enough coffee yet to really be a part of this discussion. But... I'm opposed to just adding the "B-class LGBT articles" category and removing the tag. For one thing, I don't know if that would still keep the article on the LGBT Watchlist. However, I do support putting a text-only banner on NAMBLA that states that we watch and edit the article. Though I do wonder at Jeff's comment about where this will lead - Bugchasing is one thing, but personally I find Log Cabin Republicans offensive - would we use this banner there, too?

So lets compromise a little. It's no big deal to add a parameter to the template like image=no that would suppress the image. That combined with a thorough review of the wording (per the comment by Haiduc and others) should address most concerns, no? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 15:21, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

We have to be very careful about creating a two-tier classification with our template: "things we like and things we do not like about LGBT culture." We all have our betes noires, I am sure. Who shall we cast out farther? The NAMBLA rapists or the Bugchasing and Barebacking murderers? I suggest caution here. Haiduc 15:04, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, Haiduc, for your take on the situation. I agree that this article is being handled differently because it makes people uncomfortable, and not because it is so difficult to classify. After giving this some thought, I think that if people are not comfortable participating due to articles falling under the scope of our project, they are free to leave. But to say that certain articles must be deleted if individual participants are to remain is both a form of censorship as well as an invitation to chaos. Jeffpw 15:15, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with both statements Haiduc made above. We have to be careful of creating a two-class system and the template is/was overly effusive. The current version is better. A text only version would suit me, afterall many articles also have the LGBT template/footer - we don't have to have the flag on everything. It signals a tacit endorsement. --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 16:23, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

So the wording on the tag has been changed to

This article is within the scope of WikiProject LGBT studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBT related issues on Wikipedia.

Which is much better. I do not think supressing the image is a good idea as then we might need to have this discussion every time someone wants to supress the image b/c they "disagree" in some way with labeling the article as LGBT related.
The explanation now attached seems incredibly redundant, and pretty harsh. I haven't read the article, but it appears by this statement that the project has taken a position on the topic of the article which is inappropriate conduct for the project at large. Can we simplify and reword this explanation - It should not be more than one (maybe compound) sentence. ZueJay (talk) 18:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Zuejay, one could say that this entire discussion is based upon the project taking a position one way or another on the article. That disclaimer on the article was placed there in response to editors saying they were leaving (and in one case, had left) if the tag stayed at all. To me, removing the tag, as has been suggested, is taking an even stronger position. My feeling is that, as the article falls under our scope, we slap the same tag on it that we do on every other article, and let people manage their potential discomfort in their own way, as long as it doesn't disrupt the project or encyclopedia. Jeffpw 19:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I understand what it appears this discussion "looks like" but I've tried to avoid expressing opinions about the article subject matter. I have read this conversation and I do understand what is going on. I agree, now, that there should only be one tag to avoid edit wars with the project tag and other similar foolish edit problems. I am simply expressing dissatisfaction with the current wording of the 'explanation'. May I propose another wording?

This article falls within the empirical scope of the wikiproject. This tag does not imply acceptance or endorsemsnt of NAMBLA.

I just want to simplify the bugger. ZueJay (talk) 20:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I didn't mean to imply that you weren't fully informed about the discussion. I know you have been following it closely. I was just confused at what seemed the full circle we were making with this discussion. The text as you wrote it seems fine to me, if, indeed, we need text at all. Coelacan, however, seemed to feel the text as it now is on the tag, was not strong enough, and wanted the flag removed. I am beginning to wonder if we can please everybody involved in this discussion. Jeffpw 20:15, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Sorry if I got snippy - inflections in voice don't "show-up" online. It seems not everyone will be pleased no matter what. The tag does need to appear on the page just as it does on Exodus International (as someone pointed out on NAMBLA's talk page - which needs to be archived). I understand the desire to supress the image, I just think it will lead to more edit conflicts. And I feel the simpler the wording, the better off we all are - the more words, the more oppotrunity for mis-interpretation. ZueJay (talk) 20:23, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I want to point out again that this isn't simply a project-internal discussion on what everyone's comfortable with. Non-members, self-identifying as straight, have complained on Talk:NAMBLA about the project tag. The template is generating false understandings. So the discussion has to be about more than simply making everyone comfortable; we have to try to see why the template is/was being misconstrued, and fix it, for the sake of facts. If there are elements of the tag that are contributing to false understanding, then those have to be on the table. I think the flag is one such visual cue. Since it's not a meaningless symbol, it carries along the frames that people have associated with it: often gay-positive. When people see it on that talk page, there's cognitive dissonance: "wait, no, that's wrong, NAMBLA isn't LGBT". All the text explanations in the world don't alter the underlying processing of frames that the symbol carries. I think this contributes to the misunderstanding. Anything else that does so also needs to be on the table. This isn't just about comfort zones, it's also about accuracy. — coel acan — 23:51, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I've created a custom version of the banner to try to make clearer what project's position on NAMBLA is. Regards, Ben Aveling 00:51, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I appreciate the simplified 'explanation'. However, "maintained by" is not accurate as it implies the LGBT project alone works on the article. A disccusion on this is occurring further down this page. ZueJay (talk) 01:06, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Not a member of your project, but would like to request help

I keep coming across your tags and have enjoyed browsing around your project. Now I'd like to ask for advice. What criteria should editors use when deciding where in an article (or whether) to include a person's sexuality? The two examples I have in mind are fairly straightforward, in that the individuals are out and have used gay issues as some part of their political work, so their sexuality is of relevance to their public lives. Even in these cases, there is some debate on the talk pages. (The two I am thinking of are Irshad Manji, controversial Canadian writer, and Waheed Alli, Tony Blair's youngest appointment to the House of Lords.Any comments you would care to make there would be gratefully recieved as well.) But what about more generally, when the person is out in some contexts? Or it is of less relevance to their work? If it's of no relevance to their work, or they are not out, then it is reasonable not to mention it. But otherwise? Do you have a proto-policy about this? Many thanks. BrainyBabe 17:31, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

If they are a gay activist, or their work is based in gay themes (such as writers, artists etc.), this should be mentioned in the introduction and expanded on in their career sections. If they are simply someone who happens to be gay (e.g. Evan Davis) than it should simply be mentioned in their personal life section section and as a category. IMO, anyway. It's the principles I follow when editing articles. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:59, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Whether: Personally I feel it's always good to include that a person is LGBT. If nothing else, it helps educate people that we are everywhere. That might be POV, but there ya go. :)

Where: I think Dev put it right on the money. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 07:04, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I usually treat WP:V and WP:N as significantly overlapping. If something can be verified, that's usually because reliable sources have considered it notable enough to mention. That's not a perfect guide, but it usually works in my experience. — coel acan — 07:31, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

List of non-tagged articles

If anyone's interested, there's a list of ~1,400 non-tagged articles available. These are articles that are under an LGBT category but do not yet have the {{LGBTProject}} banner.

If you go through the list and find articles tha belong to the category correctly, but don't need the banner (for instance Zoophilia), simply make a note next to the entry on the list, but leave it on the list until I can mark it in my database.

If you work off the list, remove entries as you add the banner. I'll be working off the list, so if you don't remove an article, I'll do it.
Thanks!! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:53, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Erm, why does Zoophilia belong in an LGBT category!?! WjBscribe 15:06, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Category:Sexual orientation and identity, I would imagine. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:08, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Oh, OK. hadn't thought of that as an LGBT category. WjBscribe 15:09, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I would be inclined to hand it over to WikiProject Sexology, but there's too much gay stuff in there. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:13, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Umm, we could work together with WPSexology... nothing says these have to be either/or things. :) Aleta 00:16, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

While I agree that the category is one that both groups can work on, I don't think the article Zoophilia is anywhere near our scope :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 00:55, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

When using this list, watch out for category vandalism.[2] some people aren't supposed to be in these categories in the first place and their articles should not be tagged. — coel acan — 18:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

And indirect categorization, such as Washington Square Park which is in Category:Greenwich Village which is in Category:Gay villages, so it ended up in the list, but shouldn't automatically be tagged imho. — coel acan — 18:34, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I've been manually reviewing all the articles on the untagged list to a) make sure they're in the right categories and b) tag them or not as appropriate. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 20:30, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Added to the project page. -- Beland 19:13, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Resources list

I have created a resources list for people wanting to write LGBT articles - I would be grateful is everyone could add to it. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:37, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

This is a great idea! We really need to make this work, it'd be terribly helpful to have a good resources list. If every one of us adds just one link, we'll have 100+ resources! :-) Come on people! Raystorm 16:50, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Added to the project navbar. -- Beland 19:13, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Added LGBT Portal to Seattle Men's Chorus

This is the largest LGBT community chorus in the world; I was surprised that the LGBT portal was not already on it. --Allyn 13:35, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

