Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 11:02, 9 June 2019

Before posting, check the archives and list of perennial sources for prior discussions. Context is important: supply the source, the article it is used in, and the claim it supports.

Sections older than 5 days archived by lowercase sigmabot III.

Additional notes:

• WP:RSN
• WP:RS/N
• WP:V/N

• RFCs for deprecation, blacklisting, or other classification should not be opened unless the source is widely used and has been repeatedly discussed. Consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments.
• While the consensus of several editors can generally be relied upon, answers are not policy.
• This page is not a forum for general discussions unrelated to the reliability of sources.

RfC: TRT World

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

Y Consensus exists that TRT World is reliable for statements regarding the official views of the Turkish government but not reliable for subjects with which the Turkish government could be construed to have a conflict of interest. For other miscellaneous cases, it shall be assumed to be reliable enough. ∯WBG 10:13, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

What is the best way to describe the reliability of TRT World? --Jamez42 (talk) 07:55, 8 May 2019 (UTC) 16:25, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

@Jamez42: I've removed the "RfC:" from the section heading, since this discussion doesn't use the {{rfc}} tag. If you would like to turn this discussion into an RfC, please follow the directions at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment, and then change the section heading back. — Newslinger talk 07:53, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Notified: Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Turkey, Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Television — Newslinger talk 08:04, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

It would probably help to use the four-option response format:

• Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
• Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
• Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail

--Sunrise (talk) 01:15, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

• It will not be neutral and will be intrinsically unreliable. Media in Turkey is not classed as Free and TRT is a state-run body fully under the control of the Turkish government. ] 89.242.251.96 (talk) 15:57, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

Reliable for what it's reliable for - I think you're going to have to be more specific about this: what are you relying on TRT to show? FOARP (talk) 12:13, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

This RfC has been renewed for another 30 days due to low participation. — Newslinger talk 07:55, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 2 - reliable for statements regarding the official views of the Turkish government, not reliable for subjects with which the Turkish government could be construed to have a conflict of interest, otherwise generally reliable. _signed, Rosguill 01:25, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
• (Summoned by bot)Option 2 per above. SemiHypercube 15:54, 12 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2 - Rosguill said it perfectly. petrarchan47คุก 07:13, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2. Generally seems to be treated as reliable by other sources with clear exceptions described by Rosguill. Ralbegen (talk) 12:22, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2 Per Rosguill. Comatmebro (talk) 19:00, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2 I agree with Rosguill, that can be applied to most news outlets. They aren't reliable where they have conflict of interest.--01:27, 24 May 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by SharabSalam (talk • contribs)
• Option 2 per Rosguill · · · Peter Southwood : 08:35, 24 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2 barely. There is a wide spectrum in degrees of reliability in both independent/private media and state-run media. When the political situation on the ground changes, i.e. there is a change or shift in the regime's control of the media, the media sitiation changes too, by definition. As numerous Misplaced Pages articles on the history and the politics of Turkey inform us, the regime in the country has turned more authoritarian. Therefore, constant vigilance would be required as to the use of TRT as a source. Accordingly, we should also be prepared to downgrade its status to the third option. -The Gnome (talk) 10:12, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

RfC: IMDb

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

Y Consensus in favor. ∯WBG 16:29, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Should IMDb (Internet Movie Database) be added to User:XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList, which tells User:XLinkBot to automatically revert edits containing citations of IMDb in <ref> tags by unregistered users and accounts under 7 days old? This behavior is subject to additional limitations described at User:XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList. — Newslinger talk 18:08, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

• Yes. Most of IMDb is user-generated and unusable for Misplaced Pages articles, as established by 12 previous discussions on this noticeboard. Despite this, many less experienced editors continue to cite IMDb inappropriately, which introduces violations of the verifiability and living persons policies into articles on a regular basis. Adding IMDb to User:XLinkBot/RevertReferencesList would slow the addition of these inappropriate citations.

  New editors and unregistered users who add a reference to IMDb would be reverted by User:XLinkBot, as seen in Special:Diff/897360391 for Discogs. XLinkBot would then send the user a talk page warning that looks like Special:Diff/897360410. The warning tells the user to undo the bot's revert if they believe the edit was appropriate.

  The RevertReferencesList is currently used to reduce inappropriate citations to Discogs (RSP entry) and Crunchbase (RSP entry). External links to IMDb, which are encouraged in WP:ELP § IMDb, are not affected by this proposed measure. This RfC is the continuation of a discussion at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist § IMDB. — Newslinger talk 18:08, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

• Yes I did not know such a thing existed, given this is a user generated content site Yes, yes we should.Slatersteven (talk) 18:12, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Absolutely - It has been well established that IMDB is not a reliable source and, like Misplaced Pages, virtually anyone can edit it. DarkKnight2149 18:16, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Enthusiastic f yeah it's not even that "virtually" anyone can edit it - anyone can edit it and to remove false content (lord knows I've tried, repeatedly) is next to impossible. And also maybe an AWB bot run would be nice to remove it from any existing articles as a reference and replace it with CN.Praxidicae (talk) 18:17, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
  • @Praxidicae: I've had similar experiences. For some reason, the site allows to people to post information without proof, but it's policy you have to prove that it's not true in order for it to be removed. What kind of an information base is that? In one particular instance, someone posted their non-factual subjective opinion of a movie in the "Trivia" section but put an obligatory "It's considered..." in front of it. I tried to have it removed on those grounds, but the change was denied because of their backwards "proof" policy :/ DarkKnight2149 07:07, 17 May 2019 (UTC)
    • Oh, I can do better than that! I once contacted IMDb, with proof, that one series in their listing contained a fictitious episode that did not exist, and it was still rejected because "EpGuides (another site that doesn't have perfect trackrecord) agrees with IMDb's current info". So even if you give them proof, IMDb still won't fix wrong stuff! --IJBall (contribs • talk) 12:24, 17 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes If anything I would support reverting anything by non-extended confirmed and/or notification about why this is a bad reference for anyone. It is a great external link so I wouldn't support blacklist but anything we can do to discourage/prevent its use as a serious reference should be done. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 18:19, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

• Yes – IMDb is not a reliable source for anything, which is frequently a source of confusion for new editors. This is a great idea. – bradv🍁 18:20, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes, I would support this, for all the reasons outlined. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 19:04, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes Sir Joseph 19:09, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes, provided it doesn't affect IMDb-affiliated places such as Box Office Mojo. AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 19:41, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

• Yes Please ~ as per everyone above i think, inc. Newslinger, bradv and Barkeep49. ~ BOD ~ 19:56, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes - It would save editors the effort of reverting such poor sources on TV/Movie pages. Esuka (talk) 20:40, 16 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes anyone can edit IMDb, having the reliability of a personal blog. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 07:22, 17 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes - I didn't know that imdb was mostly user-generated and used it with impunity when I first started doing edits. It would have been useful to have some sort of alert about this, in the same way that you are informed about various vanity publishing houses. Also, an additional question - Is the use of imdb discouraged in citing any sort of information or just some? Can it be used, for example, in stubs about obscure films to source the year the film was launched or its length, or even the film's very existence, when a better source isn't available? PraiseVivec (talk) 12:39, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

  ​Misplaced Pages:Citing IMDb states that it's okay to use IMDb for writing credits that are directly supplied by the Writers Guild of America and for MPAA ratings reasons that are directly supplied by the Motion Picture Association of America. For released films, citing running times is "disputed", and IMDb would definitely not count toward a film's notability. — Newslinger talk 17:23, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

  Thanks for the clarification. Well, maybe the Misplaced Pages:Citing IMDb page should be linked in the alert received by users that are trying to use imdb as a resource. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:28, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

  ​I should also mention WikiProject Film's guidance on questionable sources, which discourages the use of IMDb in general, but says that it can be a good tool to help editors find more reliable sources to cite. I don't think it's possible to customize the warning message at the moment, but an entry can be added to User:XLinkBot/Reversion reasons (which is linked to from User:XLinkBot) to explain this to editors. — Newslinger talk 17:54, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Surely there are other sources for this information?Slatersteven (talk) 17:32, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

I've checked several featured articles of recent films, and it looks like the MPAA rating is usually not included in a film's article unless it was mentioned by reliable sources. The credits can reference official listings published by film companies, TV companies, or other distributors. It's also acceptable omit a citation for the credits, which implies that the credits were sourced from the film itself as a primary source, much like the track listing in album articles. — Newslinger talk 18:05, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

So we lose nothing by the above suggestion, and avoid any wiklaywering about "butitsreliableforthisism".Slatersteven (talk) 18:09, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes, it would be best to avoid citing IMDb completely. — Newslinger talk 18:10, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

• Yes of course, and, yes, again per all^^^ ——SerialNumber54129 12:23, 18 May 2019 (UTC)
• Comment. If IMDb is so bad, why is it cited by The New York Times ? wumbolo ^^^ 12:02, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

• One should note that the New York Times no longer "fact checks" its own articles, as the era of old-time newspapers has faded. That it used sources Misplaced Pages declines to use does not suddenly make such sources reliable. What it does do is make the "guaranteed reliable sources" no longer able to be guaranteed. They even abolished the Public Editor position with its head saying our followers on social media and our readers across the internet have come together to collectively serve as a modern watchdog. Anyone care to defend that statement? Collect (talk) 12:16, 18 May 2019 (UTC)
• The New York Times has different goals and a different purpose than Misplaced Pages. In this context, it's what we would consider a WP:SECONDARY source - it has its own fact-checking mechanisms and reputation, and the journalists it employs are notionally experts, capable of providing interpretation on their own. None of that applies to Misplaced Pages - we rely on secondary sources like the NYT to provide interpretation and fact-checking for us. --Aquillion (talk) 17:58, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

Because we are not discussing it. Moreover I can write for IMDB, I cannot write for the NYT.Slatersteven (talk) 13:28, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

• 20 mule team yes. It is bad enough that their fact checking is minimal at best but getting them to fix an error is maddening and occasionally impossible. Here you can contact an editor who has posted something to an article - at IMDb you can't get to an individual at all. MarnetteD|Talk 15:01, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes – Proven unreliable over and over again. — JFG 15:08, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
• I would certainly favor a bot that alerted editors to our guidance on citing IMDb, but I hesitate when it comes to automated removal of citations. The problem with automated bots is that they don’t deal with exceptions well. Can this bot tell when a citation to IMDb falls into one of the rare exceptions mentioned at WP:citing IMDb? If not, then we have to continue to manually sort the good from the bad. Blueboar (talk) 15:56, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

  No, the bot doesn't identify these exceptions, but the talk page message (example: Special:Diff/897360410) that accompanies the revert tells the editor to undo the revert if the edit is acceptable: "If you were trying to insert an external link that does comply with our policies and guidelines, then please accept my creator's apologies and feel free to undo the bot's revert." Also, as I discussed with Slatersteven above, MPAA ratings are usually not mentioned unless covered by a different reliable source, and it's not necessary to cite IMDb for the writing credits, because the film itself can be used as a primary source for this information. Since citations of IMDb are either inappropriate or unnecessary, I think this proposal is a net positive. — Newslinger talk 08:18, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

• Hell yeah. Self-explanatory. JOEBRO64 00:48, 22 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes Go on. Sincerely, Masum Reza 18:05, 24 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes The website being user-generated makes it obviously unreliable. X-Editor (talk) 03:19, 25 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes IMDb's content is entirely user-generated; it is not a reliable source. Also, it is commonly added as a source by new users who do not understand our standards for sources. We need something that can end this flood. ―Susmuffin  21:15, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes Makes sense. It can never be valid in the ref tag. --SubSeven (talk) 06:50, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Yes please _signed, Rosguill 21:07, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Strange Fox News story about AOC and climate change

Some editors are eager to include a Fox News story to the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article (citing this noticeboard's decision to declare Fox News as a RS). The bolded text is the text in dispute:

• Ocasio-Cortez has called for "more environmental hardliners in Congress", describing climate change as "the single biggest national security threat for the United States and the single biggest threat to worldwide industrialized civilization" and stating that the world will end in 12 years unless the problem is addressed. Her comments referred to the recent United Nations report that established that unless carbon emissions are reined in over the next 12 years, the effects of climate change will be irreversible. In May 2019, Ocasio-Cortez contended that her statements were sarcastic and not intended to be taken literally; she added that “you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal. However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change.”

References

1. Aronoff, Kate (June 25, 2018). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Why She Wants to Abolish ICE and Upend the Democratic Party". In These Times. ISSN 0160-5992. Archived from the original on December 27, 2018. Retrieved January 27, 2019. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
2. Zhao, Christina (January 22, 2019). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Warns, 'World Is Going to End in 12 Years,' Reiterating Claims of Recent U.N. Climate Change Report". Newsweek. Archived from the original on February 24, 2019. Retrieved February 23, 2019. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
3. Cummings, William (January 22, 2019). "'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change,' Ocasio-Cortez says". USA Today. Archived from the original on February 7, 2019. Retrieved February 23, 2019. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
4. Ocasio-Cortez, Alexandria (2018). "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Platform: Mobilizing Against Climate Change". Ocasio2018.com (campaign website). Archived from the original on January 16, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
5. John, Bowden (January 22, 2019). "Ocasio-Cortez: 'World will end in 12 years' if climate change not addressed". The Hill. Archived from the original on March 5, 2019. Retrieved March 5, 2019. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
6. Mikelionis, Lukas (May 23, 2019). "AOC says only a 'sea sponge' would believe her '12 years' doomsday remark, but most Dems bought it". Fox News.

This text does adhere to the language of the Fox News story, but the problem is that the Fox News is absolute trash. For a very simple reason: the poll did not ask respondents whether the world would literally end in 12 yrs (even though the writer of the Fox News story suggests it did - it's such a rudimentary error that it's hard not to assume it's malicious). In their desperation to trash AOC and portray those seeking to curb climate change as lunatics, they ran a story that is completely and intentionally misleading, and now editors on Misplaced Pages are saying "Oh, Fox News is RS! It's a RS! Go to the RS noticeboard to have it deemed unreliable if you disagree!" while they edit-war to restore this crap content. So: 1. Can I please get confirmation from this noticeboard that this particular story is not valid for inclusion on Misplaced Pages?

This gets into a broader problem regarding Fox News' RS status: the stunning fact that Fox News is considered a reliable source in general on Misplaced Pages, but specifically on the topic of climate change. And I'm not talking about the opinion shows (most of whom are climate change deniers), it's the news division that is unreliable (the story above is a Fox News "news" piece). Academic books on the climate change denial movement have covered how the news division at Fox News has promoted falsehoods and fringe views on the subject of climate change:

• Bill Sammon, the Fox News Washington managing editor, instructing Fox News journalists to dispute the scientific consensus on climate change: "A leaked email from the managing editor of Fox News Washington, Bill Sammon, during the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009 reveals Fox’s scepti- cal policy towards climate change. Sammon advised Fox journalists to “refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called into question”." Page 174 of Marisol Sandoval. "From Corporate to Social Media: Critical Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility in Media and Communication Industries". Routledge.
• Bret Baier, a straight-news anchor -“In February 2010, a paper on sea level rise that had previously been published in Nature Geosciences74 was formally withdrawn75 by the authors because of an error they had identified subsequently in their calculations. Fox News announced the development in this vein: “More Questions About Validity of Global Warming Theory.”76 In fact, the error in the calculations had led the authors to projections of future sea level rise that were too low!77” Page 223 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.” Columbia University Press.
• Bill Hemmer, a straight-news anchor: Promotion of Climategate falsehoods: "“This particular falsehood had been promoted recently by venues such as Fox News , e.g., Bill Hemmer on Fox’s America’s Newsroom, December 3, 2009: “Recently leaked emails reveal that scientists use, quote, ‘tricks’ to hide evidence of a decline in global temperatures over the past, say, few decades." Page 353 of Michael E. Mann. “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From the Front Lines.” Columbia University Press.

See more here.

So: 2. Can I please get confirmation from this noticeboard that Fox News is not considered a reliable source on the subject of climate change? Surely if the managing editor of the network is instructing Fox News reporters to push fringe views on the subject of climate change, then it's not a RS on the subject. And this matters, given that editors are as we can see above adding deceptive Fox News stories on the subject of climate change to our articles. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 01:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

News spam is one of our biggest problems overall....not just fox news. Daily news coverage should be used exceedingly rarely overall. The propagation of daily news stories that are incomplete, opinionated are simply incompatible with an encyclopedic entry and result in a dead link in a month or so.... leading to debate over if the source even says what we say. This seems to be an extreme problem in political articles on the United States.....so much a concern.... that the academic community has criticized Misplaced Pages for blow by blow coverage over analytical coverage.--Moxy 🍁 02:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

1. Mainstream news organizations are often terrible at reporting on public opinion polling and on the sciences. They should be used with caution for those topics even if we generally rely on them for other stuff. 2. Fox is kind of an outlier with their AOC coverage, and it's probably WP:UNDUE to cite them if they are the only major news organization running with a story like this. General reliability is neither necessary nor sufficient for inclusion, and this is a case where editorial common sense should give us plenty reason to exclude this. Nblund 02:18, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

In general, we should not be including Twitter-based reactions in ongoing news stories -140 characters is nowhere near enough to derive sufficient context for what the person meant. (This applies both ways). On this, the Wiki text given is missing a key point in both AOC's and the Fox news stories, that she was saying that it was the GOP taking the story seriously or to whom her sarcasm was missed, and that's why the Fox story proceeds to describe how many Dems thought the 12 years were legit. So no, there's no issue on Fox's side outside of the overall media's probably of taking 140 characters to a full length article, and the larger issue is the UNDUE nature of this coverage. --Masem (t) 02:27, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

No, the Fox News story is not right at all. The story is falsely suggesting that Democrats believe that the world will literally end in 12 yrs (which the poll does not at all substantiate), and that therefore AOC believes they are idiots. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:34, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Snooganssnoogans what about the USA Today report:

sparked conservative criticism when she said Monday that she and other young Americans fear "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change."
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., made the remark during an interview with writer Ta-Nehisi Coates at the MLK Now event in New York City celebrating the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.
Ocasio-Cortez called the fight to mitigate the effects of climate change her generation's "World War II."
"Millennials and Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up, and we're like, 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change, and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?' " she said.

