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There should be biography-specific advice about filling in the fields of an infobox, especially since most biographies include one.– Gilliam ( talk) 04:13, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Under heading "Occupation titles" are offered the examples Hirohito was Emperor of Japan; Louis XVI was King of France. At MOS:JOBTITLES is offered the example In 1974 Vice President Ford was sworn in as the 38th president of the United States by Chief Justice Warren Burger. "President of the United States" looks like the name of an office, so I think that a little more discussion belongs in both articles explaining when something that looks like the name of an office should not be treated as such. How would the Ford example be capitalized if we omitted "the 38th"? If that means capitalizing "president", why should "the 38th" matter? Obviously Wikipedia editors have a lot of trouble understanding this rule. Examples abound:
and fewer compliant examples:
— Anomalocaris ( talk) 05:21, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
I'd go for downcasing where the job title isn't directly associated with a person's name. Even then, the boundaries become difficult and cause editors extra decision-making—We spoke with Garbage Collector John Blow about the new vehicles. – really? And seniority is an awkward boundary. "The chief executive officer, Rebecca Schmidt, was unavailable for comment." Why poke our eyes with a row of caps? Chicago MOS and Oxford's New Hart's Rules both favour avoiding unnecessary caps. Tony (talk) 06:52, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
I mean: a good image is better than a bad one. But what is a "good image" for the subject of a biography? For example in this article at least one image where the subject's face is not hidden by dark sunglasses seems reasonable to me, but not to the anonymous ip. Well, he probably consider himself the owner of the page because is reverting any edit, but this is another problem... Anyway: is there any guideline about what is a "good image" for a biography? It would be useful in these cases. Thanks in advance. -- Basilicofresco ( msg) 07:37, 26 January 2015 (UTC)
What's the consensus (or is there one) on discussing a person's race, ethnicity, and ancestral origins? I've noticed most articles don't; and I'm sure in most articles it's unnecessary and potentially inflammatory; but if there is something interesting about their race or ethnic heritage, is there a consensus on where in the article it should be discussed and how? ~ ONUnicorn( Talk| Contribs) problem solving 22:12, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
I've copied over a point made by IP: Stacie Croquet ( talk) 23:16, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
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.
An editor made this edit which I've rolled back pending discussion and consensus.
The gist of the editors point is is: as we know, the usual form is not include a comma before "Jr." in a name, so that the normal form is Sammy Davis Jr. was a member of the Rat Pack.
But if, for some reason, either Mr Davis or the preponderance of sources regarding Mr Davis went out of their way to style his name as "Sammy Davis, Jr." (with a comma between "Davis" and "Jr.") then.... speaking for myself, I don't think we should pay very much attention to either the subject's wishes or the preponderance of sources for issues of typography on this level of detail. As a practical matter we do use non-stylebook typography for some cases (k. d. laing, eBay) and not for others (Macy's rather than Macy*s)... but for "Jr.", for some unaccountable reason, some person wrote into the rule that we do, probably years ago, and so it is what it is.
So anyway, it is what it is, and what the editor has proposed is that we should add material to the effect that, in cases like this, our proper form is
and not
Why? This doesn't follow at all. It is true that we have a problem if Mr Davis or most of his sources choose to use this nonstandard format (since we have chosen to bind ourselves to following that), and there's no perfect solution to that problem. However, presenting "Jr." as a comma-delimited phrase -- essentially similar to writing "Sammy Davis (Jr.) was a member of the Rat Pack" -- is not prima facie better than treating "Sammy Davis, Jr." as a unitary name which happens to have the oddity of having a comma embedded within it.
I am very much not in favor or editors making changes to any of our rules, regardless of merit, without a thorough discussion and acceptance. So the place to begin making the case that this is an improvement is here. Herostratus ( talk) 14:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
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I agree that commas should be matched, if we have to have them, but since the post-nominals are very short, I'd prefer that we lose both commas. Otherwise there will be a lot of punctuation marks very close to each other, and that looks ... awkward. I guess this is why the style guides have abandoned it. If you ask me, we could lose the period/full stop too. HandsomeFella ( talk) 16:51, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Mismatched commas are registered as errors by English-literate people. I agree with Chicago that omitting both is a good modern solution, and I see that many sources do so with Sammy Davis Jr. and others. I don't understand why we would suggest using different styles based on the preference of the subject. Dicklyon ( talk) 06:55, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
I object. Rather replace "Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject" with "Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation" which is shorter, easier to remember, more consistent, and better in every way. Sources are great for facts. They are largely worthless for style questions. "Preference of the subject" leaves us subject to the whim of any mook on whom we have an article, to the detriment of what we're trying to do here. I honestly don't give a rat's ass for the "Preference of the subject" on this particular matter and neither should anyone IMO.
I would be interested in how we are supposed to treat names like will.i.am. Above it's asserted that in "Sammy Davis, Jr." the comma is not part of the name, but rather part of the sentence and requires a matching comma and such other grammatical structures as needed.
Ditto for will.i.am I guess. The dots don't indicated a truncation or abbreviation (there is none) and the only other way to parse them is as full stops, and full stops are followed by a space and the beginning of a new sentence (which requires capitalization), we would have to render this as "Will. I. Am". (Note that sentence capitalization overrides non-capitalization of names so that a sentence starting with a normally uncapitalized name is capitalized, e.g. if starting a sentence with the last name of "Bobby del Greco" you would write "Del Greco was also...")
Since the ""Preference of the subject" is to sprinkle his name with dots (there are other similar people who are pleased to insert various types of punctuatation in their names) our "Preference of the subject" clause requires us to scratch our heads over this stuff and generally dance to their silly tunes.
Let's not. Herostratus ( talk) 15:25, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Still hearing no objection, I went ahead and updated the section to say
And since this involved removing the comma from Sammy Davis, I went ahead and opened a Requested move discussion to make sure we have consensus: Talk:Sammy_Davis,_Jr.#Requested_move_25_December_2014. We'll see. Dicklyon ( talk) 17:45, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, but there is no consensus above. Three editors agreeing isn't enough to change a guideline like the MOS. I would suggest using an RFC to get consensus for the change, because a requested move isn't a valid way to weigh such changes. -- Calidum 21:27, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
Would someone check Talk:Nathuram Godse#Lead: why .22sole.22? Few weeks ago, I had discussion with an editor and very soon it became repetitive. Main objection [1] was, whether he was "sole" assassin or not and it turned into a lead re-write. I still think that the lead fails per WP:OPENPARA. Thanks. OccultZone ( Talk • Contributions • Log) 08:03, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
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.
Should the section Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biographies#Child named for parent or predecessor be removed? Is it necessary or required? DrKiernan ( talk) 07:32, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
I would like some clarification on the issue of whether people, usually men, who have the same name (or at least the same first name and family name) should have "Jr" included in their full name even when such people didn't include it in their name. Some editors include "Jr" for such people on the basis or assumption that this should be part of their full name. I seem to recall, however, that there is, or used to be, a comment in the MoS that "Jr" should only be included in a people's names if they used it themselves. Apologies if this has been discussed before. Thanks, Afterwriting ( talk) 01:37, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
There have been two long RfC in the last two years on the talk page of AT there is no consensus that the MOS guidelines cover article titles. Therefore discussions such as " #RfC: Comma or no comma before Jr. and Sr." are taking place in the wrong locations and any consensus that comes out of them are not binging on article titles. If there is to be a change to the article title policy or its naming conventions guidelines then any such changes ought to be discussed on the title policy talk page and/or the appropriate naming convention. -- PBS ( talk) 20:11, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Sorry, I know this has been rehashed several times above, but the current wording on the page:
which seemingly mandates not using the comma, does not match the decision of the RfC above, which was:
The actual wording on the MOS page does not convey the message that "both forms are acceptable". Thanks — Amakuru ( talk) 11:35, 9 March 2015 (UTC)
This message comes from the talk page of a biography ( Talk:Marshall Rosenberg#Nationality), where the nationality is listed as "American" in {{ Infobox person}}:
A USA citizen's passport gives the nationality as "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA". [1] This is a bit strange, since it is a noun, but "American" can hardly be a nationality, seeing as "America" is not a country (old debate, I know, but "American" seems like the worst of all possibilities, many countries being American). I guess "US-American" might do (even though Mexico is a "US", as well, apparently). Don't know how wide-spread this is on WP. kamome, 2015-03-03
Good question! I suggest that we just go with what the passport says, and write "USA". — Sebastian 19:01, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
at Randy Stonehill, there is a section discussing the subject's marriages.