That article was a word-for-word copy violation. It even said at the bottom: "Taken from the Seattle Men's Chorus Homepage http://www.flyinghouse.org/about". If this is an important article, maybe someone would like to start it again from scratch? WjBscribe 13:57, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Seattle Men's Choruses' claim to be the largest LGBT community chorus in the world is erroneous, as there are several others (e.g. San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus and Turtle Creek Chorale) with at least as many members. MusicMen 17:09, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Wording of project banner

Evidently, Dev's not too keen on "within the scope of" for the project banner. As I recall it sets off her synesthesia. Do we reopen the discussion on the wording of the banner? Or is the explanation on the NAMBLA banner enough for those concerned? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 23:21, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

On further review, we voted 6 to 1 for the phrase "within the scope of". -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 23:25, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

There's also the problem that many of the articles tagged are not supported by this WikiProject. By that I mean they've been tagged, but not edited significantly or even cleaned up. I tag a lot of talk pages without touching the articles themselves (shame on me, but I'm lazy like that). WjB pointed out that "within the scope of" avoids any appearance of taking credit for other editors' work. Appearing to take credit for no work at all is undesirable too. (League of Sloppyeditors?) — coel acan — 23:37, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I think "within the scope of" remains the best wording at this point; I'd really like to hear what others think, including other suggestions. Perhaps, now that there are significantly more members, another list of options should be entertained and another vote needs to be held? ZueJay (talk) 01:13, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Discussion can't hurt. I favoured "within the scope" at the time of the last discussion and still do. In my view "supported by" implies an approval of the topic and commitment to maintain the article. The former we simply should not do. The latter we we cannot commit to given the shear number of articles with this project's scope. However, our membership has expanded considerably since the discussion last December and it may be a good idea to revisit the matter. WjBscribe 01:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I would like to see that I think it's ridiculous that you want to change the wording of the banner for the sake of one sodding article. This also goes back to my attitude towards tagging articles like Buffy and V for Vendetta - if we aren't going to at least plan to support them we shouldn't tag them. However, 6-1 is a fairly definitive ratio, so if you all decide to go with that I only ask that you chnage "scope" to "remit", because my eyes are starting to water. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 01:29, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

How are we changing the banner for one article? The discussion in Dec was way before the recent probs with the NAMBLA article. Surely we should now discuss what the banner should read for all articles, rather than having disclaimers on some articles but not others, which I find problematic. Either we disavow approval on all articles or none- otherwise a subjective judgment will creep in as to which articles need the disclaimer. By the way, can I ask why you prefer the word "remit" to "scope"? WjBscribe 01:57, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I have changed the banner 'just for this one article' by expanding the macro and editing the result. (Currently "This article falls under the scope of", but feel free to change it.) There is no need to change the overall banner just because of one article, if we don't want to. Regards, Ben Aveling 04:42, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Better. Please, feel free to contribute to this conver., too. ZueJay (talk) 04:58, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

That should help prevent any revert warring and calm people down, though it is just a temporary solution. Banners need to be transcluded templates rather than substituted because it makes it harder to maintain the banner, makes a mess of the talk page, and besides, we should have a uniform statement. If we have separate messages for subjects we don't like we haven't solved the problem at all. Koweja 05:06, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

With synesthesia, certain combinations of letters can cause unpleasant sensations, if I learned anything from the Discovery Channel (and others can be pretty awesome). Anyway, thesaurus.com suggests bounds, breadth, field, purview, range, span, sphere, stage, and ... purlieus. I remember the discussion that Satyr linked; I don't remember how it changed after that. But, whatever. I'm partial to "breadth", myself. Makes me think of warm loaves. — coel acan — 03:56, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying synesthesia; I must have read the first few sentences at least three times and still wasn't certain how it applied here. So Dev920, let us know which words trip your troubles and which don't; as you are Coordinator, we can certainly come up with a reasonable alternative to the dreadful sko-p-e. Also found: gamut, spectrum, domain (from Merriam-Webster). ZueJay (talk) 04:58, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

This isn't just for one article. There was already a minor issue at Homer's Phobia because someone thought that "supported by" meant we were claiming credit for it reaching GA status. I thought supported would be an acceptable alternative, but apparently not. An alternative to skope (does it help if we misspell it?) would be fine but we have to be careful that we don't imply that we a)own in whole or part, b)are actively involved with the development of, or c)agree with the subject of the article. Koweja 02:45, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

crickets

So... anybody like "breadth"? — coel acan — 06:50, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

"Breadth" always means "wide" to me. I think I'd prefer sphere, domain, or spectrum (which implies rainbows!) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 07:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

"Domain" sounds too territorial and royal to me. "Spectrum" and "sphere" are okay. Also "bounds". — coel acan — 07:27, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Spectrum work well, especially with the Rainbow flag as part of our Project's symbol. I don't particularly like sphere because it makes me think of sphere of influence. Bounds works well too. Koweja 15:23, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

What's wrong with remit? :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:48, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Regional, IMHO :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 16:19, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

In the sense that I am using it, it seems also to be limited to the judiciary. Maybe not. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:22, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Ha! I could not figure out remit - no wonder! ;) ZueJay (talk) 04:23, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

(reset to margin)

"This article falls under the scope of" is my choice. I also think a generic statement like "The WikiProject banner on this article does not imply acceptance or endorsement." would be appropriate. I reworked the banner on one of my user pages HERE. Don't worry I don't plan to use it anywhere, just an idea.--ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 16:59, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I also like purview "within the purview of." Or would too many have to check it in the dictionary? Might need a proposal of all and multiple vote cycles to narrow down. ZueJay (talk) 04:23, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I love purview. Completely missed that when it was mentioned above. I would be happy with breadth as well. Although a part of me would like to see, "This article falls under the ever-vigilant and restless eye of WikiProject LGBT studies! Be afraid, be very afraid." but maybe that's just me. :-) --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 06:02, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

{{LGBTProject}} : let's pick one/some

Okay, these are the wordings supported by two or more editors here. Add others if I've overlooked them. This is simple approval voting, so choose any and all that you like. I suggest this run three days, as I expect five days is unnecessary, but if anyone disagrees, we'll make it five. — coel acan — 03:12, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Can we vote for "scope"? Frankly, I don't like any of the choices, and I believe some of them aren't in the lexicon of most English speakers (American or otherwise). HalJor 06:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Note: I didn't add scope because the word aggravates Dev920's synesthesia and many of us were looking for a work-around. However, if you think it's the only workable option, I (or anyone else) can add it anyway. I wanted to make this caveat clear first though. Shall I add it? — coel acan — 06:50, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Scope is used by many other Wikiprojects and is far preferable to anything else here, IMO. If Dev's synaesthesia is really the only issue, it would be easy enough to set her up with a custom stylesheet that causes the word to be blacked out for her. (Or just black out the letter "o", or whatever is sufficient.) —Cel ithemis 12:39, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
It's not the only workable option, but it's the most clear and non-pretentious, which are important to keep the project legitimate and respectable. HalJor 15:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, well obviously it should be in the list, if five people chose it while I was sleeping. — coel acan — 16:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Here's a thought. If we wrap the words in a div tag with an id, Dev can just add a line to her CSS file to hide it. That way we can still have it say scope but she won't have to see it all day. Koweja 17:54, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. Very simple. —Cel ithemis 23:26, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, "scope" it is. Feel free to edit war over whether it should be "falls" or "in", that wasn't clear. — coel acan — 09:31, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

DYK

Is it just me, or are we getting a lot of main page articles? I mean, Classification of transsexuals and Gender identity disorder as DYK's yesterday, and I see that Same-sex marriage in Spain will be Featured on the 14th, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer on the 10th. I think that speaks very well of our project! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:26, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Aye! It's pretty sweet. Help me squeeze a DYK out of Steve Stanton! The article's approaching 36 hours now. Is there a tidbit there? "Did you know that Steve Stanton was fired by jerks?" That doesn't seem to work. — coel acan — 03:59, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Did you know that successful city manager of Largo, Florida — Steve Stanton — has been fired for pursuing sex reassignment? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 05:07, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Satyr, that inspired me to be just NPOV enough. =) We'll see how it goes. — coel acan — 06:22, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Quick note - make sure the sex reassignment link is disambig. Perhaps sex reassignment therapy with the "therapy" hidden. ZueJay (talk) 06:05, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I did, because I anticipated that the redirect would change soon. Thanks for making the disambiguation page. — coel acan — 06:38, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Steve Stanton made it to the main page![3] And then was vandalized! Yay!! — coel acan — 19:08, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Stubs

If any stubs need expanding, feel free to let me know, I'll try and wikify them where possible. Good work so far with this project! --sunstar net^talk 14:44, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, we have 2000 of them here, edit any that takes your fancy. :) Oh and if you join WP:LGBT, enter our Jumpaclass competition too! Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:47, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Hiya! Some help with Same-sex marriage in Italy would be quite welcome. :-) The first merge threat has been issued, and I don't want that to happen if I can help it! Cheers Raystorm 16:36, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Another call for opinion re: tagging

Family Research Council. Thoughts? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 23:00, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

What is the purpose of tagging? Haiduc 23:36, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't really know anymore. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:52, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

There have been a couple comments lately that have bothered me about project banners and their application. I wanted to clarify some of my thoughts and actions. I've been using the bot to tag ~3,000 articles, reviewing each article and assessing it at the same time — and I want feedback if I'm being overzealous or spending time needlessly.