There is nothing wrong with this USA Today report. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:14, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

They are reporting what the survey gave. So unless we know the survey's wrong, and Fox is purposely misreporting it, then there's nothing like that in the actual Fox story. The poll results are available (though the breakout by party affiliation is behind a paywell) So no, Fox is not misreporting, they specifically note the context is with respect to the GOP (which you'd think they want to ignore). --Masem (t) 03:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Basically yes, unless user:Snooganssnoogans has a reliable source that proves the survey invalid, I don't see why his personal opinion overrules the reporting.--Rusf10 (talk) 04:19, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I never at any point said that the poll was unreliable. What are you talking about? What I said was that Fox News are misreporting the poll results. This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Fox News is lying about what the poll says: the poll does not at all ask respondents whether the world will literally end in 12 yrs (i.e. AOC is not calling Democrats idiots). The Fox News story, which is entitled "AOC says only a 'sea sponge' would believe her '12 years' doomsday remark, but most Dems bought it" is not complicated to read. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 09:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

That's "spin", which is common to all MSM. I can read that statement one way and agree that it is completely misrepresenting the survey question, but I can read the same statement in another way to say it is one "colorful" way to phrase it but not actually wrong. They later are more exacting and non-obtusely correct about what the survey question is. This is not unique to Fox. (And yes, headline is extremely clickbait, but this is why we have stated that ALL RS headlines should not be used as a "reliable source" or any type of statement due to the clickbait used nowadays. --Masem (t) 13:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

It's a straight-up falsehood, and in this case it has deceived multiple editors, including Rusf10 (who edit-warred the misrepresentation into the AOC page, yet bizarrely also claimed that your comment was correct) and SunCrow (who tried to have me sanctioned for reverting this rubbish). And no, the problem is not just with the headline, so please do not dismiss my concerns with "Headlines are not RS. Everybody move on." I've explicitly referred to the body of the article, and even copied the deceptive text into our discussion here. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 13:47, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

That's what "spin" is, its meant to confuse readers or obfuscate the details. I agree the first paragraph of the Fox article is badly worded to frame the story, but it is not "wrong", because it remains vague on what "end in 12 years" meant, whether it is "earth blows up in 12 years" or "irreversible change" is not clear. I fully agree Fox is cherry-picking its interpretations here between what AOC actually said and what the poll questioned, but that's tactics used in every press room to gain the audience to their side. I point to the later paragraph in the Fox article that is much more direct and accurate "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change. Out of all total likely voters, 48 percent of respondents believed the apocalyptic claim." So again, this is not a wrong story, but it is the type that needs to be understood and the underlying sources evaluated to know what is meant, and that should be done only after considering if this is even UNDUE to include or not (I'm firmly thinking it is not appropriate to include even if it came from the NYTimes - its blithering on a twitter comment which is useless for an encyclopedia). --Masem (t) 13:54, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Ah, ok. So all RS lie and deceive (citation needed), therefore we should accept Fox News as a RS on the subject of climate change, even though the news division puts out deceptive stories about the subject and the managing editor of Fox News has instructed his reporters to cast doubt on the scientific consensus on climate change. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Nearly all media engage in opinionated reporting nowadays especially on issues they show bias on. Doesn't make them non-RSes, but it means we use those RSes with care to work around the spin. This is why the less we actually cover of ongoing controversies (and wait for more academic or time-separated coverage) is far better for the encyclopedia, so that we're not dealing with the mudslinging and spin of day-to-day reporting, making it easier to use sources that have 20/20 hindsight working for them. So yes, any story on climate change from Fox News that is deemed of appropriate nature to include, and not covered elsewhere, I would make sure to double check if there's any collaborating info (here we can validate the poll questions). I don't know what goes on at Fox but I would actually not be surprised if they are told to create a cloud of doubt around climate change, but I'm also of the same concern that editors at CNN and other media also are instructed to create similar clouds of doubt around, say, Trump and so on. When we see such stories, we're not eliminating them as RSes, but we need to get out of that cloud to know how to actually present it. As to the specific bolded addition, I do think it is wrong, as misses that AOC and Fox's story point out that the GOP were taking the "12 years" claim as a fact; its clear Fox news jumped to that poll to go "Well, yeah, GOP does it, but so does the Dems! Look here!" --Masem (t) 14:26, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Is However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change.” considered to be a misrepresentation of the poll? If so, how? - Ryk72 13:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Aye. But that's not the text that's in (or out of) our article. The text that being discussed for our article is as I've quoted it above, and that does appear to be supported by the Fox News source. If it's not demonstrably contradicted by the study itself, then I'd say Fox News is reliable for inclusion. Like Masem, however, I think there are better pegs to hang the leave it out hat on. - Ryk72 14:10, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

The text that's in dispute suggests that AOC is calling democrats brain-dead when she does absolutely no such thing (just like the Fox News story): In May 2019, Ocasio-Cortez contended that her statements were sarcastic and not intended to be taken literally; she added that “you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal. However, a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I pointed this out before but if you go to AOC's original tweet , she clearly IDes that quote related to the GOP. The choice of Fox News to leave it out is not making it factually "wrong" - that's what she did say - but it is 100% spin because they didn't give full context. Then they go and use the poll that shows Dems believed the statement (related to irreversible change), which just adds to the spin. Nothing's factually wrong, but it is also not Pulitzer prize-winning, and if that was included in WP in that fashion it would break all NPOV alarms. We just have to look past that. --Masem (t) 14:43, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

And that's a much better peg! - Ryk72 14:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Just a point - this noticeboard did NOT declare Fox News to be RS. It just failed to uniformly ban it as non-RS. It can still be not RS depending on circumstances.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:12, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Another point - this noticeboard didn't declare Fox News to NOT be a RS, and that's why we adhere to WP:NEWSORG which answers the question quite well: News reporting from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact (though even the most reputable reporting sometimes contains errors). The most watched cable news station makes it well-established. Everything beyond that is possibly either opinion-based, or perception-based, a bit of speculation, or easing into DONTLIKEIT territory. _Talk 📧 14:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Fox News being the most watched cable news station merely confirms that The Masses Are Asses.- MrX 🖋 15:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Who got the most votes in 2016, MrX? Do the masses approve or disapprove of Trump? Enlighten us. 174.211.4.175 (talk) 21:10, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources#Fox_News kind of disagrees, in that "generally reliable" is about as "high" as we go. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:35, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

If the motive here is to declare the most-watched cable news network unreliable based on what...????...political bias? It's time to take a closer look at all news sources and maybe add several more networks/publications to the unreliable list if Fox is going to be added because of "media failures". We may need to look closer at some journalists and maybe a few academics for some of the same reasons per the following articles:

1. Harvard about network propaganda
2. WaPo writes about made-up Trump quote
3. The Intercept...
4. Strathprints
5. Journal of Gender Studies
6. Black Agenda Report
7. Politico
8. Harvard to NYTimes
9. Guardian about Abramson
10. AP & NYTimes bungled fact-checks

There are many more articles that name names and address this very topic. I think the point that needs to be made is the fact that it's not just Fox, there are quite a few others in the same boat. The bigger problems arise when editors fail to closely adhere to our own PAGs, such as NOTNEWS, NEWSORG, RECENTISM, NPOV, V, SYNTH, etc. _Talk 📧 06:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Lying about science is not "political bias". Spreading of discredited fringe views is not "political bias". It is just caused by political bias. So, bias alone does not make a source unreliable. Unreliability does. As in: something you cannot rely on. That is what the word comes from, you know.

When it comes to climate change, Fox News is clearly an unreliable source. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:08, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

@Atsme: What is the source of that list? cygnis insignis 10:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Cygnis insignis - my research sourced it. _Talk 📧 16:53, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Ratings have nothing to do with it - popular tastes denote notability, not reliability. The "everyone are biased" argument is false; the extent of Fox's biases reach so far beyond that of other news outlets, that many scholars don't even consider it "news". Lauren Feldman, Rutgers: "while MSNBC is certainly partisan and traffics in outrage and opinion, its reporting—even on its prime-time talk shows—has a much clearer relationship with facts than does coverage on Fox." Nicole Hemmer, UV: "it's the closest we’ve come to having state TV". Joe Peyronnin, Hofstra: "it's as if the President had his own press organization". Daniel Kreiss, UNC: "Fox’s appeal lies in the network’s willingness to explicitly entwine reporting and opinion in the service of Republican, and white identity." This isn't just "bias", it's a whole alternative agenda that isn't journalism. François Robere (talk) 12:11, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I am of the opinion RS policy should be blind,else we just get to exclude stuff we do not like. What we should do is attribute. However the source does not support the text anyway, except its headline. Its clear the text says "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world”". I have no idea to be honest but wwe may need a rule about "No headlines", this has cropped up time and again.Slatersteven (talk) 08:50, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

That is common sense (I hope), headlines can be really crappy sources. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

The problem is not just the headline. This is the opening paragraph: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 11:48, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Sadly then I cannot see a way round this, unless we start to use "but I don't like it". I think in this instance we attribute it, and then provide the quote that is actually about the poll in question. We let the reader decide if Fox is telling porkies.Slatersteven (talk) 11:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

No, we are not here to repeat obvious falsehoods on behalf of the most watched news station. The way around it is to not use the trashy source. - MrX 🖋 16:06, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Not an RS. Fox News is not only a poor source on climate change, it's also inexorably linked to the Republican party and the White House, and has a weird obsession with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Fox News should not be used as a source for anything on climate science or American politics and policy, including individual politicians like Ocasio-Cortez. François Robere (talk) 09:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

References

1. Krosnick, Jon A.; MacInnis, Bo (2010). "Frequent viewers of Fox News are less likely to accept scientists' views of global warming" (PDF). Report for The Woods Institute for the Environment. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 1, 2020. {{cite journal}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
2. Adams, Guy (2010-12-17). "Leaked memos cast doubt on Fox News' claim of neutrality". The Independent. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-03-08. {{cite news}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
3. Feldman, Lauren; Maibach, Edward W.; Roser-Renouf, Connie; Leiserowitz, Anthony (January 2012). "Climate on Cable: The Nature and Impact of Global Warming Coverage on Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC". The International Journal of Press/Politics. 17 (1): 3–31. doi:10.1177/1940161211425410. ISSN 1940-1612. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. {{cite journal}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
4. Michael Mann gives several examples of this, as well as noting that News Corp, the parent company of Fox News, is "the parent company of several of the British tabloids, Fox News, and the Wall Street Journal that were most active in promoting the climategate charges": Mann, Michael E. (2012). The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 9780231526388. OCLC 785782088.
5. Science or Spin?: Assessing the Accuracy of Cable News Coverage of Climate Science (2014) (Report). April 2014.
6. Ward, Bob (2018-06-07). "The Times, Fox News and Breitbart still promoting fake news about climate change". Grantham Research Institute on climate change and the environment. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-03-08. {{cite web}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
7. Maza, Carlos (2018-11-27). "Fox News keeps breaking its own rules". Vox. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-04-07. {{cite news}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
8. Guild, Blair (2018-07-02). "The Fox News employees hired by Trump". CBS News. Retrieved 2019-04-19.
9. Inside the unprecedented partnership between Fox News and the Trump White House. PBS News Hour. 2019-03-05. Retrieved 2019-04-01.
10. Smith, David (2019-04-12). "Fox mentions Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for 42 days running – 3,181 times". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2019-04-19.

• There's nothing in your comment that I disagree with, but the pro-liberal MSM are at least as bad as Fox. If you can cite Media Matters for America for Fox's "weird obsession with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez", then I can cite NewsBusters for the MSM's obsession with AOC. . You write about Fox's links to the Trump White House, but the MSM's connections to Democrats in and out of power are well-documented . The climate change denial is cherry-picked from the article Fox News controversies, and I could similarly cherry-pick something from CNN controversies, MSNBC controversies or CBS News controversies and criticism. I expect no reasonable editor to cite Fox in a climate science article, considering Misplaced Pages:Identifying reliable sources (science)#Popular press. Deprecating Fox on the basis of climate change denial is WP:CREEP. That said, if it comes up often at WP:RSN, it can be added to WP:RSP. wumbolo ^^^ 12:41, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Très amusante. Can we take turns at picking sources to deprecate? Because I have a few in mind. - Ryk72 13:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  As Reliable as any other NEWSORG source - none of them are infallible - attribute as Slatersteven mentioned above. I just noticed that a few sources in the reference list include articles about Trump's connection to and hiring of former Fox News employees. If we're going to speculate on the perceived media influences and biases, then see the following sources and connections of major MSM networks to the Obama administration and in general:

  1. Shorenstein Center report
  2. CNN controversies where there are many sources cited
  3. Hunch the news system was rigged
  4. WH Media Connections
  5. Trump TV pipeline a joke in comparison
  6. Meet the Liberal Press
  7. NBC
  8. MSNBC Wallace dating NYTimes reporter

  And there are many other sources which say similar things about MSM & Obama administration that the above sources report about the Trump administration. Repeated attempts to discredit Fox News appear to be politically motivated, inadvertently or otherwise, and really need to stop as it has become a major time sink. _Talk 📧 13:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  @Atsme: - how is MSNBC Wallace dating NYTimes reporter an example of sources and connections of major MSM networks to the Obama administration? starship.paint (talk) 13:44, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

  If the SC report is about how the media likes "Cinderella stories", then that's not the sort of repeated, ideologically-slanted coverage we're talking about with regards to Fox, and you won't find a single scholar who'll equate the two; CNN had its share of controversies, but how does it and how does Fox deal with them?; the Snopes ref you cite contradicts your argument; I'm not familiar with ToF; I've addressed the "media pipeline" in a comment below - 24 active journalists from a single outlet is unprecedented by any measure; the Washingotn Times isn't an RS; political contributions are a thing, but they alone do not denote slanted coverage - see below for a couple of examples of what does; an anchor dating a reporter isn't news in any sense, so I'm not sure why you included it. François Robere (talk) 14:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Oh, I see - the only RS are the ones who support your POV. Excuse me but I can't waste another minute of my time here - there's a backlog at NPP that needs my attention. _Talk 📧 21:26, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

  WP:RSP#The Washington Times. François Robere (talk) 13:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

  Right. Just to address your sources quickly before getting to the main point:

  • None of the Newsbusters items shows anything even remotely close to an "obsession" the order of magnitude of fox (3100 mentions a month for Fox, vs 24 for WaPo), but more importantly: none of them shows evidence of the sort of rabid demonization that Fox is engaged with with AOC. Does the media like a good "upstart" story? Of course they do. Do they like photogenic candidates? They do. Do they obsessively smear a fresh congress rep. as the enemy of the people because of their eco policies? They don't. Another major difference is that mainstream outlets, unlike Fox, continuously self-criticise (eg. this, on the same phenomenon you just raised); compare with Fox, whose ideological hegemony does not allow most any criticisms outside of a handful of token news anchors.
  • Similarly, none of the "cozy relations" items suggest anything as outrageous as reporters coming on stage in rallies to urge voters to vote for specific candidates or moving to and from the White House (!) ruled by their preferred candidate. Slipping a story to a friendly journalist? Yeah, okay. Interestingly, one the items is about coverage bias for Trump - for the same reasons as AOC (ie. not political reasons); and another lists Jay Rosen and Glenn Greenwald - both of whom have a foot in "mainstream journalism" and severe criticisms against Fox News. If you accept their criticisms towards the "mainstream" media, you ought to accept Rosen's observation that "there's been a merger between Fox News and the Trump government". Your final link, about former reporters working for Obama, lists perhaps a dozen media outlets from which these reporters hail - or about 2 past or present journos for each; for Fox it's more than 12 who were drafted to one while still being employed for the other, in one case being paid by both at the same time as part of a severance agreement. It's not even in the same ballpark.
  • There's no cherry picking here. This phenomenon is so severe that there are studies about Fox News ignoring studies. Can you say the same about any of the other networks?

  Which brings us to the bottom line: reputable sources have repeatedly called out Fox for biases at a scale not present in any other outlet (I've added some quotes in a comment below). According to those sources Fox is not "just another network", but an entirely different beast. François Robere (talk) 14:05, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

References

1. Raymond, Laurel (2017-06-27). "A tale of two networks: How Fox News and CNN handled recent retractions". Think Progress.
2. Shapiro, Rebecca (2012-11-26). "WATCH: Fox News Interview Ends Abruptly After Guest Attacks Network". Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-04-02. {{cite news}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help); Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
3. ‘You’re a moron’: Tucker Carlson clashes with Dutch historian. Washington Post. 2019-02-21. Retrieved 2019-03-08.