The issue is not about accuracy but about how to describe the second spouse. She took the subject's married name, so should it be "Sandra" or should it be her family name? Walter Görlitz ( talk) 03:28, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Terry Acebo Davis#BRD. Thanks. RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 22:08, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
Need 2nd opinions at Talk:Ada Lovelace#Ada Lovelace's name. Thanks. Kaldari ( talk) 19:11, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
There is currently a discussion at the village pump about creating a noticeboard (similar to the RSN, ORN and NPOVN) for people with questions about how to implement Wikipedia's style policies. The proponents say that one centralized board would be easier for editors to find than many talk pages, and opponents say that it might be a venue for forum-shopping and drama. Participation is welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 19:01, 14 April 2015 (UTC)
Is there an active discussion anywhere on the Jr. comma issue? There are several pending RMs but none of the discussions on this page appear active. Thanks. Dohn joe ( talk) 20:59, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
There is a dispute here (Nicki Minaj article) over the understanding of when to include a notable person's ethnicity in the opening line of the lead. I assume I have a proper understanding of MOS:BLPLEAD, but would appreciate any constructive feedback other editors here can provide in that discussion. As a common courtesy, I thought it would be a good idea to give this a broader audience. Thanks in advance. -- GoneIn60 ( talk) 13:44, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
That maybe the best way to go. Let the body get into the detail of the matter, especially if there is conflicting reliable sources.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 00:45, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
In WP:LASTNAME, the third paragraph (with emphasis (not in the original) added to a problematic passage) reads:
What in heck is the purpose of the highlighted passage? Has this ever been an issue -- that only controversial persons should be referred to by their last name? The controversial J. Edgar Hoover as "Hoover", but the uncontroversial David Brenner as "David"? Makes no sense to me and although I generally oppose changes to rules pages before getting consensus, but in this case I went ahead and removed the passage. Maybe I'm missing something tho. Herostratus ( talk) 13:15, 19 April 2015 (UTC)
The Manual of Style insists that royals have their names split at the beginning of the article. For instance, the article on Princess Charlotte begins "Princess Charlotte of Cambridge (Charlotte Elizabeth Diana)". What is exactly is the reason for this? The Manual says something about "visual clarity", but what is visually unclear about starting the article with her full name, viz. Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana of Cambridge? This is the format used on all non-royal articles; for instance, the article on David Cameron begins "David William Donald Cameron", not "David Cameron (David William Donald)".
I therefore propose that the Manual be amended to state that articles on royals begin with the subject's full name, as any other article would. Zacwill16 ( talk) 19:09, 4 May 2015 (UTC)
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.
What guidance should be given (on this page and on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people)) concerning the use or non-use of commas between a person's name and "Jr." or "Sr."? W. P. Uzer ( talk) 09:36, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designations. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr. (not Sammy Davis, Jr.); John F. Kennedy Jr. (not John F. Kennedy, Jr.); Otis D. Wright II (not Otis D. Wright, II). |
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... In the case of Senior/Junior, the preferred format is with "Sr." or "Jr." written after the name without any preceding comma (see WP:JR); ... |
Well, given the previous discussions, I don't think we need a general discussion of what guidance should be provided, but rather a simple up-or-down show of hands on what we want to say. So pick one:
[N.B.: bolding in Option 2 is just to highlight the existence of the additional text, which will not be bolded in the actual rule.] Herostratus ( talk) 19:39, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
"Use the abbreviation Jr (with a point in US use) for Americans, prefaced by a comma unless it is known that the bearer of the name did not use one. In British usage, Jun. is more common, and the comma is not usual."
I think NHR's intended meaning would be clearer if they started the second sentence with "In British usage referring to Britons,"). Am I right in saying that? They seem to leave it open for US usage in referring to Britons (admittedly, it arises much much less often). Either way, it seems to me that our old article-consistent model—so successful for spelling varieties, units of measure, and date formatting—might be the first principle to state, with some flexibility written in and pointers to the most usual US and UK practice. Could be done fairly succinctly, I think. Tony (talk) 16:48, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
IMO sroc kind of nailed it. To reiterate what he said, Option 1 is the way to go because using Option 2:
IMO this is a pretty strong argument and a close on strength-of-argument alone could be called for here. Herostratus ( talk) 14:40, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
Just to be clear, when the closer says "the MOS page can be left as it is", that's because I already made the change a while ago to remove the exception "unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject" per consensus here. Dicklyon ( talk) 04:10, 13 February 2015 (UTC)
I've been moving and editing to get rid of the unbalanced commas. Maybe a hundred articles so far; but miniscule impact on the problem. No pushback encountered. In most cases I find the classic mismatch comma error that all the guides warn against. And in many the titles of cited sources have commas inserted where the source did not use it. Apparently a number of editors felt that comma before was really important for some reason. I also see quite a few uncommented moves to titles with comma, when the article originally was without. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:30, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Per discussion below, I regret that I had not noticed that my change to the MOS per the text proposed in the RFC had been changed by DrKiernan before the close. What a mess this causes now. Dicklyon ( talk) 04:33, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
I recently moved:
These moved have been reverted by Richard Arthur Norton claiming that the names with a single comma should remain "per the name from government website" or "the actual name", even though the names with a single comma are not only against MOS but also style guides on English punctuation. I have started a move request at Talk:John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial Parkway § Requested move 2 March 2015.
I have also requested a technical move for:
See Talk:Samuel Goldwyn, Jr. § Requested move 1 March 2015. — sroc 💬 08:58, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Requested moves are decided on the AT policy and its naming convention guidelines. So why are you posting this here? and not on WT:AT? -- PBS ( talk) 20:15, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
There seems to be some confusion about what this RfC actually decided. The whole point of the RfC was to amend the previous wording:
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject. Examples: Sammy Davis, Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
On the basis that there was a consensus forming that Wikipedia's style should not be subject to an evaluation of the subject's preferences, I proposed that the wording be amended to read:
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designations. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr. (not Sammy Davis, Jr.); John F. Kennedy Jr. (not John F. Kennedy, Jr.); Otis D. Wright II (not Otis D. Wright, II). |
Herostratus restated this as:
Do not place a comma before "Jr.", "Sr.", or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
This wording was broadly supported by most respondents. Dicklyon made the change on 7 February to reflect the above wording. DrKiernan made a further change on 9 February to read as follows:
Generally, there is no need to place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
I reverted that edit on 10 February as it was not supported by the RfC discussion but DrKiernan again edited it to read:
It is unnecessary to place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
Although the above change was not supported by the above RfC, it was the wording that was in place when Robert McClenon closed the RfC on 13 February stating:
The consensus is that, while both forms are acceptable, the omission of the comma is preferred. One of the reasons is that the rules about following the qualifier with a comma are themselves complicated. The MOS page already states that the comma is not needed, so that the MOS page can be left as it is.
The consensus of the RfC was that the commas should be omitted; however, the final wording at WP:JR does not reflect this. In fact, the final wording arguably opens up the case to allow a comma before "Jr." and "Sr." at editors' discretion where this was not permitted before (it previously said "Do not" except for following the subject's preference). The current wording has been used in discussions to thwart page moves on the basis that the wording does not prohibit commas before "Jr." and "Sr.":
"The new WP:JR wording does not prohibit a comma..."
"The VIAF links and official sites use the comma, and there's no rule in the MoS against using one."
The current situation remains deplorable also because WP:JR provides no guidance on matching commas having to follow "Jr." or "Sr." if one precedes it, which is also being disputed by various users, and which is one of the reasons supporting the RfC to omit the commas altogether.
It seems that Robert McClenon, in closing the RfC, did not realise that the words "It is unnecessary..." would be interpreted in this way and used to undermine the whole point of the proposal. The wording "Do not...", which was as it appeared in the original text and in the proposals put forward in the RfC and agreed by most respondents, should be restored to WP:JR to avoid any ongoing confusion. — sroc 💬 14:47, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
It appears that I may have made the mistake of following a Wikipedia policy, assume good faith. I am no longer sure that there is good faith, because there are low-grade personal attacks. On the one hand, my own opinion is that the use of a comma between the name and the suffix should not be prohibited, provided that two conditions are met, first, the subject has expressed the desire for the comma, second, the rules concerning subsequent punctuation, which are complicated, are followed. However, my own opinion is not important, because I was trying to summarize consensus in closing the RFC. I will be requesting closure review at WP:AN with regard to three issues: first, did my closure reflect consensus, or, at least, was it a valid assessment of consensus; second, were there issues that should have been addressed that were overlooked; third, is administrative attention needed because of low-grade personal attacks? Normally non-administrative closure is just as good as administrative closure, but this may be a case where administrative closure is needed. Robert McClenon ( talk) 17:18, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
It has been suggested by administrator User:EdJohnston that a new RFC be opened to change the current wording "It is unnecessary to" to "Do not", as in "Do not use a comma". I will be opening such an RFC shortly, but would appreciate comments on one particular point. That is the impact in cases where the subject prefers the use of the comma. In those cases, we have two choices. We can say that, in Wikipedia, we will not use the comma. ( The policy on biographies of living persons doesn't require that degree of deference.) Alternatively, we can specify that we will use the comma in that situation, but that the rules concerning subsequent punctuation must be followed. My wording of the RFC will simply say "Do not", thus mandating no comma. Robert McClenon ( talk) 18:38, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Well let's see. The close was
Striking to heart of this, it devolves to
when push comes to shove, since "is preferred" is just a general admonition with no enforceability, and "not needed" is far from "forbidden".