As I see it, banners are integral to achieving the stated goals of the wikiproject: build a thriving community, raise LGBT-related articles to FA status, and maintain or improve articles that are within the spectrum of the project. I can explain why I feel banners help us achieve those goals if you want, but that's not the main reason I'm posting this.

The way I approached determining what articles are within the spectrum is that I started with the Category:LGBT and worked my way down through the category tree. Most articles within those categories should, logically, be included.

During the process, of course, I ran across all sorts of categories. Some of them — Category:Sexual orientation and identity, for example — are easy to mark for inclusion. Others — Category:BDSM, which is a subset of Cat:So&i — are only partially included. This particular article (Family Research Council) is in the Category:Ex-gay movement.

Given our recent discussions on NAMBLA, I wanted to get input from the group as to what articles should have the banner and what articles shouldn't. If it seems like I'm bringing up some strange or disturbing, or even *wrong*, articles, that's because I've worked my way through all the easy cats and now have only the marginally-related cats left.

So why are we doing this? For me, what I'm doing is completing the process of determining what articles fall within the spectrum of the project.

I hope that helps explain what I see is going on. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 02:38, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I hope it is clear that my question was not intended to imply that banners have no value, but to investigate and clarify (at least for myself) their aims, so as to weigh them against the methods. I come to this with a fresh mind since I have paid the whole process absolutely no attention (as you probably figured out from my lack of involvement).

Looking closely at the tag, a couple of issues come up for me. One, the ease with which "supporting the article" can be read as "supporting the practice". I would suggest that the wording be changed in all instances to a more neutral formulation. I am not sure how I feel about the sentence inviting users to collaborate (in an ideal world I would leave it out for going beyond the bare minimum necessary from encyclopedic purposes, it seems too political, but if this what all projects do . . .) I am also not too happy with all the graphic apparatus that has begun to accumulate at the head of the talk pages, and I would reduce the size of all tags by 75%, but that discussion goes beyond our project and probably should be engaged at Wikipedia level (by someone with more free time than myself).

The question of flying the gay flag over all these articles also needs to be closely examined. I would prefer two identical gender signs, whether male or female. Flip a coin to decide which, and indicate how that was determined, for all future sleuths who will detect nefarious conspiracies in that choice.

Beyond these criticisms, I support the basic purpose of the tag, and SatyrTN's work. A register of articles indexed by quality and completeness is a valuable tool, and making readers aware of the existence of a co-ordinated (ha!) effort to raise the level of discussion on this topic is also worthwhile. The goal however should be to keep things as low key and neutral as possible.

Finally, it is worth pointing out that matters at NAMBLA have not been resolved, defensive disclaimers not being acceptable for reasons which I indicated previously. They only support the argument that the tag in its present formulation over-reaches. Haiduc 04:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Agreeing with Haiduc, I support the purpose of the tag, and appreciate SatyrTN's hard work. I think it's in our best interest that the banner's be as generic as possible to avoid any tacit endorsement or disapproval. I don't think we're here for that. Personally I think the flag should go. On the non-controversial pages there are usually several gay flag icons already and on the controversial pages the flag provokes unwarranted attention (NAMBLA).

Family Research Council is tricky. Their only relation to us is their antipathy to LGBT issues and the Ex-Gay tag, as far as I can tell. I don't think just opposing LGBT issues is enough for us to tag them. If their only purpose was opposition to the LGBT community, I would say tag it, but that doesn't seem to be the case. --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 06:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

First off, Satyr, I think you're doing a wonderful job tagging the articles, and I thank you for taking the time and effort to do it. Without addressing the specifics of Haiduc's criticisms (except to say that if one adds {{skiptotoc}} to articles, one can skip right over all of the extraneous crap and get right to the table of contents) I want to say that FRC article, in it's present state) should not be tagged by our project. I did a text search for "gay"and homosexuality" and found a several mean spirited, hysterical comments about LGBTs ("Spongebob Squarepants is gay", etc.), but nothing that seemed to call for us to tag them. As to their being categorized as ex-gay, that seems a mistake. The article does not reference that at all, so I think until it addresses that issue, this article should be taken out of the category. Jeffpw 08:23, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

FAs

We have 21 FAs tagged, and approximately 4 of them were written by us. Either we need to stop being so banner happy or start writing more. Shall we have a special LGBT WP:FAPQ, or what? Cos this is getting worrying. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:52, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Banner happy - I've been considering my original tag on V for Vendetta (film) which was all ready of FA status. When I saw the movie, I thought for sure it should be tagged LGBT. Since reviewing the article, I would have to say I now disagree with my (younger) self. I would not be opposed to removing the LGBT project tag from this non-LGBTProject-created-FA-possibly-thinly-related article.

removed. Jeffpw 15:47, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Aherm, I know this board gets pretty busy but I expressed rather a contrary view a few days ago. Please my thoughts on this film at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies#Scope. V for Vendetta does not just have 2 gay characters, the general theme of anti-gay oppression which runs through the film makes it, in my opinion, within the scope (or whatever word is in fashion today) of the project. WjBscribe 00:55, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Hmm...Perhaps it is the article that needs tweaking instead. ZueJay (talk) 01:09, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Writing more - I have great hope for the Steve Stanton article in which User:Yksin has invested significant effort along with other editors. The four articles up for peer-review should all be considered promising based solely on the fact that editors working on those articles are requesting more input. ZueJay (talk) 03:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Writing more - That's the aim of this project, right? I personally find it kinda sad when FA's are tagged with projects' banners and not a single member of the project has contributed substantially to it becoming a FA... Raystorm 12:50, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Julius Caesar

I've always understood that he was bisexual ("every woman's man and every man's woman" or something like that), but I see that the WP article has a section entitled Julius_Caesar#Political_rivals_and_slanders_of_homosexual_activity and the Talk page has multiple Project tags but not one from these parts. "Slanders", eh? At the very least, I'd have expected "rumours" rather than "slanders" - just because some or most of the stories were apparently put about by his enemies doesn't mean that there might not have been some truth in them. Anyway, I have absolutely no expertise in Roman history and don't feel like disturbing the certainties of the editors of the Caesar page just now, but I thought I'd flag this up here for everyone to think about, consult their reference-books, tag the article, start an edit war over there or what you will. Best to all. --GuillaumeTell 22:34, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I've always thought that if Suetonius saw fit to add in the rumour, it must have been big. Having read the Twelve Caesars (*shuffled off to find copy*), my translation says "When Thermus sent Caesar to raise a fleet in Bithynia, he wasted so much time at King Nicomedes' court that a homosexual relationship between them was suspected, and suspicion gave place to scandal when, soon after his return to headquarters, he revisted Bithynia". Oh and Cicero apparently wrote " Caesar was led by Nicomedes' attendants to the royal bedchamber, where he lay on a golden couch, dressed in a purple shift... So this descendant of Venus lost his virginity in Bithynia". Apparently the rumours dogged him all his life and he was dubbed "the Queen of Bithynia". So even if it's not true, it's big enough to be worth including, I reckon. Strange how the most successful people always turn out to be bisexual, huh? :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:13, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I find it hard to believe that the term "slanders" has been accepted. It is glaringly pov. "Rumors" or "insinuations" or "accusations" are certainly better choices. Haiduc 05:34, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I altered it to "rumours" last night {which means that the link above doesn't work properly) and no-one has objected so far. "insinuations" and "accusations" aren't as bad as "slanders", but still make it sound as if there's something wrong with homosexual activity, or that's how it seems to me. --GuillaumeTell 18:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Assessment of importance

I see people here have been doing a wonderful job of assessing articles by quality. I was looking over the results to see if there were any "important" articles that were in a bad state, but there are so many lower-quality articles, it can be hard to get a handle on the situation. I was wondering if it would be useful to also assign an important level to all LGBT articles, using the standard importance scale like the Math project. -- Beland 19:55, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Importance ratings for articles are a sticky barrel of worms, IMHO. To rate an article's quality can have a degree of subjectivity, but importance? I can only imagine the arguments over that. Maybe I'm over-worrying, but whenever I do article assessments, I never rate importance, only quality. My two cents, for what it's worth. --Ebyabe 20:52, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Importance is really something that has to be determined by the Project, not an individual, which makes it difficult (judging quality is hard enough, which is why I avoided it at first). Obviously articles on LGBT, Homosexuality, Bisexuality, etc are high importance, but there are thousands of articles tagged. Perhaps we could elect a committee of Project members to evaluate the importance of the articles? Koweja 23:40, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

