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Deprecate sources repeating citogenetic claim (discovery of alcohol & sulfuric acid)

Latest comment: 2 years ago35 comments13 people in discussion

There are a number of sources out there which claim that the Persian physician and chemist Abu Bakr al-Razi (c. 865–925) discovered alcohol/ethanol, as well as sulfuric acid. There's for example this paper by Amr & Tbakhi 2007, this one by Modanlou 2008, and this entry in the New World Encyclopedia. As I will try to show below, these two last sources were copying from unreferenced claims in Wikipedia itself, while the first is also likely based on Wikipedia and in any case not reliable in context. Since every once in a while someone shows up at the Razi page to add these sources, insisting that they're reliable, I would like some input from other editors.

First note how our page on al-Razi looked c. 2004–2006:

10 March 2004: Inter alia he discovered alcohol, the use of alcohol in medicine, and he also discovered Sulfuric acid.

20 April 2005: He is credited with, among other things, the discovery of sulfuric acid, the "work horse" of modern chemistry and chemical engineering; and also of ethanol-alcohol (in addition to its refinement) and its use in medicine.

19 April 2006: As an alchemist, Razi is credited with the discovery of sulfuric acid, the "work horse" of modern chemistry and chemical engineering. He also discovered ethanol and its refinement and use in medicine.

Note that none of these revisions refer to a source to verify these claims. Then compare:

Modanlou 2008, p. 674: He discovered and purified alcohol (ethanol) and pioneered its use in medicine. Also, he is credited with the discovery of sulfuric acid, the “work horse” of modern chemistry and chemical engineering.

New World Encyclopedia: As an alchemist, Razi is credited with the studies of sulfuric acid, the "work horse" of modern chemistry and chemical engineering. He also wrote about ethanol and its refinement and use in medicine.

New World Encyclopedia is an internet encyclopedia produced by the Unification Church that selects and rewrites certain Wikipedia articles through a focus on Unification values, so the fact that they copy from Wikipedia is not a surprise. But Modanlou 2008, who is writing for an academic journal ("Archives of Iranian Medicine"), should not be literally copying from Wikipedia. Yet that's undoubtedly what he's doing, and since he does not even refer to Wikipedia, he is actually plagiarizing. He has in turn been cited for this on Wikipedia at least from 16 June 2017 until 15 February 2021 (the other source removed there, Schlosser 2011, actually does cite our Wikipedia article for the claim the discovery of alcohol, first to produce acids such as sulfuric acid on p. 4). Unless the 2005 Wikipedia article and Modanlou 2008 were somehow drawing from the same unnamed and unknown source, this must be a case of WP:CITOGENESIS.

That leaves us with Amr & Tbakhi 2007. They only mention Among his discoveries in alchemy, he is credited with the discovery of sulfuric acid and ethanol. Again no reference whatsoever. The "he is credited with ... the discovery" is literally the same as the 2005~2006 Wikipedia article, but more conspicuous is the way in which sulfuric acid and ethanol are mentioned together (these are very different substances with very different historical trajectories of discovery). It seems more likely than not that Amr & Tbakhi 2007 too were drawing on the Wikipedia article.

Given all this, I think that no source which just passingly mentions that al-Razi discovered sulfuric acid and alcohol/ethanol, without itself detailing these discoveries in primary sources or referring to some more specialized source, should be considered reliable for these claims. The fact of the matter is that the sources which do discuss the details of the historical developments which led to the discovery of ethanol and sulfuric acid, as described in Ethanol#History (e.g. al-Hassan 2009) and Sulfuric acid#History (e.g. Karpenko & Norris 2002), do not at all attribute the discovery of these things to al-Razi.

What I propose is to deprecate Amr & Tbakhi 2007, Modanlou 2008, and any other source passingly mentioning that al-Razi discovered sulfuric acid and alcohol/ethanol without itself giving primary evidence or references for this, as support for these claims on Wikipedia. Thanks for reading, any input is very welcome! ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 23:41, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

These claims didn't originate in Wikipedia, here's an example from 1983 [1]. I think it's likely that those better references that mention primary sources exist. Geogene (talk) 00:07, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
That's interesting. However, the blurbs shown from the 1983 source are also just making the claim in a rather grandiose way without providing any evidence, and the nature of the work (Islamic Scientific Thought and Muslim Achievements in Science, published by Ministry of Science and Technology, National Hijra Centenary Committee, and Organization of Islamic Conference) does not suggest that it's very likely to contain evidence of that sort. In any case, with regard to that source considerations of WP:DUE apply, given that its claims are not repeated and in fact contradicted by later reliable sources such as Karpenko & Norris 2002. Perhaps this thread, which is about reliability as affected by citogenesis (the loud reinforcement by Wikipedia of an unreferenced claim made on Wikipedia, regardless whether the claim was original to Wikipedia or not), should be restricted to sources published after c. 2005.
But more importantly, note that I only propose to deprecate sources that repeat this claim without giving primary evidence or references. If it can be shown for any source that it does give evidence of any sort, the proposal does not apply. Even only specifically deprecating Amr & Tbakhi 2007 and Modanlou 2008 would already be of help. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 01:00, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
If the 1983 source is making the same claims, how are we sure that any of the sources were citing Wikipedia? Couldn’t it be that they just took it to be a well-accepted fact that didn’t need to be explicitly cited? It feels difficult to reduce it all to citogenesis. — Mhawk10 (talk) 03:02, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
I found this source which cites Islamic Technology, Ahmed al-Hassan and Donald Hill, 1987, Cambridge University Press. Also this source which is published in 2002 makes a similar claim but it doesn't cite any source, however judging from its publication year it is probably not from Wikipedia.Premitive (talk) 05:38, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
The attribution of these discoveries to Al-Razi is quite contentious, and the repeated use of this "workhorse" phrase is certainly a bit off with these particular sources. On a broader note, there is quite a lot of information that needs setting right on Wikipedia on the subject of medieval Arabic/Persian scientific discovery. Here alone, there is quite a lot to unpack. Really this subject is a bit of a Pandora's box. Some sources attribute the discovery of sulfuric acid to al-Razi, while others attribute it to the Geber (also known as pseudo-Geber, not to be confused with Jabir Ibn Hayyan).[2] While encyclopedia.com is hardly authoritative, it is interesting to note that while it separately, actively attributes the discovery to Geber,[3] there is no further mention of it on the dedicated page for al-Razi.[4] The first distillation of an alcoholic beverage to produce something close to pure ethanol is quite firmly attributed to Al-Kindi, who wrote an entire work entitled The Book of the Chemistry of Perfume and Distillations, and who lived about two generations before Al-Razi. This is also noted in the Hassan 2009 source @Apaugasma mentioned on Ethanol#History, which itself refers back to an 1893 work. Iskandar323 (talk) 06:24, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
So at any rate not a case of citogenesis. --Andreas JN466 11:46, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Some further comments and answers to the above. @Mhawk10: for Modanlou 2008 the the "work horse" of modern chemistry and chemical engineering phrase leaves no doubt he was copying from WP (phrase added to WP in 2004 here). Amr & Tbakhi 2007 also have the he is credited with ... the discovery phrasing. At the very least the fact that Modanlou 2008 was cited for c. 4 years on WP is a case of circular sourcing, if not citogenesis.
But yes, it's established now (thanks for all the input!  ) that the claims are much older, per the evidence of Premitive, Iskandar323 and Andreas (Jayen466) above. Among the more serious sources, it occurs in this 1983 work and apparently in al-Hassan & Hill 1986 (for alcohol). However, it's important to note that these claims are not well-accepted facts. The attribution of sulfuric acid to al-Razi directly contradicts the authoritative account of Multhauf 1966 (The Origins of Chemistry, pp. 141–142) as accepted by, e.g., Karpenko & Norris 2002 or Newman 2006 (Atoms and Alchemy, p. 98) –for an account of the mainstream view of the historical development of the mineral acids, including al-Razi's role in it, see Hydrochloric acid#History. The attribution of alcohol to al-Razi contradicts the authoritative account of Forbes 1970 (A Short History of the Art of Distillation) as accepted, e.g., by Moran 2005 (Distilling knowledge, p. 12). Even one of the two authors of al-Hassan & Hill 1986 (pp. 133–149, which I fortunately don't have access to), al-Hassan 2001 (Science and Technology in Islam, vol. IV, part 2, p. 60) admits that al-Razi's works do not explicitly describe the production of sulfuric acid, pointing instead to two Arabic manuscripts which he says date from before the 13th century (which is significant because the mainstream view of Multhauf et al. is that mineral acids date from the 13th century). In his description of the history of alcohol, al-Hassan 2001 pp. 65–69 does not even mention al-Razi, nor does he in his 2009 recapitulation of this.
If one adds to this that even al-Hassan's views are not followed or accepted by any other scholar that I know of, one may get an idea of how fringe the unreferenced claims attributing these things to al-Razi really are. Some of the confusion undoubtedly stems from the fact that the production of some mineral acids is described in the 13th-/14th-century works of pseudo-Geber (who certainly also knew alcohol), which used to be attributed to the 8th/9th-century Jabir (al-Hassan is the only scholar still defending this latter view). Exaggerated claims based on religious or national pride is probably also part of the story.
In any case, these claims are circulating extraordinarily widely, ever without proper references, and have for a very long time been promoted on Wikipedia (c. 2004–2021). Perhaps 'deprecate' is not the right term (I only call for disallowing the use of evidence-less sources for these two specific claims), but it would really be nice to have consensus about that here which we can point to in the future. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 12:26, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
Pinging User:Ajrocke, who notes on his user page that he is professional historian of chemistry, to this discussion. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 12:41, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
Any sources claiming to be able to definitively attribute either of these discoveries to Al-Razi cast considerable suspicion upon themselves, as the evidence for all of these sorts of claims is pretty debatable. Declarative statements without the qualification of phrases like "may have" or is "widely though to have" are clearly doing any injustice to the inherent ambiguity of peering this far into the past. The strongest of all of these claims is that Al-Kindi was the first to distill wine into ethanol, as evidenced by information in his book which yields detailed diagrams of the equipment used (thanks @Apaugasma). There are also multiple sources asserting that Jabir Ibn Hayyan was also familiar with the process in principle and certainly carried out experiments to the point of producing an ethanol flame. We can therefore pretty much definitively ignore sources claiming that Al-Razi was the first to distil alcohol - though I believe part of the confusion here may be the fact that it is possible that he may have been the first to apply distilled ethanol to medical applications (TBC). The sulfuric acid claims appear to be murkier still, as the details are this are far from clear and the wildly varying origins stories for this range from Jabir Ibn Hayyan, to Al-Razi and on to Pseudo-Geber in the 12th-13th century. All in all, very ambiguous. As @Apaugasma notes, the sources mentioning the discoveries of 'sulfuric acid and alcohol' together in the same sentence as if both are an unambiguous fait accompli without explanation expose their own poverty. Iskandar323 (talk) 13:24, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

So, now that it has been positively established that the claim did not originate on Wikipedia so forget that. Forget deprecation also; that is a severe degradation of a source for most uses and no such case and can be found in this discussion. The way to deal with uncertainty and disagreement between sources is attribution. "AUTHOR1 attributes him with XYZ,[cite] but AUTHOR2 considers that unlikely.[cite] AUTHOR3 attributes the discovery to ABC.[cite]". Stuff like that, this is basic wikicraft. Zerotalk 13:19, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Standardly using attribution where multiple POVs are found in the sources is a perfect recipe for creating a false balance. Some POVs are repeated and repeated by poor sources without any evidence whatsoever. The relevant policy is RS/Context matters: Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content. So how do we weigh these sources? ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 14:00, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
WP:GOODRESEARCH and WP:TERTIARY. For instance "Alchemy" in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World , and "Chemistry and Alchemy" in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam and following the bibliographies. "...also managed to produce mineral acids, although it is doubtful whether he recognized them as isolated substances" looks like a good starting point for sulfuric acid. fiveby(zero) 16:34, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
For reference, here is a doc on the history of sulfuric acid from California State University, Los Angeles, saying,
  • 8th century c.e. - Jabir ibn Hayyan became the first recorded person to produce mineral acids including sulfuric acid
  • 9th century c.e. - Al Razi used iron sulfates and copper sulfates under distillation to produce small quantities of sulfuric acid.
  • 13th century c.e. - Albertus Magnus, perhaps the most widely read author of his time, wrote several influential books in medieval Europe describing Al Razi’s method of producing oil of vitriol [= sulfuric acid]
That document lists further references at the bottom of page 2 that may be helpful. Maybe it's more correct to say that al-Razi invented a method for manufacturing sulfuric acid. (That would tally with what Hunke says on p.170 of her work cited in The History of Anaesthesia, published by the Royal Society of Medicine.) --Andreas JN466 17:04, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
I am usually against this deprecation (or depreciation as some seem to think it is) system, but if nobody can prove this isn't citogenisis then it seems like the best move. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:39, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
The sources produced above prove that the essential claims predate the existence of Wikipedia. Zerotalk 03:21, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
  • There is no need to formally deprecate. Sources that are based on (or, worse, copy) Wikipedia can simply be declared unreliable. Blueboar (talk) 20:09, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Wow, thanks for all these sources! This combined heuristic power is really awesome, we should be asking each other for sources like this more often!   Unfortunately, however, I'm not learning anything new from these sources about the history of alcohol/mineral acids, though I am gaining a deeper insight in the 20th-century history of tendentious claims about early Muslim chemists, so to speak.
See the problem is this: above I cited respected authorities in the field of the history of chemistry, like Multhauf 1966 and Karpenko & Norris 2002, whose primary source based-accounts (concluding that the discovery of sulfuric and other mineral acids dates to c. 1300) are accepted by top scholars like Newman 2006 (Atoms and Alchemy, p. 98). But apparently already in 1960 someone like Sigrid Hunke, a religious studies (!) scholar allegedly influenced by Nazism (!), published a work called Allahs Sonne über dem Abendland, "Allah's Sun over the West" (!), in which she already made these same seemingly omnipresent claims about al-Razi being responsible for the discovery of sulfuric acid and alcohol (p. 170), without referring to any primary source or to any other form of evidence whatsoever. This is a really problematic pattern: unqualified scholars repeating unevidenced attributions of alcohol and various mineral acids to early Islamic chemists, often with some apparent religious or national axe to grind, who are completely ignored by actual historians of chemistry who actually deal with the primary sources on the history of these things.
When Nomanul Haq in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World writes that al-Razi managed to produce mineral acids, although it is doubtful whether he recognized them as isolated substances, he seems to be referring to the well attested fact that Jabir and al-Razi were experimenting with the heating of alums and salts, in which they must indeed have produced gaseous substances like hydrogen chloride and mercury(II) chloride, the study of which was in turn essential to the later discovery of mineral acid-based substances such as aqua regia (it's actually hydrogen chloride, itself not a mineral acid but forming fumes of hydrochloric acid upon contact with the water vapor in atmospheric air, that went unrecognized by al-Razi: see Multhauf 1966 pp. 141–142, 160–163; cf. al-Hassan 2001, Karpenko & Norris 2002). But how would we know what Nomanul Haq means, since he does not refer to any source for his claim? Abdul Mujeeb Khan in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam is even worse, attributing the whole gamut of nitric acid, sulfuric acid, hydrochloric acid and other acids to both Jabir and al-Razi, giving us only the name of a Jabirian work and of the medieval historian al-Mas'udi (edition? page number? secondary source on this?). No, we don't need tertiary sources, quite the opposite: we need a secondary source that actually comes up with some hard evidence in primary sources for all of these claims.
I should perhaps emphasize that I personally would be very happy if someone here would find such a source. I want to learn, and to get it right. But in the meantime my request is actually much simpler. I was wrong to ask for deprecation, not fully understanding what it means. Despite the fact that Modanlou 2008 literally copied a whole sentence from WP and was later cited for that very sentence on WP for c. 4 years (I'm rather amazed at the lack of concern for that!  ), citogenesis is not really the most relevant thing here either. Rather, there's a problem we've discovered goes all the way back to 1960 of unreferenced claims being ever again recycled, which despite the fact that there is no evidence in sight, have become almost part of the 'common wisdom' about the accomplishments of early Muslim chemists. To deal with this problem, I simply propose the following:

Can we agree that sources which merely claim that al-Razi discovered alcohol and sulfuric acid, without providing primary evidence or a full reference to a more specialized source, are unreliable in context for this specific claim?

I'm already seeing some support for this here and there above, but it would be nice to have a full-flung consensus. We have for almost twenty years been on the wrong side of this (cf. also the massive amounts of misinformation removed from the Jabir article here), so let's make it very sure we stay on the right side now! ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 23:33, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
I thought the Oxford works were helpful in not giving prominence of a discovery for balance. For tracking down the evidence i have been searching for H. E. Stapleton; M. Hidayat Husain (1927). "Chemistry in Iraq and Persia in the Tenth Century A.D". Memoirs of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. 8: 316–417. which i am led to believe may be helpful, but no luck so far. fiveby(zero) 03:52, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes, Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 (available here) is a very good source for early Islamicate chemistry (sad to say, it remains perhaps the best source for it today). The long and the short of it is that they explicitly state that al-Razi, though coming very close to it, did not discover sulfuric acid (pp. 333, 393; cf. p. 369, note 3). They do, however, suggest that he may have found a primitive way to produce another mineral acid, hydrochloric acid (p. 333), which I will be adding to our relevant articles. A longer explanation is found below.
Longer explanation with quotes from Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927

On p. 333, Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 write:

Nitre was not apparently differentiated in the time of ar-Razi from other salts, so we could not expect the isolation at this period of Nitric acid. As regards sulphuric acid, although ar-Razi subjected vitriols to dry distillation (vide infra pp. 334 and 393) he appears only to have done so with the idea of separating their 'Souls' or 'Spirits,' and as, in accordance with the same mistaken theory, he subsequently returned the distillate to the residue in the alembic, he seems to have altogether failed to notice that the distillate was a particularly powerful solvent.