The OP's claim is false, the writer of the Fox News story did not suggest that the poll asked whether the world would end in 12 years. It is true that the writer said respondents believed that, but the description of the actual poll question and results was correct, so readers had a fair opportunity to decide whether the writer's opinion was justified. Now look at the bolded words and you'll realize they don't include that opinion so WP:RS policy about context was followed, thus the OP's claim is irrelevant as well as false. Please do not give confirmation or encouragement to this. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Good grief. This is the opening paragraph of the Fox News story: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it." Snooganssnoogans (talk) 14:20, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Of course Fox News isn't reliable for climate science, but that's not what it's being used for here. So, with regard to the source in question, of course we shouldn't be using such an internally inconsistent, misleading source. That's not a judgment of Fox News as a source, but of this particular article. While there's no consensus that Fox News is, in general, unreliable (and in some cases there has been consensus that it is generally reliable), that still doesn't mean it's reliable for every purpose. With any of this it's contextual. In this specific case it looks like a lousy source. Half the rest of this thread has devolved into standard "all MSM is biased" fare as though that has anything to do with the reliability of this source. If you see an obviously unreliable article on NBC or whatnot, address it. Absolutely no news source is bulletproof, nor should we expect that any source will be right all of the time. Getting into "the liberal media" or the "Fox is evil" stuff doesn't help anything. — Rhododendrites \\ 14:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  It is clear from AOC's statement that her reference to the end of the world was rhetorical. What she meant was that in 12 years, the effects of climate change would be irreversible, which is what scientists and most Democrats believe. While I am not a fan of blacklisting sources, the fact that it was the only major cable news network to provide this novel interpretation means that it fails weight for inclusion. Ironically, had AOC said that Armageddon was only 12 years away, Fox would give her a regular spot. TFD (talk) 14:43, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Absolutely not - What a horrible sham of a report by Fox News, which until now, I've considered reasonably reliable. It starts off "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats" and supports it with "But it appears that more than two-thirds of surveyed Democrats took her literally. A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change." Rasmussen asked: "A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world. Do you agree or disagree?" I mean, Rasmussen was begging the question, but then Fox took it to a whole new level by shamefully conflating "12 years to avert" with "the world will end in 12 years". This is trash journalism on the level of the National Enquirer and the Daily Mail. No way does this belong in Misplaced Pages. Jesus!- MrX 🖋 14:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Do not use Whatever the general attitude is towards Fox News, this particular story is shit, and should not be used to reference anything at Misplaced Pages. Just because Fox News is capable of being a reliable source does not preclude them writing terrible things, and this story is clearly misleading, badly written, and an obvious distortion and should not be used to reference anything at Misplaced Pages. --Jayron32 14:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Fox News is Generally an RS, though, like all RS, it can be deemed unreliable in a particular case for one reason or another. What about this case? AOC suggests that you would have to be unintelligent to interpret her claim literally. What the Fox report and the underlying poll show is that a majority of democrats interpret the "12 years" part of her statement literally. Is that a good point? Not up to us to say. Fox News seems to think so, and they're generally RS, so I'd defer to them in this case. However, the wording in the article could be more careful to state the point more clearly. Shinealittlelight (talk) 14:56, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  "What the Fox report and the underlying poll show is that a majority of democrats interpret the "12 years" part of her statement literally." No it doesn't. The pollster did not ask if the world was going to end in 12 years, and they didn't ask anything about AOC's comments. This is not complicated.- MrX 🖋 15:19, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  (FWIW they actually did allude to her comments. The poll question was "A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world. Do you agree or disagree?" .) --Masem (t) 15:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  They allude to Bernie Sanders' comments. — Rhododendrites \\ 15:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Ah, right, my bad. --Masem (t) 15:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Actually, they mentioned Sanders in the first paragraph of their report but not in the poll or how they posed the question - see my bold underline:

  Voters tend to agree with Senator Bernie Sanders that America will be in big trouble very soon if it doesn’t aggressively tackle climate change, even though they question the integrity of politicians who champion the issue.

  The actual poll asked

  (1) A prominent politician says the United States has only 12 years to aggressively fight climate change or else there will be disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world.
  (2) Do most politicians raise climate change issues to address real problems or to get elected?

  AOC and numerous other politicians are using global warming as an integral part of their platform. She said what she said about the world ending and there's no going back. She was serious when she said it per the RS I have already cited and what's happening now is that editors are willing to dismiss her hyperbole but not Trump's? It's politics - pure politics - and WP editors need to steer clear of it by closely adhering to NPOV, RECENTISM, NEWSORG and by actually attributing the author/source (in-text attribution) when including opinions, etc. Why all the fuss about Fox being a RS? Just follow PAGs and stop trying to make everything with a conservative and/or liberal slant a bad thing. This discussion is running rampant with it. The challenged paragraph is an easy fix and does not require condemnation of a RS as unreliable to fix it simply because the editor who included it used SYNTH.

  1. The first sentence needs to be cited to a RS.
  2. I've modified the second sentence to not connect to the first sentence and to stand independently as follows: However, A May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents likely voters and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change; 40% disagreed and 11% were undecided.” Cite the report. The End. _Talk 📧 17:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  The point remains that, if when AOC said that people should not take her literally, she meant that they should not take "12 years" literally as the time-frame we have to act to avert disaster, well, the poll suggests that lots of people do take "12 years" literally. Maybe that's not what she meant. Maybe she meant that the 12 year figure was meant literally, but the "end of the world" part was not. I can't really tell what she meant, and it's not our place to speculate, it seems to me. Shinealittlelight (talk) 15:51, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  And why 12 years? Not 11 or 13 years? Bus stop (talk) 15:56, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Uh, seriously, thats the original report . --Masem (t) 15:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Masem, in that same published report, directly below the 12 yr predicted climate change disaster, The Guardian headline reads Toxic America: Is modern life poisoning us? and goes on to report "Weedkiller in your breakfast cereal. Contaminated drinking water. Carcinogenic chemicals in your furniture." - have you seen the fiasco over at the glyphosate article? 😳 Oh well, bottomline with the 12 yr. prediction - WP:CRYSTALBALL. When left unchallenged we end up with broadly construed interpretations and questionable perspectives. So where did the urgency originate - the UN since that's the report being cited? I remember in the 70s we had the cooling earth scare. Stopping deforestation of the world's rainforests would go a long way. j/s _Talk 📧 19:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  The specificity can suggest verisimilitude. Bus stop (talk) 16:05, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Does it not smack of WP:original research to say "the problem is that the Fox News is absolute trash. For a very simple reason: the poll did not ask respondents whether the world would literally end in 12 yrs"? I thought we relied on sources. You mean now we are experts on polls? Bus stop (talk) 15:45, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • If the Fox News story is claiming that respondents literally believe the world will end in 12 yrs, then yes, it's a pretty big problem if the poll did not ask about that. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • "You mean now we are experts on polls?" No, but I assumed editors had some basic reading comprehension. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:49, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • It is not original research if we know source A quotes source X, and we have access to source X and X clearly does not make the claims source A says X does, then we can question what source A is doing. (There's more complexities than that to this situation, but on general, we have this ability to check and corroborate information). --Masem (t) 15:51, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
    • The bottom line seems to be that Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole. Bus stop (talk) 15:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      When Trump does it, it's called lying. _Talk 📧 17:01, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      That's not what anyone here says. Ironic that a discussion of a source misrepresenting others contains such an obvious misrepresentation of what people are stating. --Jayron32 15:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      I'm not misrepresenting anyone. I'm pointing out that a fundamental idea is supposed to be that we rely on sources. We don't second-guess them, as doing so is akin to original research, the only difference being that it is not taking place in article space. Bus stop (talk) 16:00, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      We do second guess them. From the policy:

      "Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. ... Proper sourcing always depends on context; common sense and editorial judgment are an indispensable part of the process."

      Fox News has shown us that they cannot be relied on for accuracy, or truthfulness.- MrX 🖋 16:15, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      We use attribution (as previously stated by Slatersteven) to show the origin of the perspective or the material being represented. We don't throw out material just because a source is deemed to be biased. Bus stop (talk) 16:24, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      The source isn't being dismissed or thrown out because it is biased. It is being thrown out because it is demonstrably wrong. We don't blindly use sources without regard for whether or not they are correct. Part of reliability is that they are reliably correct. If a particular source can be shown to contain demonstrably untrue things, we don't cite those untrue things, knowing they are untrue. That is part of editorial discretion in choosing which sources to use. If a source is shown to be wrong, we don't use that source. Also, when you said "Ocasio-Cortez can engage in hyperbole but we can't repeat that hyperbole." that misrepresented the current discussion, because not one person made that claim. When you said that, you misrepresented the points being made by people opposed to using this source. When you stated "I'm not misrepresenting anyone.", that was incorrect, because your statement immediately preceding misrepresented the arguments of those who state the source is not reliable. --Jayron32 16:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      A politician is a representative. Does she know the people she represents? Isn't it self-serving to characterize a portion of her constituency as sea sponges after her own hyperbole is called into question? I think it is ridiculous that she can say "12 years" and at a later time say that number was not to be taken literally. Then why did she say it? Is twelve her favorite number? Fox News is merely reporting on the discrepancy between language taken literally and language taken figuratively. Fox's reporting is of good quality, in my opinion, and should be woven into the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article, using attribution, of course. Bus stop (talk) 16:55, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

      That's entirely out of the scope of this discussion. Discussions about content of specific articles in a general sense are best held in the talk page of that article. We aren't here to discuss the content of the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez article here. We're only here to discuss the reliability of the specific Fox News article being called into question. You're clouding the discussion with mostly unrelated matters. --Jayron32 19:09, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  • To quell the fear of OR, here are some sources and what they say on FN:

• François Robere (talk) 17:04, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Don't use One of the comedians once joked that Fox was starting a 24 hour AOC channel that only ran stories about AOC, because Fox was running near daily anti-AOC stories after she won. Fox is a poor source for AOC or climate change, and this story is an example of why. I don’t see why we would use FOX for a political story that no one else was reporting. O3000 (talk) 16:02, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • I don't understand why politicians get off the hook by claiming to have been just joking. (“you’d have to have the social intelligence of a sea sponge to think” that the comment was literal.) Bus stop (talk) 16:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Use News sources all have their editorial biases and have been taken to task for either a rush to print (oftentimes never retracting what is later proven to be false) or for misrepresenting information from time to time. No reason one cannot say, according to then follow that with, however, according to. FoxNews reported that...blah, blah, blah. However CNN (or whomever) reported that, Blah, blah, blah. One would think this is a case by case issue, not a blanket ban issue.--MONGO (talk) 17:34, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Reference remarks (not poll) with attribution The fact that Fox News has been deemed RS at this noticeboard is significant. Quoting them with attribution should solve any issues. Readers know what mainstream sources lean left, and which one(s) lean right, and can judge the reliability of statements accordingly. This seems a straightforward issue: what did OAC say, and what did she later say she meant? When OAC first made the claim, she was clearly serious about it, and partisan source The Hill came to her defense with "Her comments referred to the recent United Nations report...". The Hill makes no attempt to source their claim. At the time, (I am the editor who added this "12 year" claim to her article) I could find no support anywhere for the Hills claim that she was citing the UN. Fox News is also a partisan source, and in this case, their report is backed by AOC's actual words. We could also quote her directly by using her tweet. It's sad that media only reports what will help or hurt their chosen saints or villains, rather than simply reporting facts with a NPOV. I don't particularly find this bias cute regardless of whether I agree with their position. I quite despise this era of partisanship-masquerading-as-news from CNN, MNBC, The Hill and Fox. It's challenging to build a NPOV article from only partisan sources, but it certainly cannot be done using only one side. Partisan sources simply won't report, or will twist, news that makes their side look bad. The "12 years" statement was highly notable, so walking it back, or clarifying the intent, is also notable. If Fox is the only media reporting on it, perhaps they should be commended. However the second half of the contested text should not be added; ...a May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change. would constitute a SYNTH violation (one that Fox committed, but we don't need to follow suit). "Disastrous and irreparable damage" is different from AOC's (according to WaPo) "all-too-accurate warnings. She said recently that if we don’t start to address climate change aggressively right now, the world will end in 12 years." The poll changes the wording and drastically changes meaning, so it does not apply and shouldn't be included. Just mention her words/tweet (regardless of how it makes her look), per NPOV. I could be mistaken, but if we are simply quoting her, the Tweet itself can serve as RS and replace Fox. OP should open a new thread focusing on whether there should be restrictions placed on content from Fox, such as climate change. petrarchan47คุก 17:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Note: "according to WaPo" isn't a WaPo news item or editorial statement, it's an opinion piece by Tom Toles, the Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist for The Post who also blogs and, with Michael E. Mann, co-authored "The Madhouse Effect" about climate and climate change denial. His informed comment is that AOC's warning are "all-too-accurate", but he's clearly not the WaPo. . . dave souza, talk 13:42, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

  Just for the record, I'm the one that followed your addition with the Hill reference that explained her statement. I felt it was irresponsible to include her few short words that gave the impression that she is some sort of climate change imbecile that literally believes the world will end in 12 years and leave it at that. If you were to include something so unusual as the 12 years statement you should rather rely on a detailed discussion that fully explained her position, not some off the cuff remark. And then to complain that using the Hill was not warranted is totally unreasonable IMO. Gandydancer (talk) 19:41, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  I'm not complaining that the story of her remark was fleshed out. My statement was on the partisanship and unreliability of both "right" and "left" leaning sources, and to challenge the notion that sources on the left are automatically more reliable than Fox. At the time, no sources reporting on her statement (that warranted inclusion, IMO, because of the coverage it received) added any reason or back story. I noticed that the Hill threw in reference to the UN report, but it struck me as odd since no other RS was doing that, and there was no indication how The Hill got the information, no mention of an interview with AOC or a direct quote, etc. However I'm not saying it wasn't warranted; The Hill is now considered RS, so I didn't challenge the addition. petrarchan47คุก 06:23, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Obviuosly not RS. That Fox piece is an obvious piece of devious, manipulative misinformation, as is the summary of it written for Misplaced Pages as cited above. No matter how reliable Fox might otherwise be, it's a piece of propagandistic junk journalism, and we don't use those. WP:RS is not a suicide pact; even if we had reasons to believe that Fox otherwise has a reliable reputation, we're not obliged to cite junk journalism when it's so self-evidently out of touch with reality as this. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:03, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Use , Fox is reporting what AOC said. If she didn't like it, maybe she'll think twice before Tweeting or saying something for her Twitter army. Fox's job is to report, same as CNN's or MSNBC's. AOC did say that the world will end in 12 years, that she is backtracking is not Fox's fault. Sir Joseph 18:16, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Question: Are we judging sources based on our own opinion or that of RS? If we're to judge based on RS, then Fox News is pretty much out (see "expert opinions" above); if we're to judge based on our own opinion, then WP:NOR is out. François Robere (talk) 18:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Don't use. Reporting AOC's "12 years" remark as literal when it obviously wasn't is clearly a malicious action on Fox's part. For us to repeat the lie would be at best terrible judgement and at worst a BLP violation. Zero 19:03, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  What about Newsweek? or USA Today, or CNN ? Sir Joseph 19:08, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

  Reminds me of a great book title I saw once: "If you can't live without me, why aren't you dead yet?" People use metaphor to dramatise their words all the time. No reason for us to buy into the pretence of not understanding that. Zero 05:18, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

  Metaphor for what—1200 years? 12,000 years? 12,000,000 years? Numbers are inherently quantitative. Bus stop (talk) 09:24, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Do we care that CNN said the same thing, "During an interview the next day Ocasio-Cortez said "the world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change." Sir Joseph 19:13, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Use as RS but slightly modified as follows:

  1. The first sentence needs to be cited.
  2. Second sentence should stand independently as follows: However, A May 2019 Rasmussen poll showed that 48% of respondents likely voters and 67% of Democrats believe that the U.S. “has only 12 years to avert the ‘disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world’ stemming from climate change; 40% disagreed and 11% were undecided.” Cite the report. _Talk 📧 19:48, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Lets remind users that issue if the claim about the poll, not what Ocasio-Cortez said.Slatersteven (talk) 20:01, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Comment: other factors such as WP:WEIGHT (how much has this been given in all reliable sources?), besides whether or not Fox is an RS for the claim, also bear on whether or not it should be mentioned. -sche (talk) 20:13, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Those discussions should happen elsewhere, like the article talk page. Matters of what material to cover are best held there. This forum is really only useful for discussing the reliability of sources. --Jayron32 20:25, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I agree :) but I saw that this thread was started following a disagreement over whether the content should be included at all, and I don't want anyone to take this discussion, if it concludes that the source is reliable, to mean that the content automatically gets included. (I have noted the other problems on the article's talk page.) -sche (talk) 21:57, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Obviously not RS for anything related to the climate - Fox News made that excessively clear with tons of articles full of nonsense. See its article if you need references for that. --mfb (talk) 03:27, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
  • "nonsense" Your characterization. Bus stop (talk) 09:24, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