To tell you the truth, since we have ~6,000 articles (rather than ~221,000 that WP:WPBIO has, or ~31,000 that WP:MILHIST has), I'd rather spend my time increasing the quality of articles than worrying about their "importance". Just my $US0.02. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:40, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, yes that should of course be everyone's goal. However if we want "our" articles to make into the Wikipedia release then we need to allocate our time so we focus on getting the most important LGBT articles ready. Koweja 02:49, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a strong argument either way. It wouldn't hurt to at least get the High-priority articles put into a category. There's probably less than 100 of those (possibly way less). I've seen templates that take both class and priority parameters, but only give a visual of class, and just drop a category for priority. That way nobody has to feel guilty about not using the priority, because those pesky ???'s don't get displayed. If this is adopted, I would suggest "priority" instead of "importance", as {{WPBiography}} has done. — coel acan — 06:46, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, if we're assessing the importance for a Wikipedia release, why don't we simply create a list of Core Topics? That way people can have a list to look at but we don't have to go through the palaver (and I can only imagine the edit warring as someone discovers their pet article is "low importance") of implementing it for all six thousand articles. AND, if we work on those core topics, we can get some wikireaders out as well, something I've wanted us to do for a very long time. Does that sound OK? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:48, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

It does. I suggest as core articles every letter of L G B T, plus same-sex marriage, queer theory and history of homosexuality. :-) Raystorm 16:41, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Lesbianism in erotica

I'm trying to get consensus about usage the adjective "lesbian" and the noun "lesbianism" in the article Lesbianism in erotica and potentially head off an edit war between myself and User:Joie de Vivre. Basically, this user insists on very narrow usage of the words "lesbian" and "lesbianism" no matter what the context, restricting only to descriptions of self-identified "lesbians". It is my belief that "ordinary language" use of the word lesbian allows this term as a broad description of same-sex activity between women and that the phrase "lesbian sex" can be reasonably used to describe sex between bisexual women. I feel very strongly that English usage in Wikipedia should reflect generally accepted usage of the English language by the larger public and not usage that may be confined to a particular subculture.

Based on this, JdV had changed the title to "Sex between women in erotica" and rewrote the article to expunge nearly every instance of the word "lesbian". I think the results of JdV's edits were largely tendentious and clunky and have reverted them (though I've incorporated some of JdV's edits after reverting).

If you have an opinion on this, please weigh in at Talk: Lesbianism_in_erotica: Renaming_article. Iamcuriousblue 00:19, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Crossgender impersonators in film/theatre

Hi all. I have been working on a number of articles related to crossgender impersonators in Japanese performance. In Kabuki, as in Shakespearean theatre and other forms, all the roles are played by men, and some men play only women's roles. Similarly, the Takarazuka Revue features all-female troupes and casts, in which some women specialize in only male roles. This phenomenon extends beyond just these two forms, and beyond just Japan, of course. But I can't seem to find any extensive articles on the subject (just a small section under Transvestism), and no categories for actors who professionally specialize in impersonating the opposite sex.

You all likely know as well as I do that people who crossdress professionally in this way are not necessarily gay. So I apologize somewhat for bringing this somewhat out-of-scope topic up here. Any thoughts or suggestions - if you know where to find these articles & categories, and I'm just looking in the wrong places - would be most appreciated. Thanks. LordAmeth 13:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi, LordAmeth! I ran in to a couple of similar situations when reviewing the articles in Category:Drag kings and Category:Drag queens. Some of the articles in those cats (though not many) aren't LGBT. Though some might argue that drag in general falls under "T". I don't believe there's a category for Category:Performers who cross-dress, which might include Eddie Murphy and Robin Williams. But equating Kabuki players with Drag queens does seem out of place. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:46, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Do you think I should create something? Category:Female impersonators and Category:Male impersonators, or something like that? A man like Taichi Saotome (not a kabuki actor) or Tamasaburo (who is), playing the role of a woman in a play is not the same as Eddie Izzard playing himself - a man - in drag. Though I do see your point about Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy, Monty Python actually playing women's roles. LordAmeth 15:04, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think those categories would be a good idea. I'm passing over tagging Vesta Tilley right now. She's currently in Category:Drag kings but it appears Category:Male impersonators would be more approrpriate. — coel acan — 05:01, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

FAs needed

Many people use current FAs as a template for other poetntial ones. Certainly, I do. I noticed that, while we have FAs on gay films, gay people, gay books, gay marriage etc., there are some areas where we could do with some people out there breaking new ground, so to speak. So, here is a list of areas that I think we could do with addressing:

A newspaper (probably The Washington Blade, if jtowns has anything to do with it)
A gay rights in...
A homosexuality in...
An LGBT rights organisation
A transgender organisation
An article on a religion and homosexuality
An LGBT term
An article on a gay hate crime victim
An LGBT event

Anyone interested in developing articles in any of these areas, please, do go ahead. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:50, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I plan on working on the Paul Broussard stub who was a gay hate crime victim. I'll certainly use a current FA as a template.--ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 15:21, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Wilberforce Claybourne Humphries

This is not encyclopedic, but I thought I'd spread the news here. I'm not sure who has heard, but John Inman, who played the famous (if not infamous) Mr. Humphries on the British sitcom Are You Being Served, died today. For those of you not familiar with the show, Mr. Humphries was among the first gay characters on TV. Inman played the character stereotypically with a kind of mincing flair that he stated he took from some of the young men who worked in London retail shops. Inman, himself gay, died from a Hepatitis A infection. He is survived by his partner. *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 15:18, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Mr Humphries was never actually confirmed as gay (just checked the article), though I must admit it's hard to imagine a straight man coming to do decorating in pink dungarees! Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:24, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Shame. He always seemed such a sweet man. Although he was never confirmed as gay, the subtext was barely kept sub. All those constant references to "friends" he had in other departments. Not to mention the episode when the word "poof" is mentioned and he assumes it's in reference to him. Still, my mother (a woman of her era) often uses the word, with no sense of animosity, as a synonym for "camp man" regardless of sexual preference. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Garik (talk • contribs) 15:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC).

Gay and Ex-gay?

Can someone give me an opinion on Kirk Talley? Does he belong in Category:LGBT people from the United States? Does he also belong in Category:Ex-gay people? The article is almost totally unsourced and is giving me a headache. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 22:17, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Phew. Get a ref confirming that story (the struggles and 'pulled together' quote), and I'll say he belongs to ex-gay too. Raystorm 22:54, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Scope of LGBT RE "I"

I have been looking at some of the intersex and related articles recently, and have noticed that some of them have been tagged as part of the LGBT, for instance:

Whereas others, such as;

Aren't tagged. I was looking for guidance whether these should or shouldn't be tagged.

Looking at the project's scope, "What this wikiproject is not" says

This project does not extend beyond the cultural, political and historical manifestation of same-sex, bisexual, or transgender identities, attractions, and relationships, and related societal reactions.

Which doesn't really address intersex issues. However, Intersex communities and LGBT communities have worked together in the past and I suggest that it would be appropriate to tag and watch some of these articles. I understand, however, that this might be an unpopular suggestion from both sides of the fence.

My main worry is that many of these articles don't have a wikiproject looking after them if we don't include them, and many aren't being looked after by us if we do include them.

Cheers, Lwollert 06:17, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I tagged 5-alpha-reductase deficiency the other day; this question nagged me but I neglected to bring it up. My initial thinking was that many intersex issues become transgender issues during the course of a person's life, and so are likely to be covered by this project regardless. But I agree it's a good idea to decide on this specifically. So should Erik Schinegger be covered by this project? I'd say so. When I run the acronyms in my head, it's LGBTIQA, and I feel that intersex is such a close topic that it's at home here. And as a practical matter, Category:Intersexuality isn't very large. — coel acan — 06:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I really don't think we should include intersexual articles, they're really nothing to do with LGBT at all. There is a wikiproject that covers them, WikiProject Sexuality and Gender, and so I don't think we ought to lay claim to them. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 15:21, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

A few reasons I disagree: WP:SEX isn't very active. As I said above, many trans issues are also intersex issues (though of course far more issues are unique to each). But they come into close contact enough that they are often addressed together. Also, our LGBT article is actually an LGBTI article, and has been for quite a while. And about 240,000 google hits suggest inclusion as well. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Coelacan (talk • contribs) 23:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC).

RE Dev920, Both WP:SEX and WP:GS don't state that intersexuality is part of their scope; additionally i would support the argument that Intersex issues come very close to transgender issues. I suppose that my argument is that if WP:LGBT includes "T", it should also include "I" - both are quite different in many respects from each other, but T and I issues have more in common than they tend to do with "LGB" issues. The varied groups have banded together over the years because of a variety of reasons, included but not limited to repression/discrimination, medical-based categorisation, social and legal rights, and cross-over between the groups (there are LGB transsexuals, and some interssexuals were picked up in gender dysphoria clinics).

