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This article should adhere to the gender identity guideline because it contains material about one or more trans women. Precedence should be given to self-designation as reported in the most up-to-date reliable sources, anywhere in article space, even when it doesn't match what's most common in reliable sources. Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. Some people go by singular they pronouns, which are acceptable for use in articles. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. Former, pre-transition names may only be included if the person was notable while using the name; outside of the main biographical article, such names should only appear once, in a footnote or parentheses.If material violating this guideline is repeatedly inserted, or if there are other related issues, please report the issue to the LGBT WikiProject, or, in the case of living people, to the BLP noticeboard. |
A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the On this day section on September 13, 2017. |
Could someone lead me to the source of this claim ? 23.242.139.139 ( talk) 23:58, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
It really is a mistake that Magnus Hirschfeld did carry out the first sex operation on Elbe. The name of the surgeon was Dr. Warnekros (from Dresden). Hirschfeld appears to have been involved in the psychological preliminaries of the operation, but he was a medical doctor, not a surgeon. Niels Hoyer's book about Elbe should be used with caution as a source for her life. Soczyczi 02:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
I entirely agree on both counts. Hirschfield supervised the first surgery and I believe he wasn't in Berlin long after this event anyway? I also agree that Niels Hoyer's book 'romantisised' the facts and created a lot of inacuracies. Fluffball70 09:19, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
I did a moderate edit to delete contradicting and inaccurate information. Elbe's final surgery was to implant a uterus and at that point both ovaries had been removed. Deleted a couple of links, one was dead and one was a link to unrelated blog content. Looking for a better reference, as the current online source has no references. Glamrockboy ( talk) 17:25, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
@ Soczyczi and Fluffball70: This is a bit...late but I noticed that in the book it is never said that it was Magnus, identified as Hardenfeld in it, but rather Gebhard that did the first surgery, and from what I managed to find he(Gebhard) was never identified. Magnus is said to have only dealt with the psychological area of the transition, in the book. That said, can I ask why is the book not a good source ? No trying to be pedant here but I became very interested in Lili's life after I heard about her and would love to know if the book is in fact incorret. Thanks! Rafael.hocevar ( talk) 22:46, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
From the top of the section entitled "Lili":
"that Gerda's women were in fact Einar herself. No one had suspected before then that the petite femmes fatales of Gerda's work could have been modeled on anyone other than a woman, but Einar had acted as Gerda's chief model for years. [3]
After that, in the 1920s and 1930s Wegener regularly dressed as a woman, attending various festivities and entertained guests in his house as Lili Elbe."
Ok, I really sympathize with the pronoun challenges here. In these sentences you are going through different periods of time and using both the birth name and chosen name. I just wanted to point out the inconsistency here. In the first paragraph, you use the birth name Einar and are referring to an early period before any major transition was occurring, yet in that paragraph you use "herself." That's not really wrong since you could justify using female pronouns throughout the article. However, in the following paragraph, you use the term "his house" even though in the period in question a clear transition was in play and the name Lili was established. Rather than just changing pronouns willy nilly on my own, I wanted to see if there is a clear plan for maintaining a consistent approach throughout the article. My guess is that there are two possibilities. One, just use female references throughout, even when the birth name and earlier untransitional periods of life are being discussed. That ensures consistency and respect but may suffer aesthetically. Two, separate all references chronologically and use the birth name and male pronouns for all early references and the chosen name and female pronouns for all later references. This approach may sound better to the ear but may be more likely to violate standards and philosophical goals.