This seems to be the ultimate basis of Nomanul Haq 2009's account of producing it but not isolating it. To be honest, from the perspective of the chemical theories of the time (which regarded 'spirits' generally as the active forces in nature), I find it hard to believe that al-Razi would have just discarded the spirits and not tried to isolate them and investigate their properties. See, for example, what Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 write on p. 393: It is extremely curious to see how close ar-Razi came to the discovery of Sulphuric acid, without actually recognising the powerful solvent properties of the distillate of vitriols and alum. This is all the more surprising, as he fully realised the reactive powers of both Arsenic sulphide and Sal-ammoniac, the 'Spirits' with which he must have associated the distillate from alum. Extremely curious indeed, to the point of unbelievable (did he perhaps lack an apparatus sufficiently resistant to high-temperature corrosive substances, as postulated by Multhauf 1966 p. 204?). But this is the view of the scholars who actually investigated the primary sources.
It would, by the way, be wrong to conclude from the fact that al-Razi did not produce sulfuric acid that he did not know any other acids and corrosive substances, through the study of which he greatly contributed to the progress of chemistry. He may even have succeeded in producing a primitive form of hydrochloric acid. Let me again quote Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 p. 333 on that:

By 'Sharp Waters' (al-Miyāh al-ḥāddah). These were a curious collection ; and apart from miscellaneous liquids obtained from urine, as well as from inorganic substances, included Vinegar ; Caustic Soda (mixed with some sal-ammoniac) ; a strong solution of Ammonia (made by distilling a mixture of sal-ammoniac and copper oxide, but afterwards mixed with sal-ammoniac and colocynth pulp) : Calcium Sulphide (called Zād al-Raghwah) ; and a solution of Mercury in Sal-ammoniac, which was used, in particular, to dissolve calcined substances. Although Beckmann and others have ascribed to ar-Razi the discovery of the so-called ' mineral' acids –possibly on the basis of certain interpolated passages in the Liber Bubacaris, –the only prescription in this section that suggests that he was acquainted with any of them is the following, which may be explained as a primitive method of obtaining Hydrochloric acid.

The Liber Bubacaris is a heavily interpolated Latin translation of al-Razi’s Kitāb al-asrār which contains an interpolated description of sulfuric acid probably dating to the 12th/13th century (see Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 p. 369 note 3). The recipe in al-Razi's original Arabic work that perhaps would result in hydrochloric acid seems to have been missed by Multhauf 1966 pp. 141–142, who on the basis of three other recipes concluded that al-Razi produced hydrogen chloride but not hydrochloric acid, and who (p. 204) contended that only the more efficient cooling apparatus of the 16th century led to the discovery of a process to produce isolated hydrochloric acid. I will add this to the Hydrochloric acid and Hydrogen chloride articles.
Though Nomanul Haq 2009 (one of the tertiary Oxford sources) is closer to the specialist secondary sources when saying that al-Razi produced mineral acids without recognizing them, he's still stretching it a bit since the specialist sources are very clear that for the most part any production of them was purely fortuitous. Anyway, though it's good that you made me look at Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 again, there's still the matter of the dozens of sources out there plainly claiming that al-Razi discovered sulfuric acid and alcohol (the latter not even mentioned by Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927, Multhauf 1966, or al-Hassan 2001/2009) without offering any evidence or references for that. Given everything already said in this thread, perhaps it has now become clear that these claims are part of a myth rather than of a legitimate tradition of scholarly research? ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 17:10, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
@Apaugasma: Looking at this further in Google Scholar, I am inclined to agree with you that there is an awful lot of very superficial copying of the alcohol/sulfuric acid claims going on, with the Wikipedia article and then Modanlou apparently being a significant vector (neither claim is in Britannica). I also agree that reinserting anything on this topic should only be done if in-depth sources are found that clearly link this assertion back to Razi's own (voluminous and only partially extant and translated) writings. That is just a question of demanding good sourcing; I am not sure it is necessary to deprecate the bad ones. Here is a nice paper that actually does analyse Razi's laboratory records and provides some historical perspective; unfortunately, it doesn't answer the question we are concerned with here: [5] --Andreas JN466 19:15, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
How about this UNESCO publication (Science and Technology in Islam: Technology and applied sciences, by Maqbul Ahmed, A. Z. Iskandar, 2001, pp. 58ff.)? This asserts that al-Razi's Kitab al-Asrar contained three recipes for making sulphuric acid, and quotes one of them (p. 60). (No claim is made that he was the first.) Also note the comments on page 59 which I think relate to what you were quoting above. Cheers, --Andreas JN466 19:44, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes, that's Al-Hassan 2001, to whom I referred a number of times above. The three recipes are not from al-Razi's Kitāb al-Asrār but from an anonymous Karshuni manuscript containing a compilation taken from several authors (see Al-Hassan 2001 p. 63) and whose dating is uncertain (before 1100 according to its editors, Berthelot & Houdas 1893 vol. II p. xvii). As such, Al-Hassan 2001 is not repeating the claim that al-Razi discovered it, just that it occurs in early Arabic sources. On pp. 58-59, Al-Hassan 2001 makes an interesting argument that Jabir must have already known mineral acids because he was aware of the need to cool the distillate (which indeed addresses the concerns of Multhauf 1966 et al.). But note how he himself explicitly acknowledges that what he is proposing runs contrary to the prevailing notion that Islamic chemists did not produce mineral acids (citing authorities like Multhauf and Needham). It's because of this engagement with actual research that Al-Hassan is a reliable source, even though his views (which reviewers have noted are often polemical in nature, e.g., Ferrario 2010 p. 132 the tone of an open and fiery polemic against other scholars [...] the tone of the polemics tends to exceed the desirable boundaries of an academic disagreement; Brentjes 2011 The at times rather sharply ideological tone does not improve his arguments) have as of yet not been accepted by other scholars (meaning they should be accorded less weight than others). As I noted above, if even a polemical minority source like Al-Hassan does not attribute alcohol and sulfuric acid to al-Razi, the many sources which do this without any proper reference should be considered fringe.
You're right that this could equally well be accomplished by insisting on good sourcing. But it's hard when there are so many sources out there repeating the fringe view, and editors (most of them probably in good faith) keep coming up with these sources, in their turn insisting that they should be included. I don't want to spend three full days on it every time this happens: it would be much better to be able to point to a broader consensus saying that these are indeed bad sources. I think that a rough consensus in that direction, as well as a lot of useful extra information, has accrued here in this thread, for which I wish to thank everyone who participated. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 22:44, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
Thanks for taking the time to explain and sorry for missing that this was the source you had previously referred to (I got confused by the author names vs. the editor name). Same for the Berthelot (thanks for the page reference) – you are quite right that this is not al-Razi. I thought at first the text was talking about a MS of al-Razi's book in that script ... As for the polemics, I believe it is good for people like Hassan who are at home in both cultures to be working in these fields. It would be surprising if they didn't complain about shortcomings or subconscious biases in Western scholarship, just as we would likely complain of shortcomings or subconscious biases in Japanese scholarship of European culture, say. That's just human nature. After a couple more centuries of scholarship it will probably work itself out ...   Anyway, reiterating that I agree with the sourcing standard you propose. Happy editing. --Andreas JN466 01:09, 7 March 2022 (UTC)

Comment Late to the party, only found this thread after having seen this edit summary from Premitive. We should go by what Zero said, retaining only the sources that cite primary sources would be tantamount leaving out many reliable sources for no legit reason, i think it's more than likely that there is a huge gap in the relevant litterature about these dicoveries, thus, all views should be included with due weight.---Wikaviani (talk) (contribs) 16:52, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Agreed that all legitimate views should be represented according to their due weight. My argument here is that some views are not legitimate, because though often repeated they do not derive from any discernible historical research. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 22:44, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
I understand, but any source that is deemed reliable should be able to be cited in the article, whether it cites primary sources or not.---Wikaviani (talk) (contribs) 09:37, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
I agree that there should not be a general requirement for any source in the article to cite primary sources. But I should perhaps clarify the underlying policy here. WP:No original research states that a secondary source contains an author's analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources. [...] Policy: [...] Articles may make an analytic, evaluative, interpretive, or synthetic claim only if that has been published by a reliable secondary source (emphasis in original). So yes, the article may cite a reliable source that does not itself cite a primary source, but that citation will not support any claim for which no reliable secondary source (i.e., a source that analyzes/evaluates/etc. the primary evidence) can be shown to exist. It's the standard verifiability criterion: at every level a published source needs to exist so as to be able to trace back any claim to the basic evidence for it. I have tried to show above that no secondary source (in the technical WP sense clarified above) exists for the attribution of alcohol and sulfuric acid to al-Razi. What I am asking for is an explicit consensus that as long as no such secondary source is found, the many non-secondary sources making these claims cannot support this attribution, and are thus unreliable in context. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 19:43, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
@Apaugasma: What do you think of this one? [6] This asserts that in his "great Licht der Lichter", i.e. Lumen Luminum (attributed to Razi, possibly incorrectly so, but listed as translated in the 12th century by Gerard of Cremona (1114 – 1187) on p. 38 of this Harvard tome), (Pseudo-)Razi speaks of "an oil won by distillation from iron vitriol". (It occurred to me that we might have to look for publications in other languages than English to find a link back to a primary source.) I might have a look for the Latin text later (unless you're aware of an English, German, French or Spanish translation ...) if you think it's worthwhile (do tell me if I've missed something and am barking up the wrong tree). --Andreas JN466 21:10, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
I'm normally the first to emphasize that the best research on Islamicate chemistry is very old, most of it dating to the first half of the 20th century, but Hager 1877 (!) really is a bit too old. In the 19th century, the authenticity of the many Latin alchemical writings attributed to Arabic authors was for the most part still taken for granted. However, this all changed with the work of Berthelot in the 1890s, and especially with the work of Stapleton and Ruska in the 1920s and 1930s. Nowadays most of these Latin writings are recognized as pseudepigraphs, though quite a few of them are likely translated from the Arabic. A good recent survey of this by a noted expert is Moureau 2020, Min al-Kīmiyā’ ad Alchimiam.
The "grossen Licht der Lichter" or Lumen luminum referred to by Hagen 1877 p. 420 may be any of three works discussed by Moureau 2020, the first (p. 114 no. 20) variously attributed to al-Razi or to Aristotle but in some manuscripts also anonymous (extracts edited by Ruska 1939, "Pseudepigraphe Rasis-Schriften", pp 56-65; whether it is a translation from the Arabic or not needs further investigation according to Moureau 2020), the second (p. 114 no. 22) attributed to al-Razi or anonymous (very likely a translation from the Arabic according Moureau 2020), the third (p. 107 no. 5) more often called De perfecto magisterio and variously attributed to Aristotle or al-Razi (likely originally written in Latin in the 13th century according to Ruska 1939 pp. 45-56, which Moureau 2020 finds convincing). All of these works need much further investigation, but their attribution to al-Razi in some manuscripts is not currently accepted as authentic.
Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 in the quote I gave above (p. 333) mentioned that some earlier authors mistakenly ascribed the discovery of the mineral acids to al-Razi based on what are in fact later interpolations in a Latin Razi work (the Liber secretorum Bubacaris, Moureau 2020 p. 117 no. 18, the only Latin text attributed to al-Razi whose authenticity is currently accepted, though it also contains many interpolations). More generally it seems likely to me that the ultimate origin of the repeated claims that al-Razi discovered sulfuric acid lie precisely in this 19th-century literature, which took all Latin works attributed to al-Razi as authentic. But I think there really is a limit to the lengths we should go to here in the archaeology of this mistaken claim. If it was ever proposed by a serious secondary source detailing the evidence in primary source texts, then this source must be so antiquated as to be utterly useless. We've gone through a major part of the relevant 20th-century and 21th-century secondary literature, and the most recent source that even alludes to the claim (only to refute it) dates from 1927. I think it's time to finally put it to rest. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 19:09, 8 March 2022 (UTC)
@Apaugasma: Thanks for the interesting sources. I do think that if we want to exclude something so widely stated as fact in academic sources that would ordinarily be deemed reliable, we should go the extra mile. Being new to this, I did not know there were (at least ...) three different texts ascribed to al-Razi titled "Lumen Luminum".   But the description as the "große Licht der Lichter" in Hager now makes sense, as one of the three texts is known as the "Lumen Luminum Magnum" (there is also a Lumen Luminum Minus).
This means we have the primary source you asked for, which led to the widely repeated claim. It's also cited in Hoefer's Histoire de la Chimie (1866), which stated that (quoting an English summary from the 1920s) "in the book LUMEN LUMINUM MAGNUM, Rhases describes a preparation of Sulphuric Acid from Sulphate of Iron, in a way similar to the Nordhausen process" (note this is followed by a comment casting doubt on el-Razi's authorship, quoting Schmieder History of Alchemy p.95) (p. 341 of Hoefer). It is similarly cited in another 19th-century French work. Hoefer identifies the Lumen Luminum Magnum as the 14th-century manuscript 6514 beginning fol. 113r in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, which is different from the Pseudo-Aristotle Lumen Luminum that is mentioned on p. 107 of Moureau and which Huska thought was a much later original text written in Latin. (That text is part of the same BnF MS, but starts a few pages later.)
Now you may say Hoefer is even more ancient than Hager, but this precise page is still being quoted today to say that Geber and el-Razi knew how to produce sulphuric acid in History of Analytical Chemistry, Elsevier, 2016, p. 13, p. 20, note 10. This is a recent work by a major publisher of reference works.
Of course this doesn't prove that Rhazes wrote the passage in question in the 9th or 10th century, and I'm not saying that – it is a 14th-century manuscript after all, according to Hoefer. But maybe we could look a little further into the Lumen Luminum Magnum, and whether there is an Arabic original for it? (Moureau unfortunately doesn't seem to cover it, but it used to be considered authentic.) Can you find out any more about it?
At the very least we might at the end of our research be able to add something about this manuscript and its role in this widespread claim to the article, because that in my view is the best way to forestall future editors coming along adding "And by the way, el-Razi invented sulfuric acid."
It's the absence of any mention of a popular claim (even if it is a partial debunking) that causes drive-by additions, as well as potential accusations of bias.
Speaking of citogenesis, which is how you started this section (and which is something I've always been interested in and have written about on- and off-wiki[7][8]), the phenomenon clearly wasn't invented by Wikipedia. It occurs to me that this might be one of the cases where Wikipedia could actually mitigate citogenesis among conventional sources by providing enough background to dispel widespread but simplistic claims. Regards, Andreas JN466 12:50, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
@Jayen466: it's nothing short of fantastic that you managed to find in works as old as Bobierre 1852 [9] and Hoefer 1866 (also present in the 1st ed. 1842–1843, vol. I, pp. 323–325 according to Ferrario 2009 p. 42 note 22; I checked Ferrario's refs to Kopp 1875 and Thorndike 1923, but these have no bearing upon our subject here) what may indeed be one of the origins of the repeated attributions of sulfuric acid to al-Razi (though the fact that al-Razi is known to have widely experimented with the dry distillation of vitriol may also be an independent driving factor: it's not for nothing that Stapleton & Hidayat Husain 1927 write on p. 393 that he came very close to discovering it, a fact which others may have interpreted more generously). I for my part have also done some additional digging, and came up with the following: the Lumen luminum magnum in which the passage on sulfuric acid occurs is attributed to al-Razi in ms. Paris BnF Lat. 6514 f. 113ra–120va, but the same work (incipit Cum de sublimiori atque precipuo) is attributed to Aristotle in ms. Florence Bibl. Riccardiana L. III. 13. 119 f. 19va–29rb, there carrying the title Liber Aristotilis (see Pattin 1972 pp. 93–94; its incipit and attribution to Aristotle is also noted by Halleux 1996 p. 892). It is in fact the Lumen Luminum discussed by Moureau 2020 p. 114 no. 20 (note the incipit), in some manuscripts anonymous but in other manuscripts attributed to al-Razi, to Aristotle, or (one time) to Avicenna (extracts edited by Ruska 1939, "Pseudepigraphe Rasis-Schriften", pp. 56–65).
As noted both by Pattin 1972 p. 93 and Halleux 1996 p. 892, the work refers multiple times to Jabir ibn Hayyan's Book of Seventy, one of the few Arabic Jabir works translated into Latin (by Gerard of Cremona, as Liber de Septuaginta). In fact, Ruska 1939 p. 58 notes that the author of the Lumen luminum magnum/Cum de sublimiori presents themselves (i.e., al-Razi) as the author of the Liber de Septuaginta, which would be an odd mistake for an Arabic author and quite impossible for al-Razi himself, but nothing out of the ordinary for a Latin author. Ruska 1939 pp. 58-61 further argues at some length that the work must be an original composition in Latin based on various works translated from the Arabic (as is the case for many Latin works of this type). If I may add a note from my own OR expertise, I would add that the authentic works by al-Razi never refer to the otherwise very influential Liber de Septuaginta, which would also speak against the attribution of the Lumen luminum magnum/Cum de sublimiori to al-Razi. As noted both by Halleux 1996 p. 892 and Moureau 2020 p. 114, one manuscript says it was translated by a certain Raymond of Marseilles. It may still be a translation from the Arabic, which Moureau 2020 says needs to be further investigated. Whether it is an authentic work by al-Razi, however, is not really a question: it would be very surprising if it were.
In fact, Moureau 2020 p. 117 states quite clearly that although many alchemical Latin texts are attributed to Rāzı̄, only one is, in the current state of research, known to be a translation of the famous physician and alchemist (i.e., the Liber secretorum Bubacaris, a heavily interpolated paraphrase of al-Razi's Kitāb al-asrār). As I wrote above, this has been the scholarly consensus since the very rigorous work done by Stapleton and Ruska in the 1920s and 1930s. Hoefer 1866 vol. I p. 343 may still have written with regard to the three Latin (pseudo-)Razi writings to which he had access (no Arabic Razi works had yet been edited or studied at the time) that rien n'indique que les trois écrits de Rhasès soient apocryphes. Il n'y a aucune preuve solide à faire valoir contre leur authenticité, but this is simply outdated. Critical comparison with the authentic Arabic material has completely changed the scholarly view, and as Ferrario 2009 pp. 42–43 says with regard to another of the three Latin works known to Hoefer 1866, Ruska's critique of the attribution to al-Razi still needs to be refuted.
You're absolutely right that making sure that an article contains much reliably-sourced information is the best way to protect it from bad drive-by additions. Currently the article in general, and the section on chemistry in particular, is a total mess. I think that ideally, all of the above should be incorporated in a section in the article dealing specifically with the Latin works attributed to al-Razi. We may also mention there that one of these, the Lumen luminum magnum, contains a recipe for sulfuric acid, if we also summarize Ruska 1939's arguments against the authenticity of its attribution to al-Razi, which given their acceptance by Ferrario 2009, Moureau 2020, et al., should be presented as authoritative. The De aluminibus et salibus, another pseudo-Razi work but one of much greater historical importance (see, e.g., Hydrochloric acid#History), should also be covered there. I will not be working on this in the foreseeable future (real-life priorities mean that I won't be editing much), but a lot of the relevant material has already been collected in this thread, so perhaps someone else will take a stab on it. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 00:17, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

RfC: Behind the Voice Actors

Latest comment: 2 years ago17 comments13 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
There is consensus for option 1. Namely, "Generally reliable for the voice or actor of a character/entertainment news". However, it is important to note that due to the statistical nature of the website, there is consensus that coverage in this source does not contribute to significant coverage. A. C. Santacruz ⁂ Please ping me! 16:07, 10 March 2022 (UTC)


What is the reliability of Behind the Voice Actors (BTVA)? They are not user-generated content and they try to distinguish themselves from websites like IMDB and it also looks like they fact-check/verify their information with the primary source with a green tick. Past discussions here look like there is no clear consensus on BTVA. After this RfC, I think we should consider putting it on WP:RSP. Here are the past discussions [1], [2], [3], and [4].