The difference is that, if I am reading things correctly, formerly the rule was:
and now it is
since it just says "It is unnecessary..." which can certainly be interpreted as "Not required but allowed". Looking at it one way this is even worse than it was (endless arguments, even less uniformity), looking at it another way it removes one small bureaucratic rule preventing writers from writing how they like.
So how about a clean RfC which simply asks for preference:
Let voters rank these 1-2-3. (You could add a #4 "must use the comma" if you think that ought to be on the table (it hasn't been brought up as a possibility before, though)). If #3 wins the day we would then (I guess) be faced with whether to have an admonition to leave existing material as you found it. How this would work with article titles I don't know -- probably simple majority rule on a case-by-case basis. Herostratus ( talk) 21:56, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
My issue isn't about whether or not to have a comma, but whichever it is, it should say why -- not just say do not do it. -- Musdan77 ( talk) 21:35, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
Are we ready for a new, broader RfC? The current RfC languishes at a closure review that may or may not be acted upon any time soon. In the meantime, we have had several ad hoc RMs on the issue of Jr. commas. User:sroc above said that we should wait for that review to close before starting a new RfC, while User:Dicklyon has queried why some RM participants have not already started a new one if they intend to.
I think it's time to start the new RfC. The current RfC asked a narrow question: whether to allow evidence of personal preference over comma usage, or only to mention guidance to avoid the comma. The RfC will include several options, some of which were not presented in the current RfC. For that reason, the new RfC will likely make the current RfC moot. Instead of waiting for that RfC closure review to conclude, I'd like to start the new RfC now. But I think we'd all like to avoid procedural objections from people who think we should wait.
So I'm asking here: does anyone object to starting a new RfC on Jr. commas now? Dohn joe ( talk) 17:07, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
The big question for me right now is what to do with guidance on the comma after Jr. Addressing that issue right now is good because it would hopefully resolve the WP:JR guidance completely. Doing so now is bad because it could make the RfC too unwieldy, and doom consensus on the comma before. We could split this into two questions, with the second question being something like "When a comma is used before Jr. or Sr., what should WP's guidance be regarding a comma following Jr. or Sr.?" The options could be 1) include a following comma, no exceptions; 1A) include a following comma, subject and source exception; 2) allow both, with internal consistency. I'm on the fence as to whether to include this at the same time as the other. Any thoughts? Dohn joe ( talk) 15:10, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
The proposed style noticeboard has fallen through. There is now a conversation under way at WT:MoS about endorsing and centralizing its longstanding Q&A function. One of the issues raised is encouraging users to ask questions about style and copyediting either at WT:MoS or a subpage and not at other talk pages. The discussion is still very preliminary and participants from other pages that would be affected are very welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 16:03, 5 May 2015 (UTC)
This edit summary requested a discussion. It's unclear, though, what new can be said that wasn't already in previous summaries. Can someone please clarify what the problem is now? -- Ħ MIESIANIACAL 18:28, 4 May 2015 (UTC)
Thanks to @ GoodDay: for the request to join this discussion. I don't have an opinion on the matter one way or the other as I don't edit on these kind of articles, however @ Miesianiacal: (or anyobody else for that matter) should not be making changes which affect so many articles without going through RFC or similar lengthy discussions. Giant Snowman 16:49, 8 May 2015 (UTC)
I recommend that we continue to include the country of the monarch's entry we're mentioning in the section we're discussing. Not all of our readers are fully knowledgeable of which country a monarch lives in. GoodDay ( talk) 12:58, 10 May 2015 (UTC)
The essay at Wikipedia:Nationality of people from the United Kingdom was put together some seven to eight years ago, following extensive discussion, to help editors in addressing the thorny question of nationality in relation to biographies of UK subjects - in particular, whether they should be described as British, English, Scottish, Welsh, etc. etc. Many would argue, I think, that the essay has been more helpful than unhelpful in reducing pointless arguments, edit warring, etc., over that period. However, discussion had now flared up again on the talk page - with some unilateral editing of the essay and subsequent reverting - and is focused in particular (but not solely) on the question of whether the nationality of all UK subjects should be described as British (rather than English, Scottish, Welsh, etc.) in the infobox. (The word "nationality" has several meanings - its meaning in law being just one of them.) The move to change (or delete) the existing essay was initiated by Martin Hogbin, and is supported by Twobells and GoodDay. I and others have argued against many of the proposals being made by those editors, believing them to be ill-considered and unhelpful. The discussion on that talk page is clearly never going to achieve a consensus. I am raising it here, firstly to alert a wider group of editors of the continuing discussion and disagreement, and secondly to seek some help in identifying the best way forward. I'm aware that many, many experienced (and not-so-experienced) editors have tried to address this issue before, and the great majority of those editors are probably fed up to the back teeth of it being raised again. But, the issue refuses to go away, and some editors are unfortunately becoming increasingly agitated as a result. I'm sure that the three editors I've mentioned will comment here, but, personally, I'd like to hear a wider range of views. Ghmyrtle ( talk) 19:32, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
Indeed, we need input from the wider community. GoodDay ( talk) 19:37, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
I've been on the 'pedia for nearly 10yrs. I'm still amazed that there's a resistance to using British & United Kingdom across most British bio articles. GoodDay ( talk) 10:03, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
The people of the UK are British, whether they like it or not. But, we'll never be able to get those British bio articles corrected, as long as opposition continues :(
GoodDay (
talk) 21:44, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
We could adjust the infoboxes, to add UK to the birthplaces or deathplaces of those who were born or died in a foreign country. As for those born & died within the UK, we'd merely leave UK out. For examples: We should add UK to Andrew Carnegie's birthplace, because he died in the United States. Meanwhile, we don't add UK to Robert Burns, because he was born & died within the UK. GoodDay ( talk) 11:06, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
I'm wondering why the MOS has a section called "Opening paragraph" (singular) instead of "Lead section". But my main question is this: I've seen several bio articles where most of the lead is basically a listing of awards and nominations given to the person. Is that really what an intro section should be like? -- Musdan77 ( talk) 02:26, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
I suggest to insert the following phrase, or similar, into the section Post-nominal letters before the words "ensuring that readers".
{{
Post-nominals}}
,I also suggest to remove the line "See also" at the beginning of this section because a) referring to 'Middle names and abbreviated names', its relevance in this section is unclear; b) the target section doesn't exist under that name. Lastly, the meaning of the sentence "(See above in regard to academic titles and post-nominal initials.)" is unclear and it should be removed. -- Michael Bednarek ( talk) 23:36, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
So, WP:OPENPARA currently states that "Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they are relevant to the subject's notability." This feels highly reductionist and very limited. It's possible for somebody to be notable, generally, and their ethnicity or sexuality to be a prominent contextual element for understanding their work.
A good example of this is artists; there are a lot of artists who have an ethnicity and a nationality; say, Chinese-American or African-American. Their ethnicity is not part of their notability: they are notable as artists. But it is important in understanding the context in which they work. When you have an artist who is a first generation Chinese-American and their work is centred on that identity...sure, they're notable without it. But it's pretty much impossible to understand the work they do, or why they do it, or what it refers to, without also understanding their background.
I'd like to propose amending the guidelines around the opening paragraph, specifically, changing:
Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they are relevant to the subject's notability.
to:
Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability, 'or provides important context to understanding the subject or their work. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they meet the same standard.