jg (
talk)
07:57, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
Another example: I've just changed "Einar managed to get his sex and name legally changed" to "Elbe managed to get her sex and name legally changed", for name/pronoun consistency with the rest of the article. As per the MOS, we should refer to her as female unless it makes the sentence confusing; I don't believe it does in this example. — Spudtater ( talk • contribs) 10:58, 24 August 2011 (UTC)
Many Intersex people are getting increasigly fed up with Trans people appropriating Lili Elbe. Lili has been proven as having reproductive organs of male and female. This made Lili an Intersex person. Lili was transitioning from Intersex to female. Please stop marginalising Intersex people any further by trying to make out we don't exist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.124.74.183 ( talk) 11:13, 12 October 2011 (UTC)
References
Comment moved from my talk page to here. -- Irn ( talk) 23:48, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
The changes I made on the Lili Elbe page were not intended as vandalism. I merely wanted to correct a number of historical inaccuracies: The name she was given at birth is Einar Magnus Andreas Wegener. The name she chose for herself in November 1930 is Lili Ilse Elvenes, despite the fact that she is know as Lili Elbe today. She died on September 12th, 1931. She had four, not five surgeries. Warnekros never attempted a uterus implant. That is a myth. Her last surgery was a vaginoplasty. Also the marriage to Gerda Wegener was resolved in court and not by the Danish king. I would kindly ask you to withdraw your veto on my changes and allow for her to be represented in a historically accurate way. Thank you. 78.52.10.31 ( talk) 13:43, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Many sources listed in the article (such as The Telegraph, The Guardian, Biography.com, etc) [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] claim that she had a relationship with Claude Lejeune and died form organ rejection due to a uterine transplant, but someone is erasing this information from the article claiming that it's "false information", but with no source to prove that it's false. He/she is even changing the date of Lili's death without providing any source, it's only his/her word. This person has been doing this for months. Can a mod do something about it? ( 179.111.181.22 ( talk) 00:38, 5 February 2016 (UTC))
I came here as a fact checker today, of an outside manuscript in preparation that references the WP article, and found that the closing paragraph in the Marriage dissolution section was not derived from a stated source, but was rather fully plagiarised from that source. (The text appears, verbatim as it does in the source, without quotation marks.) This paragraph, in my view, needs a vary hard look, both because of the plagiarism, and because the source on which it derived is not an encyclopedic source (it is a self-published web source, see here).
As well there are various other issues with language and sourcing that keep this article from being encyclopedic; look for plaices where the prose, it is "likely that" or it is "very likely that" appear. Such subjective medical statements are not appropriate, unless they are the expressed opinion of an encyclopedic source, where the person (author) holding the opinion is clearly identified. In the indicated places, the majority of sources in support are news reports pertaining to a movie production (i.e., they are not authoritative sources regarding a medical conclusion).
I have no personal opinion on the matters being discussed. But I do strongly encourage the editors of this article to follow WP:VERIFY strictly, and not to use popular press statements to support one or another side of a fact-based matter, medical or otherwise. Le Prof 73.211.138.148 ( talk) 18:29, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Much of the section "Lili Elbe x Dora Richter: the first sex reassignment surgery" seems out of place here, as it isn't about Elbe. From the information presented here, it seems that Dorchen Richter should be the subject of her own article, not shoehorned in here. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 16:48, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Lili Elbe. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
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Contrary to Fæ's repeated assertions, MOS:GENDERID does not say that birth names should not be bolded. In fact, it does say "The MoS does not specify when and how to present former names, or whether to use the former or present name first", which exactly contradicts that claim. Furthermore, WP:R#ASTONISH encourages the use of bold when there is a redirect from another name, to avoid confusing a reader who may follow it to an article with an unexpected name. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 19:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
The following text seems awkward and misleading: It is generally believed that Elbe was born in 1882, in Vejle, Denmark. Her year of birth... Einar Wegener was born in 1882 and he was male at birth, at least he was legally listed and regarded as male. The previous writer above states that, in cases of name change the name in use at the time should be used to describe the event. I agree, as otherwise it leads to a confusing narrative. I would also suggest that in referring to his gender, the pronoun for the gender he had at that time should be used, and then at some later point the feminine pronoun should be used after her transition to a woman, or perhaps after her self-identification as a woman. See the article on Cat Stevens, who was known by three different names. It smoothly makes the transition of name usage at every step, in a way that is clear to the reader. This is not a transgender/intersex/politically-motivated comment, it is just a standard used across Wikipedia for clarity. Jaywilson ( talk) 01:31, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