  • Option 1: Generally reliable for the voice or actor of a character/entertainment news
  • Option 2: Unclear or additional considerations apply
  • Option 3: Generally unreliable for factual news
  • Option 4: Publishes false or fabricated information and should be deprecated

― Kaleeb18TalkCaleb 16:17, 4 February 2022 (UTC)

  • I have No opinion on the reliability of the source… but 4 discussions over nine years is hardly perennial. Blueboar (talk) 02:36, 5 February 2022 (UTC)
  • While it’s not as bad as IMDb, I’ve still seen the site be unreliable on a few different occasions, so I personally wouldn’t think it would be a great idea when using it as a reference or a source to back up anything because it isn’t always reputable. Unfortunately because of this, I would have to go with Option 3. SlySabre (talk) 04:59, 5 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Option 3 I scrolled down and read "This is an unofficial site", which is somehow weird. Also too many advertisements and banners and there are no authors, we do not know who says what. I 'd suggest it 's better to avoid. Cinadon36 08:29, 5 February 2022 (UTC)
  • I reject such over generalizations. (invited by the bot) But on average, weaker than a typical RS. So e.g. generally strong enough to retain an uncontested contested fact, not strong enough to retain a contested one. North8000 (talk) 10:49, 5 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Option 3: Immediately visible is a paragraph describing itself as a "community database", which means it likely is not as reliable as a page with a stated author(s) and preferably some kind of editorial team. Also as per Cinadon36, the bottom states that it is an "unofficial website" which is concerning and raises questions over its reliability. Liamyangll (talk to me! | My contribs!) 02:30, 6 February 2022 (UTC) At second glance, it appears my brief, superficial scan of the general website was not accurate. The thorough points specified by Compassionate727 seem to address the points made by Cinadon36 which I originally supported. After doing a little more digging, I'm inclined to lean towards Option 1, but I'm overall still undecided as I don't believe the reliability could span the entire website. I'll replace my past opinion with Option 2. Liamyangll (talk to me! | My contribs!) 12:11, 11 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Option 2 they claim to fact check and there are no examples specified of errors so it could be used for uncontroversial information in my virw, Atlantic306 (talk) 18:50, 6 February 2022 (UTC)
    This is how I also feel about it. ― Kaleeb18TalkCaleb 18:52, 6 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Option 1. As already noted, the website describes itself as "unofficial" in the footer alongside a note about copyrights and trademarks, which I interpret to be their attempt to make some kind of fair use claim. The home page describes it as a "community database"; I believe this means community-maintained, because when I navigate to the content guidelines, there is a note that: The BTVA site is run by a handful of volunteers who contribute content in their spare time as a hobby; the FAQ notes that: all the site staff either have jobs or are still in school. It is clear that not everyone can be a volunteer, because site visitors are instructed to request additions or changes to content via forum post, unless they are a voice actor making requests concerning their own content, in which case they are instructed to contact the site admin directly. There is a note in the FAQ that: If you prove yourself a reliable and trustworthy contributor who works well with others, then you may be invited to become a team member. Currently there are only 13 such individuals.[10]
Their FAQ suggests an extensive fact-checking process, and they claim: Our site is not perfect and we do make some mistakes, but unlike user submitted sites like imdb and wikipedia our sources come from official voice actor websites, voice actor resumes, DVD/Blu-ray ending credits and from conversations with the voice actors & voice directors who actually worked on the titles. If you notice any green checkmarks those are confirmed credits. Click the greencheck mark to see the source. Our goal is to have a green checkmark for every single role on the site so fans will know these credits are confirmed. Then you won't have to rely on other sites that don't list any sources at all. I found some pages that have these green checkmarks and clicked on them, which brought up screenshots of the show's credits, either taken directly from the animation or on the websites of distributors like Funimation. The FAQ notes, in the context of someone claiming that their credits lists for particular actors may be incomplete, that: Other sites might claim to be up-to-date but anybody can write words; gathering pictures and verifying credits takes a lot of time and effort. Listing another site isn't as helpful as you think it is. It's not going to make the work go any faster and chances are the site staff already know what hasn't been added yet. They note elsewhere that they sometimes receive conflicting information and conduct some kind of investigation when that happens.
My overall assessment is that for a website run by a dozen volunteers, they seem shockingly professional. I would say that any credits with a green checkmark are clearly reliable. Content without a checkmark should be treated with a little more skepticism, but even then I would say it is probably generally reliable unless we have specific reason to doubt its accuracy in a particular situation. Despite their unpolished presentation, they seem generally high-quality, certainly better than somewhere like IMDb or Wikipedia. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 20:48, 6 February 2022 (UTC)
Wow thanks for the detailed review! ― Kaleeb18TalkCaleb 20:53, 6 February 2022 (UTC)
Agreed, coverage on this website is inherently statistical/routine and does not constitute significant coverage. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 15:33, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
I would also agree. Iamreallygoodatcheckers (talk) 03:34, 8 March 2022 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Ruptly, subsidiary of RT (Russia Today)

Latest comment: 2 years ago37 comments20 people in discussion

Should Ruptly, a state-owned subsidiary of   RT (Russia Today) (RSP entry), be treated as part of RT and be considered to inherit the reliability status of RT? There are approximately 41 citations of ruptly.tv     across Wikipedia article space at the moment.

As concluded in the 2020 RfC and affirmed by academic consensus, RT is a propaganda outlet (sources) with a reputation for publishing disinformation (sources) and conspiracy theories (sources), especially about geopolitical matters. Many of the 41 citations of Ruptly are for geopolitical or military claims (e.g. in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership article), and should be reviewed. — Newslinger talk 11:15, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Yes.Slatersteven (talk) 11:47, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. Renat 12:33, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. It's a bad source for a few reasons. The fact it is a Russian propaganda outlet which publishes fake news is clear in our article. But also its footage is mostly essentially user-generated content that it uploads without any real checks, so is almost a SPS platform like YouTube (example here) so not the sort of source we should use even if it weren't biased. At best, we should handle it as we do primary sources like YouTube videos. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:37, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. Iskandar323 (talk) 12:53, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. I would say that it's even less reliable than RT because of the reasons Bobfrombrockley outlines. —AFreshStart (talk) 13:07, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. Pretty straightforward conclusion. oknazevad (talk) 13:22, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Note Added Ruptly and Redfish to WP:UPSD as deprecated, same as RT. Will change the classification if this discussion closes differently. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:32, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes, even without the RT ownership it still wouldn't be a reliable source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:27, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Comment. What untruths are being aired? Only what Reuters says? Seems like a rush to Russian Xenophobia over what a small section of government did. Welcome to the revived Cold War. When I look at the 41 citations they're things like "A protest against COVID happened in Russia. Or Russian troops were involved in a Syria war. Is that untrue? CaribDigita (talk) 17:32, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
It is not "Xenophobia" to recognize that the subsidiary of a disinformation outfit is unreliable; as you can see on the perennial sources list, questionable sources based in many other countries have also been designated as unreliable. I can't find any evidence that Ruptly is somehow more reliable than its parent organization, RT. Also, see this excerpt from the peer-reviewed Politology journal that explains how RT, Sputnik (RSP entry), and Ruptly share the same objective of disinformation:

Today, disinformation and propaganda are a component of Russia’s “soft power” and a part of its security policy, including hybrid warfare. In 2012–2013, after being elected for his third term, Putin began using cyberattacks and disinformation to counter the “soft power” of the West and to compensate for the weakness of Russia’s own conventional strategy. Russia’s disinformation and propaganda strategy works on a trial-and-error basis and is clearly developed separately for each country or group, focusing on those narratives and unfortunate news that work best in a particular environment. The main goal is to discredit politicians, experts, institutions, and media of the target countries and to create a one-sided pro-Russian reality. Tools of such influence involve the media outlets RT, Sputnik, Ruptly, TASS.

Karpchuk, Nataliia; Yuskiv, Bohdan (February 2021). "Dominating Concepts of Russian Federation Propaganda Against Ukraine (Content and Collocation Analyses of Russia Today)". Politology. 102 (2). Vilnius University Press: 116–152. ISSN 1392-1681 – via CEEOL.

— Newslinger talk 18:19, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Comment:I hear you what's an example that source gives? I always hear the accusation but never see anything ever quoted as a clear-cut example of the "propaganda". Like with CGTN from China, they give as an example the forced confession. CaribDigita (talk) 22:20, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Here's an example. Since Ruptly is a service offered by RT, a source that the community has already determined to be unreliable in almost all cases, the burden of proof is really on those who want to use Ruptly to show that it is reliable despite the limitations of its parent company. — Newslinger talk 23:09, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Comment: So that New York Times said the "Bible burning" occurred at the protest and says CBS showed it too but their problem was Ruptly didn't show that someone came thereafter to put the Bible out? And that's their claim of misinformation. CaribDigita (talk) 06:37, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Deceptively editing a video to manufacture a scandal, as Ruptly did in this example, is a negative indicator of reliability. The US-based disinformation operation Project Veritas (RSP entry) uses a similar strategy, and is also considered unreliable for this reason.
Responding to your comment about CBS, the article states that the local CBS affiliate (unlike Ruptly) presented the information in a non-deceptive way: "Apart from the Ruptly videographer, only one other journalist — a local television reporter — heard about the Bible burning, and noted it with a single sentence in a lengthy report on that night’s protests. The story, by KOIN, the local CBS News affiliate, also reported that a group of women calling themselves Moms United for Black Lives Matter attempted to put out the fire — a detail not included in the Ruptly video, which was edited to string together a number of clips from the night." — Newslinger talk 10:52, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. I don’t know that there is evidence to suggest editorial independence from RT. For completeness sake, I would also support deprecating Redfish <redfish.media>, which is owned by Russia as a subsidiary of RT. — Mhawk10 (talk) 16:40, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
I also support assigning Redfish the same classification as RT and Ruptly. Georgetown University's Gnovis Journal published an article confirming that many Redfish staff members migrated from RT, Ruptly, and other Russian state media outlets. Combined with the fact that Ruptly owns Redfish, it is undeniable that Redfish is repackaging the same questionable propaganda of RT/Ruptly in a different format under a different brand. — Newslinger talk 17:12, 2 March 2022 (UTC) Edited 17:28, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Also, I want to note that ANO TV-Novosti is a shell organization founded by the Russian state-owned RIA Novosti (RSP entry) that holds the assets of RT, RT's subsidiaries, and other organizations that are closely associated with RT. Organizations that operate under ANO TV-Novosti have shared resources (including employees and office space) and objectives, and should be treated similarly since the dividing lines between these organizations are minimal. ANO TV-Novosti organizations include RT, Ruptly, Redfish, Maffick, and any other brands that are launched in association with ANO TV-Novosti. — Newslinger talk 10:13, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
Agree. Slatersteven (talk) 17:16, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Surely there's no need for a separate depreciation discussion given that these are literal subsidiaries? Just need to be added to the RT rsp entry and added to the edit filter. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:05, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Since these sources are politically sensitive, and because these sources have previously claimed to be editorially independent of each other (a dubious claim), I thought it would be better to err on the side of caution and get community consensus first. — Newslinger talk 18:26, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Ruptly denies that their organization is a subsididary of RT. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 19:07, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
RT, Ruptly, et. al. sometimes deny connections to each other, but both primary sources and reliable secondary sources contradict Ruptly's denial. Please see Talk:RT (TV network)/Archive 11 § Ruptly and, in particular:
— Newslinger talk 19:36, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
RT including Ruptly in their network broadcasting would be consistent with Ruptly being a sister company as they claim. The US government puts it thus: "RT was established by TV-Novosti, which was founded by RIA Novosti. RT’s network also includes a sister news agency Ruptly ..." So the title of this thread, which presents "subsidiary" as if it's an undisputed fact, doesn't appear to be consistent with WP:TALKHEADPOV. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:02, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
The heading is consistent with the content in the RT (TV network) and Ruptly articles, consistent with the consensus that determined that content in those articles, and consistent with the reliable sources that the consensus is based on. Therefore, the heading of this discussion is consistent with WP:TALKHEADPOV; feel free to obtain consensus for your view on the respective article talk pages if you disagree.
Additionally, the United States Department of State report linked in your comment explains that the ownership claims made by RT, Ruptly, Redfish, and Maffick are logically inconsistent:

Redfish claims Ruptly is its parent company and officially it is registered as belonging to Ruptly, however RT has also called Redfish an RT “digital content project.” Both Ruptly and Redfish are located in Berlin, and until 2021 when Maffick closed its Berlin office, Ruptly, Redfish, and Maffick shared the same address. Ruptly’s website states it was founded “to act as an independent commercially funded organization and sister agency to RT,” while Redfish’s website states that Ruptly is “a news agency owned by RT.” On RT’s website, Ruptly is described as “RT’s video agency.” This discrepancy could be an indicator of a lack of organizational independence.

"RT and Sputnik's Role in Russia's Disinformation and Propaganda Ecosystem" (PDF). United States Department of State. 20 January 2022. p. 22.

Thank you for sharing this report, which shows the lack of transparency among these media outlets and supports the understanding that Ruptly, Redfish, and Maffick inherit the unreliability of RT. — Newslinger talk 16:32, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
If Wikipedia were a reliable source then its statement that "ANO TV Novosti ... is the principal shareholder in both Ruptly and RT" would further reinforce the idea that Ruptly is a sister company, and of course your further quote of the US government doesn't say otherwise, it says sister. My !vote is that the question is bad. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 17:06, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
The source that was cited for the statement doesn't mention Ruptly at all, so I've amended the Ruptly article to remove the unverifiable content in Special:Diff/1075062354. Please see the citations at Ruptly#cite_note-subsidiary-1 that establish that Ruptly is a subsidiary of RT. And finally, RT (the company) marketing Ruptly (the channel) as a sister channel to RT (the channel) does not preclude Ruptly (the company) from being a subsidiary of RT (the company). — Newslinger talk 18:11, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

What about TASS? Is that one better, or still hot garbage? It has a much longer history. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:06, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

There was consensus to designate TASS (RSP entry) as a situational source because it is the flagship news agency of the Russian government, and it is considered usable for the government view when appropriate and accompanied with in-text attribution. Because it is a major news agency, content from TASS is heavily reused by other domestic publications.
This is different from RT, which is a TV network that primarily targets non-domestic audiences and has a reputation for propagating disinformation. RT adapts its message for each market it operates in to most effectively "encourage conspiracy theories about media institutions in the West in order to discredit and delegitimize them". RT, Ruptly, and Redfish also have a pattern of misleadingly portraying themselves as "independent" of each other and of the Russian government, when reliable sources confirm otherwise.
As an analogy, TASS is like Xinhua News Agency (RSP entry), while RT is like China Global Television Network (RSP entry). (In fact, CGTN was modeled after RT.) — Newslinger talk 22:47, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
Missed the TASS entry in the list, thanks. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:57, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
That is apparently its WP:RSP entry. My personal opinion is that all sources owned by or otherwise under the effective control of the Russian Government should be treated together. Therefore, since RT is deprecated, TASS should be too. But that's just my opinion. Adoring nanny (talk) 23:51, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
The difference is that TASS is a reliable source for the position of the Russian government (i.e. if TASS says the Russian government believes "X", we can be sure that the Russian government does indeed believe X) which is due in some situations (e.g. in disputes to which Russia is a party). It might also be reliable for facts relating to situations the Russian government has no political position regarding (this is true of at least some state-owned media, I've not looked to see if applies to TASS). RT is not reliable even for those limited uses. Thryduulf (talk) 21:02, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Yes to considering both Ruptly and Redfish as equivalent to RT in terms of reliability. Not to mention, its UGC aspect makes it unusable even if one disregards the Russian disinformation operation. Tayi Arajakate Talk 10:37, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. The source contains nothing but Russia propoganda and misinformation. It should not be trusted at all, especially with the situation with Ukraine, a lot of misinformation and fake news is going around. ArsenalGhanaPartey (talk) 19:05, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes. Elinruby (talk) 09:01, 6 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes to deprecating both Ruptly and Redfish, as subsidiaries of RT. Ruptly acts as the video arm of RT, and Redfish as the left-wing "outlet" of RT. All are known for peddling debunked conspiracy theories and for their unequivocal parroting of official Russian governmental positions. Pilaz (talk) 01:18, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
Yes, and every other subsidiary, due to lack of independence. BilledMammal (talk) 03:04, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

Use of TASS for Ukranian refugee figures

Latest comment: 2 years ago7 comments5 people in discussion

Article:Ukrainian refugee crisis Text and source: Before the invasion, the war in the Donbas (2014-present) had already resulted in a large number of refugees and internally displaced persons, including 1.5 million refugees from the region moving east to Russia.[1]

References

  1. ^ TASS (2016-05-16). "Russia, Belarus undertake exhaustive measures to host Ukrainian refugees — CSTO official". TASS. Retrieved 2022-03-09.