    Bus stop, yes, the references use more polite words to say the same thing. I'm not bound to their style, I can be more direct. mfb (talk) 10:23, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Do not use- Fox's coverage of climate science is frequently dishonest, and this story in particular is a load of shit. Reyk _YO! 07:40, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
  • I just want to point out that "load of shit" would basically be your characterization. Bus stop (talk) 09:24, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
    • And an accurate one. Reyk _YO! 10:19, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
• Not reliable. I think it's reasonably clear that Fox News lacks a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy today; but it certainly doesn't have the reputation WP:RS requires when it comes to climate science or for adding negative material to a WP:BLP that falls squarely in the scope of its biases. --Aquillion (talk) 04:07, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Usable Mostly per Sir Joseph. Run of the mill peice of gotcha journalism that's been brought up in other newsmedia. WP:UNDUE seems more relevant. --RaiderAspect (talk) 09:20, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Usable No one is a prognosticator of the future. The best scientific sources could be wrong. Fox News is a journalistic source. It is entirely capable of reporting on the facts about something a politician said. Bus stop (talk) 16:22, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  If it was being used as a source for what she said, yes. Its not its being used to make a statement about how people answered a poll (by misrepresentation of the poll).Slatersteven (talk) 16:27, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  AOC has told us that climate change is "our WW2", that if we don't act immediately on climate change we will have "blood on our hands", and that climate change, if left unaddressed, will bring about the "end of the world in 12 years". It is not surprising that some people believe her. She is saying the same thing in more than one way. The language is very fanciful. No scientist would ever speak that way. She is a politician, trying to influence people. What is so surprising about the fact that she actually succeeds in influencing some people? Fox News conducted a survey (a poll) that shows that some people believe her, or at least chose not to express disagreement with AOC. Misplaced Pages editors did not conduct the survey. Suddenly we are experts on poll-taking? I don't find the results surprising. AOC has deployed exceptionally passionate language and some, when responding to a poll, choose to express agreement over disagreement, whether that is because they literally agree with AOC or because they agree with the spirit of what she is saying. I don't see how the poll is inaccurate and I don't think we should exclude information from the article based on our uninformed, at best incomplete, understanding of the methodology used in the poll. Bus stop (talk) 16:56, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  And what the poll said (according to the source "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change.", which is not the same as saying the believe the world will end in 12 years. Oh and it does not appear to have been conducted done behalf of Fox ].Slatersteven (talk) 17:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  This can be explained by considering that respondents may choose not to disagree on specifics with a political leader that they generally agree with. But this problem traces right back to the user of fanciful language. AOC is causing this problem. No responsible scientist would speak this way—and in fact no responsible politician would speak this way. AOC is not deploying language with requisite restraint. Her language is over the top. "Ocasio-Cortez has emerged as the key Democratic voice on how to tackle climate change, proposing the Green New Deal resolution that seeks to radically reorganize the economy to ensure climate change is tackled." She apparently does not grasp that in pushing for the adoption of the position she is spearheading she cannot mix up the literal with the figurative without being taken to task for it. Fox News is reporting on her misuse of speech and the skewed results seen in entirely reasonable polls. A respondent is asked (paraphrasing) Do you accept AOC's contention that the world will end in 12 years if climate change is not addressed? Anyone supporting the general positions of AOC is incentivized to agree with her. This understandably might be the case even if the respondent does not agree with AOC on the specifics. Fox News is simply showing the trouble that her misguided words cause. Why don't we hear other politicians speaking this way? Obviously it gets the speaker into trouble—either by a poll taken or by some other means. A savvy politician speaks with restraint. But AOC does not. Bus stop (talk) 17:45, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  Why don't we hear other politicians speaking this way? We do, all the time. O3000 (talk) 17:55, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  MMmm, I am rethinking, they do in fact both quote the Poll correctly and misrepresent it at the same time. However this also does not appear to be a poll about her views, but a general one. No, I do not think this is reliable for the claim this poll is related to her comments. It is clear they have spun this (with the claim that they think the world will end in 12 years demonstrating this dishonesty about the poll).Slatersteven (talk) 18:09, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  What is so surprising about the fact that she actually succeeds in influencing some people ... Fox News conducted a survey ... that shows that some people believe her - you cannot possibly be looking at the source this thread is about. If you are, and this is what you took away from it, then that's not great. The poll was based on something Bernie Sanders said, not AOC. Fox didn't conduct it. It didn't ask if AOC's 12 years quote should be taken literally. It asked something different. Fox invented those connections/glosses for this source, which is the problem. It says the poll found something about someone that any critical reading at all makes clear it did not. But you are repeating these claims here... — Rhododendrites \\ 22:15, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  The first paragraph which I think we all recognize is terrible writing for a supposedly RS, does make that inference. But when they get to the poll later, they don't mention AOC (but nor does address that the survey was spurred by Bernie's comment). They do try to link AOC's comment that is directed towards the GOP misunderstanding her retort to the poll that show dems were also believing the 12 years thing. Which to me all points to this being mudslinging not appropriate for WP, regardless if it came from Fox, CNN, or any other RS or non-RS. --Masem (t) 22:34, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Not reliable Given that many of the reliable votes are not even based upon what it is being used for I have to assume that it is knowingly false. We do not repeat lies, even from RS.Slatersteven (talk) 16:27, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• This entire discussion is pointless... whether AOC was speaking literally or was being intentionally hyperbolic, it is UNDUE to highlight her comment. We should be SUMMARIZING her stance on climate change issues, and not mentioning every instance when she addresses the issue. And if we don’t mention it, then there is no need to mention how many people took her comments literally. Note... I have this same issue with bio articles on other politicians (regardless of party)... we need to summarize a LOT more and note specific statements a lot less. Blueboar (talk) 17:24, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  There are some cases where a statement attracts so much attention, controversy and coverage, that to forgo inclusion in leui of a summarized version constitutes a glaring ommission resulting in obvious POV issues. When readers see obvious POV on WP the result is less trust, and fewer donations. This is happening. We need to cover the controversies to remain seemingly-neutral if we continue to call WP and encyclopedia. As another editor here suggested, politicians sometimes make hyperbolic statements not intending to represent science, but to get attention for their cause and to sway the voters. If a politician does this successfully, the coverage garnered, per our PAGs, often will justify inclusion here. Sure, there is good reason to have a readable summary of her position (a position which may be evolving), but to omit notable highlights within that story isn't justified if they received significant coverage, which this has IMO. petrarchan47คุก 22:08, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  • While I agree that it's WP:UNDUE, the problem is that Fox has covered it as if it were a big deal; we cannot avoid a decision about whether that coverage implies due weight. I would argue that since Fox is well-known as a partisan source, and since it's been extensively demonstrated that they weigh their coverage in a distorted manner in order to present particular narratives, that Fox alone should never satisfy WP:DUE about anything controversial within American politics (ie. it's a usable source, but always requires another high-quality source to demonstrate due weight, at a bare minimum within WP:BLP articles.) A Fox News criticism that has not seen mainstream coverage can be reasonably interpreted as a line of attack by the target's ideological opponents which did not take off and which is therefore WP:UNDUE. When dealing with extremely partisan or heavily WP:BIASED sources like Fox, due weight has to be assessed with respect to the biases of a source and their willingness to try and push marginal or inconsequential stories as part of a broader agenda. --Aquillion (talk) 03:38, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
    • "it's a usable source, but always requires another high-quality support to demonstrate due weight" The implementation of that idea would be tantamount to censorship. I don't think a reliable source can only be used if other, less "partisan" sources can be found for corroboration. We don't, or at least we should not, omit from the article perspectives based on a lack of support found in non-"partisan" sources. Bus stop (talk) 13:08, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
      • But this isn't about percepctives, it's about facts. If an outlet is partisan to the extent that it affects its ability for factual reporting, then by definition it's not as reliable as outlets that aren't partisan. Also, saying "we should not omit from the article perspectives based on a lack of support found in non-"partisan" sources" is the equivalent of saying "we should introduce partisan bias to our articles." François Robere (talk) 13:59, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
        • Even if a source is deemed biased, there is no absolute requirement for corroboration in a source not deemed biased. Bus stop (talk) 14:30, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
          • Because it's obvious..? François Robere (talk) 15:42, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Don't use. It's a clear misrepresentation of information, per MrX, and would come under WP:Synth if it had been written here. Whether or not Fox News is a RS more generally is irrelevant, since we're the ones who decide on that, and a prior, more general judgement doesn't prohibit us from using common sense in a specific case. That said, in theory we could still cite it for the poll figures, though personally I don't think they're particularly notable. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 12:30, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

(Side note: I'm somewhat sympathetic to those saying it's undue and a summary would be better but until someone actually writes one I don't think there's grounds to remove it. That said, insofar as we're treating the specific comments as notable for now we should probably give the full quote for context.) ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 12:30, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

• Don't use, and consider deprecating Fox News like the Daily Mail. Media Matters for America has proven that Fox News's "hard news" side spewed misinformation every day on air from January 1, 2019 to April 30, 2019 as seen in https://www.mediamatters.org/research/2019/05/13/fox-news-lie/223683 and https://www.scribd.com/document/409793749/The-Fox-News-Lie.Jesse Viviano (talk) 06:23, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
• Not RS for the statement as originally proposed, not RS regarding the 2/3 survey in general, and therefore a bad source to choose for the OAC quote. There can be little dispute that the source either carelessly or maliciously butchered the part about the 2/3 survey. If it's really necessary for OAC's comment to be part of a historic encyclopedic summary of the subject, we would of course be required to include OAC's explanation of that comment. However I doubt it will genuinely pass the 10 Year Test. Alsee (talk) 06:49, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Dealing with a source that is both factual and misleads at different points

Core to this is not necessary Fox News but the specific article at issue: . For the hypothetical, lets assume this was determined to have the right WEIGHT to include and happened to be the only source that covers it. (As it actually issue, I really don't think we should even include anythng about AOC's comment and how it was taken, even if this was a truly RS source, its a minor quibble over Twitter which is far below NOT#NEWS appropriateness).

We have that:

• It opens with a grossly vague or illogically consistent restatement of the elements at hand: "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the world will “end in 12 years” unless climate change is tackled was accepted as a fact by two-thirds of Democrats, even though she said herself that only those with the “social intelligence of a sea sponge” could actually believe it."
• It later has a much more accurate statement of the survey: "A Rasmussen poll, conducted earlier this week, found 67 percent of Democrats believing that the U.S. has only 12 years to avert the “disastrous and irreparable damage to the country and the world” stemming from climate change. Out of all total likely voters, 48 percent of respondents believed the apocalyptic claim." This clearly is in alignment with the survey results (outside of what I can't check behind the paywall).

If the article didn't open with that first line, I doubt we'd be here now. The second line is fine and non-controversial within the scope of the survey's findings. But we have this other claim that, while not creating a self-paradox, puts crappy reporting against decent reporting. I would argue that as WPian we can read through the BS and report only on what we know or can judge to be accurate or non-editorial (the second part) and not consider the first part to have tainted the work. We are not that "mindless" to not be able to recognize that problem.

The reason I break this out is that there is the general question of when any source have both good quality journalism and terrible editorizing in the same article, is the entire article now useless? This a question regardless if it FOX or any other nominally RS source --Masem (t) 19:29, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

"I would argue that as WPian we can read through the BS and report only on what we know or can judge to be accurate or non-editorial (the second part)" This is belied by the discussion above where numerous editors claim that the egregiously deceptive opening paragraph of the piece is perfectly fine. There are apparently plenty of editors who cannot distinguish basic facts from falsehoods. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 19:42, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Who has claimed the first para is "perfectly fine"? --Masem (t) 19:50, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• I'd say that "happened to be the only source that covers it" is, by definition, a strong indication that WP:WEIGHT requirements have not been met. You've described what is, as far as I can tell, a mutually exclusive set of conditions. If something is to appear in such a Misplaced Pages article as the AOC article, AND only one source is covering it, it is probably WP:UNDUE in nearly every case I could imagine. Doubly so when the reliability of that specific source has been called into question. You're describing things that don't exist.--Jayron32 20:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • I know I'm talking a huge stretch for inclusion, per WEIGHT, so maybe this is a situation we never will ever really encounter again, but we are here now. It's a fair question if, say, CNN ever did this. --Masem (t) 20:41, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Not useless, but one that requires extra care. Why? For starters, because biased sources - even the accurate ones - tend to involve heavy selection bias (ie. WP:CHERRYPICKING). The facts themselves may or may not be true, but the overall picture is at best partial; and as we all know, a "cherry picked" picture can be just as misleading as a false one. Case in point: reports covering heavy winters that imply that global warming isn't happening. As Misplaced Pages is only as good as its sources, using a biased source inadvertently introduces selection bias into our articles even if the core facts are true. Another reason is that we don't want to mis-lead the reader: this item is actually used in AOC's article; the reporting itself is correct, but readers following up on the source will quickly find themselves faced with the ridiculous and misleading comment of Brian Kilmeade and Andrew Pudzer that are embedded in the piece (something about "trains to Hawaii" and Soviet socio-economic policies). In other words: using that source means putting Fox & Friends literally two clicks away from the article, and that's a disservice to the reader and to their trust in us and our policies. François Robere (talk) 20:30, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Snoogans has been trying to get rid of Fox News here for years. He needs to drop the stick and stop his tendentious war against non-leftist media companies. I recommend a trout for the continued disruption and a stern warning that any future behavior of this nature will be met with sanctions. 174.211.4.175 (talk) 21:17, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

This noticeboard is for the discussion of article content, not editor conduct. Your complaints should be directed to User talk:Snooganssnoogans. — Newslinger talk 21:21, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

And the argument is fallacious: any non-right or non-GOP media must not necessarily be leftist... —PaleoNeonate – 03:00, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Three notes on the preceding discussion

1. Most of this discussion consisted of editors' opinions and explanations, with very few RS to support them. Having brought to the table 26 references which were mostly ignored, I have to ask: are we conducting these discussions based on our own opinions or those of RS? If we're to rely on RS, then Fox News is pretty much out (see "expert opinions" above); if we're to rely only on our own opinion, then WP:NOR is out. Which will it be?
2. This whole discussion is an example of what Matthew Yglesias of Vox termed the "hack gap" (see here for a quicker, but less thorough explanation), where Fox's focus on a completely meaningless story drives it deep into mainstream discussion (this is well documented by other sources as well). If it weren't for Fox we wouldn't have spent three days discussing an off-hand comment by a fresh congresswoman.
3. Some editors found a solution to this discussion by stating "we shouldn't trust any news media outlet for news on climate change". I find this argument unsatisfactory, as it (conveniently) ignores two problems: first, it sidesteps the fact that Fox does distort the facts on climate change on a regular basis - "distort", not "oversimplify" or "popularize" like other outlets - and this has to be accounted for with respect to how we treat the network in general. Second, this argument ignores the fact that studies are only a part of the picture, and networks do have legitimate uses here: for analysis (eg. policy analysis and expert scientific commentary), as a tertiary source (eg. "The UN today published a report..."), for surveys and opinion polls, or for coverage of public discourse ("the EPA responded by...") - this very discussion was about the latter, not about a study, so the lack of a determination with respect to the OP's specific question doesn't actually solve the problem. François Robere (talk) 12:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

   • Arguable a LOT of this would be unnecessary if WPians writing on current events avoiding the "talking heads" part of the coverage. We don't need to, within days or weeks of an event like this, to be trying to slot in opinions from politicians or analysts or the like, which is going to have uneven/biased coverage in the RSes (fox or otherwise) and focuses too much on the "now" rather than the long-term importance. This own issue between Bernie, AOC, and the UN climate change report is the type of thing that really has no place yet to be on WP. Ideally we should be approaching these type of stories like the Guardian does with its "live"-type coverage; strict factual timelines with no color commentary from any random talking head for example. As many have said for this specific story, it likely fails UNDUE for inclusion in the first place.
   • Now, months after an event, then we have better hindsight and can write quality summaries using RSes, and this is where Fox is clearly fine as an RS. The comment about about "not trusting any sources for CC" fits into this concept: the UN Report came out (a factual event) and then everyone and their brother tries to broadcast their opinion about it in the short term. We shouldn't at all be talking about those opinions unless they are creating major news stories, or until we have enough hindsight to know if those opinions are part of the longer-term coverage of the story.
   • What I'm trying to get at is that we should be questioning RSes that are going deep into opinion and commentary about reactions to an event in the short-term - Fox may be the worst of these RSes, but CNN and many of those others also throw out spin. The best solution is not to even include these pieces so that we don't have to play the RS-questioning game, and just wait until the story has had sufficient time to percolate and where there's little doubt about the RS coverage of past events. That gives us a better sense of what is not UNDUE to include and removes many of the issues of source bias (Fox and otherwise). --Masem (t) 15:03, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

   Agree 100 percent ...what is need is simply time...not clickbait news with blow by blow coverage that all media have. As an encyclopedia we should be waiting for analysis of topics (in depth coverage or academic review of information. Yes mention of a debate is fine...by day by day ocerverage till an incident is over is simply not compatible with encyclopedic writing. --Moxy 🍁 12:40, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

RfC: Is Fox News a generally reliable source for reporting related to climate change?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is Fox News a generally reliable source for reporting related to climate change? - MrX 🖋 18:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

This seems like a malformed question, and a an outgrowth over the rather tempestuous discussion above. Is anyone actually claiming that it is? --Jayron32 19:06, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Fox News is used extensively as a source on Misplaced Pages, so the presumption is that its new reporting is reliable. The discussion above calls that into question, at least on the topic of climate change. As we can see above, yes, some people are actually claiming that it is.- MrX 🖋 19:30, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Objection to RfC. I don't think we should be using RfCs to decide whether a media outlet is "generally" reliable for certain subject matter. Context matters, and each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Misplaced Pages article and is an appropriate source for that content. A controversial but relatively mainstream outlet like Fox News is a good example of that. Asking editors to gauge its "general" reliability without a specific test case effectively boils down to a popularity contest. R2 (bleep) 19:07, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
  • Agree with this, and we need a moratorium on challenging Fox news as a RS beyond what has been already established unless there is clear evidence that they are making stuff up. --Masem (t) 19:24, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

By the way, in the above discussion, there is clear evidence that are making stuff up.- MrX 🖋 19:32, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

There's truth-stretching, but not falsification. --Masem (t) 19:39, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