The section on Elbe's surgeries mentions Dr. Erwing Gohrbandt's vaginoplasty surgery twice, but provides only his last name (not even the title "Dr."), with no explanatory links. As there is no page for Dr. Gohrbandt himself, I searched for his name and found it, with a little more identifying information, on the page for Dora Richter. I'm not sure what the best way to address this would be, but I think there definitely needs to be either no mention of Gohrbandt at all, or more info than just his last name—preferably, something indicating who he was in relation to the other doctors Elbe was treated by. I don't know enough about Gohrbandt (TBH, nothing at all beyond what's on Dora Richter's page) to know whether he's worthy of his own page, much less to write one, but since he seems to be the first person to have ever performed vaginoplasty, he's significant enough to be worth more than just a last name reference. Quantumpanda ( talk) 00:59, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
While reading about Magnus Hirschfeld's role in the homosexuality trial of Kuno von Moltke I noticed that the name of von Moltke's ex-wife (who testified against him) during the time of his trial was 'Lilly von Elbe'. Have any scholarly sources noted the parallel here? Was Lili Elbe's name a reference to this? PigeonAppreciator ( talk) 18:52, 22 July 2019 (UTC)
In October 1930, Danish court invalidated the couple's marriage. At that time, Lili Elbe had transplanted ovaries and did not have scrotal, testicles and penis. Removing all male genitalia and transplanting female gonad are sex reassignment surgeries. Danish court thought that Lili was legally a woman in October 1930. Vaginoplasties of Dora Richter and Lili Elbe were performed in 1931. It should be mentioned that Lili Elbe was the first recipient of SRS. -- Sharouser ( talk) 01:34, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
The well-intended removal of her original name is not consistent with Wikipedia policies. That name is well known, with plenty of sources available. (It wasn't cited because it was obviously true.) In fact, she put that name on each of her paintings. As the article indicates, she achieved notability under that name, and that work remains well known. [7] [8] WP policy recognizes that names under which a person was notable are appropriate to include, because doing so gives them proper credit for it. (This even applies to living persons, which she is not.) Bottom line: Before she transitioned, the person known as "Einar Wegener" was a noteworthy painter. Someone researching the artist should be able to find information by searching for that name on Wikipedia, and understand right away when they come to this article that it is about the person they're looking for. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 16:07, 14 February 2022 (UTC)
although I refrained from making extensive changes, and now I find that more than one person has come along and changed it so much that it's unrecognizable from the version I started with (which was within the last week). For one thing, someone insists on referring to the male infant who became a female in adulthood as "she" and "her." That's unnecessary. When the child was born, he was male. I left the birth name, Einar Wegener, where it referred to Einar before he became Lili—for example, in discussing his marriage to Gerda. Someone has been so obsessed with "correctly" referring to this transgender person that they have lost all perspective and common sense.
I understand that the "anyone can write and edit Wikipedia" sounds very fair and equitable, but what's happened is that it makes Wikipedia a MESS. The volunteer "editors" are so concerned with their own personal hobgoblins--political, personal, or grammatical--that they allow horrible writing that makes no sense to stand, as long as no one refers to someone's birth gender "incorrectly" or gets some formatting wrong. WORDS MATTER. THE ORDER IN WHICH WORDS ARE STRUNG TOGETHER MATTERS. It seems to me also that some of these microeditors do not go back and read the whole article after their edits to see whether they have introduced errors or made detrimental deletions.
My pride is not wounded. I am not going through all the edits and reversions, because it's a waste of time. I just wish, if anyone reads this and gets my point, that that person would try to spread these ideas at Wikipedia. If you're going to replace the encyclopedia as the go-to reference for all the world, it's worth trying to be as accurate and clear as possible.
In my own writing these days, I am using britannica.com as a reference whenever possible, and I am encouraging others to do the same. 2601:5C2:201:7C90:B582:549F:73A2:6DC5 ( talk) 20:46, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
For a modern trans figure, the birth name would not be included in the article if the person was not notable prior to their transition. Why does this article list it? JDBauby ( talk) 21:04, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 10 January 2023 and 19 April 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Sarahaguiar, Nr2023 ( article contribs). Peer reviewers: CyanCaribou.