The source for the bold part of the above claim in the lead of the 2022 Ukraine refugee crisis is TASS quoting a Russian official body. It is highly questionable whether the claim (which predates the 2022 crisis by 6 years) is either relevant, presents a neutral picture or is reliably sourced. The Ukrainians in Russia gives a much more nuanced picture and much lowere estimates, although it remains questionable whether numbers fleeing in any direction in 2014-16, and for any reason, is sufficiently relevant to the 2022 crisis to be included in the lead. Confirmation of my doubts and/or any help editing would be appreciated since the topic is very contentious at present. Pincrete (talk) 14:57, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

Discussion here
See the RSP entry: Editors consider TASS fairly reliable for statements of fact as stated by the Russian government, but also agree that there are deficiencies in the reliability of TASS's reporting on other issues. We should not use this source to assert that claim in Wikipedia's voice, but is perfectly acceptable for us to use it to say that Russia claims that 1.5 million refugees have moved into Russia. Whether this statement constitutes due weight in the lead is a discussion for the article talk page. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 15:15, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
No they can not be, we have WP:RS which say that TASS has pushed conflict related disinformation [11]. TBH we probably need to consider formal deprecation procedures, goddamn shame but we can't force a source to be reliable. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:32, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
  • We don't need TASS for this. As of September 2014, the UN reported that 814,000 people had fled from Donbas to Russia. In a 2016 report, the UN OHCHR said that 'over 1 million Ukrainians are seeking asylum or protection abroad, with the majority going to the Russian Federation and Belarus'. I have this report on hand because I used it in our articles back in 2016. I'm sure there are more recent reports that can provide an updated number. As for whether these numbers are necessary in an article about the current invasion, I don't know. However, it is definitely true that at least a million Ukrainians fled to Russia during the Donbas war. RGloucester — ☎ 15:50, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
Please additionally note that at least some of these people likely returned to Donbas in the intervening years: see this report by Deutsche Welle. It has also been noted that, despite the large number of people that fled to Russia, very few were actually granted 'refugee' status. RGloucester — ☎ 15:56, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
Agree, I came across another TASS source that claimed that the numbers were in the low thousands, most having voluntarily returned. The questions of how many, why and where people left to in previous years are complex and not an easy fit into the article about the current crisis IMO. Pincrete (talk) 17:16, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
I agree with RGloucester that we don't need TASS here. I've replaced it by the OHCHR report you referenced earlier. Alaexis¿question? 10:18, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Shia or Wiki Fiqh

Latest comment: 2 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Hello, are the sites of Wiki Shia or Wiki Fiqh valid and can they be used in matters related to Shia?اوهریش (talk) 09:33, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

@اوهریش, wikis in general fall under WP:USERG, and I see nothing at the site that hints it should be an exception. But perhaps they use WP:RS as references, if so you can use those. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:05, 11 March 2022 (UTC)
Thanks اوهریش (talk) 11:28, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

Museum's online website

Latest comment: 2 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

Keeping in mind the rarity of early 19th century sources about bona fide dog breeds in general, much less their ancestry (there were no breed registries or verifiable pedigrees back then), would this museum's website be an acceptable source to cite as an historic reference for the Staffordshire Bull Terrier and other purebreds that share the same ancestry? The museum has historic documentation and images that have also been used in various books & magazines. Atsme 💬 📧 13:46, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

It's a very small one room museum, looks like very minimal staff. It is effectively someone's personal website. I would say not reliable. - MrOllie (talk) 14:13, 12 March 2022 (UTC)
  • At a glance I'd say definitely not - it looks to me like a personal website with no reputation, and the geocities-level design certainly does not inspire confidence that they are fastidious about fact-checking and accuracy. If they have historic documentation and images that have been used in various books and magazines, it might be better just to cite those sources instead. --Aquillion (talk) 17:51, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

Fox News

Latest comment: 2 years ago191 comments58 people in discussion
Failed attempt at turning this into an RfC. Firefangledfeathers (talk
contribs) 20:26, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
Should Fox News' reliability level—for politics, specifically—be changed at WP:RSP?
  • Generally reliable
  • No consensus, unclear, or additional considerations apply
  • Generally unreliable
  • Deprecated
Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 21:05, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • This discussion has been active since soibangla's 18 February opener, just below. I am just adding an RfC tag and a neutral statement because (a) this discussion could use community-wide input and (b) there are good reasons to doubt that the RSP listing could be changed without an RfC. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 21:05, 23 February 2022 (UTC) inserting anchor link to original opener 21:21, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
Because dozens of editors have already responded to the non-neutral statement I believe a new discussion should be opened, as adding a neutral statement now doesn't address that issue. BilledMammal (talk) 21:12, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I can't agree. Neutral statement's are not a requirement for regular noticeboard discussion, just RfCs. A brand new discussion would be excessive bureaucracy, involving us pinging all prior participants to re-comment, all of whom have seen the non-neutral statement anyway. I am certain that most won't change their minds, and if a few do, they're welcome to strike and re-!vote here anyway. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 21:21, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I've removed the RfC tag. If we are going to do a RfC is should be done correctly and with a neutrally phrased question. It should not take this mess and try to turn it, retroactively, into a RfC. Springee (talk) 21:30, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I've re-added it. Messiness is a problem, but wasting the community's time on pointless bureaucracy is a bigger problem. RfCs can end in very specific ways, and removing someone else's rfc tag is not one of them. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 21:36, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I've removed it again. Please create a new, neutrally worded RfC. Springee (talk) 22:28, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
soibangla restored the tag. I don't intent to add it again over these objections, but I maintain that re-running the discussion is a waste of community time. soibangla, if consensus develops that a new RfC is needed, I have a list of editors to ping ready to go, so they can (in all likelihood) copy and paste their comments into the new section. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 22:51, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I'm going to link a diff, so much shorter, way of the future. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:52, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
I find myself agreeing with Springee here for the reasons they've given, despite disagreeing with them on the matter up for discussion. I will be objecting to any attempt to turn this discussion into an RfC, and I've said as much below; you clearly didn't have consensus for this change, Firefangledfeathers. Note that I would not object to starting a proper RfC later, however, I think it would be premature to start one while this discussion is still in progress. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 22:32, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
We require neutral statements to avoid predisposing the reader towards a particular conclusion; if substantial discussion occurs while the statement is non-neutral, then this requirement has not been met and the normal consensus decision-making process has been compromised - ensuring that it is uncompromised is essential, not excessive bureaucracy. Further, whether !voting started while the discussion was a regular noticeboard discussion or an RFC is not relevant, as the impact on the process is the same. BilledMammal (talk) 21:43, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
@Firefangledfeathers: We can't just slap an RfC tag on top of a discussion after multiple editors below objected to the noticeboard discussion not being an RfC and call it a day, particularly when the discussion is so far along. Both on ordinary talk pages and on RSN, typically an RfC gets its own brand new section (or subsection) so that the discussion that led to the RfC and the RfC itself can be identified separately. There's also at least one editor below who is arguing that Fox News is WP:GREL, so the options atop the RfC aren't entirely an accurate summary of the discussion below. I would kindly ask that you please remove the several days retroactively applied RfC tag from this discussion, since the insertion of the tag itself creates procedural issues. — Mhawk10 (talk) 22:59, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
Mhawk10, I disagree, but I won't stand in the way of removing the tag, as noted above. It's now not my tag to remove. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 23:02, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
If the RFC tag is to remain - though my objections remain - then based on Mhawk10's comment I believe it needs to be switched to the standard format, both for clarity and to avoid predisposing the reader towards (or away from) a particular conclusion. BilledMammal (talk) 23:14, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
Standard options instated. InedibleHulk, sorry I missed your option. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 23:36, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
@BilledMammal: wouldn't that just result in all of the bolded "support" or "oppose" !votes being made a little less clear? People were responding in a support/oppose manner on whether or not to downgrade Fox News's political coverage from WP:MREL to WP:GUNREL. — Mhawk10 (talk) 23:48, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

  • I propose that Fox News be deprecated as an unreliable source for political topics on WP:RSP. I will present evidence here that "the news side" of Fox News fabricated a major outright lie, which continues to advance despite significant blowback from reliable sources, to create a false narrative of "Hillary Clinton spied on Trump" that has spread like wildfire as truth across right-wing media. This can get a bit complicated, so if anyone asks for a source to substantiate anything I say, I'm happy to provide it, though the wikilinked articles should be adequate.
Background: John Durham indicted former Perkins Coie attorney Michael Sussmann for allegedly lying to an FBI official by saying during a 2016 meeting between them that he was not representing a client for the purposes of their meeting. Durham alleges that Sussmann was actually representing the Clinton presidential campaign. Sussman, a cybersecurity law expert, represented the Democratic National Committee when they were hacked in 2016, and his former Perkins Coie colleague Marc Elias represented the Clinton campaign. Parenthetically, Elias almost single-handedly shut down Trump's 60+ legal attempts to overturn the 2020 election results, so it goes without saying some might be kinda upset with him, perhaps to the point of seeking payback.[12] But I digress...
Sussmann worked with internet analyst Rodney Joffe, who analyzed DNS traffic (not communications content) during 2015 and 2016, both at the White House and Trump properties, which his spokesman has said was based on concerns of Russian infiltration to disrupt the election (Russians hacked the Executive Office of the President in 2015 and the DNC in 2016). Joffe's company, Neustar, had a government contract for this work to identify security threats. In February 2017, Sussmann took to the CIA Joffe's findings that a Russian phone was querying the White House and Trump properties networks. Durham asserts Sussmann did this to gin-up intelligence community suspicions about Trump and Russia, on behalf of the Clinton campaign. Sussmann denies this. Again, he went to the CIA after Trump was already president.
On February 11, Durham filed a court motion that included a description of Joffe's alleged activities. This is where Fox News comes in. The next day, the Fox News news side ran a story entitled:

Clinton campaign paid to 'infiltrate' Trump Tower, White House servers to link Trump to Russia: Durham[13]

and the lede continued...

Lawyers for the Clinton campaign paid a technology company to "infiltrate" servers belonging to Trump Tower, and later the White House...

Here's the problem: Durham did not say the words "paid" or "infiltrate" in his motion.[14] Instead, Fox News reveals in the 21st paragraph of the story that those words actually came from former Devin Nunes and Trump employee Kash Patel, who is characterized as a Trump loyalist. But not surprisingly, and likely/certainly by design, the Fox News headline and lede were sufficient to detonate an explosion in conservative media: "Clinton spied on Trump! He was right all along!" It's no accident they used Patel's word "infiltrate," they know their audience will interpret that to mean "hacking." There is no evidence of hacking.
Durham's motion said none of these things:[15][16]
  • Clinton campaign was involved
  • Payments were made
  • Joffe's alleged activity was unlawful
  • "Infiltrate" or "paid"
Today, the same Fox News journalist ran:

Clinton campaign lawyer Sussmann files motion to dismiss Durham prosecution[17]

Again, Durham has alleged Sussmann was a Clinton campaign lawyer, which has not been established as fact, and which Sussmann has denied. The reason the "news side" of Fox News has done this is transparently obvious, to misleadingly connect dots to fabricate a false narrative:
"Joffe monitored Trump's internet traffic, Sussmann took that to the CIA, Sussmann worked for Clinton, therefore Hillary was the mastermind behind a scheme to spy on Trump."[18][19]
And of course, the primetime opinion side of Fox News amplifies and blasts that false narrative out to millions, who will accept it as proved because, you know...Durham said so. Except he didn't, not yet anyway. Since Fox News first published this false story days ago and it was ripped apart by reliable sources, they have made no effort to correct it, let alone retract it.[20]
This is egregiously unethical conduct. It clearly demonstrates that the opinion side of Fox News now fully controls the enterprise, and it should be deprecated as an unreliable source for politics. soibangla (talk) 00:32, 18 February 2022 (UTC)

As a follow-up, yesterday the presiding judge in Sussmann's case held a hearing which was characterized as:

But the same Fox News reporter who wrote the previously-discussed story once again deeply buried the lede, focusing instead on a peripheral matter:

"Durham probe: Judge rejects Sussmann request to 'strike' special counsel's 'factual background'". Fox News. March 10, 2022.

soibangla (talk) 18:49, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

There's a difference between "generally unreliable" and "deprecated". But WP:DEPREC says it requires an RfC. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:42, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
Fox News (politics and science) (RSP entry) has been designated as "no consensus" since the 2020 RfC. Only the talk shows (RSP entry) have been designated as "generally unreliable". The closure and subsequent indexing of that RfC were accurate reflections of community consensus at that time. I don't think a new RfC would be helpful right now, since political content on Fox News that is determined to be unreliable can still be excluded from Wikipedia articles on a case-by-case basis. — Newslinger talk 03:13, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
Also, in this specific case, its clear that we can document how Fox is approaching the story from far more reliable sources to flag any attempt to use Fox as a "factual" source here as completely inappropriate. --Masem (t) 03:47, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
But is Fox News reporting anything substantially different than the Wall Street Journal or NBC, on this story? It's reasonable to assume that investigative journalists are able to uncover facts that go beyond what a prosecutor is yet willing to divulge their strategy on. So the indictments shouldn't be held as a ground truth to which Fox News should be compared. I don't watch Fox News, and generally only hear bad things about Fox News, but it's not like there's some "fair and balanced" counternarrative among journaists, that paints Joffe as innocent. People who've actually looked into it seem to be reasonably in consensus:
And, if you feel like going a little further in depth:
So, sympathetic as I'd be with the notion of deprecating Fox News as a source, this seems a very weak basis on which to do so, since it would equally hold against NBC and the Wall Street Journal. BurritoTunnelMaintenance (talk) 07:46, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
The WSJ articles are clearly marked as opinion pieces, and RealClearPolitics articles are usually op-eds, so those links don't have the same issue as there is with Fox News calling these stories "news." The NBC article might be in the "Hillary Clinton" category (I say "might be", because it just links back to the one article), but they're not running a sensationalist headline, and they bury any connection to Clinton deep in the article, where it's only present in quotes or carefully qualified as an unproven accusations. Even if the NBC article was essentially identical to what Fox is running (it's not), NBC still doesn't have Fox's long, sordid history with this sort of thing. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 11:48, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
We need to be careful that the "anti-Fox" stories are talking about normal Fox News reports vs commentary from people like Tucker Carlson etc. The opinions/analysis expressed by the commentators are already marked as unreliable and are separate from the normal news reporting. Also, I think some of the "nothing to see here" sources are basically taking the limited claims of the Durham report and saying they don't prove larger claims. For instance, lets accept as true that a lawyer who does work for the Clinton campaign contacted Joffe to get meta data from Trump computers. That does not mean the lawyer did any of that at the request of the Clinton campaign nor that Clinton herself had any knowledge. This is a simple logical statement that association doesn't equal causation. If CNN runs a story saying as much and saying that this isn't proof even though a Fox commentator is saying as much, well that is correct. However, it doesn't mean a commentator is wrong to say, "this looks like" or "this may mean". This is also problematic because we had many sources who took evidence that was just as limited as this and used it to accuse Trump of Russian associations (a claim that hasn't been conclusively proven one way or the other). Now, let's assume that in a few months more conclusive evidence comes out and it turns out the Fox talking heads are right. Would we then say this is proof that the NYT etc should be considered questionable at least for political analysis? This is really a new source Rorschach Test. We have something that currently isn't conclusively anything. It could be A, it could be B or even something different than A or B. What we probably should report is what the sides claim. We shouldn't assume one side is right or wrong unless they make a claim that isn't supported by the very limited evidence to date. It may not be a bad idea to take a wait and see approach. Sadly it may be many years before the news sources on either side can give an impartial review of this huge mess. Springee (talk) 14:35, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
The Fox News article is presented by them as "normal Fox News reporting" and not "commentary", it's not categorized by them as an opinion piece, and the case being made here is that there is no longer any meaningful distinction between the two at Fox News. Also, in this case, your suggestion would almost certainly run afoul of WP:FALSEBALANCE. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 14:56, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
I think you would need to show which article they are they refer to. I know in a related discussion I followed a link and saw references to Fox commentators. We should be careful about what is actually claimed vs what other sources claim is claimed. Saying what various sources report is false balance if we have only a few sources on one side vs the other. However, we actually have quite a few sources that are saying things similar to Fox, that this does at least appear to support a claim that the Clinton campaign was attempting something. Yes, a number of those sources are no-consensus on political topics but when so many say the same thing (and The Hill and WSJ are green) we shouldn't just act like there is nothing to see here. Springee (talk) 15:22, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
Again, the Wall Street Journal articles ([21], [22]) are clearly marked as opinion pieces, the Fox News article ([23]) is not. The rest of your comment is tangential. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 15:27, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
I'm sure this is not the sum of all articles on the subject. Also, OpEd restrictions dictate how we should use these sources in articles. It doesn't mean we can't point at the arguments made in those sources to say they tend to counterbalance the analysis made by the NYT et al outside of their OpEd pages. Springee (talk) 15:50, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
The subject of this discussion is Fox News, or more specifically, the article I linked that was also linked above. This is not a general discussion of the topic of that article, we are discussing the article itself. The WSJ articles were presented by BurritoTunnelMaintenance to show that other news outlets were publishing similar reports, but the difference is that the WSJ articles are presented by them as opinion pieces, while the Fox News article appears to be an opinion piece masquerading as news reporting. Do you disagree, and if so, on what grounds? Mysterious Whisper (talk) 16:00, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
Yes, but if the justification for this subject is Fox News is making false claims based on the claims of a few other sources then we need to show that what Fox is claiming is outside of reasonable. So far you and Soibangla haven't met that standard. As for the OpEd "masquerading as news reporting" part, well that is a big problem with many sources. Many sources that claim to just be reporting include some level of analysis even in stories not marked as OpEds. However, if that is the issue we should zoom out and discuss this as a general topic, not something restricted to Fox News. Springee (talk) 16:18, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
I, for one, will discuss Fox News in the Fox News section, and other topics in their own sections, because I view the alternative as being disruptive. I think Soibangla has done much more to support their opinion here than anyone else has, and they've provided enough verifiable evidence to convince me, but you're free to disagree. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 16:25, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Paraphrasing Durham from last night: "It's not my fault some are lying about what I said."