Bolding for the diff (I don't plan to have random bold text in guidelines ;p). Thoughts? Ironholds ( talk) 19:44, 3 April 2015 (UTC)
Oppose and counterproposal. Isn't the real problem here with the use of the word "notability"? Notability has a very specific meaning here and is actually a fairly mechanical concept only affecting inclusion or exclusion from the encyclopedia. We don't evaluate significance or importance to determine notability, we look for multiple reliable sources. That makes this standard, frankly, nonsense. If "notability" were replaced with "overall importance or significance," then it wouldn't seem to me that we would need to invite rule creep by adding the proposed qualification. I would note that the current formulation has been here (in reference to ethnicity, sexuality was added later) since this edit by @ Pharos in 2006, whose edit comment refers to this discussion on the talk page, in which Pharos' comment before making the edit was, "It's not official anywhere, but it's I think this is the general consensus of the very long discussions above. Exceptions would be in cases where someone's ethnicity was exceptionally tied to their significance; e.g. some minority rights activists and ethnically-focused artists. Since the issue comes up so often, perhaps we should establish a simple guideline on ethnicity for the fromt side of this page." ( Diff, emphasis added.) Perhaps Pharos will respond here and say why he chose "notability" over "significance" in the actual edit. Since I spend most of my time doing dispute resolution, I'm really afraid that the proposed addition is going to provide an excuse to open up a furball of contentious claims between warring ethnic and national groups and have to wonder if the current reductionist formulation wasn't designed to avoid that. Best regards, TransporterMan ( TALK) 15:36, 14 April 2015 (UTC)
There are no clear guidelines for when a nickname is supposed to be placed within the full name as opposed to being mentioned separately afterwards, e.g. (using listed examples from the article itself) William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton vs. David Drew Pinsky, nicknamed "Dr. Drew". Can this be addressed? MarqFJA87 ( talk) 15:49, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
Question, what do manuals of style for major publications say? NYT goes with full name, also known as nickname, format. I cannot access the Chicago Manual, which has a section on it (8.36). Christian Writer does not give a preference to within the name or after the name, but when in the name quotations are required. We should take some of our guidance from other MoSs if we are to create an essay or guideline about such a thing, as it will impact a large number of articles.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 03:00, 16 June 2015 (UTC)
I just reverted Necrothesp on the removal of "Bill." I don't see a problem with having "Bill" in the WP:Lead sentence, especially since it is his WP:Common name. Per WP:Alternative name, that name should be bolded in the lead somewhere; same goes for similar articles. Flyer22 ( talk) 15:36, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
in this edit Necrothesp removed the "Bill" Clinton example with the summary "removed contentious edit following support and no opposition on talkpage". I said above that I thought this form was acceptable in the case of Clinton and other similar cases where the nickname is the true COMMONNAME, so there was not "no opposition". What I think we should do is not remove the Clinton example, but instead add several other examples showing the variety of acceptable forms, as has been done in this thread. That way the examples cannot be rationally taken as a mandate for a single site-wide format, as a single example might. Would others favor such a change? DES (talk) 22:08, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
Persondata has been deprecated and the template and input data are subject to removal from all bio articles in the near future. For those editors who entered accurate data into the persondata templates of biography subjects, you are advised to manually transfer that data to Wikidata before the impending mass deletion occurs in order to preserve all accurate data. Here are two examples of Wikidata for film actors: Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. If you have any more questions about the persondata removal, Wikidata, etc., please ping me. Dirtlawyer1 ( talk) 13:57, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
@ Pigsonthewing: Apparently no updated data in the persondata templates has been pulled by the bots since at least November 2014. It is unclear whether newly entered data has been added or not in the eight months since then, or whether the bots have simply ignored updated datapoints. It is apparent that the issues have not been long and knowledgeably discussed because in manually transferring over the persondata from over 150 articles in the last two days, I can substantiate that many items of accurate data have not been previously transferred by bot action to Wikidata, including full names and other name variants, birth places, and all "brief descriptions" updated since November 2014. It's more than enough to raise doubts about whether these issues have "been long and knowledgeably discussed and the consequences well-considered." I'm happy to share details of my review. Dirtlawyer1 ( talk) 19:40, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
One of the exceptions provides that we can use "Mrs Alfred Jones" and other Mrs situations when we don't know the woman's given name. Why doesn't this extend to men with unknown first names? When writing about historic-but-somewhat obscure houses, I often discover that my source says something like "it was bought by a man by the last name of Lastname. He lived here a long time until John Someoneelse bought it", and it's much easier to say "the original owner sold it to a Mr. Lastname. In later years, Lastname sold it to John Someoneelse". The source's usage is in line with WP:HONORIFIC, but my preferred style is simpler and conveys the fact that we don't know Mr. Lastname's first name. Nyttend ( talk) 23:24, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
I'd be interested to know what the guidelines and current consensus say on including details of the height of children in infoboxes. I have stumbled across a number of articles about junior figure skaters ( Kaori Sakamoto, Marin Honda, and no doubt many many more) which include the individuals' height in the infobox. While the heights are confirmed by their official profiles, my view is that, as these people are still in their early teens, their height will be increasing over time, and so it is not a good idea to include such time-sensitive information in the infoboxes. What do other editors think about this, and what is common practice in articles about children who are still growing? -- DAJF ( talk) 03:29, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
Do we have a guideline on contributions along the lines of "X is currently dating ..."? (I'm looking at this.) If it's a disparaged practice, do we have a guideline on distinguishing gossip-sheet fodder from relationships other than marriage that definitely rate mention (such as Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell's)?
A recent proposal at the Village Pump: Policy about how to refer to Caitlyn Jenner in an article about the 1976 Olympics ended with the recommendation 1) that MOS:IDENTITY's policy on transgender individuals be revisited and 2) that the issue of how to refer to transgender individuals who are mentioned in passing in articles of which they are not the principal subject be resolved. We want help working out the wording before we post them to WP:VPP.
We are preparing two separate proposals for the Village Pump, one about whether the main MOS:IDENTITY should be kept or changed, and one about drafting a new rule for transgender individuals who are mentioned in passing. Here's where we could use a little help: We don't want this to confuse anyone or to have too many moving parts, and we don't want to ask the community "Do you want bananas or apples?" if half of them have been yelling "Oranges! Oranges!" for years. You guys have probably worked on more articles about transgender subjects than the MOS regulars have, so you probably know what issues actually come up and what just looks like it would.
For Proposal 1, are the two options that we're offering actually what the community wants? Are they phrased well? Are they easy to understand? Did we leave anything out? Could we trim anything back?
For Proposal 2, are the four/five options that we're offering actually things that people say they want? Should any of them be discarded? Are they easy to understand? Are the examples easy to understand? Did we leave anything out? Could we trim anything back?
Your contribution is welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 03:30, 9 October 2015 (UTC)
BLPNAME says that "in the case of transgender and non-binary people, birth names should only be included in the lead sentence if the person was notable prior to coming out." I presume that this excludes the case where the subject is not out -- where the subject does not claim to be transgender or non-binary? The analogy with our policies on sexual orientation and religion seem clear: we require reliable sources and a public affirmation.
I am especially concerned regarding the situation where a person is termed "transgender" on Wikipedia by their opponents, who may seek to publicize purported birth names or distribute purported images either in order to damage their opponents or to promote self-harm. This pattern, alas, is not unknown at Wikipedia. MarkBernstein ( talk) 14:44, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
The specific case that raises this question has already been oversighted. I'm not eager to further publicize the smear here; after all, that’s what the subject’s opponents want from Wikipedia. I believe the scenario is clear. If John Doe is not out -- does not claim to be transgender or non-binary -- then I presume that BLPName also says their birth name (or alleged birth name) does not belong in the article. MarkBernstein ( talk) 15:47, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
Is there any consensus/guidance for determining what/how many occupations to use in identifying a person in the lede? I see many articles which try to recap the subject's entire resumé, even delving into hobbies, (e.g. "actor, director, producer, writer, voice actor, comedian, singer, juggler, and television host"), which is awkward to read and isn't terribly information for someone who is simply wondering why this person is notable. Obviously someone such as Ronald Reagan who had two substantial and distinct careers needs more than one occupation listed, but how many items is too many, how much detail is too much, and how minor a role is too trivial? - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 14:16, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Right now, the guideline doesn't mention what to do about nicknames. The common practice on Wikipedia seems to be to put it in quotes. See Billy Carter, Casey Jones, Dick Van Dyke, Jimmy Hoffa, Tom Daschle, and our own Jimmy "Jimbo" Wales. Let's put something in the guideline at WP:FULLNAME, maybe something like: "When the subject is commonly known by a nickname, the nickname may be included in quotes next to the proper name." Thoughts? Darx9url ( talk) 09:47, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
Can we please do something about the nonsensical guideline to not have places of birth in the opening line. This has been discussed before as being WP:Local consensus. In ictu oculi ( talk) 08:21, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
Apologies for the rather awkward subject line! The situation I'd like feedback on is this: the subject of a biography changed her surname simply for personal preference, not through marriage, and not to her original/birth name. In this situation is it appropriate to use "née"? i.e. Jane Doe is born, later changes her name to Jane Bricken because Doe is too boring, and becomes famous as Jane Bricken. Is she now "Jane Bricken (née Doe)" or "Jane Bricken (born Doe)" or "Jane Bricken (formerly Doe)" or "Jane Bricken" and the name change is noted in the body of the text? Or some other solution? I feel uncomfortable using "née" as this is typically used to signify a surname used before it was changed by marriage, and in this case the change is not due to marriage. The use of "née" might give the reader an inaccurate impression of the person's decision. FYI the bio in question is Suzie Moncrieff. Many thanks! MurielMary ( talk) 10:20, 8 December 2015 (UTC)
This MoS currently has a section on the Opening paragraph. but none on the sections of the main part of the article. E.g., for a person who founded an organization, can there be a section for Appearances containing links to interviews they gave? What sections should typically be included? — Sebastian 19:28, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
Users (mostly IPs) keep changing the nationality of notable citizens in the open paragraph, when someone was born in country A but became notable in country B. Two examples are Riccardo Giacconi and Richard Rogers. I always revert these changes according to the WP:OPENPARA guideline, but I am wondering whether it would not make more sense to mention the double nationality in the lead (although I am aware that this would simply change the targets of the POV pushing, but not solve each problem).