— Assignment last updated by Rgxo ( talk) 16:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Lili Elbe article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
This
level-5 vital article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
The
contentious topics procedure applies to this page. This page is related to gender-related disputes or controversies or people associated with them, which has been
designated as a contentious topic. Editors who repeatedly or seriously fail to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behaviour, or any normal editorial process may be blocked or restricted by an administrator. Editors are advised to familiarise themselves with the contentious topics procedures before editing this page. |
This article should adhere to the gender identity guideline because it contains material about one or more trans women. Precedence should be given to self-designation as reported in the most up-to-date reliable sources, anywhere in article space, even when it doesn't match what's most common in reliable sources. Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. Some people go by singular they pronouns, which are acceptable for use in articles. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. Former, pre-transition names may only be included if the person was notable while using the name; outside of the main biographical article, such names should only appear once, in a footnote or parentheses.If material violating this guideline is repeatedly inserted, or if there are other related issues, please report the issue to the LGBT WikiProject, or, in the case of living people, to the BLP noticeboard. |
A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the On this day section on September 13, 2017. |
Could someone lead me to the source of this claim ? 23.242.139.139 ( talk) 23:58, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
It really is a mistake that Magnus Hirschfeld did carry out the first sex operation on Elbe. The name of the surgeon was Dr. Warnekros (from Dresden). Hirschfeld appears to have been involved in the psychological preliminaries of the operation, but he was a medical doctor, not a surgeon. Niels Hoyer's book about Elbe should be used with caution as a source for her life. Soczyczi 02:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
I entirely agree on both counts. Hirschfield supervised the first surgery and I believe he wasn't in Berlin long after this event anyway? I also agree that Niels Hoyer's book 'romantisised' the facts and created a lot of inacuracies. Fluffball70 09:19, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
I did a moderate edit to delete contradicting and inaccurate information. Elbe's final surgery was to implant a uterus and at that point both ovaries had been removed. Deleted a couple of links, one was dead and one was a link to unrelated blog content. Looking for a better reference, as the current online source has no references. Glamrockboy ( talk) 17:25, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
@ Soczyczi and Fluffball70: This is a bit...late but I noticed that in the book it is never said that it was Magnus, identified as Hardenfeld in it, but rather Gebhard that did the first surgery, and from what I managed to find he(Gebhard) was never identified. Magnus is said to have only dealt with the psychological area of the transition, in the book. That said, can I ask why is the book not a good source ? No trying to be pedant here but I became very interested in Lili's life after I heard about her and would love to know if the book is in fact incorret. Thanks! Rafael.hocevar ( talk) 22:46, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
From the top of the section entitled "Lili":
"that Gerda's women were in fact Einar herself. No one had suspected before then that the petite femmes fatales of Gerda's work could have been modeled on anyone other than a woman, but Einar had acted as Gerda's chief model for years. [3]
After that, in the 1920s and 1930s Wegener regularly dressed as a woman, attending various festivities and entertained guests in his house as Lili Elbe."
Ok, I really sympathize with the pronoun challenges here. In these sentences you are going through different periods of time and using both the birth name and chosen name. I just wanted to point out the inconsistency here. In the first paragraph, you use the birth name Einar and are referring to an early period before any major transition was occurring, yet in that paragraph you use "herself." That's not really wrong since you could justify using female pronouns throughout the article. However, in the following paragraph, you use the term "his house" even though in the period in question a clear transition was in play and the name Lili was established. Rather than just changing pronouns willy nilly on my own, I wanted to see if there is a clear plan for maintaining a consistent approach throughout the article. My guess is that there are two possibilities. One, just use female references throughout, even when the birth name and earlier untransitional periods of life are being discussed. That ensures consistency and respect but may suffer aesthetically. Two, separate all references chronologically and use the birth name and male pronouns for all early references and the chosen name and female pronouns for all later references. This approach may sound better to the ear but may be more likely to violate standards and philosophical goals.