If third parties or members of the media have overstated, understated, or otherwise misinterpreted facts contained in the Government’s Motion, that does not in any way undermine the valid reasons for the Government’s inclusion of this information.:[24]

soibangla (talk) 17:05, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
To be precise, it is listed as no consensus on the reliability. It isn't listed as unreliable. The commentary shows are listed as unreliable. Springee (talk) 16:52, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose deprecation noting that even after setting the various problems with deprecation as a process aside, it is from a technical perspective not possible to enforce deprecation for a specific set of topics, as the edit filter cannot tell what the subject of an edit is. No opinion at this time on otherwise adjusting the reliability. signed, Rosguill talk 16:28, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support unreliability, oppose deprecation - I agree that Fox News is unreliable for political and science news, and RSP should be changed to clearly say that. But I don’t think it is practical to deprecate for just some topics. John M Baker (talk) 17:07, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Comment, we can't deprecate a source for just some topics. That being said there is an extremely strong argument for deprecating Fox but that will have to be a holistic argument/discussion because we would be deprecating the whole enchilada not continuing the split opinion.Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:17, 18 February 2022 (UTC) Update: now that its an RfC with a formal question I would support downgrading to generally unreliable. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:44, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Downgrade to "generally unreliable" We should have a consensus that the "news" division of Fox News exists to prop up the U.S. Republican Party and related causes. They have been overhyping the Canadian trucker convoy.[25][26] Fox News isn't news, it's propaganda. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:49, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Neither of those sources criticize Fox’s news coverage for being factually wrong–they just don’t like that Fox is providing positive coverage regarding the protestor’s goals. But that is evidence that Fox News has a conservative (or I guess in a really narrow sense for those two articles a “pro-protester”) bias, not that it is unreliable. The Hannity and Tucker stuff is already considered GUNREL, since the talk shows are largely commentary, opinion, and entertainment. And Media Matters for America isn’t exactly a WP:GREL source either, per WP:RSP, so it really should not be the basis of downgrading Fox. Fox News, used in a manner that doesn’t put it in Wikivoice for exceptional claims, is generally fine and can provide useful information on politics-related topics when people keep in mind that additional considerations apply. — Mhawk10 (talk) 20:04, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
This is all just the tip of the misinformation iceberg. So many times Fox News pushes misinformation and disinformation. It's real bad. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:23, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
In order, your sources are an WP:MREL source that is actually criticizing the fact-checking on Fox’s opinion-based talk shows or an article that Fox corrected (which is actually a sign of a good editorial practice), an opinion piece ([https://www.washingtonpost.com/policies-and-standards/ analysis pieces at WaPo are interpretive and for anticipating how events might unfold), a discussion of Fox News’s talk show hosts (who are WP:GUNREL), and excerpt from Brian Shelter’s book that basically criticizes Fox News for airing too many opinion-based talk shows and the effects that the opinion shows are having. I am not arguing that the network in its entirety is generally reliable in the field of politics—what I am arguing is that its straight news reporting is fine to use in the field of politics provided that it isn’t given undue weight or used alone to substantiate extraordinary claims. The name of Thomas Binger’s wife and the number of kids they have is something perfectly fine to cite Fox for, as are his previous roles and the fact that he ran a campaign for DA. To mark Fox News off as something less reliable than the blogs hosted on The Guardian for purposes of politics seems ill-advised. — Mhawk10 (talk) 23:42, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Short of deprecation, at minimum the Fox News RSP entry should be amended to explicitly mandate that any Fox News reference in politics/science must be accompanied by at least one fully corroborating green source. soibangla (talk) 20:50, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
We should change the results of a RfC that had over 100 participants and a panel closing because you don't like how they covered a recent story? OK. Springee (talk) 21:30, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
There were no "results" in the last RfC, it was closed as "no consensus". And it was from July 2020, which was almost an entire pandemic ago. – Muboshgu (talk) 22:03, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
Yes, after over 100 editors weighed in there was no consensus. Where is the evidence that things have changed? Springee (talk) 22:23, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
I believe that the evidence they are referring to is currently being discussed here and now. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems as though this argument is akin to Circular reasoning ie "How can there be a new consensus if there was no previous consensus, and if there was no previous consensus, how can there be a new/different consensus?" I'm not trying to straw man, just asking for clarification. DN (talk) 01:04, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
Fox overhyping Canadian truck convoy is not a valid reason to downgrade them. Fox covering more about news that are more favorable to the conservatism or Republican Party is not also a cause for downgrading. SunDawntalk 04:59, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Leave as is: The evidence presented here is not sufficient to show Fox News should be downgraded. Yes, we should always be careful when commentary gets into factual reporting but this is hardly unique to Fox. Springee (talk) 20:10, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable", without prejudice towards deprecation (via RfC) should the trend continue. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 21:05, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable" "generally unreliable for politics" per Soibangla's and Mysterious Whisper's arguments. DN (talk) 21:39, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to generally unreliable for politics, or full depreciation if a consensus exists for it, though not solely because of this one incident. High-quality sources bluntly describe Fox News as distributing misinformation.[1] Sources specifically note that both the news and opinion portions of the network have worked to intentionally spread disinformation[2] and that almost nothing that Fox News airs meets traditional journalistic standards.[3] In the previous RFC some of its defenders speculated that while Fox's talk sections and opinion pieces are obviously unreliable, it could be possible that the other parts are reliable; however, no evidence has been presented that its news sections actually have a higher reputation or that the problem is confined to opinion, while there is plenty of evidence at this point unambiguously indicating that no such division exists. This is just the latest example; but sources are extremely clear that Fox's news section systematically and intentionally spreads misinformation when doing so serves the network's political processes. Obviously Fox is a WP:BIASED source when it comes to American politics and could never be cited without attribution anyway (many of the sources above use it as their specific example of "partisan media"; many others specifically note that it was created with the intent of being stridently partisan and to advance its owners' political agenda[4][5]), but the key point is that this institutional bias has led to it introducing intentional misinformation into its news side. This certainly makes its political reporting unreliable, and truthfully it's sufficient to justify wholesale depreciation, especially given that the political divides it both created and exploits means that there will always be people who continue to try to use it as a source for topics directly or indirectly connected to American politics, despite its plain and well-documented unreliability. EDIT: Since people have asked what changed since the previous RFC, I'll point out that, in addition to the incident that prompted this, there is a lot more coverage of Fox's misinformation during COVID, as well as broader coverage sparked by it or reflecting it. Most of the sources I mentioned are from 2021 or later. In addition to directly providing an example of deliberate misinformation by their news section, the significant impact of COVID misinformation has prompted more coverage of ideologically-driven misinformation from partisan sources in general; many sources have used Fox as a prime example for this. --Aquillion (talk) 00:52, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Aquillion, Political Communication in the Time of Coronavirus do not say anything like that on page 83. There is nothing there that can reasonably construed as "not[ing] that both the news and opinion portions of [Fox News] have worked to intentionally spread disinformation." Can you re-check your reference and provide the exact quote? Alaexis¿question? 18:09, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
It spills onto page 84 and 85 and isn't easily summarized into a single pull-quote. But the key points are The parade of pseudo experts appearing on right-wing news and interview programs helped spread and legitimize claims that Trump had been making since march that hydrochloroquine (hereafter HCQ) was a cure for COVID-19. This false narrative was widely repeated within the radical right media sphere, which we define as a media ecosystem in which a variety of outlets produce and spread a mixture of conventional and fake news, political propaganda, and public mobilization activities (Yang, 2020). A casual observer might conclude that outlets in this sphere, centered around Fox News... --Aquillion (talk) 19:26, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
Thanks. I think this isn't equivalent to intentionally spreading disinformation, which would require them knowing that they were spreading falsehoods. In the hindsight we know that, but you can't retroactively charge them with it. As you'll remember, there were experts who quite confidently said that masks were useless for laypeople, and this wasn't disinformation either. Alaexis¿question? 21:26, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
If you continue on to page 86, the piece describes Fox as "producing propaganda materials" and part of the "co-production of disinformation." I think it's fair to read intention in to those, at least so far as this article takes us. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 21:33, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
Fair enough. The examples on that page appear are all about the opinion pieces ("falsehoods ... came from Fox personalities", "...Fox news host ... railed about economic shutdown") which we wouldn't use anyway. It looks like nitpicking but Aquillion's claim was that both news and opinion parts of Fox News intentionally spread disinformation and I still think it's not supported by this source. Alaexis¿question? 06:37, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Croce & Piazza 2021 are more nuanced than you claim. The full quote is The first objection sheds light on the difficult problem for mainstream media of finding a balance between the duty to report what relevant public figures maintain – including cases in which what they assert is mostly fake news – and the duty to inform their audience, that is, to provide them with high-quality information. This problem becomes even bigger if media outlets themselves are involved in distributing misinformation. As anticipated, this typically happens with partisan media such as Breitbart and Fox News. So the claim here is that "partisan media such as Breitbart and Fox News are typically involved in distributing misinformation", which adds two (three?) qualifiers to your quote, and hence is not their blunt description. JBchrch talk 19:53, 20 February 2022 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Croce, Michel; Piazza, Tommaso (19 July 2021). "Consuming Fake News: Can We Do Any Better?". Social Epistemology. 0 (0): 1–10. doi:10.1080/02691728.2021.1949643. ISSN 0269-1728.
  2. ^ Aelst, Peter Van; Blumler, Jay G. (13 September 2021). Political Communication in the Time of Coronavirus. Routledge. pp. 83–84. ISBN 978-1-000-46710-9 – via Google Books.
  3. ^ Jones, Jeffrey P. (2022). "Challenge Fox News". Fixing American Politics. Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781003212515-36/challenge-fox-news-jeffrey-jones. ISBN 978-1-003-21251-5.
  4. ^ Mort, Sébastien. "Truth and partisan media in the USA: Conservative talk radio, Fox News and the assault on objectivity." Revue francaise detudes americaines 3 (2012): 97-112.
  5. ^ Peck, Reece (2021). ‘Listen to your gut’: How Fox News’s populist style changed the American public sphere and journalistic truth in the process. Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781003004431-18/listen-gut-reece-peck. ISBN 978-1-003-00443-1.
  • Comment: If there are going to be !votes, then this should be an RFC. BilledMammal (talk) 04:40, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
    An RfC is only necessary for a formal deprecation; other sources have been declared "generally unreliable" through informal discussions like this on this noticeboard. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 11:31, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
    A RfC is required to change the outcome of such a well attended RfC even if the question isn't deprecation Springee (talk) 11:40, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
    There was no result at the last RfC, and I see that someone else has already explained that to you. Unlike that RfC, this discussion may yet yield an actionable consensus. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 11:49, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
    There was a result, no-consensus. This discussion with editors who happen to have seen this discussion is not sufficient to overturn a no-consensus at a RfC that specifically asked this question and had over 100 editors !vote and a panel of closers. Springee (talk) 12:33, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
    "No consensus" means no consensus, it's not an endorsement of the source, and it doesn't mean a consensus can't emerge later. Can you cite a policy that requires an RfC when previous RfCs failed to result in a consensus? So far, this discussion is going more smoothly than that RfC, and I think it's more likely to result in a consensus, while another RfC would probably go the same way as the last one. That might seem like a good thing, if you endorse the status quo (because "no consensus" defaults to the status quo, without explicitly endorsing it), but then it would also be a waste of everyone's time.
    Do note the rest of the closing remarks, about bludgeoning and avoiding "parallel discussions" during contentious debates about this topic. You participated in that RfC, so you should already have known better. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 12:51, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Procedural close, per discussion above. When an RFC is opened, I would also suggest using the standard format, as it is not clear to readers what "keep as is" means. BilledMammal (talk) 21:51, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to generally unreliable for politics, or full depreciation if a consensus exists for it as well. CaribDigita (talk) 05:23, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade per Aquillion above. Cheers, all. Dumuzid (talk) 05:26, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Comment. Agreed that the !voting, if it happens should surely become an RfC.
Regarding my !vote, neutral about downgrade for politics.
The review of the scientific literature is fairly clear: this paper argues, Fox News is a sui generis kind of journalism, but it doesn't seem very supportive of it; this one summarises an argument that Fox News mixes conservative viewpoints with tabloid journalism). This includes a chart in which a grading of fact-checkers is presented, and Fox News is about as good as the Daily Mail and the New York Post, which, well, aren't.
Looking at the stories they publish, this one reads fairly cringe, and we have the above almost obvious fabrication + we have beating the dead horse about the "lib'ral bias!!1" described on p. 122 of the book. This would make you think that I'd ask for a downgrade. I don't think this should be the case for national politics, though.
I know of pieces such as this, this and this (with input from AP). I'd cite this one too for the fact the lawsuit is out there, however. Looking here, I see that whatever is not labelled "Media Buzz" (opinion rants about lib'ral bias and about-faces of Democrats) and "Videos" seems to be reported either rather neutrally (such as here, this and here) or with some deliberate spin (such as this story - I see no apparent reason to raise fentanyl in this article other than to show disapproval of her policies), but I see in general no policy-based reason not to cite it for facts presented in the articles - the bias is rather obvious (sometimes in wording but mostly in what they select to cover), but there is a mixed bag of plain political reporting mixed with dubious pieces. This leaves me with a very hard choice, as Fox both seems to have some legitimate usage but at the same time is capable of doing "reporting" like this one. Leaving the current grading sends the wrong signal, while downgrading will omit a fair part of what seems to be otherwise fair reporting but with a strong slant, so I ultimately am undecided on that.
I remind everyone that pundits (Tucker, Hannity, Ingraham etc.) have all a dedicated rating (generally unreliable), and most scholarly works understandably, but unfortunately for us, concentrate on pundits, not the reliability of plain news reporting. With the nonsense that Tucker spews, I'd even deprecate it but I'm afraid we won't because there's no technical way of implementing it.
Downgrade for science topics. We should ideally restrict ourselves to scholarly/scientific sources when describing scientific topics per WP:SCIRS (not a guideline, sadly). Fox News is just too bad for lay summaries of scientific articles, and we shouldn't cite it for levels of consensus or non-ABOUTSELF scientists' viewpoints (and, unless we're speaking of Fauci-like jobs where such communication is critical, I hardly imagine any legitimate scientist making an interview for a Fox pundit). Many of the more mainstream outlets also often fail to produce good science journalism, but at least the latter seem to be trying harder. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 09:47, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
Again, downgrading for science/medical topics is unnessesary, as WP:MEDRS already downgrades (all) news media as a source for such content. Blueboar (talk) 17:18, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
The current listing says "Fox News (politics and science)" as a "no-consensus for reliability". This creates the misleading IMHO impression that we can't agree if Fox News is good enough to cover scientific topics, including in lay summaries of scientific articles (there are legitimate uses for NYT or The Atlantic for scientific topics). No, we need to change it explicitly. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:52, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
There is more to Wikipedia than can be found in the RSP list. There is an entire guideline (WP:MEDRS) that deals explicitly with which sources are acceptable for medical and med-science content… it already says that news media sources are “generally unreliable” (See WP:MEDPOP). This applies to Fox, and also to CNN, BBC, NYT, WaPo, WSJ, Guardian… (etc). They are all deemed generally unreliable in this context. Blueboar (talk) 13:03, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
Right, but MEDRS does not cover non-medical science and thats were Fox has been the most problematic, for example around climate change and pollution. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:22, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
And I specifically remember the Fox RFC talking this in the context of climate change coverage that Fox had. --Masem (t) 16:26, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
Are people proposing downgrading them for climate change/science coverage or for politics? While there is an overlap they are not the same thing so examples of issues in one area should not be used to justify a change in the other. Springee (talk) 21:35, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
More generally, wouldn't we just be better off using scientific studies for most things climate change? I'm confused as to why we'd use news organizations at all given the robust corpus of academic work on the topic. — Mhawk10 (talk) 23:20, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • I'm inclined to oppose reclassification. Practically speaking, we already treat Fox News as not-so-good for political topics under the current classification, and don't know how much would be achieved by formally downgrading it. The effect would, I think, be more about meta discussions about Wikipedia than any change in the way we source contentious political topics. At very minimum, in order for this thread to go anywhere, it would need (a) an RfC tag, (b) a concise summary of Fox News's coverage outside of the Durham affair (Aquillion gets this started above), and (c) importantly, evidence Fox is still being treated as reliable for political topics. Otherwise what's the point? — Rhododendrites talk \\ 13:05, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose Any change we already downgraded FOX I don't see the evidence presented as pervasive to support any change Shrike (talk) 18:39, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Question Forgive me if this has already been brought up, but I am curious if the current lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems, which "accuses Fox of trying to boost its TV ratings by falsely claiming the company rigged the presidential election against Republican Donald Trump" [27] should also be added to the pile, here? DN (talk) 20:57, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • While it's something we can certainly take into account, I don't think it should really have that much sway until final in some way. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 20:59, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • I think not. The original complaint, as summarised by Delaware state judge in his granting the motion for trial of the defamation case, explicitly notes that: Dominion contends that: (i) Fox intentionally provided a platform for guests that Fox's hosts knew would make false and defamatory statements of fact on the air; (ii) Fox, through Fox's hosts, affirmed, endorsed, repeated, and agreed with those guests' statements; and (iii) Fox republished those defamatory and false statements of fact on the air, Fox's websites, Fox's social media accounts, and Fox's other digital platforms and subscription services. The judge later notes that the relevant non-parties in the case, working for Fox News, are: Maria Bartiromo, Tucker Carlson, Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity and Jeanine Pirro - all pundits and none of them "plain" journalists in the way AP journalists normally are. In any case, the complaint does not refer to plain news coverage about current politics (unless by that we count quoting XYZ as saying "the election was stolen", but then again it's opinions, and WP:FRINGE ones. Unless the website or the prime time news asserted that as fact, but I've missed it (or rather, I don't watch American TV in general, so...) Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:27, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable" in the area of politics I could have sworn this was the result of the prior Fox News RFC but if not, this should enshrined now. Fox is fine when covering elements that do NOt have any political angle but their veracity should be immediately thrown into doubt when politics enters the picture. --Masem (t) 21:38, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade Fox News is a propaganda outlet, with no reputation of fact-checking. Why would we trust that Pinocchio will not tell lies? Dimadick (talk) 21:42, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Comment, certainly Fox News has a lot of eyes focused on it but where it the hard evidence that the politics news (not commentary) is actually unreliable? This also raises a big bias question. One of the legitimate bias concerns with Wikipedia is that sources that are seen as "conservative" are far more likely to be considered yellow vs sources on the left. Consider a recent RfC where we decided that Jacobin is actually a green source yet now we want to claim Fox is not just "no-consensus", a result from a very extensive RfC, but actually "unreliable". Note that we don't see CNN is problematic even though we have evidence that top people at CNN had not only serious conflicts of interest with regards to coverage of NY Gov Cuomo but that they were coordinating on how to handle coverage of Cuomo's sexual abuse scandal. Aquillion likes to post searches for Fox News in scholarship but is it actually good scholarship and does it say what they are claiming? How often are they citing Fox simply because they have become a target for "all that is wrong on the right" rather than for any specific misdeed? Does it actually provide the hard evidence that Fox is putting out false information. The opening accusation here is not sufficient to show that Fox's report is false or misleading. How would many other sources fair if we looked so carefully at what they claimed when dealing with Trump or other political hot bed cases like Kyle Rittenhouse or George Zimmerman? What about the settlements places like the WashPo and others have had to pay out to the Kentucky Catholic high school kids who were accused of misdeeds in DC? Anyway, it is interesting to look at what we consider green and yellow sources then look at an independent rating site like Adfonts Media. WE consider MSNBC green yet would have Fox as red. Adfonts has them basically equal but opposite left right. We say the Daily Beast is no consensus but want to say the similarly placed Fox is unreliable. We say the Daily Wire is bad but the similarly ranked Salon is just yellow. Sadly this often isn't because one side has the fundamental facts right or wrong. Politics is very often dealing in gray which allows our own bias to help decide a source is bad because we like or dislike their interpretation of the facts.
    As a non-fox example, take these two Rittenhouse related Politifact articles. In this fact check they say Trump was wrong for claiming Rittenhouse was trying to run away and was attacked [28]. That appears to be what was found at trial yet PF still says Trump's claim was false. Why? Because they felt that Trumps statement left out critical context. Well that might be sufficient to say, "True but..." it certainly doesn't make the core of what he said False. Another example is PF fact checking the legality of Rittenhouse having a rifle. PF came out shortly after the crime and said a claim that it was legal for Rittenhouse to have the rifle was false. At trial the charge was thrown out because the court found it was legal. PF updates their statement but leave the assessment as False even though the court disagrees. What does this have to do with Fox? These are exactly the sort of gray areas people use to say Fox (and other conservative sources) are mixed or unreliable yet we overlook them, we over look obvious conflicts of interest at CNN and say they are fine. That certainly creates an inherent bias in what we cover since any time someone wants to add an opposing view, ie this evidence does support a claim that Trump was being spied on in at least some capacity according to some sources editors just say, "not reliable". Fox saying Cuomo was messing up would have been viewed as unreliable while statements about Gov Cuomo from CNN, where there was an actual conflict of interest, are fine. It's one thing to say, we have to be careful how we use political content from sources like Fox. It's much different, and not good for balanced coverage of political topics, to say, we can't use sources on the other side because we don't like their spin (while ignoring the spin coming from sources we do like). I apologies for the length of this post and also note that I can't think of a time I was an editor who originally added a Fox News source though I have defended/restored it when others falsely claim Fox News is listed as "red for politics". Springee (talk) 22:43, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable" where politics is concerned. Their last figleaf of respectability left with Chris Wallace. It's not our job to ensure that citations come equally from all parts of whatever we imagine the political spectrum to be. XOR'easter (talk) 00:19, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable" in the area of politics - Fox News' essence is counterfactual political storytelling. Iskandar323 (talk) 02:07, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade, not convinced that there is a problem. There was one editor with substantial arguments for the downgrade (Aquillion). I've reviewed their arguments, to the extent I could get access to the underlying sources, and I don't think they support the claim that the news part of Fox news is unreliable (the opinion part of course is already deemed unreliable) - see above for the details. Also many examples of misinformation are about COVID coverage, for which we would never use Fox News per WP:MEDRS. Alaexis¿question? 06:52, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    Even though we do not use opinion pieces for a number of reasons on Wikipedia, news organisations are still editorially responsible for the contents of opinion pieces they publish. If they are happy to provide a platform for disinformation even for information related to a public health crisis and pertaining to matters of life of death, why on earth would you want to trust that same platform to behave better when reporting on less critical, but still politically charged, matters. Iskandar323 (talk) 08:25, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    By that logic Wall Street Journal must be unreliable because its opinion pieces on climate change and techniques to fight COVID often went against the scientific consensus. See here for an example. Even though their editorial board position has shifted to the right (towards libertarianism?), WSJ is still a newspaper of record. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 12:27, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    Apples and oranges. Fox News peddles the stuff of pure conspiracy. Here, WSJ published an op-ed from a professor at John Hopkins School of Medicine who it would rightly have assumed was a subject-matter expert, but who later turned out to be flawed in their analysis. There is no indication that the professor was willfully peddling misinformation, only that there methodology was off. It is more of a reputational issue for John Hopkins. Iskandar323 (talk) 15:47, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    But we don't have the evidence needed. Lot's of people dislike Fox News but, as Alaexis showed, they often conflate Fox News commentary with the news reporting. Fox is one of the major networks and, in large part due to their commentators, they have been closing scrutinized and villainized by other sources. That means it would be relatively easy to do a key word search for an article that is critical of Fox vs Jacobin (a site we have said is green). That doesn't mean the average Fox News political story is somehow less reliable than Jacobin only that more people are searching to find fault. Zooming out, I would question if we really should be dumping sources into these big blocks of Green, Yellow, Red. RS says reliability is context dependent. We really should be doing less blanket banning (which is a bias issue for Wikipedia) and do more case by case evaluations. Springee (talk) 16:04, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    First of all, major =/= reliable. For a case in point, see Telewizja Polska - the most watched outlet news outlet in Poland and yet, since 2015, generally unreliable for political coverage.