Moreover, I would like to ask if this rule can be enforced asking help to an admin. Thanks, Alex2006 ( talk) 13:00, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
There should be biography-specific advice about filling in the fields of an infobox, especially since most biographies include one.– Gilliam ( talk) 04:13, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Under heading "Occupation titles" are offered the examples Hirohito was Emperor of Japan; Louis XVI was King of France. At MOS:JOBTITLES is offered the example In 1974 Vice President Ford was sworn in as the 38th president of the United States by Chief Justice Warren Burger. "President of the United States" looks like the name of an office, so I think that a little more discussion belongs in both articles explaining when something that looks like the name of an office should not be treated as such. How would the Ford example be capitalized if we omitted "the 38th"? If that means capitalizing "president", why should "the 38th" matter? Obviously Wikipedia editors have a lot of trouble understanding this rule. Examples abound:
and fewer compliant examples:
— Anomalocaris ( talk) 05:21, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
I'd go for downcasing where the job title isn't directly associated with a person's name. Even then, the boundaries become difficult and cause editors extra decision-making—We spoke with Garbage Collector John Blow about the new vehicles. – really? And seniority is an awkward boundary. "The chief executive officer, Rebecca Schmidt, was unavailable for comment." Why poke our eyes with a row of caps? Chicago MOS and Oxford's New Hart's Rules both favour avoiding unnecessary caps. Tony (talk) 06:52, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
I mean: a good image is better than a bad one. But what is a "good image" for the subject of a biography? For example in this article at least one image where the subject's face is not hidden by dark sunglasses seems reasonable to me, but not to the anonymous ip. Well, he probably consider himself the owner of the page because is reverting any edit, but this is another problem... Anyway: is there any guideline about what is a "good image" for a biography? It would be useful in these cases. Thanks in advance. -- Basilicofresco ( msg) 07:37, 26 January 2015 (UTC)
What's the consensus (or is there one) on discussing a person's race, ethnicity, and ancestral origins? I've noticed most articles don't; and I'm sure in most articles it's unnecessary and potentially inflammatory; but if there is something interesting about their race or ethnic heritage, is there a consensus on where in the article it should be discussed and how? ~ ONUnicorn( Talk| Contribs) problem solving 22:12, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
I've copied over a point made by IP: Stacie Croquet ( talk) 23:16, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
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.
An editor made this edit which I've rolled back pending discussion and consensus.
The gist of the editors point is is: as we know, the usual form is not include a comma before "Jr." in a name, so that the normal form is Sammy Davis Jr. was a member of the Rat Pack.
But if, for some reason, either Mr Davis or the preponderance of sources regarding Mr Davis went out of their way to style his name as "Sammy Davis, Jr." (with a comma between "Davis" and "Jr.") then.... speaking for myself, I don't think we should pay very much attention to either the subject's wishes or the preponderance of sources for issues of typography on this level of detail. As a practical matter we do use non-stylebook typography for some cases (k. d. laing, eBay) and not for others (Macy's rather than Macy*s)... but for "Jr.", for some unaccountable reason, some person wrote into the rule that we do, probably years ago, and so it is what it is.
So anyway, it is what it is, and what the editor has proposed is that we should add material to the effect that, in cases like this, our proper form is
and not
Why? This doesn't follow at all. It is true that we have a problem if Mr Davis or most of his sources choose to use this nonstandard format (since we have chosen to bind ourselves to following that), and there's no perfect solution to that problem. However, presenting "Jr." as a comma-delimited phrase -- essentially similar to writing "Sammy Davis (Jr.) was a member of the Rat Pack" -- is not prima facie better than treating "Sammy Davis, Jr." as a unitary name which happens to have the oddity of having a comma embedded within it.
I am very much not in favor or editors making changes to any of our rules, regardless of merit, without a thorough discussion and acceptance. So the place to begin making the case that this is an improvement is here. Herostratus ( talk) 14:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
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I agree that commas should be matched, if we have to have them, but since the post-nominals are very short, I'd prefer that we lose both commas. Otherwise there will be a lot of punctuation marks very close to each other, and that looks ... awkward. I guess this is why the style guides have abandoned it. If you ask me, we could lose the period/full stop too. HandsomeFella ( talk) 16:51, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Mismatched commas are registered as errors by English-literate people. I agree with Chicago that omitting both is a good modern solution, and I see that many sources do so with Sammy Davis Jr. and others. I don't understand why we would suggest using different styles based on the preference of the subject. Dicklyon ( talk) 06:55, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
I object. Rather replace "Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject" with "Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation" which is shorter, easier to remember, more consistent, and better in every way. Sources are great for facts. They are largely worthless for style questions. "Preference of the subject" leaves us subject to the whim of any mook on whom we have an article, to the detriment of what we're trying to do here. I honestly don't give a rat's ass for the "Preference of the subject" on this particular matter and neither should anyone IMO.
I would be interested in how we are supposed to treat names like will.i.am. Above it's asserted that in "Sammy Davis, Jr." the comma is not part of the name, but rather part of the sentence and requires a matching comma and such other grammatical structures as needed.
Ditto for will.i.am I guess. The dots don't indicated a truncation or abbreviation (there is none) and the only other way to parse them is as full stops, and full stops are followed by a space and the beginning of a new sentence (which requires capitalization), we would have to render this as "Will. I. Am". (Note that sentence capitalization overrides non-capitalization of names so that a sentence starting with a normally uncapitalized name is capitalized, e.g. if starting a sentence with the last name of "Bobby del Greco" you would write "Del Greco was also...")
Since the ""Preference of the subject" is to sprinkle his name with dots (there are other similar people who are pleased to insert various types of punctuatation in their names) our "Preference of the subject" clause requires us to scratch our heads over this stuff and generally dance to their silly tunes.
Let's not. Herostratus ( talk) 15:25, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Still hearing no objection, I went ahead and updated the section to say
And since this involved removing the comma from Sammy Davis, I went ahead and opened a Requested move discussion to make sure we have consensus: Talk:Sammy_Davis,_Jr.#Requested_move_25_December_2014. We'll see. Dicklyon ( talk) 17:45, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, but there is no consensus above. Three editors agreeing isn't enough to change a guideline like the MOS. I would suggest using an RFC to get consensus for the change, because a requested move isn't a valid way to weigh such changes. -- Calidum 21:27, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
Would someone check Talk:Nathuram Godse#Lead: why .22sole.22? Few weeks ago, I had discussion with an editor and very soon it became repetitive. Main objection [1] was, whether he was "sole" assassin or not and it turned into a lead re-write. I still think that the lead fails per WP:OPENPARA. Thanks. OccultZone ( Talk • Contributions • Log) 08:03, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
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.
Should the section Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biographies#Child named for parent or predecessor be removed? Is it necessary or required? DrKiernan ( talk) 07:32, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
I would like some clarification on the issue of whether people, usually men, who have the same name (or at least the same first name and family name) should have "Jr" included in their full name even when such people didn't include it in their name. Some editors include "Jr" for such people on the basis or assumption that this should be part of their full name. I seem to recall, however, that there is, or used to be, a comment in the MoS that "Jr" should only be included in a people's names if they used it themselves. Apologies if this has been discussed before. Thanks, Afterwriting ( talk) 01:37, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
There have been two long RfC in the last two years on the talk page of AT there is no consensus that the MOS guidelines cover article titles. Therefore discussions such as " #RfC: Comma or no comma before Jr. and Sr." are taking place in the wrong locations and any consensus that comes out of them are not binging on article titles. If there is to be a change to the article title policy or its naming conventions guidelines then any such changes ought to be discussed on the title policy talk page and/or the appropriate naming convention. -- PBS ( talk) 20:11, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Sorry, I know this has been rehashed several times above, but the current wording on the page:
which seemingly mandates not using the comma, does not match the decision of the RfC above, which was:
The actual wording on the MOS page does not convey the message that "both forms are acceptable". Thanks — Amakuru ( talk) 11:35, 9 March 2015 (UTC)
This message comes from the talk page of a biography ( Talk:Marshall Rosenberg#Nationality), where the nationality is listed as "American" in {{ Infobox person}}:
A USA citizen's passport gives the nationality as "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA". [1] This is a bit strange, since it is a noun, but "American" can hardly be a nationality, seeing as "America" is not a country (old debate, I know, but "American" seems like the worst of all possibilities, many countries being American). I guess "US-American" might do (even though Mexico is a "US", as well, apparently). Don't know how wide-spread this is on WP. kamome, 2015-03-03
Good question! I suggest that we just go with what the passport says, and write "USA". — Sebastian 19:01, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
at Randy Stonehill, there is a section discussing the subject's marriages.