jg (
talk)
07:57, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
Another example: I've just changed "Einar managed to get his sex and name legally changed" to "Elbe managed to get her sex and name legally changed", for name/pronoun consistency with the rest of the article. As per the MOS, we should refer to her as female unless it makes the sentence confusing; I don't believe it does in this example. — Spudtater ( talk • contribs) 10:58, 24 August 2011 (UTC)
Many Intersex people are getting increasigly fed up with Trans people appropriating Lili Elbe. Lili has been proven as having reproductive organs of male and female. This made Lili an Intersex person. Lili was transitioning from Intersex to female. Please stop marginalising Intersex people any further by trying to make out we don't exist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.124.74.183 ( talk) 11:13, 12 October 2011 (UTC)
References
Comment moved from my talk page to here. -- Irn ( talk) 23:48, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
The changes I made on the Lili Elbe page were not intended as vandalism. I merely wanted to correct a number of historical inaccuracies: The name she was given at birth is Einar Magnus Andreas Wegener. The name she chose for herself in November 1930 is Lili Ilse Elvenes, despite the fact that she is know as Lili Elbe today. She died on September 12th, 1931. She had four, not five surgeries. Warnekros never attempted a uterus implant. That is a myth. Her last surgery was a vaginoplasty. Also the marriage to Gerda Wegener was resolved in court and not by the Danish king. I would kindly ask you to withdraw your veto on my changes and allow for her to be represented in a historically accurate way. Thank you. 78.52.10.31 ( talk) 13:43, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Many sources listed in the article (such as The Telegraph, The Guardian, Biography.com, etc) [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] claim that she had a relationship with Claude Lejeune and died form organ rejection due to a uterine transplant, but someone is erasing this information from the article claiming that it's "false information", but with no source to prove that it's false. He/she is even changing the date of Lili's death without providing any source, it's only his/her word. This person has been doing this for months. Can a mod do something about it? ( 179.111.181.22 ( talk) 00:38, 5 February 2016 (UTC))
I came here as a fact checker today, of an outside manuscript in preparation that references the WP article, and found that the closing paragraph in the Marriage dissolution section was not derived from a stated source, but was rather fully plagiarised from that source. (The text appears, verbatim as it does in the source, without quotation marks.) This paragraph, in my view, needs a vary hard look, both because of the plagiarism, and because the source on which it derived is not an encyclopedic source (it is a self-published web source, see here).
As well there are various other issues with language and sourcing that keep this article from being encyclopedic; look for plaices where the prose, it is "likely that" or it is "very likely that" appear. Such subjective medical statements are not appropriate, unless they are the expressed opinion of an encyclopedic source, where the person (author) holding the opinion is clearly identified. In the indicated places, the majority of sources in support are news reports pertaining to a movie production (i.e., they are not authoritative sources regarding a medical conclusion).
I have no personal opinion on the matters being discussed. But I do strongly encourage the editors of this article to follow WP:VERIFY strictly, and not to use popular press statements to support one or another side of a fact-based matter, medical or otherwise. Le Prof 73.211.138.148 ( talk) 18:29, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Much of the section "Lili Elbe x Dora Richter: the first sex reassignment surgery" seems out of place here, as it isn't about Elbe. From the information presented here, it seems that Dorchen Richter should be the subject of her own article, not shoehorned in here. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 16:48, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Lili Elbe. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
An editor has reviewed this edit and fixed any errors that were found.
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 09:09, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
Contrary to Fæ's repeated assertions, MOS:GENDERID does not say that birth names should not be bolded. In fact, it does say "The MoS does not specify when and how to present former names, or whether to use the former or present name first", which exactly contradicts that claim. Furthermore, WP:R#ASTONISH encourages the use of bold when there is a redirect from another name, to avoid confusing a reader who may follow it to an article with an unexpected name. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 19:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
The following text seems awkward and misleading: It is generally believed that Elbe was born in 1882, in Vejle, Denmark. Her year of birth... Einar Wegener was born in 1882 and he was male at birth, at least he was legally listed and regarded as male. The previous writer above states that, in cases of name change the name in use at the time should be used to describe the event. I agree, as otherwise it leads to a confusing narrative. I would also suggest that in referring to his gender, the pronoun for the gender he had at that time should be used, and then at some later point the feminine pronoun should be used after her transition to a woman, or perhaps after her self-identification as a woman. See the article on Cat Stevens, who was known by three different names. It smoothly makes the transition of name usage at every step, in a way that is clear to the reader. This is not a transgender/intersex/politically-motivated comment, it is just a standard used across Wikipedia for clarity. Jaywilson ( talk) 01:31, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