So our standard for a reliable source is "one that only stretches the truth"..? My standard for a reliable car is "one that doesn't break down", not "one that breaks down but doesn't explode." François Robere (talk) 19:44, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Its how frequent (or more desirably infrequent) they stretch the truth. ALL RSes do this today, but some more than others and some very little of the time (eg BBC and NYTimes). --Masem (t) 19:52, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Do you know of any network that does it this frequently? François Robere (talk) 20:33, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

We can line-up all the left leaning RS that desparage/criticize right leaning RS and vice versa, put them in a big ole basket, and probably guess what each side will say about the other. They are competitors. If you're expecting the competition to say nice things about their opposition (be it political or whatever) - the ones who are taking food off the tables of the other and threatens their very existence - don't hold your breath. I have yet to read an ad by MacDonald's boasting about how much better a Burger King Whopper is than a Big Mac. They are competing with one another. News sources are not academic sources - there has been a paradigm shift in the way news is reported today - we now have pundits and opinion journalism disguised as news. It's time we catch-up to 21st century reporting on the internet. There are numerous historians and academics who have published papers/books/research about this very topic - start with the Harvard report (see my RS above) and keep going - it sometimes seems like it's neverending. _Talk 📧 20:54, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Is CNN more likely to draw crowds from Fox or from MSNBC? In other words: does it have more of a motive (per your argument) to criticize Fox or MSNBC? François Robere (talk) 21:09, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

To be fair on that Media Matters, ~half of the incidents are the talking heads shows we've already dismissed (Fox & Friends, etc.) The remain half that I have spot checked is the televised news program. And while there are clearly wrong facts, one can argue if that's tied to the rush of reporting or speaking on the spot, whereas the print version of Fox has the time to correct. We don't usually look to televised news, but what ends up in print as the sources for information. And even for RS televised networks I've rarely seen an errata or apology on the station unless the news report was so far off the mark. --Masem (t) 21:23, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

One could certainly find justifications for some of Fox's mishaps; the only question we should consider is whether, according to RS, other outlets make the same mishaps at similar frequencies. AFAICT that isn't the case, so the "rush of reporting" isn't a satisfactory explanation, and we ought to consider eg. poor editorial standards. François Robere (talk) 13:22, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• The context is " reporting about climate change". We have had many such RfCs. If you don't want to participate in this RfC, that's your choice.- MrX 🖋 19:30, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

• Objection to RfC - if we're following WP:NEWSORG and WP:RECENTISM as we should be, we should not be rating any mainstream media as unreliable, especially when WP:CRYSTALBALL is part of the equation. This is not the same as WP:MEDRS. _Talk 📧 19:36, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Objection to RfC We do not need to discus this twice on the same forum.Slatersteven (talk) 19:59, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
• Perhaps a better question is whether ANY news media outlet is reliable for reporting on climate (and science in general)? I would say that ALL media outlets are guilty of over-simplification and spin when it comes to their climate reporting (they simply spin their oversimplifications in different directions, depending on their target audience). Blueboar (talk) 20:35, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Excellent suggestion, Blueboar. _Talk 📧 20:40, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Only it's a false equivalence. Popular media is to blame for a lot of things, including over-simplification of science, but it rarely does so intentionally and never zealously in whatever political direction that suits it. Fox News does both, frequently distorting the facts beyond recognition. I'll grant you that not only Fox does that: Michael Mann notes that other News Corp outlets do it as well. François Robere (talk) 20:58, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

News should never be used for scientific verification.... it should only be used for opinions... and even then very sparingly especially American Media.--Moxy 🍁 21:16, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Agree with Moxy. False equivalency is being used as an excuse whenever there isn't a valid argument (at the expense of serious issues where that actually is the case). The same talking points are mirrored/repeated relentlessly throughout like-minded RS. Has nothing to do with FE and everything to do with advertising dollars, filling unsold time slots, and repeating the news director's POV while trying to maintain credibility...until the lines cross, as what happened here nothing will change. And then there is this. Political science is at issue, not real science. _Talk 📧 21:24, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Hardly. Along with secondary sources that give quantitative analysis of just how much more biased Fox News is compared with the "mainstream" outlets, we have both secondary and tertiary sources explicitly stating that this "everyone are just as bad" sort of argument is a false equivalence. I've provided some two dozen quotes in the "expert opinion" section above, and I have three dozen more which you're invited to scrutinize. François Robere (talk) 20:19, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

I was not trying to draw any “equivalency” (false or not) with my rephrasing of the question. I am honestly questioning whether it is appropriate to use news media as a source for information on science related topics. If we say “no” to that... then any questions about a specific outlet are irrelevant. Blueboar (talk) 21:46, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Right. The problem is that this sort of argument, as valid as it may be, is twofold: first, it hides the fact that Fox News does distort the fact here in a way no other network does, and we must account for that in our treatment of Fox even if we don't accept any network's coverage for reasons of general accuracy; second, it ignores that fact that we actually do rely on the networks quite often for all kinds of legitimate uses: for analysis (eg. policy analysis and expert scientific commentary), as a tertiary source (eg. "The UN today published a report...") or for coverage of the public debate ("the EPA responded by..."). All of these uses are hampered by allowing the use of an extremely, and demonstrably biased source like Fox News without prejudice. Case in point: "climategate" a manufactured controversy that Fox News pushed for years, which we were obligated to cover by Policy. François Robere (talk) 20:19, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• I agree with Blueboar. This RfC needs specify whether we're talking about climate change science, or climate change politics. Any news organisation would be reliable for what what its own editors think about climate change, and it would probably be reliable for what such-and-such a politician said about climate change (but that might be worth considering on a case by case basis, depending on the organisation and politician in question), but I can't see why we'd use any news organisation as a source for any actual scientific content when we should be going to much more reliable academic publications. GirthSummit _(blether) 07:32, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Objection to RfC Support Blueboar who as usual has shown good insight. News media are not good sources for science. An academic hired to write a textbook for science students is not going to base it on articles in Fox News, CNN or other mass media, but will use academic sources. The policy of weight is sufficient in the AOC case. Facts or opinions reported in Fox News that are ignored in the other four major news networks lack weight. Similarly, facts or opinions reported only in MSNBC lack weight. TFD (talk) 10:34, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

References

1. Mann, Michael E. (2012). The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 9780231526388. OCLC 785782088.

• Objection to RfC per above. SemiHypercube 10:41, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
• Objection to RfC per above. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 12:58, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Objection to RfC The question heading up this RfC is myopically focussed. Are we just evaluating the appropriateness of Fox News "for reporting related to climate change"? No, we are not. We are also interested in the qualifications in the area of science of a politician. The appropriateness of the source has to be considered for use in the context of an article that is the biography of a politician. There are sources that are especially appropriate "for reporting related to climate change" but how likely is it that such sources would be passing commentary on the qualifications in the area of science of a politician? Not very likely. Thus my conclusion is that Fox News or any other journalistic outlet is an entirely appropriate source for passing commentary on the qualifications of any politician in areas relating to science such as the study of climate change. If a source other than Fox News reaches different findings on Ocasio-Cortez on her qualifications to provide knowledgeable commentary on climate change then that other source should be included in addition to the Fox News source. Bus stop (talk) 18:41, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

another question

I’ll toss in yet another question: are politicians generally reliable sources for information on climate change? I would say no. So, perhaps we should stop mentioning every instance when some politician (regardless of party) bloviates and says something stupid on the subject. It gives the stupidity undue weight. Blueboar (talk) 20:45, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

I would agree, no. And not a reliable source of information on nuclear warfare either, or its consequences. However … cygnis insignis 21:13, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Blueboar, politicians aren't RS for information about politics (beyond verifiable facts) much less climate change. It's much better to wait for the experts to weigh-in and then we can present all relevent views. It won't be much longer (in comparison to light years) for historians and academics to publish their perspectives based on knowledgable retrospect. _Talk 📧 21:42, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Blueboar, on what pages? (1) On their own pages? (2) On pages where climate change are tied in to politics? (3) On pages of the science of climate change? starship.paint (talk) 01:21, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

In general politicians are not scientists nor are they experts on climate change. So their views do not matter on climate change pages, but they may be relevant in the biographical pages of the politicians. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 04:17, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

Indeed, in this case, the comment wasn't seen as encyclopedic for information about climate change, which is why it was added to her bio and not to Climate change. As for due weight, that is supposed to be determined by sources per WP:BALASP. The comment made headlines and continues to do so. That is why to ignore the comment in WP constitutes an NPOV violation. At the same time it is obviously true that we aren't here to document every asinine comment from a politician, and most assuredly we should not add them to the Pedia if they receive little coverage in mainstream media or elsewhere. But, after ignoring the many right-leaning sources covering this, we still have:

• CNN Fact-checking Trump, AOC climate claims
• USA Today 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change,' Ocasio-Cortez says
• Newsweek Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Warns, ‘World Is Going to End in 12 Years,’ Reiterating Claims of Recent U.N. Climate Change Report
• WaPo Opinion Ocasio-Cortez says the world will end in 12 years. She is absolutely right.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Petrarchan47 (talk • contribs) 18:57, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

• • Taking the last one, that's not "WaPo Opinion", it's the opinion of Tom Toles, editorial cartoonist. He's published on climate change denial so maybe his view that AOC "is absolutely right" has some substance. . . dave souza, talk 13:51, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
  • USA Today 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change,' Ocasio-Cortez says is the headline, but the article shows the quote in context:
    Ocasio-Cortez called the fight to mitigate the effects of climate change her generation's "World War II." "Millennials and Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up, and we're like, 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change, and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?' " she said.
    Moral: never trust headlines, which get written by a sub-editor. . . . dave souza, talk 14:09, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

I normally highlight the entire headline when linking to RS, I am not promoting the idea of focusing on them. One editor did try adding the entire quotation, but was immediately overturned for no given reason. So my addition was what I consider a good summary of the RS at the time ( stated that the world will end in 12 years unless the problem is addressed). petrarchan47คุก 17:57, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

RfC - CoinDesk as a source

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following lists: Economy, trade, and companies Maths, science, and technology Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

Should CoinDesk be removed as a source from all articles on Misplaced Pages? --Molochmeditates (talk) 13:49, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Survey (CoinDesk)

Previous Discussion: Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_251#RfC_on_use_of_CoinDesk

RSP Entry: CoinDesk RSP Entry

Please note: Misplaced Pages:General_sanctions/Blockchain_and_cryptocurrencies

There is currently no consensus on whether CoinDesk should be considered a [[questionable source. Therefore I do not support the blanket removal of CoinDesk references especially in cases where it leaves statements unsourced and articles incomplete (including several criticisms). Instead, editors should refer to WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.

An experienced editor is removing all CoinDesk references from cryptocurrency related articles on Misplaced Pages. My question is simply whether there should there be a blanket removal of all CoinDesk references from Misplaced Pages, even in cases where it is not used to establish notability, irrespective of context? Here is a small sample of 10 affected articles, in no particular order (there are too many to sort through):

• Andreessen Horowitz - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Andreessen_Horowitz&type=revision&diff=899210046&oldid=897849761
• Initial coin offering - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Initial_coin_offering&type=revision&diff=899236284&oldid=878360173
• BitLicense - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=BitLicense&diff=prev&oldid=899205899
• Virtual currency - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Virtual_currency&diff=prev&oldid=899205974
• Blockchain - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Blockchain&diff=prev&oldid=899204625
• Petro (cryptocurrency) - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Petro_%28cryptocurrency%29&type=revision&diff=899240624&oldid=898403220
• ConsenSys - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=ConsenSys&diff=prev&oldid=899172771
• CryptoKitties - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=CryptoKitties&diff=prev&oldid=899172717
• Vitalik Buterin - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Vitalik_Buterin&diff=prev&oldid=899039990
• Non-fungible token - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Non-fungible_token&type=revision&diff=899205438&oldid=898660433

So the question is,

• Yes all references to CoinDesk should be removed from Misplaced Pages irrespective of context
• No do not remove all references to CoinDesk per previous RfC, and instead use the context to determine whether to use the reference or not (e.g. do not use CoinDesk sources to establish notability).

Note: This is not an RfC for individual article cleanup. I am sure we can all agree that many of the cryptocurrency related articles can be improved. --Molochmeditates (talk) 01:42, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

Remove it - speaking as the editor in question, here's what my thinking was:

• In general: cryptocurrency/blockchain articles are magnets for spam and advocacy. And crypto news sites are bad sources, per the previous discussion on this topic - they appear to be specialist press, but function as advocacy. You will see every possible thing being spun as good news for cryptos. We don't need crypto sites - there's plenty of mainstream coverage and peer-reviewed academic coverage to establish notability. Using crypto sites as sources in your article is a bad sign at AFD, and using mainstream RSes and peer-reviewed academic RSes is a good sign at AFD - so the observed working consensus of Misplaced Pages editors in practice is strongly in this direction.
• In particular: Coindesk has a terrible habit of running articles on things that don't exist yet, barely-reskinned press releases and so on. There are plenty of refs that are entirely factual content! But you can say the same about blogs, wikis and other sources that aren't trustworthy in any practical sense. And this is even though Coindesk has an editor, I know a pile of the journalists and they're honestly trying to do a good job, etc. Quite a lot of the Coindesk refs I removed were to puffed-up nonsense articles, or in support of blatantly promotional article content. So the argument that editors will check the context doesn't work in practice - using the Coindesk articles that happen to be properly-made news coverage only encourages the use of their bad stuff, on the basis of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, which is the most frequent AFD argument from crypto spammers.
• I urge those thinking about this to reread WP:GS/Crypto. Just think what sort of editing would cause that harsh a community sanction to be put into place. Those conditions haven't changed. Letting just a waffer-thin crypto site in the door will invite the spammers back.
• I must note I'm arguably speaking against my own interest here - I make some money as a crypto journalist, often publishing in these very sites. I know my stuff is good and my editors are good! But I also know there's excellent reason it's not good for Misplaced Pages - when we have mainstream sources. If some subject or fact isn't notable enough to make it into mainstream or peer-reviewed sources, perhaps it's not notable enough for Misplaced Pages.
• For a recent example that did make the crypto press, check this out. (I spoke to them with my Misplaced Pages editor hat on for once, not my crypto journalist hat.) That's about spammy interests trying to weasel their stuff into just one page. Repeat for a large swathe of the crypto articles on Misplaced Pages, 'cos that sort of thing is entirely usual. Mainstream-only is good in practice. (cc Retimuko and Ladislav Mecir, who are also mentioned in that piece.)
• And, really - you think crypto sites should be used for BLPs? We have super-stringent BLP rules also for excellent reasons. I can't see how a crypto site would ever be acceptable as a source for a BLP, except maybe as an accepted subject-published link or similar - David Gerard (talk) 17:36, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

- David Gerard (talk) 17:18, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Unreliable source - beyond the issues that David Gerrard lays out above, crypto news sites also have had issues with content being gneerated for pay but not noted as such. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 20:19, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
  • to be fair, Coindesk has never been credibly accused of pay-for-play, and there's no good reason to think they'd do that. However, their editorial line has long been basically boosterism for cryptos (IMO) - David Gerard (talk) 06:56, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

    That is fair. However, beyond that for all the reasons you've mentioned, which I didn't bother to repeat since you'd laid them out in depth, I continue to believe it is an unreliable source. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:53, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Keep (do not remove all references to CoinDesk - here's my thinking and take on the matter:

• The previous RfC did a good job of getting consensus on how to treat CoinDesk articles. It clearly stated that CoinDesk shouldn't be used to establish notability but otherwise isn't barred from being used as a source. Why the sudden change in this policy by one editor deciding unilaterally that they no longer wish to adhere to this consensus?
• Yes, we all know the usual criticisms of crypto press. That's already debated and known to editors. If there are individual instances to consider incorrect usage of CoinDesk, e.g. to establish notability, by all means they should be deleted. But as long as it isn't the policy, I don't support a blanket removal of all the material from literally hundreds of articles affected.
• A lot of the material that's been removed is actually criticism of the projects. The bias is easy to understand - a lot of the overly promotional puffery has been removed by diligent editors already. This means removing all the CoinDesk references has made the problem of crypto-puffery much worse.
• Several instances of purely encyclopedic content was removed for using CoinDesk as a purely descriptive secondary source (e.g. discussion on popular standards). This hurts the quality of the articles from an encyclopedic perspective.
• This blanket removal of CoinDesk references already goes against the general consensus previously reached. There are literally hundreds (probably thousands?) of edits to go through, and I don't think it's feasible to go through them all to determine if the removal was justified. In many cases I've reviewed, I think the removal was unjustified, and in several other cases, it was totally justified. It's very hard to review now after these edits.
• In conclusion, yes, there is a problem with crypto puff material entering the articles, but the solution isn't to ban crypto press. Crypto press both has the puffiest pieces and the most critical pieces on crypto projects. As editors, we want to see a balanced article, but that balance gets lost of we cannot cite the criticisms. One editor shouldn't decide to remove criticism and encyclopedic content especially going against previous consensus

I am of course happy to comply with a consensus view that CoinDesk should never be used as a reference on Misplaced Pages, if that's what comes out of this RfC. In that case, we should edit the RSP entry to reflect this consensus. Also, a lot of articles now have material that are unreferenced. There is a good amount of work to be done to go through these and remove the unsourced material or find other sources. --Molochmeditates (talk) 19:39, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

• Keep as a source per Molochmeditates. CoinDesk's role in promoting the use of cryptocurrencies is no different from PinkNews's role in promoting acceptance of LGBT communities worldwide. Recognise their bias, and use discretion when citing the source; but do not systemically reject an entire topic area from Misplaced Pages just because it is in some way problematic or difficult to write about. feminist (talk) 07:28, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

• Most of them should be removed. But it should be done more carefully. A lot of them can be replaced by mainstream sources. Examples:

Andreessen Horowitz - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Andreessen_Horowitz&type=revision&diff=899210046&oldid=897849761

Wall Street Journal "blog" about the same thing.