The issue is not about accuracy but about how to describe the second spouse. She took the subject's married name, so should it be "Sandra" or should it be her family name? Walter Görlitz ( talk) 03:28, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Terry Acebo Davis#BRD. Thanks. RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 22:08, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
Need 2nd opinions at Talk:Ada Lovelace#Ada Lovelace's name. Thanks. Kaldari ( talk) 19:11, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
There is currently a discussion at the village pump about creating a noticeboard (similar to the RSN, ORN and NPOVN) for people with questions about how to implement Wikipedia's style policies. The proponents say that one centralized board would be easier for editors to find than many talk pages, and opponents say that it might be a venue for forum-shopping and drama. Participation is welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 19:01, 14 April 2015 (UTC)
Is there an active discussion anywhere on the Jr. comma issue? There are several pending RMs but none of the discussions on this page appear active. Thanks. Dohn joe ( talk) 20:59, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
There is a dispute here (Nicki Minaj article) over the understanding of when to include a notable person's ethnicity in the opening line of the lead. I assume I have a proper understanding of MOS:BLPLEAD, but would appreciate any constructive feedback other editors here can provide in that discussion. As a common courtesy, I thought it would be a good idea to give this a broader audience. Thanks in advance. -- GoneIn60 ( talk) 13:44, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
That maybe the best way to go. Let the body get into the detail of the matter, especially if there is conflicting reliable sources.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 00:45, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
In WP:LASTNAME, the third paragraph (with emphasis (not in the original) added to a problematic passage) reads:
What in heck is the purpose of the highlighted passage? Has this ever been an issue -- that only controversial persons should be referred to by their last name? The controversial J. Edgar Hoover as "Hoover", but the uncontroversial David Brenner as "David"? Makes no sense to me and although I generally oppose changes to rules pages before getting consensus, but in this case I went ahead and removed the passage. Maybe I'm missing something tho. Herostratus ( talk) 13:15, 19 April 2015 (UTC)
The Manual of Style insists that royals have their names split at the beginning of the article. For instance, the article on Princess Charlotte begins "Princess Charlotte of Cambridge (Charlotte Elizabeth Diana)". What is exactly is the reason for this? The Manual says something about "visual clarity", but what is visually unclear about starting the article with her full name, viz. Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana of Cambridge? This is the format used on all non-royal articles; for instance, the article on David Cameron begins "David William Donald Cameron", not "David Cameron (David William Donald)".
I therefore propose that the Manual be amended to state that articles on royals begin with the subject's full name, as any other article would. Zacwill16 ( talk) 19:09, 4 May 2015 (UTC)
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.
What guidance should be given (on this page and on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people)) concerning the use or non-use of commas between a person's name and "Jr." or "Sr."? W. P. Uzer ( talk) 09:36, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designations. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr. (not Sammy Davis, Jr.); John F. Kennedy Jr. (not John F. Kennedy, Jr.); Otis D. Wright II (not Otis D. Wright, II). |
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... In the case of Senior/Junior, the preferred format is with "Sr." or "Jr." written after the name without any preceding comma (see WP:JR); ... |
Well, given the previous discussions, I don't think we need a general discussion of what guidance should be provided, but rather a simple up-or-down show of hands on what we want to say. So pick one:
[N.B.: bolding in Option 2 is just to highlight the existence of the additional text, which will not be bolded in the actual rule.] Herostratus ( talk) 19:39, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
"Use the abbreviation Jr (with a point in US use) for Americans, prefaced by a comma unless it is known that the bearer of the name did not use one. In British usage, Jun. is more common, and the comma is not usual."
I think NHR's intended meaning would be clearer if they started the second sentence with "In British usage referring to Britons,"). Am I right in saying that? They seem to leave it open for US usage in referring to Britons (admittedly, it arises much much less often). Either way, it seems to me that our old article-consistent model—so successful for spelling varieties, units of measure, and date formatting—might be the first principle to state, with some flexibility written in and pointers to the most usual US and UK practice. Could be done fairly succinctly, I think. Tony (talk) 16:48, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
IMO sroc kind of nailed it. To reiterate what he said, Option 1 is the way to go because using Option 2:
IMO this is a pretty strong argument and a close on strength-of-argument alone could be called for here. Herostratus ( talk) 14:40, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
Just to be clear, when the closer says "the MOS page can be left as it is", that's because I already made the change a while ago to remove the exception "unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject" per consensus here. Dicklyon ( talk) 04:10, 13 February 2015 (UTC)
I've been moving and editing to get rid of the unbalanced commas. Maybe a hundred articles so far; but miniscule impact on the problem. No pushback encountered. In most cases I find the classic mismatch comma error that all the guides warn against. And in many the titles of cited sources have commas inserted where the source did not use it. Apparently a number of editors felt that comma before was really important for some reason. I also see quite a few uncommented moves to titles with comma, when the article originally was without. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:30, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Per discussion below, I regret that I had not noticed that my change to the MOS per the text proposed in the RFC had been changed by DrKiernan before the close. What a mess this causes now. Dicklyon ( talk) 04:33, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
I recently moved:
These moved have been reverted by Richard Arthur Norton claiming that the names with a single comma should remain "per the name from government website" or "the actual name", even though the names with a single comma are not only against MOS but also style guides on English punctuation. I have started a move request at Talk:John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial Parkway § Requested move 2 March 2015.
I have also requested a technical move for:
See Talk:Samuel Goldwyn, Jr. § Requested move 1 March 2015. — sroc 💬 08:58, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Requested moves are decided on the AT policy and its naming convention guidelines. So why are you posting this here? and not on WT:AT? -- PBS ( talk) 20:15, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
There seems to be some confusion about what this RfC actually decided. The whole point of the RfC was to amend the previous wording:
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation unless it is the preference of the subject or sources concerning the subject. Examples: Sammy Davis, Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
On the basis that there was a consensus forming that Wikipedia's style should not be subject to an evaluation of the subject's preferences, I proposed that the wording be amended to read:
Do not place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designations. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr. (not Sammy Davis, Jr.); John F. Kennedy Jr. (not John F. Kennedy, Jr.); Otis D. Wright II (not Otis D. Wright, II). |
Herostratus restated this as:
Do not place a comma before "Jr.", "Sr.", or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
This wording was broadly supported by most respondents. Dicklyon made the change on 7 February to reflect the above wording. DrKiernan made a further change on 9 February to read as follows:
Generally, there is no need to place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
I reverted that edit on 10 February as it was not supported by the RfC discussion but DrKiernan again edited it to read:
It is unnecessary to place a comma before Jr., Sr., or Roman numeral designation. Examples: Sammy Davis Jr., John F. Kennedy Jr., Otis D. Wright II. |
Although the above change was not supported by the above RfC, it was the wording that was in place when Robert McClenon closed the RfC on 13 February stating:
The consensus is that, while both forms are acceptable, the omission of the comma is preferred. One of the reasons is that the rules about following the qualifier with a comma are themselves complicated. The MOS page already states that the comma is not needed, so that the MOS page can be left as it is.
The consensus of the RfC was that the commas should be omitted; however, the final wording at WP:JR does not reflect this. In fact, the final wording arguably opens up the case to allow a comma before "Jr." and "Sr." at editors' discretion where this was not permitted before (it previously said "Do not" except for following the subject's preference). The current wording has been used in discussions to thwart page moves on the basis that the wording does not prohibit commas before "Jr." and "Sr.":
"The new WP:JR wording does not prohibit a comma..."
"The VIAF links and official sites use the comma, and there's no rule in the MoS against using one."
The current situation remains deplorable also because WP:JR provides no guidance on matching commas having to follow "Jr." or "Sr." if one precedes it, which is also being disputed by various users, and which is one of the reasons supporting the RfC to omit the commas altogether.
It seems that Robert McClenon, in closing the RfC, did not realise that the words "It is unnecessary..." would be interpreted in this way and used to undermine the whole point of the proposal. The wording "Do not...", which was as it appeared in the original text and in the proposals put forward in the RfC and agreed by most respondents, should be restored to WP:JR to avoid any ongoing confusion. — sroc 💬 14:47, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
It appears that I may have made the mistake of following a Wikipedia policy, assume good faith. I am no longer sure that there is good faith, because there are low-grade personal attacks. On the one hand, my own opinion is that the use of a comma between the name and the suffix should not be prohibited, provided that two conditions are met, first, the subject has expressed the desire for the comma, second, the rules concerning subsequent punctuation, which are complicated, are followed. However, my own opinion is not important, because I was trying to summarize consensus in closing the RFC. I will be requesting closure review at WP:AN with regard to three issues: first, did my closure reflect consensus, or, at least, was it a valid assessment of consensus; second, were there issues that should have been addressed that were overlooked; third, is administrative attention needed because of low-grade personal attacks? Normally non-administrative closure is just as good as administrative closure, but this may be a case where administrative closure is needed. Robert McClenon ( talk) 17:18, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
It has been suggested by administrator User:EdJohnston that a new RFC be opened to change the current wording "It is unnecessary to" to "Do not", as in "Do not use a comma". I will be opening such an RFC shortly, but would appreciate comments on one particular point. That is the impact in cases where the subject prefers the use of the comma. In those cases, we have two choices. We can say that, in Wikipedia, we will not use the comma. ( The policy on biographies of living persons doesn't require that degree of deference.) Alternatively, we can specify that we will use the comma in that situation, but that the rules concerning subsequent punctuation must be followed. My wording of the RFC will simply say "Do not", thus mandating no comma. Robert McClenon ( talk) 18:38, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Well let's see. The close was
Striking to heart of this, it devolves to
when push comes to shove, since "is preferred" is just a general admonition with no enforceability, and "not needed" is far from "forbidden".