The section on Elbe's surgeries mentions Dr. Erwing Gohrbandt's vaginoplasty surgery twice, but provides only his last name (not even the title "Dr."), with no explanatory links. As there is no page for Dr. Gohrbandt himself, I searched for his name and found it, with a little more identifying information, on the page for Dora Richter. I'm not sure what the best way to address this would be, but I think there definitely needs to be either no mention of Gohrbandt at all, or more info than just his last name—preferably, something indicating who he was in relation to the other doctors Elbe was treated by. I don't know enough about Gohrbandt (TBH, nothing at all beyond what's on Dora Richter's page) to know whether he's worthy of his own page, much less to write one, but since he seems to be the first person to have ever performed vaginoplasty, he's significant enough to be worth more than just a last name reference. Quantumpanda ( talk) 00:59, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
While reading about Magnus Hirschfeld's role in the homosexuality trial of Kuno von Moltke I noticed that the name of von Moltke's ex-wife (who testified against him) during the time of his trial was 'Lilly von Elbe'. Have any scholarly sources noted the parallel here? Was Lili Elbe's name a reference to this? PigeonAppreciator ( talk) 18:52, 22 July 2019 (UTC)
In October 1930, Danish court invalidated the couple's marriage. At that time, Lili Elbe had transplanted ovaries and did not have scrotal, testicles and penis. Removing all male genitalia and transplanting female gonad are sex reassignment surgeries. Danish court thought that Lili was legally a woman in October 1930. Vaginoplasties of Dora Richter and Lili Elbe were performed in 1931. It should be mentioned that Lili Elbe was the first recipient of SRS. -- Sharouser ( talk) 01:34, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
The well-intended removal of her original name is not consistent with Wikipedia policies. That name is well known, with plenty of sources available. (It wasn't cited because it was obviously true.) In fact, she put that name on each of her paintings. As the article indicates, she achieved notability under that name, and that work remains well known. [7] [8] WP policy recognizes that names under which a person was notable are appropriate to include, because doing so gives them proper credit for it. (This even applies to living persons, which she is not.) Bottom line: Before she transitioned, the person known as "Einar Wegener" was a noteworthy painter. Someone researching the artist should be able to find information by searching for that name on Wikipedia, and understand right away when they come to this article that it is about the person they're looking for. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 16:07, 14 February 2022 (UTC)
although I refrained from making extensive changes, and now I find that more than one person has come along and changed it so much that it's unrecognizable from the version I started with (which was within the last week). For one thing, someone insists on referring to the male infant who became a female in adulthood as "she" and "her." That's unnecessary. When the child was born, he was male. I left the birth name, Einar Wegener, where it referred to Einar before he became Lili—for example, in discussing his marriage to Gerda. Someone has been so obsessed with "correctly" referring to this transgender person that they have lost all perspective and common sense.
I understand that the "anyone can write and edit Wikipedia" sounds very fair and equitable, but what's happened is that it makes Wikipedia a MESS. The volunteer "editors" are so concerned with their own personal hobgoblins--political, personal, or grammatical--that they allow horrible writing that makes no sense to stand, as long as no one refers to someone's birth gender "incorrectly" or gets some formatting wrong. WORDS MATTER. THE ORDER IN WHICH WORDS ARE STRUNG TOGETHER MATTERS. It seems to me also that some of these microeditors do not go back and read the whole article after their edits to see whether they have introduced errors or made detrimental deletions.
My pride is not wounded. I am not going through all the edits and reversions, because it's a waste of time. I just wish, if anyone reads this and gets my point, that that person would try to spread these ideas at Wikipedia. If you're going to replace the encyclopedia as the go-to reference for all the world, it's worth trying to be as accurate and clear as possible.
In my own writing these days, I am using britannica.com as a reference whenever possible, and I am encouraging others to do the same. 2601:5C2:201:7C90:B582:549F:73A2:6DC5 ( talk) 20:46, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
For a modern trans figure, the birth name would not be included in the article if the person was not notable prior to their transition. Why does this article list it? JDBauby ( talk) 21:04, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 10 January 2023 and 19 April 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Sarahaguiar, Nr2023 ( article contribs). Peer reviewers: CyanCaribou.
— Assignment last updated by Rgxo ( talk) 16:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)