Initial coin offering - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Initial_coin_offering&type=revision&diff=899236284&oldid=878360173

"The SEC ruled that celebrity ICO endorsements must disclose the amount of any compensation paid for the endorsement." Covered by Reuters.

BitLicense - https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=BitLicense&diff=prev&oldid=899205899

"In July 2016, San Francisco-based Ripple was awarded the second BitLicense." Covered by Reuters.

There should be zero coin news references used in an article if possible. Like do you really need to use CoinDesk to write a good article about blockchain?

So if it's an important detail, look for a mainstream source. If it's only on a coin news site you should explain why it's needed on the talk page or edit summary. Blumpf (talk) 21:18, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

• Delete all references from Coindesk and other cryptopropaganda I'd thought that this was already a settled matter. There are reliable references to cryptomatters, e.g. Bloomberg, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, the Financial Times, BBC, CBC and sometimes in Fortune and some of the cable news networks. There's no reason not to just use these sources. The cryptopropaganda network is all shills all the time as far as I'm concerned. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 22:58, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Discussion (CoinDesk)

I think we need to be cautious here. Crypto/blockchain is a rather large field, but awash with people fighting over virtual dollars so sources are going to be iffy. But in other fields - for example, video games, we also know there is a lot of specialized media and a LOT of "blogs" trying to be big news sites that we at the VG project reject. That said, reviewing lists of crypto news site lists, a lot are owned by companies directly involved in the crypto game so yes, COI/self-promotion has to be a factor here. Coinbank seems to fall into that but its also the first major site after you get past CNBC and Forbes (which includes their contributors) in this list (which of course may also be suspect). I think we need some strong guidance to white/black-list sites and make it clear that sites that are knownly run by crypto backers should be considered generally a non-RS and certainly not independent for notability concerns. --Masem (t) 23:35, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

"sites that are knownly run by crypto backers should be considered generally a non-RS and certainly not independent for notability concern" - but that's literally all the crypto news sites, though. Every single one. Is there an exception you had in mind? - David Gerard (talk) 07:21, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

I don't know, I have not had any good chance to review them in any depth, their connections, and how others see those sources. For example, if we have non-crypto-based RSes routinely quoting facts from a crypto source, even if that source is not truly independent, that still suggests that that source would be seen as authorative. All the concerns related to WP:NORG obviously should be applied to any crypto-related article, but it still doesn't mean throwing the entire work out if others see part of it as reliable. But I have spent literally only like 10 minutes looking into this, nothing I would consider suitable to say such exist.

I do worry that this rush of mass removals without a clear consensus is into WP:FAIT territory, even though I suspect 95% of them removals would be proper, at the end of the day. --Masem (t) 14:06, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

I think your point about RS quoting something like CoinDesk is a fair point and I would hope that David Gerrard has stopped removing CoinDesk as a reference while this RfC is being conducted. However, because Crypto/blockchain is a substantial field we have non-industry sources covering notable organizations/developments regularly. We can rely on them without having to figure "Is CoinDesk acting as a booster of the industry here or is it reporting news of significance?" Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:57, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

No, do not remove all references to CoinDesk. As always, reliability is determined in context. Per Obsidi, "They have an editorial staff and an editorial policy. They do issue corrections". Benjamin (talk) 00:34, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

RfC: LifeSiteNews

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following lists: Politics, government, and law Media, the arts, and architecture Misplaced Pages proposals When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

Which of the following best describes the reliability of LifeSiteNews?

• Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
• Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
• Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail

--PluniaZ (talk) 04:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4 LifeSiteNews is notorious as an ideology driven arm of the Campaign Life Coalition that routinely publishes false and misleading stories. Snopes describes it as "a known purveyor of misleading information", and carries three articles debunking LifeSiteNews. LifeSiteNews used a defamation lawsuit as a fundraising opportunity. No reputable publication relies on LifeSiteNews as a source for factual information. --PluniaZ (talk) 04:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 - Pretty clear here that we're dealing with a partisan smear site on the order of (if not worse than) Breitbart. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 04:51, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 This website uses false information to promote its ideology. ―Susmuffin  07:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 1 No way. LifeSiteNews is generally highly reliable for factual reporting. Moreover many high ranking prelates, including many Cardinals, trust it and have given interviews. You can't dismiss LifesiteNews because it is conservative, even on Misplaced Pages. Thucyd (talk) 08:26, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Comment - Which other independent reliable sources say that LifeSiteNews "is generally highly reliable"? NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 13:21, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4. LifeSiteNews repeatedly publishes articles that promote conversion therapy, a pseudoscientific practice. — Newslinger talk 09:01, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  Also, the site regularly sources content from Breitbart News (RSP entry), including conspiracy theories related to George Soros in "Breitbart reveals Soros groups registering felons to oppose Moore in Alabama election" and "How billionaire George Soros is trying to hijack the Catholic Church for his progressive agenda". — Newslinger talk 10:51, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4 - As noted above this is highly disreputable source. I’ve come across it in news searches and I’m surprised it’s there as it’s so bad. The only use I see it for is to find out what one sect of religious extremists think. But even then you would need to use reputable sources to actually cite facts. I would never trust this source to report accurately. Gleeanon409 (talk) 14:20, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 5 - Reliable when used as a primary source for quotations and similar statements as to the opinions of those contributing to LifeSite, but NOT reliable when used as a secondary source to support the veracity of those opinions. Always use with in-text attribution. Blueboar (talk) 14:46, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Comment - Based on my reading of the rules, Option 4 would still allow LifeSiteNews to be used as a source about material that is published on the site: Misplaced Pages:Verifiability#Self-published_and_questionable_sources_as_sources_on_themselves. --PluniaZ (talk) 16:47, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 3 and possibly Option 4 - it's a nonsense site - David Gerard (talk) 15:24, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• 4 actually reliable sources universally agree it's a shit site. Good enough for me.--Jayron32 16:21, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXT WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Misplaced Pages article and is an appropriate source for that content. The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 17:43, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

  Your quoted sentence is not from WP:V, and I don't think WP:CONTEXT is the link you're looking for. The policy on questionable sources is a part of the verifiability policy, and LifeSiteNews is highly questionable based on the types of content it publishes. Unretracted articles supporting pseudoscience and conspiracy theories taint the entire source's reputation, and reveal the source's "poor reputation for checking the facts" and tendency to publish "views that are widely considered by other sources to be extremist". For example, the George Soros conspiracy theories are widely denounced by reliable sources as false and would violate the living persons policy if used at face value on Misplaced Pages, but a search on LifeSiteNews returns dozens of articles propagating them. WP:V also includes WP:ABOUTSELF, which maintains that questionable sources can be used for uncontroversial self-descriptions (e.g. a guest column on LifeSiteNews can be used on the article about its author to describe their views). This RfC does not change WP:ABOUTSELF, which defines the only circumstance LifeSiteNews may be considered usable in a Misplaced Pages article. — Newslinger talk 19:23, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

All of those arguments can and should be made on a case-by-case basis. I do not think we're in a position to establish a one-size-fits-all, blanket rule about this outlet or most other outlets, nor is this noticeboard the appropriate place to establish such a rule. R2 (bleep) 23:41, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

There is significant precedent supporting the identification of sources that have a pattern of publishing highly questionable material. Editors who support option 4 here would generally oppose the inclusion of content sourced from LifeSiteNews in any situation due to its abysmal reputation for accuracy and fact-checking every time the source is raised on this noticeboard (with the exception of uses qualifying under WP:ABOUTSELF). — Newslinger talk 23:58, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4 - If we aim for Misplaced Pages to become anything close to an encyclopedia, we need to stop using these rubbish sites as sources for content. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 20:19, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 2 - LifeSiteNews is a very conservatively-biased news source. However, there's a big difference between promoting viewpoints that many people disagree with, and deliberately peddling false information. (To quote from WP:BIASED: "reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject. Common sources of bias include political, financial, religious, philosophical, or other beliefs. Although a source may be biased, it may be reliable in the specific context.") A tabloid, for example, doesn't care whether their information is true or not, as long as they get readers; but I get the impression that LifeSiteNews does care about what they consider to be "truth" and are trying to report actual news events through the lens of their worldview. You or I may not agree with the biases underlying its articles, but this does not by itself make it unreliable. The reason I say Opinion 2 instead of Opinion 1 is because LifeSiteNews does lean in a sensationalist direction. It strikes me as an ultra-conservative version of something like Slate.com or Salon.com: highly biased news source with a sensationalist approach. Jdcompguy (talk) 21:01, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• The issue is not that the site is biased - the issue is that the site publishes and promotes known falsehoods and nonsensical conspiracy theories when convenient for its political worldview. When you choose to willfully publish lies about people (such as the Soros conspiracy theories cited above), you simply don't meet the standards of accuracy required for a reliable source. It doesn't matter that they consider such nonsense to be true - it factually and empirically is false.NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 21:10, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
  • You say they "willfully publish lies" and yet they also "consider such nonsense to be true." It can't be both. Jdcompguy (talk) 21:16, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
    • What’s the difference? If they delusionally promote lies or maliciously do so makes little difference. They can’t be trusted as a source. Gleeanon409 (talk) 22:18, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
  • No. A lie is a lie, whether or not the person who utters it actually believes it. "Donald Trump lost the 2016 presidential election" is a falsehood, no matter how much a person might wish it to be so. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:32, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
    • Meh... A lot depends on how we phrase things. Writing: ”Trump lost the 2016 election” is an inaccurate statement, but writing “Notable commentator Ima Crackpot believes that Trump lost the 2016 election” can be an accurate statement, if Ima Crackpot actually says this. Attribution changes the statement from being “about” Trump to being “about” Crackpot. Once you attribute, the question isn’t a statement of fact (ie whether Trump won or lost), but one of opinion (what Crackpot believes). This is why you can never have a completely unreliable source... there is always at least one context in which the source is reliable (ie a direct quote). Blueboar (talk) 23:04, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4 - More or less per PluniaZ. I had never heard of it, so spent some time on the site. To call it simply "biased" doesn't cut it. It's misleading and inaccurate all over the place in service of that bias. I cannot imagine a situation when this would be considered reliable or to have weight, outside of opinions about itself in its own article. — Rhododendrites \\ 22:38, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 I think it has been carefully examined and found wanting. Time to be deprecated. scope_creep 22:39, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• 3 or 4, per Rhododendrites. -sche (talk) 22:47, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4. As far as I can see, the website is full of fringe nonsense, and has been described by RS as unreliable (Snopes says it's "a known purveyor of misleading information", the Advocate says it's "One of the Most Anti-LGBTQ Online Outlets"). I did a brief google search on how this website covered LGBT issues, evolution and climate change...

Here are some anti-LGBT LSN headlines (all marked "news"):

• "Experts Worldwide Find Gay Adoption Harmful for Children"
• "Ex-gay man: ‘Homosexuality is just another human brokenness’"
• "Expert Research Finds Homosexuality More Dangerous Than Smoking"
• "Expert: ‘Homo-tyranny is upon us’"
• According to the Advocate, LSN frames stories about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church as a problem of homosexuality.

Here are a bunch of stories casting doubt on the theory of evolution (all marked "news"):

• "Over 500 PhD Scientists Proclaim Their Doubts About Darwin’s Theory"
• "Ranks of Renowned Scientists Doubting Darwin’s Theory on the Rise - 700 Now on Public List"
• "Astonishing 88% of Americans Believe in Creation or God-Directed Evolution"
• "Is Darwinian evolution an idea whose time has come and gone?"

Climate change:

• "More Than 650 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims"
• "Eminent geophysicist rejects global warming theory, says world on verge of ‘mini ice age’"
• "Former global warming scientist: Gov’ts seek ‘total control’ through climate theory"

There seems to be a pattern of propping up fringe views and falsehoods. Even if the headlines are attributed to some idiot, the body of the articles usually contain straight-up falsehoods and incendiary language by the "reporter", as well as a complete failure to do the minimum fact-checking that shows that the idiots that they are quoting are saying false things. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 23:26, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4. Clearly nonsense. BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 00:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 1/2 I find them reliable for facts, but I always assess on a case-by-case basis, which should be done for all cites of scources. They also have a corrections policy and they do issue corrections. I may not always agree with their bias or views and like many, many sources, even mainstream news organizations/publications, you have to consider what is left out (intentional or not) or given undue weight. I don't rely on the headline for any news article (from any source) as they are too often intentionally provocative or, given their brevity, incomplete. If there is good faith controversy on assertions, I generally find it better to balance the presentation by citing sources that offer different and contrary, even if biased, analyses. Archer1234 (talk) 13:14, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 - This isn't about bias, or their weird beef with the Pope or their support for fringe political candidates worldwide, this is about actually publishing falsehoods. I'm saying this because some people are trying to move the discussion towards the reliability of biased sources, rather than talking about actual fake news. And RealLifeNews is a websites that publishes untruths on a regular basis. Snooganssnoogans's post above offers a wide range of examples and I find it difficult to believe that somebody can look over that list and still think this is about discrimination of right wing opinions. PraiseVivec (talk) 13:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Option 3 or Option 4 An undeniably biased and intellectually slanted website. I don’t see it as falling into the Breitbart camp of complete deprecation, however: Media Bias/Fact Check finds its record to be mixed, not complete and total garbage. Basically I’m highly skeptical of using this source for factual reporting, and there’s no reason to use it in that area, if ever. Toa Nidhiki05 14:27, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

  Media Bias/Fact Check (RSP entry) is considered generally unreliable because of its questionable methodology. See the September 2018 and December 2018 discussions for details. It's not a good idea to rely on information from that site. — Newslinger talk 14:44, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) Option 1. Its journalism has brought bombshells that can be compared to The Boston Globe's. Plenty of WP:USEBYOTHERS, see and even the failing pro-pedophilia New York Times . There is also the policy WP:Child protection, which means that an anti-pedophilic bias is generally justified on Misplaced Pages. Let's look at the arguments for "option 4". Snopes's characterization of the website as "a known purveyor of misleading information" is the misleading thing here. Snopes only cites one incident for that vast overstatement so let's take a look at it. LifeNewsWire may have presented the strangling as factual even though there has never been a criminal conviction (this is a "he said–she said" situation). But every news outlet presents criminal allegations as factual! It's not a secret. I can't refute "option 4" !votes which do not provide any substantial rationale or evidence (these are mostly WP:IDLI non-arguments), so I am left with the argument that promoting conversion therapy is worse than promoting pedophilia (I won't comment on the veracity of this argument because I am not familiar enough), the WP:OR argument that the Soros story is false (it's actually true according to the magazine New York and Haaretz cites it as fact though stops short of calling the funding intentional on Soros's part; Breitbart does a lot of good stuff and most articles are correct, so one can't say their content is automatically a lie, especially when other sources corroborate the information, which is not an argument absolving Breitbart of any wrongdoing but merely the state of most Breitbart articles), the argument by Snooganssnoogans "According to the Advocate, LSN frames stories about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church as a problem of homosexuality" (the only valid argument IMO in this discussion, though WP:BIASED says that bias doesn't mean a source is unreliable if it has a track record of fact-checking, and that track record is always difficult to establish and belongs to the article Campaign Life Coalition as per WP:FRINGE, but the currently presented information there and here is scant) and Snooganssnoogans's list of LifeSiteNews articles without secondary coverage debunking them. wumbolo ^^^ 16:30, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

• The examples of USEBYOTHERS are: (1) quoting a statement made by Carson to LSN, (2) quoting a letter sent by ultraconservative bishops to LSN calling Pope Francis a heretic,, (3) quoting an anti-Pope Francis LSN story as an example of how ultraconservative Catholics have responded to Pope Francis,, (4) mentioning how LSN published an English translation of an Italian Archbishop's polemic against Pope Francis, and (5) quoting a LSN interview with an anti-Pope Francis bishop. In none of these instances are other reliable sources citing this website as if it broke news and as if its content is factual. It's cited in the same way as RS would cite InfoWars or Breitbart News: as an organization that plays an active role in the culture wars and gives a platform to prominent fringe actors. I'd also like to note that this is not the first time that you've grossly misrepresented USEBYOTHERS: you also did it in the case of the Daily Wire on this noticeboard last year. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)
• Also, excuse my ignorance: in what way is the NY Times pro-pedophilia? Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

  That remark most likely refers to the NYT's publication of Margo Kaplan's controversial 2014 op-ed "Pedophilia: A Disorder, Not a Crime", which argued that US laws should be changed to disallow employers from discriminating against pedophiles, since pedophilia is a mental illness (and mentally disabled people, with the exception of pedophiles, are a protected class in the US). After publication, the NYT acknowledged the largely negative response to the op-ed. I would not consider the NYT "pro-pedophilia" since they describe Kaplan's op-ed as a minority viewpoint, and because the op-ed doesn't even portray pedophilia in positive terms. The NYT is not "failing" by any measure (commercial or critical). — Newslinger talk 17:42, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

• Your false and nonsensical rant about the newspaper of record in the United States should disqualify you from ever discussing reliable sources again. It's clear that you have neither an understanding of fact nor an understanding of policy. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:25, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

This, from someone who cited zero sources whatsoever. wumbolo ^^^ 11:41, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4 - if only because after reading Wumbolo's nonsense above, the complete opposite *must* be correct.... (Also because LSN prints rubbish, has a clear agenda that affects its factual reporting, and has no record of reliability from anyone else) Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:48, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4, 3 being a distant second choice. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:48, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 per above. X-Editor (talk) 19:32, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
• Objection to RfC.. No evidence that a dispute made this RfC necessary, no good excuse for overriding Misplaced Pages policy that context matters, misleading wording since the effect is far more than deprecation. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 17:39, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4. By definition, this is a highly biased news source and thus unsuitable for WP as a reliable source. Britishfinance (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

RfC: MintPress News

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following lists: Media, the arts, and architecture Misplaced Pages proposals When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

What is the best way to describe the reliability of MintPress News? --Jamez42 (talk) 09:02, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

• Option 1: Generally reliable for factual reporting
• Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
• Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual reporting
• Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated as in the 2017 RfC of the Daily Mail

Survey (MintPress News)

• Option 4 (first choice) or option 3 (second choice). Reliable sources consider MintPress News disreputable:

I read through MintPress News's most recent "inside story" ("Microsoft’s ElectionGuard a Trojan Horse for a Military-Industrial Takeover of US Elections"), and I was not impressed with the level of fact-checking done. The article accuses Microsoft of "price gouging for its OneCare security software", and links that text to "Microsoft accused of predatory pricing of security software", an article from The Guardian (RSP entry) that describes the exact opposite: "Incredibly, Microsoft has priced themselves almost 50% below the market leader". (See Predatory pricing for a definition of the practice.) The MintPress News article then uses its own false claim to assert that Microsoft's "offering of ElectionGuard software free of charge is tellingly out of step for the tech giant and suggests an ulterior motive behind Microsoft’s recent philanthropic interest in 'defending democracy.'"