P.S. looking at the Wikiproject list seems like nothing else would cover it. Lwollert 04:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

This is seriously not cool. We can't take on a bunch of articles because no-one else covers them or the wikiproject that does is crap and you pity them! We have a scope, and that scope does not include intersexuality. We are LGBT, not LGBTIQAIVCFABGLITTER. I'm already uncomfortable with the articles we currently lay claim to, but this is far too far. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:57, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Okie dokie, as I said at the start, just checking and arguing, didn't meant to rile you up :) And LOL @ LGBTIQAIVCFABGLITTER. Shall we start un-tagging them, then? Lwollert 06:07, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, we shouldn't have any articles that cover exclusively intersexual and not transgender issues. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 09:08, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Multiple Maniacs

Hey guys - on the article for the John Waters page for his film Multiple Maniacs I included the photograph I took of John Waters. I feel his vision (and writing, and directing) is integral to his movies, and I also think it draws people to the John Waters article. A user on there doesn't want it on, has disparaged the photo, says it clutters the page, etc. The arguments are on the Talk page. Whether for or against the photo being on the page, can you guys weigh in with your thoughts so that I can move on? If the photo is removed from this work, it will likely be removed from all his work by the challenging user and only be included on the Waters article page. --DavidShankBone 17:07, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Transgender vs Intersexual

I'm curious as to why one is within our spectrum while the other isn't. Maybe I don't understand the words, but could someone tell me what the difference is? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 06:16, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Transgender is about people born with physical characteristics of one sex, who spend some or all of their time as the opposite gender. Intersex relates to people born with a combination of sexual organs, etc that are between male and female. --AliceJMarkham 07:49, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

That can be the case. Sometimes a person is born with no outward indication of intersexuality, but as they age their body does not react to its own hormones in the usual way. Androgen insensitivity, for example, can display late. And for reasons related to infant sex assignment, some people do not know they are intersex. Erik Schinegger and Cheryl Chase come to mind. — coel acan — 10:04, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there are further complications such as those. I was just trying to provide as simple a distinction as possible. --AliceJMarkham 23:30, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

need template feedback

A new image was added to Template:LGBT sidebar,[4] that probably needs some feedback. Anyone who's interested, chime in at Template talk:LGBT#New Image? (try to keep it centralized there, as I've also posted this at WP:VPM for general feedback). — coel acan — 04:07, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

LGBT Core Topics

There was some interest expressed above in starting an LGBT Core Topics. I personally think this is a marvellous idea, it will give people something to work on if they feel bored and perhaps, some time in the future, we can produce our own CD for LGBT organisations? Definitely a few wikireaders. It could compose of the top 200 most important LGBT articles. What do you think? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:50, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I already said somewhere above I'm all for this idea. How should we pick the articles? Via a poll? Raystorm 12:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree this is a great idea. Should we all submit lists, say our top ten and then the ten artcles that cross over the most get chosen? --ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 15:26, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we should limit it to a specific number just yet. Koweja 17:50, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I think there are too many choices to be made to require multiple people to nominate up front, or take a poll. I would think just designating a page to start a list should be sufficient - let people add to it as they will, and if anyone disagrees with a particular nomination, it can be discussed. Though actually I think it would be better to just tag the "core" topics as being of high importance to the project. If people don't want to bother classifying the importance of non-core topics, that can be left undone. But using the existing category mechanisms I think will be easier to maintain (as articles are renamed and deleted they will automatically get updated in the category) and it will be more likely that whoever spins a CD or does a print version will actually find the articles if they are in a standard category rather than a custom list. -- Beland 19:13, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Uh, well, the list has already been created here. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 19:22, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

List of LGBT-related topics

The List of LGBT-related topics is a complete mess. Either we need to delete it, or use an automated process to add all our currently assessed articles. I'm torn between those options. What do you think? And could people start replying to my posts? I'm starting to feel kinda alone... Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 12:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Ugh. It's really off-putting. If you can do the automated process thingy to improve it, great. If not, I'd say delete. (Yeah that was a great help huh?) ;-) Raystorm 12:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

What does this list do? Key topics are listed at Template:LGBT topics, which should be kept up to date. Is having that info in list form as well useful to navigation? I think it would be unmanageable if we listed all LGBT-related topics... WjBscribe 13:23, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

There are too many choices to make all of them by poll; just designating a page for people to assemble the list should be sufficient. Others will need to review the list as articles are proposed, as well as any guidelines proposed. The easiest collection technique might be to start at the top of the LGBT category tree. -- Beland 13:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Beland, is it possible you meant to reply to the above discussion of LGBT core topics? Because it looks as a reply for my question there. :-) If not, sorry for the confusion. Cheers Raystorm 17:01, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm onboard with having it automated, just doessn't seem worth keeping if we don't.--ParAmmon (cheers thanks a lot!) 15:27, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Er, yes, I replied to the wrong section. -- Beland 18:46, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what Beland means by poll, but what I was thinking was that we simply add everything we have in our automated assessment worklist. Possibly using Satyrbot? Maybe we should see what that would look like on a draft page before deciding whether to rid ourselves of the page altogether? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

If you were going to embark upon the task of compiling this list properly then using the categories would indeed be best - just go through them all and copy and paste, and then alphabetize. But the article wold be enormous, and what possible good would it do, being so generalized? Might as well compile a list of heterosexuality-related articles. Haiduc 16:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

As people have discovered, the categories that have been grouped under LGBT do not necessarily have links to LGBT. BDSM, for example, is not an exclusively gay thing but is in our category system. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:43, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Can someone help me by explaining the differences between the list (article) and the cat(s)? Perhaps a pro/con comparison of the two methods of presentation would help some of us make informed decisions. What does the list provide that the cat method does not? ZueJay (talk) 17:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:List guideline#Purpose of lists, Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and series boxes, Wikipedia:Categories vs lists. Excuse my laziness. =) — coel acan — 00:45, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Peter Tatchell

The Mail on Sunday carried an article about Wikipedia today. Peter Tatchell was featured complaining that his article is rubbish and "gayist". We may want to go and improve it... Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:58, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I'be found a copyright free photo of him and uploaded it to Commons to get the ball rolling... WjBscribe 14:09, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Cover art

Ok, all you artistic people out here, here's a challenge. I'm continuing my planning for the gay history text book (I'm going to leave transgender out - we can do a separate book on them afterwards) and I'm looking for cover art. It needs to be high enough quality to fit a 7 inch by 9 inch cover, be non-controversial (so no Nazar ill'al-murd images please), and preferably be historical, though not necessarily so (if any of those waving rainbow flags were high enough quality...). So, your suggestions? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:51, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Admitted/Stated?

So sorry if this has been discussed before, but I've been noticing that in a fair amount of articles, so-and-so "revealed" or so-and-so "admitted" he or she was homosexual or otherwise. This may just be me, but that seems to be rather rude. Perhaps it would be better if those statements were changed to "stated", "confirmed" or "said" he or she was homosexual or otherwise, or something along those lines. Just a thought. Thanks for the input-Hornandsoccer ^Talk 01:20, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Seems like a fair point. Can't say I've noticed this issue myself, but words like "revealed" or "admitted" should be avoided (perhaps an exception would be where the person had long denied it) to maintain WP:NPOV. WjBscribe 01:24, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Or use "came out" and link coming out. "Stated" sounds almost skeptical, as if we're bending over backwards not to treat it as true. —Cel ithemis 01:39, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Alright, will do-Hornandsoccer ^Talk 03:12, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Core topics

I've created the initial list of 71 LGBT Core Topics here. We could do with some more important LGBT people (ie, what they did for LGBT, not that they were LGBT). Your input would be welcome. Once we've got enough, we can arrange them by category and create an assessed worklist. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 14:06, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Brokeback Mountain a core topic? :-D And The L Word, Queer as folk? PFLAG should probably be added, btw, right? Great list so far Raystorm 14:29, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Brokeback Mountain, as I understand it, was the first mainsteam gay film with famous stars that had worldwide publicity, ticket sales and got within a hair's breadth of winning Best Film Oscar. It always struck me as a watershed in attitudes towards gay film. The others are very modern and Western, and haven't made much of an impact. I just looked up QAF though, and maybe that would count as the same sort of thing. What does everyone else think? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:21, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Makes sense to include both Brokeback and QAF. Added The Advocate for a publication. Someone above posted in the "FAs needed" thread a list that should be considered here as well, such that we might consider starting with the most notable from each of the following subcats:
Gay rights in... Homosexuality in... A LGBT rights organisation... A transgender organisation... An article on a religion and homosexuality... An LGBT term... An article on a gay hate crime victim... An LGBT event...
Such that we can maybe start with a balanced set of core topics. BTW if transwoman is included, should transman be as well? ZueJay (talk) 16:38, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I suppose. I started off by simply copying our watchlist and editing it, and transwoman was on it but not transman (I've no idea why).