    While, as you rightly note, the majority of people tend to scrutinise the commentators, the fact-checker reliability rating as provided in Pennycook [29] seems to show that the criticism has merits despite what you say is "villainising" Fox News (though undoubtedly some of it definitively happens on talk shows of, say, MSNBC and a few other channels). The paper seems to query about news coverage, not commentators.
    Finally, I see RSP as useful. People forget it's guidance, but it is better to have general guidance and query in cases of doubt than to have no guidance and repeat the RSN infighting whenever a more controversial story appears or when a correction/retraction is issued. This has a side effect of people forgetting that RSP is only a guide in sources and not be-all and end-all, still, could be worse.
    If you have any specific issue with Jacobin (such as posted here) that actually reflect on its reliability, as opposed to its opinions, you are welcome to relitigate the RFC, presenting new evidence. But let's remember one thing - Jacobin is more like Reason in that it does not really pretend to make news coverage, it's about voicing opinions based on factual premises. This is different from Fox News, which says it's reporting straight news. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:30, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    In response to this false-balance charade, and to add what Szmenderowiecki has written, if we are relying on a source (Ad Fontes Media) that is considered to be "a self-published source [with a questionable] methodology", we should not rely on it at all to prove a point as you did — if it ain't reliable to cite, it shouldn't be reliable to weight in. Instead, we should be doing what Szmenderowiecki said and what Aquillion did, e.g. relying on clearly reliable sources; we may disagree about what they entail (e.g. they are more nuanced, Aquillion's reading was correct, etc.) but not on their reliability, which is not the case for those self-published media charts (I recall one user saying they rated a clearly centrist source as left-wing). Arguments sourced to unreliable sources should hold no weight. For the record, I think the status quo is fine, as would be a downgrade to generally unreliable but still usable otherwise, which is what we do anyway. Davide King (talk) 01:27, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
    Davide King I think you missed the forest for the trees. Ad Fontes is self published but, unlike Wikipedia, it does at least use a reasonably consistent rating method while we rely as much on editor opinion as anything else. It is generally respected even if, by virtue of what it is, we don't treat it as gospel. That doesn't mean it can't be a useful reality check. Your "if it isn't reliable to cite..." argument is circular. You say it isn't good because we say it isn't good thus it can't be good. It isn't reliable only because we have said so. But what would happen if we, the Wikipedia editors in the political space, we are biased as a group? How would that impact what we think is OK/not OK over time? A group bias isn't likely to take a clearly bad source and call it good or a clearly good source and call it bad. However, it will tend to take borderline cases and call them in one direction which can create a bias issue over time. Giving the benefit of doubt to sources who's overall leaning we agree with and the reverse when we don't agree. We don't have to take Ad Fontes to be fool proof to illustrate the point that we seem more forgiving of left vs right leaning sources. That is a problem if our objective is to be neutrality. As for Aquillion's research, did anyone check to see if those sources were strong academic sources? I'm sure editors are aware that not all academic sources are created equally [30]. It also appears that those sources were picked for little more than keyword inclusion. Others have shown the sources don't support the discussion here. As a side comment, if you are going to specifically cite an editor's post it is best to include a ping or similar. Springee (talk) 02:22, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
    No, I get what you are saying but I stand by what I said. I did not ping them because I do not recall who actually said that (a centrist source categorized as left-wing), or were you saying that I should have pinged you? I thought it was unnecessary, but my bad for that.
    I think that you should do what Aquillion did and present sources to support the claim it is "generally respected", when JzG said it is not only self-published but also does not have a "peer-reviewed methodology" (to be fair, it appears they do agree with you that we can rely on them on wiki space; "it is a useful guide for us here to be factored in holistic assessment of a source based on multiple perspectives on its reliability", which is fine when it is uncontroversial and there is no major disagreement among reliable sources), which makes it no better than us, who generally rely on reliable sources when assessing sources, at least that is what I do and what I hope everyone do, rather than just stating our opinions about them.
    I think that you are being too dismissive in our assessment of sources, as if we are all just expressing our opinions without relying at all on reliable sources and what they say about said source. In conclusion, you used a self-published source with a questionable methodology to support your claim that there is a double standard in evaluating left-wing and right-wing sources (many left-wing sources are opinionated sources, while many right-wing questionable sources pretend to be straight news, and Canarin, CounterPunch, and several others are rated as "generally unreliable", while for Fox there is no consensus on politics). What I am saying is that rather than relying on self-published media charts, you should have provided reliable sources that support your double standards assertions. Either way, this discussion is about Fox, and as much as I like consistent standards (a double standard was rating Reason green and Jacobin yellow), the way we rate other sources should not be used as an argument, unless we have not self-published, reliable sources in support of it. As I said, I am perfectly fine with the status quo, like you (?), so we do not necessarily disagree on this, though I think Aquillion's reading of sources was mostly correct but I prefer to be conservative for now. Davide King (talk) 16:06, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Grrrr… how many times must we say this… WP:MEDPOP tells us not to use news media for medical content… period… whether that’s Fox or WSJ or BBC or etc. We don’t need to say: “Don’t use Fox for medical content” because we shouldn’t be using any news media for medical content. Blueboar (talk) 16:17, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
Thats not what people are saying, people are saying “Don’t use Fox for science content” only a small fraction of which is covered by MEDRS. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:26, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
But the examples they give are mostly medical (such as Fox’s coverage of Covid). Blueboar (talk) 18:25, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
As far as I can tell the example they give most (and this has been consistent for a few years) is Fox's climate change coverage which is not medical. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:54, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade. Are we really using court documents from an ongoing, high-profile legal dispute to decide things of that amplitude? Everybody here is aware that those are not reliable sources per WP:LAWBRIEF, right? In my view, any change in policy or consensus about the reliability of a source with such a wide readership/audience as Fox News, should be made on the basis of high-quality secondary or tertiary sources. Aquillion has attempted to do something like this, but their sources do not completely verify their claims. However, I would be open to changing my !vote if such sources were to be provided. JBchrch talk 19:49, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    I should note that I oppose any sort of mention of Fox News' reliability for medical claims per Blueboar, which would imply that other medpop/news sources would be more reliable for medical claims, and that is not the case. JBchrch talk 19:59, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
    I'm glad we found such a quick use for the shortcut, JBchrch :D A. C. Santacruz ⁂ Please ping me! 22:01, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Demote to "generally unreliable", as per my position in previous RfCs, these >80 sources and other, more recent evidence. François Robere (talk) 22:17, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose Deprecation is for true garbage, and while Fox is a poor source, it's still not a rag. Its no great secret that Fox is a questionable media source when it comes to politics. But when the topic isn't controversial or opinion based, the coverage is actually not atrocious. Certainly a lot better than the alternatives. But what has changed? They published a dubious article? That seems to square with the current "generally unreliable" stance. It remains valuable attribution for opposition statements (which must of course still comport with DUE).
Nor do I think changing our stance based on active litigation is smart. Court documents are supposed to be truthful. But there's no gaurantee that they are. Even if they are, such documents are full of spin: putting the best possible light on the facts to persuade the court (and more likely, the court of public opinion). Court filings lack the context and truthfulness. So let's not use the court documents and instead see what RS are saying. The NYtimes calls the issue "Byzantine" and seems to conclude that perhaps the issue was that journalists tried to tackle such a complex issue to begin with. If we remove Fox as an RS for politics, it will make major news. But this issue is too complex, too "he said/she". Fox should only be deprecated if we have an airtight case, but we do not have one. CaptainEek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 03:21, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Comment – CaptainEek, that seems reasonable. Just one thing, WP:FOX is not listed as "generally unreliable"; it is "generally reliable for news coverage on topics other than politics and science", there is "no consensus on the reliability of Fox News's coverage of politics and science", and is "generally unreliable" only for "Fox News talk shows". Davide King (talk) 19:05, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Well, CaptainEek, to be more precise, "deprecation", per Wikipedia's definition, is reserved for sources that are highly questionable and which editors are discouraged from citing in articles, because they fail the reliable sources' guideline in nearly all circumstances. This, for you, may be quivalent to "garbage" but I believe we need to be careful about labels when discussing sources. -The Gnome (talk) 10:58, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose procedurally and consequentially. Procedurally, I don't think believe this discussion can (or should) overturn the results of a previous well-attended one without a neutrally worded opening statement and an RfC tag to solicit uninvolved participants. In terms of the consequences, I oppose downgrading and especially deprecating Fox News on the basis of what has been shown here. Telling a news story, at least at a national level, inherently involves the construction of narratives: in addition to whatever happened, you are saying something about what all those happenings mean. Some sources are more explicit in saying what those happenings mean, others less so. Fox News reports, I think, tend to be more explicit in making those claims than the average outlet. For us editors, this has caused divisions in our assessments of them. On the one hand, some of us understand this relationship between coverage and meaning very implicitly; this is why one editor above argues that Fox News is unreliable because it talks too much about the Canadian trucker convoy. Others of us (I think instinctually) sift out Fox News' interpretative claims from its bare factual coverage; hence, a different editor argues that Fox News' coverage of the Durham-Sussman thing isn't substantially different from other sources when you really scrutinize it. I get the impression that the majority of editors are skeptical of Fox News' interpretative claims, especially their bolder and more controversial ones, and with reason. I think that's why they're at no consensus right now. Many (though certainly not all) editors would say that Fox News often says wrong things; few, I think, would say they are often wrong about the basic facts. Personally, I think that's good enough. Anyone who can objectively summarize the RS to write an encyclopedia article should be able to apply a little bit of scrutiny to Fox News reports, pull out the questionable interpretations and attribute them in-line, and treat them as standard RS for basic facts. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 03:30, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose Based on the evidence presented, the key problem is how Fox writes its headlines and its lede, not how the article is written. The problematic statement, while buried in the 21st paragraph, is still written in the article. Deprecating is for news that is obviously lies and fabrication, while the problem articles mentioned are not lies. Yes, burying key details is not showing neutrality in reporting and showing clear bias, but I expect news sources, from CNN to MSNBC to Fox to BBC to show bias. It is human to be biased. SunDawntalk 05:06, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
SunDawn: The content in the 21st paragraph demonstrates that not only the headline, but also the lede, was false. A false quote. soibangla (talk) 15:39, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
That is why when you quote an article you don't quote the headline, which most likely created to garner clicks, but from the content of the article. First of all, this following statement from Fox is factual: 'Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP's DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.'. And in the lede, Fox chooses to uses the word "infiltrate", note also the use of double quotations mark in their lede. While Durham didn't say "infiltration", mining DNS traffic and other data could be classified as "infiltration", at least according to Fox. In my opinion, this is biased reporting, not a false statement. Nowhere in the article it is shown that Durham said the word "infiltrate" verbatim, a read on the article shows that "infiltrating" is the opinion of Fox and Patel, not Durham. The article did take quote verbatim from Durham, such as 'Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP's DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.' or the allegations "relied, in part, on the purported DNS traffic" that Tech Executive-1 and others "had assembled pertaining to Trump Tower, Donald Trump's New York City apartment building, the EOP, and the aforementioned healthcare provider." Both statements are clearly made by Durham. And if we are talking about giving false quote, Fox clearly stated that the "infiltrate" word is used by Patel, a personal opinion from Patel after reading the report from Durham, Patel told Fox News, adding that the lawyers worked to "infiltrate" Trump Tower and White House servers.. In closing, while it is clear that this is bias reporting as is expected, this is not false quote. And why would Fox state that it is from Patel if they want to put up some fake news? SunDawntalk 02:52, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
That is why when you quote an article you don't quote the headline, which most likely created to garner clicks which I'm well aware of but from the content of the article which is what I did. this following statement from Fox is factual in the sense that Durham made that allegation. And in the lede, Fox chooses to uses the word "infiltrate", note also the use of double quotations mark in their lede followed by "a filing from Special Counsel John Durham found," which is flatly false. Fox clearly stated that the "infiltrate" word is used by Patel in the 21st paragraph, which demonstrated that they were lying for 20 paragraphs, knowing that few readers would reach the 21st paragraph before exploding in outrage because of the lie in the headline and lede. while it is clear that this is bias reporting as is expected, this is not false quote It is profoundly deceptive, and every credible source knew it and ignored it, causing Howard Kurtz to complain about it on Bret Baier's "straight news" show, until Clinton mentioned the story could constitute actual malice for a defamation suit, at which point Fox News abruptly stopped talking about it, as did everyone else in conservative media. They tacitly acknowledged it was a lie. soibangla (talk) 03:22, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
Are you suggesting other sources don't do the same? Example: NYT article regarding the US Women's Soccer equal pay lawsuit settlement. The article glosses over why the courts haven't sided with the women's team (or that during the 2020 shutdown the women were paid while the men got zero). The NYT's lead and opening paragraphs suggests this is a done deal. It recounts some of the women's complaints but doesn't offer up the solid reasons the courts rejected their pay complaints. Only when you read almost to the end does the article mention a really critical point, the deal is contingent on the men's team agreeing to transfer some of their winnings pay to the women. This is also where the article notes that the core cause of the pay difference is FIA's mens vs womens soccer pay schedules. Why aren't those facts near the top? How is this different than the complaint about Fox News? Springee (talk) 19:10, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
As I stated before, Fox placing it on the 21st paragraph didn't mean that it lies. Fox lies if they stated that "infiltrate" come from Durham, which they didn't. Fox clearly stated what Tech-Executive 1 is doing, and uses the word "infiltrate" in the lede, hoping that the reader will come into their own conclusion that "infiltration" did happen. This is clearly biased reporting, but this is not a lie. This is not something extraordinary, this is something done by other sources. For instance, check this CNN article and compared it with Reuters article. In the CNN article, there is not a single mention about "defamation", which is clearly stated in the Reuters. CNN don't even state what they are being sued with. Is CNN lying? Should they be deprecated to "generally unreliable" because of failure to mention the details of the case? No, because they are not lying. They, like Fox, "buries" the details, hoping that their readers come into a conclusion they prefered. SunDawntalk 12:46, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade The OP alleges that Fox's headlines are misleading; I agree. But we don't source information to headlines, we source it to articles. The sources which are critical of Fox do not clarify if they are referring to the talk shows or the news shows, so they are not useful for purposes of this discussion. Therefore, in the absence of solid evidence suggesting serious problems with the quality of Fox's reporting, I see no reason to downgrade. Mlb96 (talk) 07:13, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
Mlb96: Not just the headline. The lede. The body. A false quote. soibangla (talk) 15:39, 21 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade The substance of the article in dispute is true but slanted or misleadingly framed information. This is common for politically biased publications, which Fox News is, but it does not mean it is impossible to rely upon them for the facts they take and then frame or spin. "Infiltrate" was a real quote from Kash Patel, and if you wrote in a Wikipedia article that Patel characterized what happened as "infiltration", you would not be adding false information; Fox misleadingly framing that quote in delaying explaining who it came from does not change the fact that Patel really did say it. The issue with including the quote would be a question of why you chose to include a quote from an obviously biased Trump loyalist who is using inflammatory language merely in an attempt to attack the Clinton campaign. I think it will be helpful to compare this to other true but slanted or misleadingly framed stories in recent memory that riled up conservatives, from publications that have a bias but are nevertheless reliable. Conservatives recently got angry at CNN for describing the ivermectin Joe Rogan took as "horse dewormer" or a "livestock drug". Is this true? Technically, yes – ivermectin is often used for deworming horses, though the medication Rogan took was intended for humans, in pill form, and prescribed by a doctor, so this characterization was misleadingly framed (even though the medication was probably not very effective...). Does this mean we cannot rely on CNN to provide us with accurate information that their characterization was based off – that he took ivermectin, and that ivermectin is often used for deworming horses? No. CNN is reliable enough, and those things happen to be true. Fox News is a far worse offender than CNN is in this regard, of course, but framing or spinning true information in order to score political points for your tribe and get people riled up is (unfortunately) a common thing among biased news publications. It is not impossible to rely upon Fox News for the facts underneath the spin, like it would be for Tucker Carlson for example. Endwise (talk) 05:03, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
Infiltrate" was a real quote from Kash Patel that was falsely attributed to Durham, twice, right up top, but the true source was deeply buried. If that was merely an error, wouldn't a credible news organization have acknowledged at least that by now? soibangla (talk) 05:23, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
In the same way that news articles sometimes use quotes in headlines they then explain in the body of the article, they are using quotes in the lede they then explain (unfortunately much later) in the body of the article. Is this sneaky and framed in a biased and misleading way? Absolutely. But the information you'd use from this article on a Wikipedia page – Patel told Fox News [that] the lawyers worked to "infiltrate" Trump Tower and White House servers – does not have factual issues, just editorial ones surrounding bias and balance. Endwise (talk) 06:50, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
If burying the factual issues deep in the article was merely an editorial issue, by ten days and lots of blowback later they could easily remedy that by appending "Editor's note: due to an editing error, the original version of this story incorrectly attributed the words "paid" and "infiltrate" to Durham in the headline and lede; they were Patel's words. We regret the error." But they haven't. What are they waiting for? A demand letter from an attorney? One doesn't even need to be an intern in a reputable news organization to realize, "hey, wait a minute, Durham didn't really say that, we need to change the headline and lede before we run this." Even without taking Fox News's history with such stuff into account, and especially after taking their obsession with Clinton[31] into account, there can now be no doubt this was a deliberate smearjob to whip up yet another fake scandal. They have a long history of this, it's their business model, it drives ratings, it propels an entire media ecosystem that makes lotsa money for lotsa people who poison the minds of millions with lies. Lies work, but they shouldn't work here. soibangla (talk) 13:55, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
Sorry, I didn't make myself clear. I meant that quoting Patel in a Wikipedia article – Patel told Fox News [that] the lawyers worked to "infiltrate" Trump Tower and White House servers – would not impart factual issues onto that article, there would only be issues around bias and balance for us, the editors of Wikipedia, who chose to quote a Trump loyalist making inflammatory attacks on the Clinton campaign instead of presenting things in a less biased way. This article shows evidence of open and flagrant bias on the part of Fox News, which everyone already knew, but it does not show that it is not possible to use them for the facts underneath their spin. Endwise (talk) 23:13, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable" I argued a while back for this, and it continues to show it can't be trusted.Slatersteven (talk) 14:03, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose Bad idea at every level. First I oppose all such overgeneralizations and think that the entire overgeneralization list should be deleted. Second, they are the largest news organizatrion in the US, deprecating them would be a large blow to Wikipedia at several levels including content, bias, and our reputation for bias in this area. Third, the reasons given are far from sufficient to justify such a move. North8000 (talk) 14:05, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
    • "They are the largest news [organization] in the US"—what does this have to do with their reliability? "Deprecating them would be a large blow to Wikipedia at several levels including content"—such as ...? "Bias, and our reputation for bias in this area"—see WP:YWAB. "Third, the reasons given are far from sufficient to justify such a move"—why? Kleinpecan (talk) 14:31, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
      • Your questions look more like sealioning my post or try to deprecate my post than asking specific questions for a dialog.North8000 (talk) 23:13, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose as written. I would support "generally unreliable for US politics", though.—S Marshall T/C 23:15, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade. Marginally reliable sources may be usable depending on context and should be subject to a case-by-case basis while accounting for specific factors unique to the source in question. Generally unreliable sources should normally not be used, and should never be used for information about a living person. Fox News is not the New York Post. We can trust its news reporting for basic biographical facts on figures involved in politically frought areas; this profile piece is more than sufficient to describe the marital status of Thomas Binger (the Rittenhouse prosecutor) and that he has three children with his wife; I would not generally trust the NY Post for a public figure's relationship status or for the number of children they may have had. Fox News should not be used alone to substantiate exceptional claims, nor should it be used in cases where WP:MEDRS would generally guide against using news sources (WP:GREL news sources screwed up the bogus vaccine-autism connection pretty badly; for example, Mother Jones published content alleging a conspiracy to cover up a supposed vaccine-autism connection in 2004 and [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1318772/MMR-doctor-links-170-cases-of-autism-to-vaccine.html The Telegraph gave credence to Wakefield's wild allegations of 170 particular autism-vaccine links in 2001, but I don't think that bad medical reporting is really something we should be holding against news organizations). Many of the sources provided here largely analyze Fox News's commentary television shows, which is generally unreliable for facts and often flargrantly not BLP-worthy, but we have to analyze that separately from its digital news reporting (which is the typical thing cited when a Fox News source used on Wikipedia). The previous RfC actually did find a consensus that there is a reasonable consensus that Fox does not blatantly make up facts, though its headlines are misleading (WP:HEADLINE) and it's used edited photos (I can't imagine that photographs contained within news articles are ever cited anyway?). If folks would like to overturn this consensus, an RfC is the proper way to do so, but I really don't see substantial research presented that Fox News makes an such an extraordinary number of errors in the political area that it's less than marginally reliable for ordinary claims of fact. — Mhawk10 (talk) 01:54, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable for politics". Lacks appropriate editorial policies and fact checking.--K.e.coffman (talk) 02:19, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose, Support Reupgrade Under Bush, CNN and Fox lied about the same, and neither complained about the other. Under Obama, MSNBC joined CNN on the left, and started calling Fox racist liars with gusto, even good reason at times. But since WaPo joined MSNBC and CNN in openly declared and constant Trump bashing, Fox has become the relatively honest and objective mainstream domestic political propaganda outlet. Fox didn't insist George Floyd died of nothing but a physically impossible choke under the knee of a racist cop alone. Fox didn't call the resultant race-based rioting mostly peaceful protests. Fox didn't double, then triple down, on whether racist insurrectionists murdered Brian Sicknick with a fire extinguisher, bear spray or "all that transpired". Fox didn't accuse Joe Rogan of being a wormy lying horse, Russia of stealing Clinton's preconceived win or the Freedom Convoy of hiring racist insurrectionists (tied to Jan 6, tied to 9/11). Fox didn't punk Ted Cruz. There are many more lies Fox does not echo, despite the pressure from Big Tech, Pharm and Arms. It used to be the worst on TV. Now it offers the only alternative facts in mainstream American politicization. InedibleHulk (talk) 07:25, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Reading the facts on the first few pages of the Durham report reposted here [[32]]. From #3 it clearly states that the suspect repeatedly billed the Clinton campaign which to most people means he was paid by the Clinton campaign. From #5 "The Government’s evidence at trial will also establish that among the Internet data Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited was domain name system (“DNS”) Internet traffic pertaining to (i) a particular healthcare provider, (ii) Trump Tower, (iii) Donald Trump’s Central Park West apartment building, and (iv) the Executive Office of the President of the United States (“EOP”)." Infiltrate means to enter or become established in gradually or unobtrusively usually for subversive purposes - from Merriam Webster. I see a lot of POV positions in this post and I see using other so called "news" sources as evidence is not helping. Durham never said which news source was reporting incorrectly. Wikipedia expects us to use reliable sources at all times. Facts are king on Wikipedia. POV is not. This is a waste of time.Red Rose 13 (talk) 13:08, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
Reading the facts which are actually allegations. soibangla (talk) 14:18, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
True in relation to the legal document but in regards to this discussion the person who started this is challenging the use of the words pay and infiltrate by FOX which are both correct.Red Rose 13 (talk) 18:09, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I am the person who started this and both "paid" and "infiltrated" are allegations, regardless of who said them. soibangla (talk) 18:41, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
According to Durham this fact is under the heading Factual Background. These are the facts he is using. "The defendant’s billing records reflect that the defendant repeatedly billed the Clinton Campaign for his work on the Russian Bank-1 allegations." This is not an allegation but a fact that Durham uncovered. I don't think you can judge anyone at FOX, CNN, MSNBC etc... until this has gone to court and he is found guilty which I think will happen. Durham is not a fool. It is clear to me that you hate FOX and it reflects here that is POV.Red Rose 13 (talk) 19:59, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
According to Durham is exactly right. He has asserted things as "Factual Background" which the defense has asserted contains falsehoods and moved to have the judge strike them as prejudicial. Because until this has gone to court and he is found guilty Durham's assertions are not established facts, regardless of how he characterizes them in a pre-trial brief. Durham is not a fool We know only about how he has been described by others from the distant past, but we know virtually nothing about who a man appointed by Bill Barr may have become in more recent years. It is clear to me that you...oh nevermind. soibangla (talk) 20:45, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
@GoodDay: unless you're saying that MSNBC & CNN have the same issues Fox does (in which case we can open discussions about their reliability) then treating them the same would be an example of a false balance. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:48, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