The difference is that, if I am reading things correctly, formerly the rule was:
and now it is
since it just says "It is unnecessary..." which can certainly be interpreted as "Not required but allowed". Looking at it one way this is even worse than it was (endless arguments, even less uniformity), looking at it another way it removes one small bureaucratic rule preventing writers from writing how they like.
So how about a clean RfC which simply asks for preference:
Let voters rank these 1-2-3. (You could add a #4 "must use the comma" if you think that ought to be on the table (it hasn't been brought up as a possibility before, though)). If #3 wins the day we would then (I guess) be faced with whether to have an admonition to leave existing material as you found it. How this would work with article titles I don't know -- probably simple majority rule on a case-by-case basis. Herostratus ( talk) 21:56, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
My issue isn't about whether or not to have a comma, but whichever it is, it should say why -- not just say do not do it. -- Musdan77 ( talk) 21:35, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
Are we ready for a new, broader RfC? The current RfC languishes at a closure review that may or may not be acted upon any time soon. In the meantime, we have had several ad hoc RMs on the issue of Jr. commas. User:sroc above said that we should wait for that review to close before starting a new RfC, while User:Dicklyon has queried why some RM participants have not already started a new one if they intend to.
I think it's time to start the new RfC. The current RfC asked a narrow question: whether to allow evidence of personal preference over comma usage, or only to mention guidance to avoid the comma. The RfC will include several options, some of which were not presented in the current RfC. For that reason, the new RfC will likely make the current RfC moot. Instead of waiting for that RfC closure review to conclude, I'd like to start the new RfC now. But I think we'd all like to avoid procedural objections from people who think we should wait.
So I'm asking here: does anyone object to starting a new RfC on Jr. commas now? Dohn joe ( talk) 17:07, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
The big question for me right now is what to do with guidance on the comma after Jr. Addressing that issue right now is good because it would hopefully resolve the WP:JR guidance completely. Doing so now is bad because it could make the RfC too unwieldy, and doom consensus on the comma before. We could split this into two questions, with the second question being something like "When a comma is used before Jr. or Sr., what should WP's guidance be regarding a comma following Jr. or Sr.?" The options could be 1) include a following comma, no exceptions; 1A) include a following comma, subject and source exception; 2) allow both, with internal consistency. I'm on the fence as to whether to include this at the same time as the other. Any thoughts? Dohn joe ( talk) 15:10, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
The proposed style noticeboard has fallen through. There is now a conversation under way at WT:MoS about endorsing and centralizing its longstanding Q&A function. One of the issues raised is encouraging users to ask questions about style and copyediting either at WT:MoS or a subpage and not at other talk pages. The discussion is still very preliminary and participants from other pages that would be affected are very welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 16:03, 5 May 2015 (UTC)
This edit summary requested a discussion. It's unclear, though, what new can be said that wasn't already in previous summaries. Can someone please clarify what the problem is now? -- Ħ MIESIANIACAL 18:28, 4 May 2015 (UTC)
Thanks to @ GoodDay: for the request to join this discussion. I don't have an opinion on the matter one way or the other as I don't edit on these kind of articles, however @ Miesianiacal: (or anyobody else for that matter) should not be making changes which affect so many articles without going through RFC or similar lengthy discussions. Giant Snowman 16:49, 8 May 2015 (UTC)
I recommend that we continue to include the country of the monarch's entry we're mentioning in the section we're discussing. Not all of our readers are fully knowledgeable of which country a monarch lives in. GoodDay ( talk) 12:58, 10 May 2015 (UTC)
The essay at Wikipedia:Nationality of people from the United Kingdom was put together some seven to eight years ago, following extensive discussion, to help editors in addressing the thorny question of nationality in relation to biographies of UK subjects - in particular, whether they should be described as British, English, Scottish, Welsh, etc. etc. Many would argue, I think, that the essay has been more helpful than unhelpful in reducing pointless arguments, edit warring, etc., over that period. However, discussion had now flared up again on the talk page - with some unilateral editing of the essay and subsequent reverting - and is focused in particular (but not solely) on the question of whether the nationality of all UK subjects should be described as British (rather than English, Scottish, Welsh, etc.) in the infobox. (The word "nationality" has several meanings - its meaning in law being just one of them.) The move to change (or delete) the existing essay was initiated by Martin Hogbin, and is supported by Twobells and GoodDay. I and others have argued against many of the proposals being made by those editors, believing them to be ill-considered and unhelpful. The discussion on that talk page is clearly never going to achieve a consensus. I am raising it here, firstly to alert a wider group of editors of the continuing discussion and disagreement, and secondly to seek some help in identifying the best way forward. I'm aware that many, many experienced (and not-so-experienced) editors have tried to address this issue before, and the great majority of those editors are probably fed up to the back teeth of it being raised again. But, the issue refuses to go away, and some editors are unfortunately becoming increasingly agitated as a result. I'm sure that the three editors I've mentioned will comment here, but, personally, I'd like to hear a wider range of views. Ghmyrtle ( talk) 19:32, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
Indeed, we need input from the wider community. GoodDay ( talk) 19:37, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
I've been on the 'pedia for nearly 10yrs. I'm still amazed that there's a resistance to using British & United Kingdom across most British bio articles. GoodDay ( talk) 10:03, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
The people of the UK are British, whether they like it or not. But, we'll never be able to get those British bio articles corrected, as long as opposition continues :(
GoodDay (
talk) 21:44, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
We could adjust the infoboxes, to add UK to the birthplaces or deathplaces of those who were born or died in a foreign country. As for those born & died within the UK, we'd merely leave UK out. For examples: We should add UK to Andrew Carnegie's birthplace, because he died in the United States. Meanwhile, we don't add UK to Robert Burns, because he was born & died within the UK. GoodDay ( talk) 11:06, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
I'm wondering why the MOS has a section called "Opening paragraph" (singular) instead of "Lead section". But my main question is this: I've seen several bio articles where most of the lead is basically a listing of awards and nominations given to the person. Is that really what an intro section should be like? -- Musdan77 ( talk) 02:26, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
I suggest to insert the following phrase, or similar, into the section Post-nominal letters before the words "ensuring that readers".
{{
Post-nominals}}
,I also suggest to remove the line "See also" at the beginning of this section because a) referring to 'Middle names and abbreviated names', its relevance in this section is unclear; b) the target section doesn't exist under that name. Lastly, the meaning of the sentence "(See above in regard to academic titles and post-nominal initials.)" is unclear and it should be removed. -- Michael Bednarek ( talk) 23:36, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
So, WP:OPENPARA currently states that "Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they are relevant to the subject's notability." This feels highly reductionist and very limited. It's possible for somebody to be notable, generally, and their ethnicity or sexuality to be a prominent contextual element for understanding their work.
A good example of this is artists; there are a lot of artists who have an ethnicity and a nationality; say, Chinese-American or African-American. Their ethnicity is not part of their notability: they are notable as artists. But it is important in understanding the context in which they work. When you have an artist who is a first generation Chinese-American and their work is centred on that identity...sure, they're notable without it. But it's pretty much impossible to understand the work they do, or why they do it, or what it refers to, without also understanding their background.
I'd like to propose amending the guidelines around the opening paragraph, specifically, changing:
Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they are relevant to the subject's notability.
to:
Ethnicity or sexuality should not generally be emphasized in the opening unless it is relevant to the subject's notability, 'or provides important context to understanding the subject or their work. Similarly, previous nationalities or the country of birth should not be mentioned in the opening sentence unless they meet the same standard.