Please can I ask everyone to bear in mind that we're an international project; everything added so far has been limited to the US, and we want to avoid systemic bias. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:05, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm... Didn't realize that 1.5% (3 out of 200) would constitute a lurch toward North American bias. And I put Gay City News on the page b/c it is the LGBT newspaper in the US with the highest circulation (Washington Blade is second)... Okay, so that made it 2%... Maybe we should not put individuals, organizations etc. on the list by name, but start with their branching article instead: For instance, instead of Stonewall riots we should have Gay rights movement; instead of individual pubs like The Advocate and Washington Blade, we should have List of LGBT publications; instead of Brokeback and QAF, we should have List of lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender-related films and List of television shows with LGBT characters, or is that too generic in the other direction? ZueJay (talk) 17:16, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

...But the article doesn't exist. How can you add an article if it doesn't exist? Also, I like the parent articles idea, but the ones you mentioned are lists, which isn;t what we're after. Things like the Advocate and Matthew Shephard are ok, I just want to head off a mass adding off American stuff before it happens. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:24, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I know the article doesn't exist, but it seems that it should (*sigh* I'm not too worried about it, but I think it is something LGBT editors - especially those who live in NYC - should be aware of). It's fair to head off the mass adding of US stuff - very wise, actually. Lists - Those were the best parent article ideas I could come up with on the fly - I agree that the lists aren't awesome choices... ZueJay (talk) 17:46, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I think that Brokeback and QAF should be there, but I would think that Philadelphia should be there too. Burnley 00:10, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh yeah, it definitely should be included! Great call Burnley! :-) Raystorm 14:26, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

The 'by country' section should include the various 'Homosexuality in...' pages. I think they're all listed in the Homosexuality by country category, or various sub-categories thereof. --Helenalex 01:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Geography

I've noticed there are a lot of Homosexuality by country pages (Homosexuality in New Zealand, Homosexuality in Japan, Homosexuality in China, Homosexuality in Singapore etc), but no associated template or category. Most seem to be slotted into gay rights categories, even though most cover topics far broader than just rights, and most countries have specific gay rights pages. I was thinking about creating a Homosexuality by country category and possibly template, but since this is a big project with a lot of people involved (and I haven't been one of them) I thought I would float the idea here first. --Helenalex 22:30, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea to me. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 00:28, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Doing this has exposed a whole lot of inconsistency. Five countries (Australia, Canada, Norway, UK and US) have LGBT culture categories which encompass all gay stuff, four further countries (Iraq, Romania, Mexico and Scotland) have gay rights categories only, Germany has a LGBT history category, NZ has a LGBT category, Singapore has a homosexuality category, and 3 modern and 2 ancient countries have Homosexuality in... pages that aren't in wider LGBT country categories. All of this makes things difficult to find and prevents cross-country comparison on anything other than gay rights. I have no idea what can be done about this, but I thought I should bring it to people's attention. --Helenalex 02:06, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

sigh*. The problem is, patriotic people (ie, whoever keeps creating all that Canada related stuff) keep creating these categories willy nilly and putting them in the strangest of places, and then we have to deal with the resulting mess. Unfortunately all attempts to fix them have failed miserably thus far. Maybe people should just start sorting and CfDing on their own initiative and let's see what happens. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 14:09, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Another issue, which should probably be dealt with at the same time, is naming. All the general overview pages that I've been able to find are called Homosexuality in (country), but this doesn't realy reflect usage in a lot of countries, doesn't cover all the LGBT community, and IMO makes it sound like a disease, or at least a problem. There is discussion of this on Talk:Homosexuality in New Zealand#Name. I'm reluctant to make the NZ page the odd one out, and am also reluctant to jump in and rename all the other Homosexuality in... pages. In some cases they might reflect usage in those countries. I suspect people sorting this out on their own initiative is more likely to make things worse than anything else... if some kind of consensus can be reached, then whatever changes are made are more likely to stick if they are something a number of people have agreed on, rather than what one person thinks should happen. Also, I still have no idea what the answer is to this. --Helenalex 22:35, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Same-sex marriage in Spain

This article is today's Main Page Featured Article, congrats to everyone who worked on it. Its likely to see high levels of vandalism whilst on the main page so it would be great if people could add it their watchlists and help revert vandalism... WjBscribe 00:20, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Images

Is there a LGBT images category anywhere? --Helenalex 04:04, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Not as far as I know on Wikipedia itself. However there is such a category on Commons- see Commons:Category:LGBT and its sub-categories. WjBscribe 04:08, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

The "LGBT musical groups" category - a question

How does one go about finding a definition of what makes an 'LGBT musical group'? There's a lot of ambiguous middle ground. I think the main category page should explain what an LGBT musical group is. While Frankie Goes to Hollywood is an obvious LGBT musical group, debate would surround whether Hüsker Dü (two gay members but lyrics rarely touch on LGBT themes) and The Smiths (singer widely thought to be gay and has become an LGBT icon) are LGBT musical groups.

See the comments on the talk page for the category.--h i s s p a c e r e s e a r c h 18:18, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:BLP

Came to my attention through a recent FAC: It appears that there are some extensive WP:BLP violations that need to be dealt with quickly on the series of articles beginning with List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people/A-E. Biographies of living persons require high quality reliable sources, and a number of the sources used there aren't even reliable sources, much less the highest-quality sources. As one example, http://www.andpop.com/celebrity/krista-allen/3?PHPSESSID=154e933bf65caeeb21c956691175018c is a Wiki ! (There are many more examples.) This is a pretty serious issue on Wiki, so I hope Project members will get on it right away; otherwise help can be requested at the BLP violations board. Ah, heck, I think policy now requires that I must delete that example, since I've highlighted it. I hope Project members will get on this prontissimo; I'd offer to help, but I'm going to be traveling. Consult with WP:BLPN if help is needed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:06, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I assure you we take these issues very seriously. My understanding was that all unsourced and poorly sourced entries had been removed from that list. Obviously this is not the case, I will review them immediately. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. WjBscribe 04:08, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I've looked at A-E (don't have time to check the others until I'm next online). I've removed a couple of others and improved the source for one but most seem properly sourced. The key question IMO is the reliability of andrejkoymasky.com. WjBscribe 04:56, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

andrejkoymasky.com

Looking at this website, I really don't think it meets WP:RS and have grave doubts about using it to source the lists, especially entries about living people. I've removed all entries sourced from this site pending a discussion of the merits of this site as a reliable source. Please comment at Talk:List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people/A-E#andrejkoymasky.com. Thanks, WjBscribe 04:56, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Recently tagged articles

I've changed the format of the Articles recently tagged as related to LGBT section to be a list of articles tagged in the last seven days instead of the last 25 articles. This was discussed last month with some support, but not a lot of discussion, unfortunately. Let's see how this works - we can always switch it back. Koweja 05:59, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Added LGBT Portal to Peter Pace's comment on Gays

Added portal on article on Peter Pace, in the section about his comments on gays —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Allyn (talk • contribs) 02:21, 14 March 2007 (UTC).

The portal is not a bad idea, however, you added the infobox on LGBTQ series. I changed it to the portal which is less intrusive on an article that is predominantly not about LGBT, only has a section. ZueJay (talk) 02:29, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for catching me on this. This is the first time I attempted this. --Allyn 02:57, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

No problem. It's a great idea. First time I've tried the portal (not the template) too. Maybe Coelacan can take a look and check that it's all right (Nudge, nudge, wink, wink). Keep up the good work all! ZueJay (talk) 03:05, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

TIME's online coverage and a few other sources[5] are also mentioning Eric Alva, so there may be some readers at that stub. — coel acan — 02:46, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

An editor has removed the portal from Peter Pace. Was wondering if others could give feedback on this before an edit war insues. Is there a project-wide perspective on where it is appropriate to have an LGBT portal? ZueJay (talk) 23:57, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Never in the mainspace. It's an internal mechanism that acts as a gateway to the mainspace, not the other way round. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

What do you mean by mainspace? The article? Should it maybe be on the talkpage then - just the portal not any other tags, etc.? Or should we just leave it be? ZueJay (talk) 00:02, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Dev, are you sure? Take a look at where the portal currently is - almost all of them are in main space... -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:01, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I was going to make a comment along the same lines, Satyr - most other portals seem to place links in the article space, usually in the "see also" or "references" section (see Portal:World War I and Portal:Biotechnology, for example). Obviously, not all portals have to operate in the same way, but that seems to be the common practice. Carom 01:08, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Those little portal boxes are designed to be placed on articles, but Wikipedia:Portal suggests they belong in the "see also" section. My view is that they should only be added when the portal subject is of central importance to the main subject of the article -- articles like Homosexuality, Lesbian, etc. (Several biographical articles I've worked on contain sections about the subject's time as an expatriate in Paris, but if Wikiproject France tried to add a portal box on that basis, it would be annoying.) —Cel ithemis 01:25, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Quite right, quite right. Carom 01:28, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Thought about this a bit more; have plunked around the Wikipedia portal pages a bit, mostly here and its associated pages. The most informative line I can find is:

“The idea of a portal is to help readers and/or editors navigate their way through Wikipedia topic areas through pages similar to the Main Page. In essence, portals are useful entry-points to Wikipedia content.”