Arbitrary break (Fox)

  • Oppose downgrade The Fox story looks to me like a good description of Durham's filing. A news story is expected to describe events, and it does. The fact that it does not use the same words is irrelevant. Durham's statement that news coverage has mischaracterized him is also not a reason to downgrade. It is unclear which news coverage he was referring to. Also, I wish people would use more arbitrary breaks like the above. These threads get too long. Adoring nanny (talk) 23:44, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
    It's not too late to insert non-arbitrary breaks. Either one in the middle or two at the tropics, same shortening effect. I tried, halfheartedly, but kept zoning out and losing count. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:39, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose, while Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson have said controversial stuff on air, our policies already make clear that we don't allow talk shows like Tucker Carlson to be used as sources of information, regardless of which channel this is on. A lot of the news you encounter every day is biased, our goal is for Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Sure Fox News covers different stories than CNN, but then they have a conservative appeal, just as CNN has a more liberal appeal. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis 18:25, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Fox News was created with the specific intent of a partisan slant. CNN? Nope. Perhaps consider the possibility that people watch CNN for a reality appeal, rather than a liberal appeal, and depicting it as liberal is part of a strategy to demonize it and normalize Fox News as "centrist." soibangla (talk) 18:47, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
  • There are two parties in America, with unaffiliated vastness between them. The idea that one would see the other with a 24/7 channel and not match it is ludicrous, that's career suicide. On the centrist reality channels (NASA, HGTV, MTV...), the idea that a Democrat or Republican is better or worse than the other in some seat simply isn't discussed (or only briefly). There's nothing demonic about liberals, from a centrist's perspective, they're just more likely to vote against something conservatives would likely support, or shit on the other's political commentators. I promise you, as a Canadian, it's as simple as that. You don't have to support the people and ideas CNN or FOX does if you're watching it for a sports, weather or crime story (or just straight voting results), but even those tend to be tilted accordingly lately. Pre-Fox CNN had way more apolitical general interest coverage, it's true, but that ship then clearly sailed against its competition. InedibleHulk (talk) 11:18, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Wager it more likely that the Establishment which owns both of them planned this divergence a much longer time ago. Neither side exists to inform. Both are to divide, to set people against each other along easily controlled lines. Look at how controlled both of you are being to this end in this very discussion. Hyperbolick (talk) 11:48, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
So what? A lot of reliable sources are also unapologetically slanted. Wikipedia's policy allows for that because sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject per Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Biased or opinionated sources. And no - I am not saying that Fox News is centrist, I am highlighting that despite Fox News being conservative and CNN being slightly left-of-center and MSNBC being liberal, they are all ok sources for most facts. See (about Fox News) and (about CNN) and (about general bias in cable news) all published by Vox.com. The key point I am driving home is that biased != unreliable. We should never be using opinion talk shows shows like Hannity or Don Lemon Tonight or anything similar to verify claims of fact. Just like we do not cite the Onion or Stephen Colbert despite how funny they are, we don't cite opinion sources for facts. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis 20:54, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose Wikipedia already has a documented, systemic bias towards leftism. The last thing we should be doing is deprecating right wing sources. If you think Fox News is so disreputable, argue the point on the respective article's talk page. Forbidding the use of Fox News as a source regarding politics is a near-admission that your only goal is to control the narrative. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:16, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade, support boosting to generally reliable. Firstly, nothing has changed from the previous discussion to say this needs to be downgraded. Not that it matters anyway since editors practically already treat Fox as though it's blacklisted, even in cases that don't cover politics and science. Fox News is a standard WP:NEWSORG with press access to the White House, routine interviews with highly notable people, and normal journalistic practices. Discussions about Fox New's reliability is always clouded with the credibility of their talk shows. The vast majority of the sourcing below is referring to the TALK SHOWS, not the the website. Like most political talk shows (including CNN, MSNBC, etc), the Fox News talk shows are biased to a point where it's misleading and skews the facts, and just like CNN, MSNBC, etc Fox New's website is reliable for factual reporting. We have no reason to believe the contrary. Also the fact that it's biased is not an argument against it being reliable. In fact, we are doing a great disservice to Wikipedia's NPOV policy by excluding practically the only conservative voice in American politics. This has become a major problem on Wikipedia and has led to a left-wing bias, and we all know that. This Allsides source gives a good look into the bias in Wikipedia, including 2 studies from Harvard University supporting the idea of a liberal bias. [33] To not allow Fox News only cements the now prolific issue of bias on Wikipedia and is not based in any concrete evidence of unreliability (again talk shows are different from the website). Iamreallygoodatcheckers (talk) 01:42, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose downgrade One (potentially) wrong story does not an unreliable source make. The sacred cows of political sourcing on Wikipedia have all screwed up royally on occasion, and some have as-yet unretracted nonsense still published on their websites. A balanced perspective on issues necessitates drawing from idealogically diverse news sources, as each "side" covers the stories and angles that the other deliberately ignores, downplays or whitewashes. Deprecating/downgrading yet another right wing source would only entrench further Wikipedia's naked cultural leftist bias, which the diktats produced by this forum are in no small part responsible for creating. If Fox is wrong or misleading on a particular story, don't use it on the relevant article. Simple as, end of. 118.211.69.107 (talk) 08:28, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade for this but for all mainstream media mouthpiece products as well. FOX calling Arizona for Biden early wasn't sound journalism, but Establishment narrative-building (even if eventually officially "correct"). Hyperbolick (talk) 09:19, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
    Are you arguing that Fox News incorrectly reported that Trump had lost Arizona to Biden? — Mhawk10 (talk) 18:12, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose deprecation and oppose downgrade. Use with attribution as with any WP:BIASED source. CutePeach (talk) 10:49, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose just this past week there has been Washington Post news of Fox News side, cross-checking Fox Opinion side, but more importantly, our present policies and guidelines handle the issues raised and are not broke: we should be skeptical of all news-of-the-day and cross check, and cross check, and cross check; that's what is required for our DUE NPOV work. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:39, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Downgrade to "generally unreliable" as yes it is unreliable. Mostly propaganda and just makes stuff up. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:01, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Mostly because its not unreliable. People need to understand the difference between the opinion and news side. After reading through all the comments the support comments just don't do it for me, largely focusing on IDONTLIKEIT type arguments. While the oppose seem to give more thought out and reasoned arguments. Honestly given the strength of arguments I could see a promotion to Generally reliable. PackMecEng (talk) 01:17, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
    • I have noticed a tendency during contentious discussions of this sort that some editors cast a vote based on an argument they present, then their argument is refuted, but they don't follow up and yet their vote stands, while others concur with their refuted argument and vote accordingly. Cognitive dissonance. It would be nice if we could conduct a more qualitative analysis of the arguments here rather than a straight arithmetic count of support/oppose when we seek consensus. IIRC, policy mentions something along those lines. Anyway, maybe at some future date I'll present some interesting reporting by Bret Baier, host of the network's flagship straight news program.[34][35][36] soibangla (talk) 02:17, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      It would be nice wouldn't it. Also I would at no point use Media Matters are a reliable source for something about Fox. No no no lol PackMecEng (talk) 02:21, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      Oh sure, yeah. I'm well aware many despise Media Matters for presenting objective video proof that Fox News relentlessly lies. They also don't like that MM has a huge video library of it all going back many years. soibangla (talk) 02:51, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      Who is this they? This mysterious they that oppose all the things... Whatever. Listen, they are not a reliable source for this stuff. Just facts, they are not. Which is why their RSP entry is the way it is. They are a partisan advocacy group. PackMecEng (talk) 03:08, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      "They" are the people who reflexively dismiss MM, primarily because they've been told to by people such as Fox News hosts, because such people know MM has a vast library of indisputable video proof that "they" are being systemically lied to and the channel is a primary reason our politics are a trainwreck now, to the point people will actually attack the Capitol to stop a legitimate election. soibangla (talk) 03:21, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      I linked you to the RSP on the subject which shows several discussions and RFCs on the subject. Simply put the community at large disagrees with your assessment and shows you are wrong about the source. PackMecEng (talk) 04:19, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
      Even for Talk? And the RSP entry is qualified.soibangla (talk) 04:53, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
    • I've examined the evidence provided by both sides and arrived at a different conclusion. Strength of argument may be more subjective, but I find that many of the comments that seem to align with yours actually stray from the topic at hand, and quite a few are built around fallacies. Can you point out a few specific comments that best show the thought out and reasoned arguments you see in opposition to this proposal? Mysterious Whisper (talk) 03:13, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to generally unreliable for politics and science. Fox News has been on a race to the bottom for a while now. Especially when it comes to stories related to U.S. immigration, climate change, renewable energy, or anything related to Trump, they are basically acting as a propaganda mouthpiece. It seems clear that their reliability, even for straight news, has been compromised by politics. Nosferattus (talk) 20:32, 7 March 2022 (UTC)
  • Support downgrade to "generally unreliable for politics and science" but not more broadlyk, per Soibangla, Mysterious Whisper, et al., who've said what I would have but more concisely. :-)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  17:55, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

Fox : Would we grandfather older coverage?