MintPress News is biased or opinionated, and any use of the source should be attributed. Since it's associated with fringe theories, its content should be examined for due weight and parity of sources should be considered. — Newslinger talk 23:00, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

• MintPress News has also republished 340 articles from Zero Hedge (RSP entry), a blog that propagates conspiracy theories. See the count on the 404 page (under "ZeroHedge.com"), and the list of articles. — Newslinger talk 23:54, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
• The site republishes articles from the Associated Press as well. Syndicated content should be evaluated by the reliability of the original publisher. Direct citations of the Associated Press are preferred over citations of the republisher. — Newslinger talk 04:54, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
• Mick West's Escaping the Rabbit Hole: How to Debunk Conspiracy Theories Using Facts, Logic, and Respect uses the MintPress News article "No Longer Conspiracy: CIA Admits Plans Of Aerosol Spraying For Geoengineering" as an example of a fallacious argument defending the chemtrail conspiracy theory. West states:

As a source that pushes conspiracy theories, MintPress News is highly questionable. — Newslinger talk 06:16, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

• Option 3 is my impression, I noticed something was strange with this site after only reading a few of its articles, leading me to read on MintPress. When I found out about information confirming my suspicion, I also discovered that it includes reposts of Russian media that is often considered propaganda by other sources (and started a discussion thread about it here per WP:BRD when my edit to the lead was reverted). —PaleoNeonate – 01:56, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 or option 3 at best. We can literally use SELFSOURCE to state that MintPress is widely considered unreliable. They have built an entire fundraising campaign around the fact that Google, Facebook, and the collective "Mainstream Media" denounce MintPress as fake news. It's unclear whether MintPress is part of the Russian fake news engine or merely a bunch of "useful idiot" nutters participating in the same content-sharing web of alternative "news" sites, but for our purposes it doesn't matter. If a story runs on MintPress and it appears in a normally Reliable source, I would consider that good reason to consider whether the Reliable Source had a lapse in their quality checks. Alsee (talk) 13:00, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

  The GoFundMe campaign uses the polemical article "Obama, Being Black, Was Perfectly Suited to Deliver the Racist Message", which asks, "Was Obama an avatar of white supremacy?", and states, "Obama clearly made a conscious effort to depict blacks as a thing apart, and the children of a lesser God, who were deserving of their material misfortune", as an example of the content MintPress News is producing. The site clearly has no ambition to be a reliable source. — Newslinger talk 16:09, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

• Option 4. MintPress News is closer to a fakenews site than journalism. No need to lower the RS bar. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 18:26, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 or * Option 3 Clearly unreliable per presented evidence --Shrike (talk) 20:37, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 although I would settle for Option 3 if there is not a strong enough consensus for the former. MintPress is a cesspool of conspiracy theories and misinformation that should never be cited on an encyclopedia.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 20:42, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 3 I have scanned some other articles on the site and followed the links. We will have to take each article on a case-by-case basis. Walter Görlitz (talk) 20:47, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
• Option 4 or * Option 3 Clearly unreliable as per evidence above. I don't think MediaBias/Factcheck or Newsguard are reliable in themselves but are useful starting points. The former rates MintPress as "biased", its factual reporting as "mixed" and notes two failed fact checks1, 2' while the latter gave it a "red" (i.e. fail) rating. FactCheck.org found it to have published a fake story in 2015 (see also AFP), and Snopes found it to have published "mostly false" stories in 2015 and 2016 BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:46, 5 June 2019 (UTC)
• Objection to RfC. This RfC violates our verifiability policy. It amounts to little more than a popularity contest and is inconsistent with WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Misplaced Pages article and is an appropriate source for that content. The TDM RfC was premised on the fact that TDM had already been a perennial source here based on many specific test cases. It is inappropriate for us to go through obscure sources that have only been glancingly addressed here and to decide whether they satisfy the reliability bar absolutely or generally. RSN is the place for individual test cases, and once enough of them have arisen then a case can be made to add a media outlet to WP:RSP. R2 (bleep) 20:01, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

  All four options in this RfC are fully compliant with the verifiability policy, especially in light of its section on questionable sources. The above evidence is more than enough to establish MintPress News as highly questionable. There is no need to go through additional motions when multiple discussions' worth of evidence is presented in this RfC. The inclusion criterion in WP:RSP § How to improve this list is one RfC or two significant discussions. — Newslinger talk 06:25, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

• Objection to RfC per above. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 22:07, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Could a source from 1825 be considered a reliable source on Misplaced Pages?

Could a source from 1825 -- for instance, this book about the geneaology of the House of Bourbon: https://books.google.com/books?id=rjsWAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA483&dq=jean+seigneur+de+carency+1825&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiF7pD-4cniAhWvJzQIHcqBB0wQ6AEIKjAA#v=onepage&q=jean%20seigneur%20de%20carency%201825&f=false -- be considered a reliable source by Misplaced Pages's standards? On the one hand, this book is extremely dated (being almost 200 years old!), but at the same time, this book has value in the sense that it contains some information that modern books might not have. Obviously this book would be unreliable for information on post-1825 members of the House of Bourbon, but the information that it contains about the House of Bourbon for the centuries before 1825 should still be considered reliable even today, no? I mean, historical genealogy for the House of Bourbon for the centuries before 1825 would still be the same whether the source is from 1825 or from today (2019), no? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Futurist110 (talk • contribs) 16:59, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Ancestry does not change a heck of a lot, so if the book was from a reputable source at the time, it is unlikely that statements of fact will have become wrong. Collect (talk) 17:01, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Howcheng has been adding a 1735 book as a reference for genealogy in dozens of articles. Frankly, I find that absurd. What counts as a reliable source, according to WP:V, are "academic and peer-reviewed publications" and "reliable non-academic sources, particularly ... respected mainstream publications". I do not think something older than the guillotine can be considered a reliable source for information about the Bourbons. If no modern, academic and peer-reviewed biography contains a specific piece of information, we should not reach for 300-year-old books to justify its inclusion. We should reflect modern scholarship and leave it out. Surtsicna (talk) 17:33, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

These kinds of old sources are very common on history related pages (as primary sources) such as those on the ancient world, medieval world, etc. These old sources are acceptable to be used in wikipedia, but it usually is better to attribute the claims from the source to the source itself if you think that statement on the wikipedia article will be controversial. For example, "According to Nicolas Louis Achaintre, .....". At least it would not treat the source as factual automatically. See WP:Primary for more on how to handle these kinds of primary sources on Misplaced Pages. In general, the use of primary sources, should be limited, not extensive on most articles. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 18:34, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Neither of the two sources mentioned here can be understood as a primary source. An 18th century book recounting events from the 14th century is not a primary source. We are discussing secondary sources which, if I interpret the terms "academic", "peer-reviewed" and "respected mainstream publications" correctly, do not exactly meet the reliable source criteria. Surtsicna (talk) 19:20, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

Ah I see your point. Nonetheless, they are usable as secondary sources because that is what most historigraphical sources are. See WP:Secondary. Attribution should solve any issues since it places weight on the source itself. Keep in mind that peer-review is a modern practice that caught on mainly in the 20th century . Most works did not go through peer review before that century and that includes the works of Darwin, Newton, Aristotle, Pliny the Elder, Julius Caesar, Plato, Galileo, Thucydides (the father of history), Marco Polo, Columbus' letters, Cortez's letters on the Conquest, etc. This is why I would attribute and leave it at that. Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 19:59, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

In general you are correct, however RE genealogical sources - some of them have more in common with tertiary sources rather than primary or secondary - being in themselves compendiums made up of mostly primary sources (written records where available) with little analysis or interpretation on the part of the author (that is usually required for a secondary source). But it would be source and context dependant. As Collect says above, a geneological book from 1825 laying out the genealogical history of the Bourbons is unlikely to have much changed since regarding statements of fact "X was born Y and married Z". Unless subsequent scholarship has discovered something to the contrary. A historical book discussing say the political and social effects of the Bourbons would be an entirely different packet of biscuits and would depend on context. Only in death does duty end (talk) 18:54, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

As a note, a Bourbon genealogy written during the Bourbon restoration is an overtly political book. The preface of Volume 1 ends with: "Nous nous estimerons très heureux si notre ouvrage contribuer pour sa part à entretenir cet amour si pur si sincère pour le roi et son auguste famille dont nous pénétrés nous mêmes et dont les François ont depuis tant de siècles d éclatants témoignages." (and contains other political asides, such as, "La maison royale de Bourbon! Y at il quelque chose plus grand de plus noble dans l'univers entier?") Achaintre was primarily a translator of Latin books - it is up to you whether you think that training would make him an useful source for the thing you wish to cite. While I know no reason to think he might be wrong about the particular fact you wish to cite, you might consider a more up-to-date source if one is available. Smmurphy 19:17, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Per Age matters, it should not be used. And the authors certainly would have a conflict of interest in portraying the family in the best possible light. Any disputes of legitimate births, or ancient rights and titles held would undoubtedly be resolved in their favor. TFD (talk) 22:19, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Provided the specific fact being cited to it isn't controversial or anything, I think it could be potentially used with an inline citation to describe what people thought at the time. I'd mention the year in the in-line cite to make that clear. The ideal situation would just be to use a more up-to-date source, but finding such sources isn't always possible; and I think it's sufficient for bare-bones uncontroversial genealogy facts. I'd use it with extreme caution, but I don't think it has to be removed on sight or anything. --Aquillion (talk) 18:54, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

On the subject of pages that are based mostly on sources from a century ago, I just now stumbled upon Chizerots (if anyone wants to help look for more modern sources for it—I'm having a hard time). -sche (talk) 21:43, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Is Kathmandu Tribune a Reliable Source

i have been watching out this online News Portal from Nepal called Kathmandu Tribune article from this portal is cited on many Misplaced Pages pages, so i want to know news on it is considered as Reliable or not Shringhringshring (talk) 20:08, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

• I see from our article on the subject that it has a partnership with Deutsche Welle, a reliable source, which would leave me inclined to lean toward reliable (although the fact that it is KT that's syndicating DW content is less of a vouch for KT's credibility than the inverse relationship would be). Looking at its "About Us" page , the only red flag is a partnership with Xinhua, and it's not clear what the nature of the partnership is. As such, without any special knowledge of the subject, I'd say that we can generally assume reliability on par with other reliable news sources for most of its coverage, and its coverage of China should be reviewed with more scrutiny. _signed, Rosguill 20:56, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
• First, Reliability generally isn't just about the source, it also depends on what you want to cite from it and what you want to use it for. The instructions on this page say that you should identify the content you want to cite as well as the article where you want to use it.
  When it is republishing content from a partner it would normally be appropriate to be citing that original source instead, and it would be the Reliability of that source being considered. However as far as 'native' content, it's a tiny "staff" with no clear reputation for reliability, it has miniscule readership as apparent by the article-view stats, some of the content has no editorial review at all (being effectively selfpublished by the "editor"), and some of the content is pretty clearly paid content. So I probably wouldn't consider it very reliable for disputed content, and I would generally not consider it reliable for establishing Notability. I would especially not consider it reliable for establishing Notability if there were concerns that the content being cited might be paid placement. Alsee (talk) 16:10, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

WalesOnline.co.uk

I'd welcome discussion on what editors think about WalesOnline.co.uk as a reliable and reputable source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Littlemonday (talk • contribs) 13:56, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

I've moved this discussion from WT:RSP to the reliable sources noticeboard, which receives more attention from other editors. — Newslinger talk 22:27, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

• WalesOnline is owned by Media Wales, and is used   in over 4,300 articles. — Newslinger talk 22:30, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

There's a lot of redigested content on WalesOnline, but it's not bad for a local source in my experience. Are there particular issues you have in mind for RSN? - David Gerard (talk) 22:50, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Anything that isnt Welsh-specific will usually be covered in more and better depth elsewhere. Its a perfectly good and useful source for Welsh-region articles where you would normally cite a newspaper/news media. Only in death does duty end (talk) 20:35, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

• Clearly a reputable source, an online news source for articles published in the dead-tree South Wales Echo (South Wales) and the Western Mail, which are both well-established reputable newspapers dating back to the 19th century. It has several very respectable journalists. I wonder why this subject has been raised here... Sionk (talk) 21:26, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
• As per Sionk, I am surprised the question has even been posed here. What's the problem, or issue, exactly? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:29, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

  Probably something to do with this. Nikkimara removed the Daily Mail and sun sources but left the Wales Online one. Not in itself an issue, generally we wouldnt cite the Daily Mail if we can find a better source, and Media Wales is certainly better. Only in death does duty end (talk) 22:17, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Call-out culture

These are all op-eds, can they be used for a statement of fact, or anything other than the authors own words?

• Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/28/style/is-it-canceled.html
• Source: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/q/blog/have-we-hit-peak-cancel-culture-1.4944521
• Source: https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/8xb9x5/logan-paul-and-the-myth-of-cancel-culture
• Source:https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/14/opinion/call-out-social-justice.html
• Source: https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/film/2018/11/how-cancel-culture-attempted-silence-jamelia-and-kanye-west

Article: Call-out culture Bacondrum (talk) 00:45, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

None of those are op-eds, so I'm assuming you mean opinion pieces. It is increasingly difficult to tell whether something should be considered an opinion piece or actual journalism, partly because they're not always labelled and partly because lots of publishers blend the two together. This is a problem because opinion articles usually only receive a cursory fact check, while actual journalism reflects the publisher's reputation for accuracy. Of the sources you listed, only the NY Times piece by David Brooks is labelled "opinion"; that's definitely opinion and can only be used as a source for David Brooks' opinion. For the others, I think you have to consider the author, the context, and the style.

The other NY Times piece is not labelled opinion, and Jonah Engel Bromwich appears to be a regular contributor to the paper . Judging by this article's style and the other articles he's written, I'd say this should be considered journalism and not opinion. More than anything else, it reads like a primer on the topic for those unfamiliar with the term.

The CBC piece is labelled a "blog" and thus falls under WP:NEWSBLOG: we have to look at the particular situation to determine whether it should be treated as opinion or journalism. The author, Jesse Kinos-Goodin, is a permanent staff member of CBC (or at least he runs this blog for them). The q blog seems to includes a mix of listicles and other entertainment news. So this one's unclear.

The New Statesman article is not labelled opinion, but they don't appear to label anything opinion, so that's not good evidence either way. The author wrote a series of articles for them over the course of two weeks in November last year. She's also written a number of articles for other publications. This is a little unclear, but I'd lean towards saying it can be used as a source.

As for Vice... I really don't know whether to call what they do there journalism. Maybe they have some worthwhile material. Just from reading this article it's obviously opinion, and thus should not be used for anything. Unless there's some major secondary sources who consider Connor Garel's opinion on the matter somehow authoritative. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 06:51, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

1. II will just answer the basic question, not analyse any of the sources. No, op-edds or opinion pieces should not be used for statements of fact (by their nature even the publisher think they are only opinions).Slatersteven (talk) 09:50, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

RfC: is "Golden Harvest or Hearts of Gold?" an RS?

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following lists: History and geography Politics, government, and law When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

Continuing the discussion from the previous RSN thread and Talk:History of the Jews in Poland: is the book "Golden Harvest Or Hearts of Gold?: Studies on the Fate of Wartime Poles and Jews" (2012) an RS? François Robere (talk) 08:35, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

• Not an RS:

• The book was originally published by The Facto, a popular press, so no evidence of peer review.
• The translation was published by Leopolis Press, the editor's own publishing house - the very definition of WP:SPS.
• Apparently the translation has so many errors that, according to one reviewer, " has more errors in basic English than any other scholarly book I have read. When authors, editors, and proofreaders – those eyes that view a document before scholarly publication – can't use so rudimentary a tool as spellcheck... the reader begins to assume that the entire text is suspect."
• The book is not listed on Google Scholar, so it's impossible to tell how many citations it has. This is quite unusual; I could find this rare book (which I came upon by literally searching for "rare academic books"), but I can't find that one.
• The first editor is Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, a controversial academic who's been frequently criticised for his ideologically-motivated writing, bias against minorities and association with far right politics. At risk of losing a $1m endowment earmarked for Chodakiewicz, the University of Virginia opted to "let him go", and he now teaches at a small college in Washington, DC.
• The second editor, Wojciech Muszyński, was also criticised for his far right links.
• The third editor, Paweł Styrna, is a research associate and former student of the first, but is otherwise unnotable.
• The book includes such right-wing staples as Chodakiewicz, John Radzilowski (who used the book to coin the term "neo-Stalinists" in reference to his critics), Ryszard Tyndorf (who isn't an academic) and Mark Paul, a pseudonymic writer (again, highly unusual) which was previously deemed unreliable.
• Several of the other authors are either non-academic or unpublished: Bethany Paluk (grad student), Barbara Gorczycka-Muszynska (judge) and Tomasz Sommer (politician and publicist).
• AFAIK the book was only reviewed twice, both negatively.
• The original proposer's response to the lack of positive criticisms was that " is nonetheless cited and engaged with by other scholars as part of an academic discourse". While true, it only establishes notability, not reliability, so it's not enough to justify using the book for statements of fact.
• The OP's other response was that "the reviews, while pointing out that bias, are themselves also likely biased." Unfortunately he did not present any evidence to support this conjecture.