Which makes me think the unobtrusive LGBT portal would be an excellent inclusion in the “See also” section of articles that contain the LGBT banner on their talk page but not neccessarily any infoboxes alongside the article. Articles encompassed by this idea might include biographies of LGBT individuals and activists. However, it would make sense NOT to add it to articles not primarily concerned with LGBT. Recall that the portal code is {{Portal|LGBT sidebar}}. ZueJay (talk) 02:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok, now I've read that policy, let me slightly amend my statement: never link to the portal at the top of an article in place of an infobox. This is what I was thinking of, it didn't occur to me that people put it in the see also section. I still find that odd, but I can understand the reason why. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:30, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

LGBT Category

You know, it's really disheartening when this project is used to *remove* the category from people who are gay and forcing us to *cite* every instance. Do heteros cite every hetero? Of course they don't have a category, are we supposed to portray everything hetero-normative? That doesn't make for a very welcoming project. We certainly don't need to be policing ourselves do we? There are *plenty* of others who will police us you know. Wjhonson 08:06, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy requires all information to be sourced. So if an editor wishes to state that someone is gay, a reliable source must be included to back up that information. Also, this project is not meant to push any agenda other than that of improving this encyclopedia. —Mira 08:30, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Believe me, this project is much better off policing itself than waiting for others to do so. Things run a lot smoother that way. And WP:V applies to everyone. Lists maintained by this project are only able to survive AFD on the merits of their reliable sources. And on a related note, if some article says that some person is heterosexual, there's better be a reliable citation for that statement or it comes down. — coel acan — 09:03, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Removing the LGBT cat from an article doesn't say the subject is straight, it doesn't even say that it isn't LGBT. It just says the article as written doesn't include information supporting the claim that the subject is LGBT-related. To be honest, the heteronormative part of this is the assumption that they're straight if they aren't labeled with the LGBT cat. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 13:39, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

When is it ever explicitly pointed out that people are straight? If it was it would probably need to be cited as well. And as Coelacan said, it's better for the LGBT project to remove categories than for the entire article/list be deleted for violating WP:BLP. Koweja 19:52, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Barnstar vandalism?

Does anyone have an estimate for how often the LGBT barnstar used for vandalizing userpages? I just saw two different IPs (almost certainly the same person) place it on dozens of user pages. —dgies^t_c 05:10, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Now that's a new and innovative form of vandalism! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 06:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

That's just...weird. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 08:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Ha. Going to school in a homophobic enviroment, I can see why some idiots would do that.Nukleoptra 17:35, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

New editing drive

Following the endless brouhaha over WP:BLP, I am announcing a new editing drive. SatyrTN has kindly compiled a list of people who are in LGBT categories but are not on our LGBT lists. The list is here. All people on this list needs to be either added to our LGBT lists with reliable sources or else have their LGBT categories removed.

Once we have accomplished this, WP:BLP will never be much of a problem again, as we will have reliable sources for everyone currently categorised as LGBT.

In this spirit, I ask everyone to pitch in and help out with this. Just looking at one person's article a day and spending a few minutes sourcing them would reduce the backlog in 20 days. That's just one article a day. Please, please, please, commit to this small request. Thank you, Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:54, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

What do we do if we can't find a reliable reference? I've just searched all over for Ebine Yamaji and, while she's almost definitely a lesbian, I'm unable to find a good ref. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 16:01, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Similarly with Abha Dawesar. Any thoughts on what should be done? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:19, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

This seems an inevitable, predictable, unavoidable conundrum in the LGBT community. To use the most stringent definition of a credible source, we will not find many of the known LGBT folks in these sources as "credible" media will not make LGBT a primary aspect of their pantheon. Credible media also tends to contradict itself, a prime example being with regards to the gender identity of Brandon Teena.
I don't have any great suggestion though; Err on the side of caution and remove them from the cats but perhaps leave the project tag on their page until we can come up with a more concrete solution? ZueJay (talk) 16:51, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Maybe Category:Unsourced LGBT people ? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 20:03, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

That kinda leaves us with the same problem, tho' with a different name. Tagging folks with the LGBT label when they may well not be - Alison^☺ 00:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we can do that. Since sourcing is a fundamental precept to Wikipedia (even if it's often not done), I don't think we can have an unsourced class. Aleta 01:05, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Maybe for now we could move the names to a separate section at the end of the "to be sorted" list for further research. I imagine that for many of these there are good sources that just aren't easily findable online. (I'd be interested to see how many of them actually fail verification, anyway.) —Cel ithemis 01:58, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

What if the source is the person's own autobiography? Aaron Fricke's autobiography, Confessions of a Rock Lobster, is mentioned in his article, and he definitely comes out in the text. Is that sufficient to consider him "sourced"? --DrGaellon (talk | contribs) 19:14, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Definitely, IMHO. Even if he came out his own blog, I would think that would be considered sourced. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 19:19, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, as well. If he wrote it, that's sufficient! Aleta 20:52, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Category:LGBT rights activists question

Was working on an article listed at Category:LGBT rights activists and ended up posing a question on the cat's name at Category talk:LGBT rights activists#Activists and supporters?. Since the cat doesn't seem to see a lot of activity, wanted to post a note here to generate response. Thanks, ZueJay (talk) 21:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

List of transgendered people

It has been proposed that this article be renamed List of transgender people. Those with a view on this may want to comment at Talk:List of transgendered people#Requested move. WjBscribe 07:18, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Gay Pride

I think this article tell not good what Gay Pride is. History and some Critics is good. The first sentenses are not. "no shame", proud, etc. In not good in english to make it self. The italien Artikle is shorter, bt a little better in this point. The first version of Gay Pride here was with a "see also" to reparative therapy. :-) --Fg68at de:Disk 22:54, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

George Takei

Probably guilty of lack of confidence here, but I wanted to verify a couple of things related to the George Takei article. Firstly, the article is categorised as LGBT Asian Americans, but not listed in "our" list of LGBT people, nor in the 'to be sorted' list. So should this article be tagged with the {{LGBTProject}} tag in its talk page, and should Takei be put on that list? I would have thought so. Just surprised that it has been missed.

Secondly, would this article be rated Start or B-class? I can't decide, though I like to err on the side of Start. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mentality (talk • contribs) 07:23, 18 March 2007 (UTC).

Looks like the article's talkpage was tagged on 9 January 2007 and rated 'B' [6]. He is listed at List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people/P-T [7] (which apparently I added him to myself on 8 December 2006). Which explains why his article isn't in the "To be sorted" list... WjBscribe 13:30, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Err, I don't know why or how I missed that. Bizarre, I could have sworn.... oh I was probably drunk! Thanks though :-) Mentality 12:15, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Notability of "Homosexuality and religion" articles

An editor has tagged Homosexuality and Scientology and Homosexuality in Norse paganism with notability tags and declared them trivial. Someone else suggested that he tag all the "homosexuality and religion" articles similarly! Folks may want to comment on and/or beef-up those articles. -Aleta 22:10, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Homosexuality and Scientology? That really only needs two words: *** ******. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:40, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Tut tut tut... ;-) WjBscribe 23:28, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Tsk, tsk. Scurrilous rumour, that :-D - Alison^☺ 23:34, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Someone else agrees :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 00:32, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

LOL!! Awesome :) - Alison^☺ 00:53, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

He's also targeted Homosexuality and Bahá'í Faith. This person believes these articles should be removed entirely. Aleta 23:01, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I think its time this guy decided to Put up or shut up. Either he AfDs them or he gets on with doing something productive... WjBscribe 23:07, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

$5 says Unification Church views of sexuality is the next target. — coel acan — 17:22, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

here's an interesting article

Eastern Orthodox view of sin. Title would suggest it's rather general. Guess what the half the subject matter is? — coel acan — 18:51, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Interesting, indeed. I've tagged it. Aleta 19:12, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

However I'm not sure about inclusion of that article in Template:Religion and homosexuality. That template already has Homosexuality and Christianity. There are also Homosexuality and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Homosexuality and Presbyterianism (just tagged), Quaker views of homosexuality, Anglican views of homosexuality, and maybe others. Someone had an idea at some point to use Template:Homosexuality and Christianity for Christian denominations. We could merge. That would make Template:Religion and homosexuality a little Christian-heavy though. Any objections to expanding the titles of thes abbreviated templates, by the way? And is isn't it strange that there's Homosexuality in the Roman Catholic priesthood but not Homosexuality and Roman Catholicism? — coel acan — 19:52, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

The Boys in the Band (play)

A well meaning Wikipedian who is not a project member has twice now changed the rating of our project tag from this article from Start to B class, in spite of both SatyrTN and myself evaluating it (independently of one another) as start. I note that the article about the film is longer and also rated start, so we are at least consistent. Maybe somebody could take a look at it and give a third opinion. Jeffpw 20:48, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

To me it seems obviously a 'Start' article. It could be improved in a number of ways, for starters a large portion of the article is dominated by explanations of the characters and a very short summary of their profiles, whereas if this were a true B class such things might have their own section. Hardly any of the article is devoted to the true meaning/plot of the story and it's short in length (which admittedly isn't always relevant, but it is here). Mentality 21:29, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I'll copy this comment over to Talk:The Boys in the Band (play) for the benefit of the other editor there. — coel acan — 21:33, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Of possible interest?