Bolding for the diff (I don't plan to have random bold text in guidelines ;p). Thoughts? Ironholds ( talk) 19:44, 3 April 2015 (UTC)
Oppose and counterproposal. Isn't the real problem here with the use of the word "notability"? Notability has a very specific meaning here and is actually a fairly mechanical concept only affecting inclusion or exclusion from the encyclopedia. We don't evaluate significance or importance to determine notability, we look for multiple reliable sources. That makes this standard, frankly, nonsense. If "notability" were replaced with "overall importance or significance," then it wouldn't seem to me that we would need to invite rule creep by adding the proposed qualification. I would note that the current formulation has been here (in reference to ethnicity, sexuality was added later) since this edit by @ Pharos in 2006, whose edit comment refers to this discussion on the talk page, in which Pharos' comment before making the edit was, "It's not official anywhere, but it's I think this is the general consensus of the very long discussions above. Exceptions would be in cases where someone's ethnicity was exceptionally tied to their significance; e.g. some minority rights activists and ethnically-focused artists. Since the issue comes up so often, perhaps we should establish a simple guideline on ethnicity for the fromt side of this page." ( Diff, emphasis added.) Perhaps Pharos will respond here and say why he chose "notability" over "significance" in the actual edit. Since I spend most of my time doing dispute resolution, I'm really afraid that the proposed addition is going to provide an excuse to open up a furball of contentious claims between warring ethnic and national groups and have to wonder if the current reductionist formulation wasn't designed to avoid that. Best regards, TransporterMan ( TALK) 15:36, 14 April 2015 (UTC)
There are no clear guidelines for when a nickname is supposed to be placed within the full name as opposed to being mentioned separately afterwards, e.g. (using listed examples from the article itself) William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton vs. David Drew Pinsky, nicknamed "Dr. Drew". Can this be addressed? MarqFJA87 ( talk) 15:49, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
Question, what do manuals of style for major publications say? NYT goes with full name, also known as nickname, format. I cannot access the Chicago Manual, which has a section on it (8.36). Christian Writer does not give a preference to within the name or after the name, but when in the name quotations are required. We should take some of our guidance from other MoSs if we are to create an essay or guideline about such a thing, as it will impact a large number of articles.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 03:00, 16 June 2015 (UTC)
I just reverted Necrothesp on the removal of "Bill." I don't see a problem with having "Bill" in the WP:Lead sentence, especially since it is his WP:Common name. Per WP:Alternative name, that name should be bolded in the lead somewhere; same goes for similar articles. Flyer22 ( talk) 15:36, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
in this edit Necrothesp removed the "Bill" Clinton example with the summary "removed contentious edit following support and no opposition on talkpage". I said above that I thought this form was acceptable in the case of Clinton and other similar cases where the nickname is the true COMMONNAME, so there was not "no opposition". What I think we should do is not remove the Clinton example, but instead add several other examples showing the variety of acceptable forms, as has been done in this thread. That way the examples cannot be rationally taken as a mandate for a single site-wide format, as a single example might. Would others favor such a change? DES (talk) 22:08, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
Persondata has been deprecated and the template and input data are subject to removal from all bio articles in the near future. For those editors who entered accurate data into the persondata templates of biography subjects, you are advised to manually transfer that data to Wikidata before the impending mass deletion occurs in order to preserve all accurate data. Here are two examples of Wikidata for film actors: Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. If you have any more questions about the persondata removal, Wikidata, etc., please ping me. Dirtlawyer1 ( talk) 13:57, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
@ Pigsonthewing: Apparently no updated data in the persondata templates has been pulled by the bots since at least November 2014. It is unclear whether newly entered data has been added or not in the eight months since then, or whether the bots have simply ignored updated datapoints. It is apparent that the issues have not been long and knowledgeably discussed because in manually transferring over the persondata from over 150 articles in the last two days, I can substantiate that many items of accurate data have not been previously transferred by bot action to Wikidata, including full names and other name variants, birth places, and all "brief descriptions" updated since November 2014. It's more than enough to raise doubts about whether these issues have "been long and knowledgeably discussed and the consequences well-considered." I'm happy to share details of my review. Dirtlawyer1 ( talk) 19:40, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
One of the exceptions provides that we can use "Mrs Alfred Jones" and other Mrs situations when we don't know the woman's given name. Why doesn't this extend to men with unknown first names? When writing about historic-but-somewhat obscure houses, I often discover that my source says something like "it was bought by a man by the last name of Lastname. He lived here a long time until John Someoneelse bought it", and it's much easier to say "the original owner sold it to a Mr. Lastname. In later years, Lastname sold it to John Someoneelse". The source's usage is in line with WP:HONORIFIC, but my preferred style is simpler and conveys the fact that we don't know Mr. Lastname's first name. Nyttend ( talk) 23:24, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
I'd be interested to know what the guidelines and current consensus say on including details of the height of children in infoboxes. I have stumbled across a number of articles about junior figure skaters ( Kaori Sakamoto, Marin Honda, and no doubt many many more) which include the individuals' height in the infobox. While the heights are confirmed by their official profiles, my view is that, as these people are still in their early teens, their height will be increasing over time, and so it is not a good idea to include such time-sensitive information in the infoboxes. What do other editors think about this, and what is common practice in articles about children who are still growing? -- DAJF ( talk) 03:29, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
Do we have a guideline on contributions along the lines of "X is currently dating ..."? (I'm looking at this.) If it's a disparaged practice, do we have a guideline on distinguishing gossip-sheet fodder from relationships other than marriage that definitely rate mention (such as Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell's)?
A recent proposal at the Village Pump: Policy about how to refer to Caitlyn Jenner in an article about the 1976 Olympics ended with the recommendation 1) that MOS:IDENTITY's policy on transgender individuals be revisited and 2) that the issue of how to refer to transgender individuals who are mentioned in passing in articles of which they are not the principal subject be resolved. We want help working out the wording before we post them to WP:VPP.
We are preparing two separate proposals for the Village Pump, one about whether the main MOS:IDENTITY should be kept or changed, and one about drafting a new rule for transgender individuals who are mentioned in passing. Here's where we could use a little help: We don't want this to confuse anyone or to have too many moving parts, and we don't want to ask the community "Do you want bananas or apples?" if half of them have been yelling "Oranges! Oranges!" for years. You guys have probably worked on more articles about transgender subjects than the MOS regulars have, so you probably know what issues actually come up and what just looks like it would.
For Proposal 1, are the two options that we're offering actually what the community wants? Are they phrased well? Are they easy to understand? Did we leave anything out? Could we trim anything back?
For Proposal 2, are the four/five options that we're offering actually things that people say they want? Should any of them be discarded? Are they easy to understand? Are the examples easy to understand? Did we leave anything out? Could we trim anything back?
Your contribution is welcome. Darkfrog24 ( talk) 03:30, 9 October 2015 (UTC)
BLPNAME says that "in the case of transgender and non-binary people, birth names should only be included in the lead sentence if the person was notable prior to coming out." I presume that this excludes the case where the subject is not out -- where the subject does not claim to be transgender or non-binary? The analogy with our policies on sexual orientation and religion seem clear: we require reliable sources and a public affirmation.
I am especially concerned regarding the situation where a person is termed "transgender" on Wikipedia by their opponents, who may seek to publicize purported birth names or distribute purported images either in order to damage their opponents or to promote self-harm. This pattern, alas, is not unknown at Wikipedia. MarkBernstein ( talk) 14:44, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
The specific case that raises this question has already been oversighted. I'm not eager to further publicize the smear here; after all, that’s what the subject’s opponents want from Wikipedia. I believe the scenario is clear. If John Doe is not out -- does not claim to be transgender or non-binary -- then I presume that BLPName also says their birth name (or alleged birth name) does not belong in the article. MarkBernstein ( talk) 15:47, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
Is there any consensus/guidance for determining what/how many occupations to use in identifying a person in the lede? I see many articles which try to recap the subject's entire resumé, even delving into hobbies, (e.g. "actor, director, producer, writer, voice actor, comedian, singer, juggler, and television host"), which is awkward to read and isn't terribly information for someone who is simply wondering why this person is notable. Obviously someone such as Ronald Reagan who had two substantial and distinct careers needs more than one occupation listed, but how many items is too many, how much detail is too much, and how minor a role is too trivial? - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 14:16, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Right now, the guideline doesn't mention what to do about nicknames. The common practice on Wikipedia seems to be to put it in quotes. See Billy Carter, Casey Jones, Dick Van Dyke, Jimmy Hoffa, Tom Daschle, and our own Jimmy "Jimbo" Wales. Let's put something in the guideline at WP:FULLNAME, maybe something like: "When the subject is commonly known by a nickname, the nickname may be included in quotes next to the proper name." Thoughts? Darx9url ( talk) 09:47, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
Can we please do something about the nonsensical guideline to not have places of birth in the opening line. This has been discussed before as being WP:Local consensus. In ictu oculi ( talk) 08:21, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
Apologies for the rather awkward subject line! The situation I'd like feedback on is this: the subject of a biography changed her surname simply for personal preference, not through marriage, and not to her original/birth name. In this situation is it appropriate to use "née"? i.e. Jane Doe is born, later changes her name to Jane Bricken because Doe is too boring, and becomes famous as Jane Bricken. Is she now "Jane Bricken (née Doe)" or "Jane Bricken (born Doe)" or "Jane Bricken (formerly Doe)" or "Jane Bricken" and the name change is noted in the body of the text? Or some other solution? I feel uncomfortable using "née" as this is typically used to signify a surname used before it was changed by marriage, and in this case the change is not due to marriage. The use of "née" might give the reader an inaccurate impression of the person's decision. FYI the bio in question is Suzie Moncrieff. Many thanks! MurielMary ( talk) 10:20, 8 December 2015 (UTC)
This MoS currently has a section on the Opening paragraph. but none on the sections of the main part of the article. E.g., for a person who founded an organization, can there be a section for Appearances containing links to interviews they gave? What sections should typically be included? — Sebastian 19:28, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
Users (mostly IPs) keep changing the nationality of notable citizens in the open paragraph, when someone was born in country A but became notable in country B. Two examples are Riccardo Giacconi and Richard Rogers. I always revert these changes according to the WP:OPENPARA guideline, but I am wondering whether it would not make more sense to mention the double nationality in the lead (although I am aware that this would simply change the targets of the POV pushing, but not solve each problem).
Moreover, I would like to ask if this rule can be enforced asking help to an admin. Thanks, Alex2006 ( talk) 13:00, 11 December 2015 (UTC)