• All in all this book barely passes WP:SCHOLARSHIP, and shouldn't be used. François Robere (talk) 08:42, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

• Bias and politics are not reasons for something to not be RS, neither is lack of peer review for books. The translation issue is more problematic. I would say the English translation is not an RS the Polish original maybe. But I am sure we only discussed this a couple of months ago.Slatersteven (talk) 09:48, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

• Not in a RfC. Being self-published in English and published in Polish by an obscure non-academic popular press (without a reputation for fact checking) is a RS issue - as is the reputation of the self-publisher / editor / authors. Icewhiz (talk) 10:53, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

• WP:SPS and WP:FRINGE books cannot be used to source such well researched academic field like Polish-Jewish relation.The source maybe reliable for Author own view when its WP:DUE -Shrike (talk) 10:11, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
• Not reliable, in WP:FRINGE turf, and WP:UNDUE regardless. This is a well published field - with several manuscripts by established academics in academic presses. The work in question is self-published in English (the first named editor and author is also the publisher - - Leopolis is published by the Kościuszko Chair who is Chodakiewicz - and hasn't published much of anything else). and published by an obscure and small publisher in Polish that is far from academic (see bookdepository). The publisher/first-editor/first-author works in academia are highly controversial, and is furthermore a far-right activist, profiled by the SPLC. Another editor was a m.sc student at time of publication and is presently at SPLC-designated FAIR. The book itself is not an academic work, but a collection of polemic essays. Some of the name authors are far-right figures, one is writing under a pseudo-name, and others are nearly unknown - including the author of the book chapter in question (Gorczycka-Muszyńska) - a journal article noting it's not a coincidence she shares a surname with the second editor of the volume. The scant attention this has received in academia - mainly due to many outlandish claims in the book (including a whole chapter devoted to describing American historical studies as "Neo-Stalinist") - has been entirely negative. Academic coverage also noting factual errors as well as numerous errors in basic English - further calling the publisher's reputation into question (if the publisher is unable to spellcheck and proofread the book - are we to trust them with fact checking?). Finally, the existence of several academically published and well-cited academic works in the field make use of this work even for an attributed viewpoint as WP:UNDUE. Icewhiz (talk) 11:09, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
• Given the number of studies in this field, a work that doesn't make it onto Google Scholar isn't the best choice for using. It may be reliable for opinions of each essay's author, but that's going to depend on WP:DUE. At best, it's barely reliable, but given the only academic journal review it received here was scathing... and then an online review by Danusha Goska isn't much less scathing. Add in the non-academic publisher, and we have better choices to use. Ealdgyth - Talk 16:08, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
• (I was summoned by bot to the RFC further up this page, and I made the regrettable decision to investigate this one as well.) Not sufficiently Reliable for anything this source is likely to be cited for. To help other new arrivals with this wide-ranging mess: this Misplaced Pages search currently finds 18 articles or discussions mentioning this source. Note to avoid confusion, Golden Harvest or Hearts of Gold is a response to Golden Harvest (book), so don't make the mistake of searching "Golden Harvest" as I initially did. This mess also involves a currently open Request to open an Arbcom case on Holocaust in Poland. One POV involved is that there are some rather unflattering events in Polish history, including slaughter of hundreds of Jews by Poles, in a city that was bypassed by the Nazi invasion. The other POV involves sources saying that any antisemitism that existed in Poland is because the Jews deserved it, and Jews are to blame because they collaborated with the Nazis via some convoluted chain of logic. The source we are discussing here was edited by Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, who is indeed a Notable Historian. However he appears to have received substantial criticism from other Notable historians for a Pro-Polish-Nationalistic historical revisionism, and numerous accusations of hostile bias against Jews. He appears to have a rather dubious reputation in the field. He appears to be outside the mainstream at best, and perhaps Fringe. The book itself also appears to have a poor reputation. If we're going to cite any of Chodakiewicz's work I suggest we at least limit to something more substantial than a compilation of essays by a non-academic publisher. And if we cite a significant non-mainstream viewpoint, NPOV requires that it be appropriately contextualized with the mainstream viewpoint. Alsee (talk) 18:39, 6 June 2019 (UTC)
• Not an RS per persuasive arguments by Icewhiz and Francois. ∯WBG 10:37, 7 June 2019 (UTC)
• Not reliable, for the reasons given. Indeed, an excellent example of what is meant by lack of reliability in this sort of subject. I find it remarkable that this would be seriously proposed as a RS for anything imaginably controversial. DGG ( talk ) 05:12, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
• Can be used with appropriate attribution. This is a book collecting writings by several professional historians including Chodakiewicz, Piotr Gontarczyk, Peter Stachura, John Radzilowski, and Waldemar Chrostowski. It was published in Polish and translated to English. Do we have concerns that the publications in this book have indeed been written by these historians? No, if I understand correctly. Hence, the book can be used per WP:RS to provide their views with direct appropriate attribution. Are their views due and should be included on specific pages? This is an entirely different question. That depends on specific page and on consensus on the page. Given that at least some of the authors are experts in their fields, I do not see why not. My very best wishes (talk) 20:04, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
• Borderline RS. Can be used, but should be used with attribution in case there are any disagreements. To the best of my knowledge, no 'red flags' have been identified in the text, i.e. it makes no outlandish claims. Care should be taken to distinguish bwtween chapters by reliable scholars like John Radzilowski and more problematic ones like the ones by Mark Paul. a person that I was not able to find any biographical informatuon about. I'd suggest not using any content from the more problematic chapters if there is any disagreement about them. We should not silence voices by minor historians. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:58, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

  Radzilowski authored a chapter devoted to labelling American social sciences, historical studies, and several historians as neo-Stalinists. Reception of which (probably the main reason this book received any notice) has been scathing. As noted in a review, he holds a position in a small campus in Alaska, while criticising fields and academics at major institutions. Is this chapter then a RS for "neo-Stalinism" of named BLPs and academic fields?Icewhiz (talk) 03:41, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

• RS but should be attributed since it is BIASed (but BIAS is not RELIABILITY). At the very least the professional historians and scholars in the volume are RS. First, note that Icewhiz does not back up any of his assertions, past the third one, with diffs or links. In case of living people, making such claims without evidence constitutes a WP:BLPVIO (BLP applies to discussion pages). The authors for the most part are professional historians. One of them, Gorczycka-Muszynska is a judge, but then she's addressing legal questions (albeit in a historical context), hence that's still reliable. Some of Icewhiz's assertions about the authors are either false or absurd. I'm pretty sure that John Radzilowski didn't "coin" (sic) the term "neo-Stalinist" and as has already been pointed out to Icewhiz, Radzilowski does NOT describe "American historical studies" as "neo-Stalinist". Rather he is referring to specific individuals, who do happen to be quite a bit to the left (whether the moniker is appropriate or not is kind of beside the point). Regarding Mark Paul, Icewhiz claims that this author "was previously deemed unreliable". This too is false. In the first RSN discussion Icewhiz links to there is clearly no consensus regarding the reliability. You get the usual split with Icewhiz/FrancoisRobere vs. others. The second link, to an RfC on a specific page was indeed closed with "not included" but mostly for reasons that had to do with the fact that the source was being used for WP:LISTCRUFT. One last comment - User:Alsee, I would ask that you don't base your !vote on the basis of claims Icewhiz has made at the ArbCom Request for Case. Indeed, Icewhiz's tendency to misrepresent editors and sources is precisely why we're likely to have a case. For example, Icewhiz mentions, and you repeat, this AfD, regarding the article Szczuczyn pogrom. Please click on the history of that article (here). Please note that NONE of Icewhiz's edits to that article have been reverted. Please look at the talk page of that article (Talk:Szczuczyn_pogrom). Please note that there are NO objections to any of Icewhiz's edits. Icewhiz is PRETENDING that he is fighting against some POV on this article, pushed by some bad editors. Except these bad editors don't actually exist. Even the AfD nomination was withdrawn once actual sources were added to the article (at the time of the AfD sources were crap). The Szczuczyn Pogrom article is NOT controversial. Nobody's denying it, nobody's rewriting it, nobody's edit warring over it. Pretty much everything that Icewhiz says in that ArbCom Case Request is either false or a gross misrepresentation.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:02, 9 June 2019 (UTC)
• More generally, RSN or not, Icewhiz really needs to refrain from making WP:BLP vios on this page. For example, the statement "At risk of losing a $1m endowment earmarked for Chodakiewicz..." is unsupported and as such a pretty blatant violation of BLP.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:29, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

  Volunteer Marek I only skimmed a small bit of the Arbcom case, and all I know about Szczuczyn pogrom is that I skimmed the article and that there was a (failed) AFD. I merely considered that article one datapoint, that there was history that some people might consider inconvenient. Most of what you deny/defend above is things I never heard of (and therefore never believed).
  While Robere's and Icewhiz's posts above looked potentially persuasive, I saw this situation was more complex and I went digging. For what it's worth I mostly reached my conclusion while independently searching info on Chodakiewicz and Hearts of Gold. I can't begin to fully investigate the big mess around this subject, and it's possible I'm wrong. However everything I found about Chodakiewicz and Hearts of Gold set off all my redflags on the source.
  As another for-what-it's-worth, if this RSN discussion goes against you and the arbcom case ends in your favor, I would be willing to revisit this question to consider any clarity the arbcom case may (or may not) bring to the picture here. But from what I've seen so far this source doesn't seem trustworthy. Alsee (talk) 11:00, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

• This discussion is all over the place between RS, NPOV, FRINGE, SPS, USEBYOTHERS and BLP. This needs a more structured format to address these issues individually. If it is true, what is said in the two on-line English language reviews, the source is very problematic indeed, and we need more information on what the paywalled reveiw says. On the other hand, if there is a counter to those reviews (Piortr) mentions a counter but not what it says, and if is true that other scholarly works (not reveiws) have used this source, what do they use it for? I suggest a mediation occur to make a structured RfC, with multiple questions (Perhaps based around each policy or guideline) and laying out all the research in accessible fashion, where the participants in the mediation agree on presentation of the questions and on laying out the research (you will, no doubt, all conduct yourself in good faith in doing so). Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:52, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

That was my statement, not Icewhiz's. The story is told in bits and pieces by Radziłowski in Glaukopis 19, p. 281, at the chair's website, in a paper by Thomas Anessi, and at the IWP's website. François Robere (talk) 11:02, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Total Environment Centre

Total Environment Centre claims to have been operating for 40 years but I'm 59 and never heard of them. The site gives the distinct impression that it's an activist site. http://www.wastenot.org.au, a wordpress website, is linked to TEC. A WHOIS shows that both domains are registered to Jeff Angel, the "Executive Director" of TEC, which itself is registered as a not for profit organisation. Can either of these websites be regarded as reliable? My gut says no but I would appreciate some opinions, especially in relation to Waste management in Australia where wastenot.org.au is used significantly as a source. --AussieLegend (✉) 11:18, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

It seems Total Environment Centre have definitely been around for ages. Looks like Mitchell Library holds papers dating back to 1975 per this. At NSW Govt handsard site there's this from 1991, this from 2008 calls them "a lead environmental agency" and Jeff Angel is mentioned here. Some more TEC publications are listed at NLA here. Many results for Angel's books and articles, including peer reviewed, at Mitchell. JennyOz (talk) 14:18, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Reliability of Al-Tabari and Tahdhib-ut Tahdhib in context of Muhammad bin Qasim

I wrote a sub-section in Early Life of Muhammad bin Qasim page, under the title of "", where I provided modern scholarly sources to refer to the first task this person carried out as an officer in Umayyad army. However, to give the details of the punishment (which is important because a mere mention of punishment could mean a mild fine or anything), I followed the reference cited in the scholarly source to report this event, and then took the details of the punishment (flogging 400 lashes), from that early scholarly sources (al-Tabari and Tahdhib-ut Tahdhib). The editor tagged these sources to be unreliable, while the modern scholarly work heavily relies on the very sources, and they were cited in details of the same event that was referred in modern scholarly source cited before.

Can someone look into this matter and remove the unjust label?

Dr. Hamza Ebrahim (talk) 12:09, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

I think at least your use Al-Tabari is OK per WP:PRIMARY (old reputably published primary source with full attribution stating a simple fact). However, the core issue here may be due weight - if only primary source lists some details that aren´t mentioned in more recent scholarship, then these details probably aren´t worth of inclusion in the article. Pavlor (talk) 09:32, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Dear Pavlor,thank you for the input. The question of due weight is also being discussed on the NPOV noticeboard. Dr. Hamza Ebrahim (talk) 14:54, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Hollywood Life

I have to ask question, is Hollywood Life is a reliable source for celebrities? --TheGreen921 (talk) 14:01, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Best to provide a specific source, article, and content.

Probably not per the need for high-quality references in WP:BLP articles. I wouldn't use it for notability nor anything remotely controversial. --Ronz (talk) 17:36, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Hollywood Life is a reliable source. However, most of the stories it covers go well beyond what articles should cover. While I had no doubt that Rihanna went on a short tourist cruise in Capri (big story on the front page), it is too insignificant to include in her article. Otherwise, care is need in reading celebrity gossip magazines. Always distinguish between what the magazine reports in its own voice and when it quotes sources that may or may not be correct. TFD (talk) 17:53, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Magazine

I need a question for reliable sources about Hello! magazine, an English version of ¡Hola! magazine. --TheGreen921 (talk) 22:58, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

I need a question too. What is your question? Huitzilopochtli1990 (talk) 23:28, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

• It's obvious that we would need some context in order to answer usefully. Almost anything can be used as a source, even if not meeting WP:RS, and there are cases where Hello! would have access to material, especially photographs, which other media wouldn't have.

• However it's also most unlikely that Hello! would ever meet WP:RS. It is simply not reliable. So it can't be used to support a contentious statement, where such support is needed before the statement can be made. Especially not if that statement is challenged, or is contradicted by some other source. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:06, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

• I am not a fan of Hello! magazine, but how does it fail WP:RS? - Ret.Prof (talk) 13:55, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_47#Online_biographies
• Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_265#¡Hola!_and_Paris_Match_magazine

Probably not something to be used, but the specific source, article, and content would make it easier to comment. --Ronz (talk) 16:45, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

It is a reliable source, but what it is used for is important. It would be good for an article about interior design at the White House for example, but not for automobile mechanics. TFD (talk) 01:06, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

• Not an RS Hello prints stories that are deliberately biased in favor of their subjects. They have even been shown to fabricate stories: . Britishfinance (talk) 15:08, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

I would rank Hello below the Daily Mail as an RS in the U.K. Britishfinance (talk) 15:31, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Reliable sources for List of most visited museums

There is a robust discussion happening about what should be considered a reliable source when listing institutions on the List of most visited museums article. A big part of the discussion is whether or not the list should only rely on agreed upon, authoritative lists of museum attendance from reliable sources, or if any reliable source stating annual attendance can be used. Feedback on these matters and others listed in this RfC are welcome. Qono (talk) 14:58, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Reliability of (mostly) Russian news sources for an engineering breakthrough in Russia

I'm reviewing Aluminum internal combustion engine in the new page queue, which has a fair amount of coverage in sources (copyediting issues aside). The problem is that all of the sources are Russian news channels , , . Additionally, I was able to find coverage in TASS , and an English language Sudanese source . I'm normally a proponent of using coverage from state media sources whose reliability is questionable for uncontroversial topics, but an engineering breakthrough (in this case, an all-aluminum combustion engine) is a subject that I could see a state media source wanting to misleadingly promote. My question is thus: are the aforementioned sources sufficiently reliable to establish the notability of this subject? Additionally, if anyone is able to find coverage in more clearly reliable sources that would be appreciated, as it would make this discussion moot. _signed, Rosguill 23:39, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

The Daily Stormer

I would ask for request for comment about the Daily Stormer, which is contain neo-Nazi and supremacist website, which is compared to a defunct Der Stürmer magazine, which is impact of hate, then I suppose that source is reliable, unreliable, depreciated or spam, as I gave the consensus on English Misplaced Pages, and I will suppose for help. --119.94.166.126 (talk) 00:11, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

• Blacklisted: The Daily Stormer is currently on the spam blacklist under the entry \bDailyStormer\.name\b (dailystormer.name). — Newslinger talk 00:19, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

A wake-up call

Answer to What people make you ashamed to be a human being? by Sean Kernan

A reminder that context is important, especially when deciding whether to rely on an article in a mainstream publication. feminist (talk) 01:26, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages noticeboards
• Misplaced Pages dispute resolution
• Misplaced Pages requests for comment