Michael Dillon, the first female to male transsexual at least in one sense of the word, see [8]. Book title is "The First Man-Made Man." Not really my area but I notice there is no article on this individual or the other key individuals mentioned. --70.51.231.230 23:42, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Fun with Babelfish

This made me laugh - "The German capital is considered to many lesbians, gays and Transgendern from all world as center of a pulsating Homoszene" :)

But if anyone can tell me what the actual event is called, I'd be grateful :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 05:16, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

They seem to run a football tournament called the Come Together Cup. It's probably not quite as much of a pulsating homoscene as the name would suggest, though. —Cel ithemis 07:18, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

'*lol* :-) Berlin is in the European community certainly a very important city. I think also for the World. So i.e. after San Francisco and New York and London. elledorado gather Money for different events and activities. i.e. the biggest de:Teddy Award fr:Teddy Award, the LGBT-Film-Award on the Berlinale, a lesbian film festival, and a soccer-cup. The other Money goes to different groups and persons in the categories arts, music, theater, film or sports. per year they gather 10.000 Euro. There is no actual event. --Fg68at de:Disk 13:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

So they are more of an LGBT organization and probably don't belong on the List of LGBT events? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:07, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

I Fixed it. There are 3 Charity-Games in 3 cities. They all firm under "Come Together Cup". Köln is organized by a own Team, Essen by the local AIDS-help organisation and Berlin by elledorado. Köln has a Subsite, Essen has its own Website and Berlin has a Subsite at sonntags-club. --Fg68at de:Disk 14:28, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Ads

Qxz has started and advertising banner, and he's welcoming WikiProject ads. I'd like us to have one, but shall we put in it? Three slides seems to be the norm (hook, follow up, lasting image), and I thought it would be quite amusing to have the final one have our rainbow flag with pen to the left and our name with "Absolutely no agenda. Except that gay one." underneath it. Your thoughts? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 04:14, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Nooooo! This looks like it has the potential to be horribly annoying, not to mention hard on those of us with slow connections. -Aleta 04:19, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

It is a purely optional extra on userpages, and if this is going to take off, we ought to get in on it, no? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 04:28, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Anh, I suppose it's probably inevitable, but I don't like it. Aleta 04:33, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I love it! I'm already starting to think of a catchy ad campaign for us. I do agree, however, that they should stay confined to userpages, and not on articles (but maybe talk pages related to the subject of the ad). Jeffpw 09:16, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Qxz has made it very clear that these will not be used outside of userspace. WjBscribe 23:53, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Interesting conundrum.

I submitted Andrew Van De Kamp as a start to Jumpaclass and the seven days are up - and Andrew is currently on FAC with 87% support. So, my question is, how the hell do we rate this? It never even saw GA. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:29, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, if we're going to be strict about it, then I guess it counts as a 'B-class' :-P. Though I guess a jump to FA is possible if it is granted FA status with no further edits to it after the 7 days were up. But it would seem a shame to endanger the FA bit for jumpaclass status... WjBscribe 23:51, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Or we could agree time extension for any article that is on GA or FA review by the end of the days...? WjBscribe 23:52, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it's going to pass on the strength of what I did to it during the set time period. Every edit since has been implementing minor suggestions. Do I get extra points for jumping it four classes instead of two? :-) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 00:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Revisit V for Vendetta

I'm patrolling LGBT cats for the (very few) articles that don't have our project banner. Once again, V for Vendetta has come up. Upon reviewing the article, I'm considering whether or not it belongs in the project. I would have agreed that "a few minor gay characters does not a gay theme make" (as Jeffpw pointed out in an edit summary), but further review shows things like a quote "one of the most pro-gay ever" and "conservative Christian groups were critical of the film's negative portrayal of Christianity and sympathetic portrayal of homosexuality and Islam". Any thoughts pro or con? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:54, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Well at risk of speaking to myself (I think I've said this three times now) I believe it is well within our scope. Not because of minor gay characters but because it deals with a totalitarian regime that persecutes homosexuals. The point that everyone should be allowed to love each other regardless of gender is made strongly (there is an entire segment of the film dedicated to the lives of a lesbian and her lovers) and implicitly accepted by the major (non-gay) characters. The film deals with the politics of gay oppression as well as the personal sexuality of minor characters. WjBscribe 15:16, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

WJBscribe seems to say it all. Most importantly there is a fairly predominant part of the film, almost a sub-story, which revolves around a lesbian couple. It repeatedly mentions homosexuality as a target group of the regime that is in power within the film...and I don't think it's a coincidence Stephen Fry was picked to play a gay character. It's a very "gay friendly" film which has controversial elements of homosexuality as a running theme, it seems obvious it should have an LGBT tag. Mentality 15:52, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, my views on the subject of articles that aren't on predominantly gay themes have been as oft repeated as WJBscribe's. As this is an issue that will only keep rearing its head, maybe it's time to better define our scope - if necessary, by vote. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:32, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I imagine that is not the sort of thing that can be decided by vote. There are too many subtleties of opinion. I could be wrong though. — coel acan — 17:43, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Maybe this is one of those gray areas where we leave it up to individual editors and/or individual articles? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 17:56, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

That only leads to edit wars over tags, as we had over Buffy, remember? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:00, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but we followed the "correct" procedure and a) talked it over and b) brought it before both the article's editors and the project. That would seem like good process. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 18:04, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

If an editor thinks it should fall under our purview and is willing (even if the only one) to support it as such, why not include it? Aleta 18:54, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Because it renders our assessment system meaningless. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 00:39, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

What? No it doesn't. That should not affect the assessment of quality at all. (I am assuming *some* valid reason for for including it in the purview of the preoject, even if not everyone would agree it is enough I'm not implying that any random article be included.) -Aleta 03:09, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

It very much falls under the category. It's practically a gay film. Maybe not even because of the characters (like Valerie and Gordon) but because it's a massive theme throughout. Buffy, too, as much as Torchwood.21:54, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Tab restart*

Although it does very much fall under the category, at the moment the article has almost no content relating to the persecution of homosexuals. It would need to have that added and referenced (and preserved long enough) before any talk of categorising it is useful. That goes for both V for vendetta and V for vendetta (film). Cheers! Lauren^♫/∆ 02:50, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Don Dunstan

Don Dunstan (an Australian state premier who pioneered gay rights legislation in Australia) was tagged as being LGBT related but a small group of people keep removing the tags. The people who claim thet "wrote" the article keep removing all gay references from the article with comments such as "take your activism elsewhere". This article may need a closer watch as it won't turn up on the watchlist if the tags are removed. 150.203.2.85 03:28, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

It might be an idea if a fresh pair of eyes took a look at this article. Its the usual problem with lack of strong verifiable sources for someone who was pretty widely known to be gay (at least towards the end of his life). I think there should be a bit more about the likelihood that he was gay (I mean he lived with a man and the Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia has said so -though not in a judicial capacity ;-) ) but never publicly came out. The issue is one of care over sourcing rather than anything more sinister. I think an overcautious line has been taken but can understand why. I suspect a well-sourced paragraph detailing the controversy may be the best way to go- not sure adding LGBT people category tags is a brilliant idea though. See discussion at Talk:Don Dunstan. WjBscribe 03:33, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I filled his entry in long, loooooong ago, but I found this reference for it. I have no idea how I found it : Spoehr, John (2000). Don Dunstan: Politics and Passion. Bookends Books. ISBN 1-876725-18-4. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dev920 (talk • contribs) 08:59, 26 March 2007 (UTC).

The article has been edited again with the comment "i will not have this article, or any article, become a vehicle for activism of any kind". 150.203.2.85 01:35, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Jody Dobrowski

I slightly improved this article some time ago, but I would like a picture up and some sort of bio table on the page. There's a black and white one of him that would be a good likeness of the Matthew Shepherd article. The scare-mongering of "Upload a copyrighted picture and face your ACCOUNT BEING DELETED" mantra has put me off understanding the ins and outs of copyright bureaucracy, so I'm sure it's my own Wiki-ineptitude that's preventing me from finding one. Can someone who's more knowledgeable than me find a pic of him? I put this on the article's talk page, along with a request for anyone who knows how to find out his D.O.B, but to no avail. Mentality 11:08, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Image added. Please check licensing, somebody. Jeffpw 12:02, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Whoo, thank you :-) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mentality (talk • contribs) 12:40, 27 March 2007 (UTC).

Whilst on this article, does anyone think this is worthy of B-class article status now? Mentality 12:49, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

It is and I raised it. You've done a hell of a lot of work improving it. Thanks, Mentality! Jeffpw 12:53, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Photos, photos, photos - PART DEUX

I just had breakfast with Evan Wolfson this morning. He knows about 95% of gay leaders, is friends or friendly with them. He offered to get in touch with them for me to do photo shoots with them for WP. I simply don't have the time to do an exhaustive search for who we need, or want updated, photographs of. So, if you know, or have a goal, now is the time to ask. --David Shankbone 14:44, 30 March 2007 (UTC)