Moving this to its own subsection, as it got lost in the discussion above…

  • Question: If we do “downgrade” Fox in some way… should we put a time frame on it? Looking at the examples given in support of a “downgrade”, I notice that they are all fairly recent. But then I think back to the news coverage of the past (from programs anchored by the likes of Brit Hume and Shepard Smith) and things look much better. I would definitely argue that Fox’s straight news coverage was much more reliable in the past. So … if we do “downgrade”, should we include a grandfather clause to allow these older programs and reports? Blueboar (talk) 23:11, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
My gut would say around 2014-2015 - this is about the time that the current culture conflict started (eg at the time of #MeToo and Gamergate). --Masem (t) 22:09, 20 February 2022 (UTC)
That culture conflict predate Gamergate and #Metoo by a long shot. They were always nutter friendly, but started to embrace it openly in 2008, and by 2016 they were glad to be operating on 'non-liberal/alternative facts'. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:14, 20 February 2022 (UTC)

Sources

  • 187 signatories of the Professors of Journalism open letter to Fox Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch: "Fox News has violated elementary canons of journalism. In so doing, it has contributed to the spread of a grave pandemic."[1]
  • A. J. Bauer, Visiting Assistant Professor of Media, Culture, and Communication at NYU, contrasts “esteemed outlets like the New York Times” with “an outlet (Fox) with dubious ethical standards and loose commitments to empirical reality.”[2]
  • Yochai Benkler, Law Professor at Harvard Law School and co-director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University: “Fox’s most important role since the election has been to keep Trump supporters in line,” offering narratives of the "deep state", "immigrant invasion" and "the media as the enemy of the people".[3] On the supposed "symmetric polarization" in media, Benkler says: “It’s not the right versus the left, it’s the right versus the rest.”[3]
  • Christopher Browning, Professor Emeritus of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: “In Trump’s presidency, [propaganda has] effectively been privatized in the form of Fox News... Fox faithfully trumpets the “alternative facts” of the Trump version of events, and in turn Trump frequently finds inspiration for his tweets and fantasy-filled statements from his daily monitoring of Fox commentators and his late-night phone calls with Hannity. The result is the creation of a "Trump bubble" for his base to inhabit that is unrecognizable to viewers of PBS, CNN, and MSNBC and readers of The Washington Post and The New York Times.”[4]
  • Lauren Feldman, Associate Professor of Journalism and Media Studies at Rutgers University: “While MSNBC is certainly partisan and traffics in outrage and opinion, its reporting—even on its prime-time talk shows—has a much clearer relationship with facts than does coverage on Fox.”[2]
  • Andy Guess, Assistant Professor of Politics and Public affairs at Princeton University: “There’s no doubt that primetime hosts on Fox News are increasingly comfortable trafficking in conspiracy theories and open appeals to nativism, which is a major difference from its liberal counterparts.”[2]
  • Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor of Presidential Studies at the University of Virginia: “It’s the closest we’ve come to having state TV... Fox is not just taking the temperature of the base—it’s raising the temperature. It’s a radicalization model. [For both Trump and Fox] fear is a business strategy—it keeps people watching.”[3]
  • Daniel Kreiss, Associate Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's School of Media and Journalism: “Fox’s appeal lies in the network’s willingness to explicitly entwine reporting and opinion in the service of Republican, and white identity.”[5]
  • Patrick C. Meirick, director of the Political Communication Center at the University of Oklahoma, states in a study of the "death panel" myth that “...rather than polarize perceptions as predicted, Fox News exposure contributed to a mainstreaming of (mistaken) beliefs.”[6]
  • Reece Peck, Assistant Professor at the College of Staten Island - City University of New York, characterizes Fox as political, "comedically ridiculous" and "unprofessional".[2]
  • Joe Peyronnin, Associate Professor of Journalism, Media Studies, and Public Relations at Hofstra University: “I’ve never seen anything like it before... It’s as if the President had his own press organization. It’s not healthy.”[3] “No news channel reported on Obama being from Kenya more than Fox, and not being an American. No news channel more went after Obama’s transcript from Harvard or Occidental College. Part of mobilizing a voting populace is to scare the hell out of them... I heard things on Fox that I would never hear on any other channel.”[7]
  • Jay Rosen, Associate Professor of Journalism at NYU and former member of the Wikimedia Foundation Advisory Board: “We have to state it from both sides. There's been a merger between Fox News and the Trump government. The two objects have become one. It's true that Fox is a propaganda network. But it's also true that the Trump government is a cable channel. With nukes.”[8]
  • Steven White, Assistant Prof. of Political Science at Syracuse University: “Political scientists are generally not massive Fox News fans, but in our efforts to come across as relatively unbiased, I actually think we downplay the extent to which it is a force for the absolute worst impulses of racism, illiberalism, and extremism in American society.”[9]

Last updated on June 2020, with one exception. Feel free to add more. François Robere (talk) 17:00, 22 February 2022 (UTC)

This again looks like a keyword search. How many of these are actual research papers vs just someone's opinion? I note that all but one of these sources predate the last RfC. If these weren't convincing then, what makes them better now? Going down the list:
1. This is an article about Covid and refers to "Fox News hosts and guests" thus the commentary not news reporting. "Fox News reporters have done some solid reporting."
2. This article predates the previous RfC. It isn't clear this is saying the basic factual reporting is wrong even though he is saying the bias etc is clear. It's not clear how this would disqualify given we accept biased sources.
3. This article predates the previous RfC. Again, heavy emphasis on the commentary shows/hosts.
4. This article predates the previous RfC. This appears to be commentary though most of the article is behind a paywall.
5. This book predates the previous RfC. Does the book say the factual reporting is wrong or is it again talking about the commentary part of the mix? Without reading it I can't say. The abstract does not mention Fox.
6. This article predates the previous RfC. This looks more interesting since it appears to be a work cited by others and presumably with actual citations of its own. However, it also is almost a decade old and we can't decide if this is a commentary or news factual reporting concern.
7. This article predates the previous RfC. Commentary/analysis from an ideologically opposed source. This article focuses on claims made by the hosts rather than the news reporting.
8. This tweet predates the previous RfC. It's the opinion of a proof and doesn't make it clear if he is referring to commentary or factual reporting.
9. This tweet predates the previous RfC. Opinion of assistant prof and cites a segment from a Fox commentary show.
It appears the idea is throw up a massive wall of citations and hope that editors conflate the commentary/talk show part of the network with the factual reporting. Since we already say the commentary/talking heads are not reliable this shouldn't be an issue. Springee (talk) 18:16, 22 February 2022 (UTC)
You're welcome to my other ~80 references. In the meanwhile - before moving the goalposts, do you have any sources of equal quality of your own? Remember, if you're arguing for inclusion, the WP:BURDEN is on you.
Regarding "[conflating] the commentary/talk show part of the network with the factual reporting": it's the other way around: the consensus among experts is that such a distinction does not exist. To quote the open letter (emphasis mine):

Fox News reporters have done some solid reporting... But Fox News does not clearly distinguish between the authority that should accrue to trained experts, on the one hand, and the authority viewers grant to pundits and politicians for reasons of ideological loyalty.[1]

Neither the network nor its >190 critics make the distinction you're asking us to make. How is it not OR? François Robere (talk) 12:16, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
The burden is on you. I'm suggesting we maintain status quo that was decided by a 100+ editor RfC. Since we specifically say Fox commentary is not reliable your concerns regarding commentary reliability are already addressed. Which of your sources say they get the facts wrong vs they get the commentary wrong? Don't just throw up a list of sources, you tell us what they are supposed to mean, that is your burden. Your quote, the extension of the one I included say "authority viewers grant to pundits etc. That is commentary which is already called unreliable. I'm not moving goal posts. You are the one unable to provide sources that support the actions you want to take. I'm sorry I don't have a list, I haven't devoted so much time to this cause. Have you considered investigating some of the other news sources or do you just have an issue with Fox? Springee (talk) 13:01, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
Your comment does not address François Robere's point that the distinction between "facts" and "commentary" is original research and that researchers specifically criticize Fox News for this lack of clear distinction.
I suggest you keep your whataboutism and "anti-Fox agenda" aspersions to yourself. Kleinpecan (talk) 13:28, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
I did address it. I went through the list of sources provided and noted when they were specifically critical of the commentary part. If the difference between facts and commentary is OR why do we mention the distinction in wp:RS? Your whataboutism is a pointless comment. When FR asked about my, call them pro-Fox sources, I don't have any because I haven't devoted a lot of time to searching for them. It appears they have. Why would you consider that an aspersion? Springee (talk) 13:38, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
@Kleinpecan, Springee, and François Robere: per WP:OR, This policy of no original research does not apply to talk pages and other pages which evaluate article content and sources, such as deletion discussions or policy noticeboards. Arguing that a noticeboard discussion that analyzes a news source somehow violates the Policy on no original research is wholly incoherent. — Mhawk10 (talk) 17:42, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
For sure - one is allowed to argue whatever nonsense one wishes, but what value does it have if it's not founded on fact? I've gone through many dozens of sources on this, and the consensus seems to be that whatever distinction used to be between Fox's "news" and "opinion" has been intentionally blurred, to the point where a casual observer might find it difficult to tell which is which (which is one problem for us, the mere observers). But more than that, there's strong consensus that Fox as a whole is a "super-spreader" of misinformation which is a threat to democracy and public health (in those words). I can't see how, where authorities on such matters offer such strong condemnations, we could insert a caveat; and if we ought, then we should at least see some sources to support it. François Robere (talk) 18:38, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
What scholars say in response to news media inquiries is not peer-reviewed research. JBchrch talk 16:29, 23 February 2022 (UTC)


References

  1. ^ a b "Open Letter to the Murdochs". Medium. 2020-04-09. Retrieved 2022-02-22.
  2. ^ a b c d Nelson, Jacob L. (2019-01-23). "What is Fox News? Researchers want to know". Columbia Journalism Review.
  3. ^ a b c d Mayer, Jane (2019-03-04). "The Making of the Fox News White House". New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X.
  4. ^ Browning, Christopher R. (2018-10-25). "The Suffocation of Democracy". New York Review of Books. ISSN 0028-7504. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved 2019-03-08. {{cite news}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help)
  5. ^ Kreiss, Daniel (2018-03-16). "The Media Are about Identity, Not Information". In Boczkowski, Pablo J.; Papacharissi, Zizi (eds.). Trump and the media. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. ISBN 9780262037969. OCLC 1022982253.
  6. ^ Meirick, Patrick C. (March 2013). "Motivated Misperception? Party, Education, Partisan News, and Belief in "Death Panels"". Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly. 90 (1): 39–57. doi:10.1177/1077699012468696. ISSN 1077-6990. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. {{cite journal}}: |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 31, 2030 suggested (help)
  7. ^ Siddiqui, Sabrina (2019-03-19). "Fox News: how an anti-Obama fringe set the stage for Trump". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2019-04-21.
  8. ^ Jay Rosen [@jayrosen_nyu] (2019-03-04). "We have to state it from both sides. There's been a merger between Fox News and the Trump government" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  9. ^ Steven White [@notstevenwhite] (2018-10-28). "Political scientists are generally not massive Fox News fans..." (Tweet) – via Twitter.

Top ten results from Google Scholar through "Fox News" search, with no preferences:

For broader context, found as the top source citing Morris 2005:

Davide King (talk) 19:52, 22 February 2022 (UTC)

Pre-RFC discussion

Any thoughts on the best way to neutrally open an RfC on this subject? Should we go with the standard four options? My thought is to re-use the format in my now-aborted RfC attempt, which is a very short question with a link to the current RSP entry and the usual four options. Pinging @Soibangla, BilledMammal, Springee, Mysterious Whisper, and Mhawk10: your input would be appreciated. It's possible your advice will be "don't start an RfC", which I'd be happy to hear about but unlikely to agree with. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 20:32, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

  • Standard four options, with a link to the current entry would be appropriate. I'm not sure if we should ping the individual editors in this discussion though; better to let editors join the conversation on their own - a new CENT listing, and a post in the Village Pump, would be appropriate. BilledMammal (talk) 20:35, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
  • What do you hope to accomplish by starting an RfC? Mysterious Whisper (talk) 21:42, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
    • I see that there is community interest in changing the RSP entry. Fox News is a major media outlet, and RSP entries are (AFAIK) only changed after RfCs, so there are at least two reasons to want as much community-wide input in the discussion. Regardless of the outcome, I hope to accomplish a solid consensus that can last for at least a couple years or so. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 16:03, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    Okay, so you're operating under the assumption that starting an RfC now will result in more "community-wide input", but there wasn't exactly a flood of new participants after you added the RfC tag to this discussion, even though it was quickly indexed by Legobot, so there's no reason to think this discussion hasn't already gotten comments from most or all interested parties. Then there's the practical issues posed by the above discussion. It's still happening, and it's gotten a lot of responses already. We can't just ignore it, but neither can we just copy everything over to a new RfC, nor can we require or expect that all the participants in that discussion will follow any instructions that accompany a new RfC. Those are just some of the reasons I've suggested allowing the discussion to run it's course, reflecting on the results, and only then starting an RfC. Also, as far as I can tell, an RfC is only required if you're seeking a formal deprecation, anything else (like "generally unreliable") just requires some amount of discussion; judging by the above discussion, there won't be consensus to deprecate at this point, so in any case, I think an RfC would be ill-advised. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 16:40, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    Deprecation is definitely on the table, though I don't predict it as a likely outcome. RSP recommends RfCs for this at WP:RSPIMPROVE. Per WP:CONLEVEL, we shouldn't be overriding wide community consensus with narrower consensus. You might be right about no new voices joining, but I'd bet an hour of RCP anti-vandalism work that you're wrong. RfCs are often started when prior discussion is not formally closed. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 17:06, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    WP:RSPIMPROVE says "consider starting a discussion or a request for comment" (emphasis mine), and if you follow the links given in the list, many of them lead to discussions at this noticeboard that aren't RfCs. We differ on our interpretation of the concept of "no consensus". I interpret "no consensus" to mean there was no consensus (and thus, nothing to override), you seem to think that "no consensus" is itself a type of consensus. I'd really have to dig into policy and previous discussions to see which interpretation is better-supported. While I agree, in principle, that an RfC would hold more weight, I need to point out that this is not a wikiproject, it is in fact a community-wide noticeboard, and it's the exact place where this kind of discussion is supposed to happen, so I'm not convinced WP:CONLEVEL applies the way you seem to think it does. If you start an RfC now, I predict that it will not achieve your stated goals, and that some of the disruption it causes will carry over to the next RfC. Mysterious Whisper (talk) 17:38, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    @Mysterious Whisper: thanks for your comments. I gave it some thought, and I agree with you about "no consensus" closes. My bad on WP:RSPIMPROVE, which I selectively quoted out of haste and not an intent to mislead. I am more hopeful that the discussion above could lead to actionable consensus than I was at the end of last week. Either way, I'm ok to wait until the close of this discussion before making any big moves. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 14:20, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
  • I think it should be very clear what the RfC is attempting to answer. In this case the question appears to be should Fox News reporting (not talk shows/commentary which is already generally unreliable) be downgraded from no-consensus (WP:MREL) to unreliable (WP:GUREL) for political topics. That will help scope what is reasonable evidence and what is off topic. We should also ask if this applies to all of their political reporting regardless of the claim being supported. For instance would we consider Fox acceptable for a statement like Senator Smith said "[quote]" in Texas on 25 Feb. The question needs to make it clear that this is not a question about the accuracy of commentary made by Fox News pundits, guess or hosts as that is already WP:GUREL. Springee (talk) 16:49, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    I'll do my best to accommodate your advice on defining the exact scope of what Fox coverage is under debate. The first part of your comment seems to be suggesting a straight yes/no on moving from MREL to GUREL, as opposed to listing all four options. My gut is to do the same, but more editors seem to prefer the standard layout. Firefangledfeathers (talk | contribs) 17:06, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
  • As a side note, I think this sort of broad brush bucketing is a bad idea and goes against WP:RS. Context matters and we should be doing less blanket accepting/rejecting sources and more looking at the actual claims being made and asking if the source is accurate for that specific claim rather than so broadly. Springee (talk) 16:49, 25 February 2022 (UTC
That view of considering context seems to no longer be the favoured view here anymore, it seems to be about deprecating or not deprecating nowadays. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:53, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Anthroponymy

Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

There's a discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Anthroponymy#RS which may interest some people here. All input welcome! Fram (talk) 12:15, 14 March 2022 (UTC)

Thomas de Waal

Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I would like to propose that Thomas de Waal be regarded as a pro-Azerbaijani source for Armenian-Azerbaijani topics. De Waal has been criticized many times for promoting a pro-Azerbaijani narrative in subtle ways that someone unfamiliar with the conflict will not recognize, and for creating false balances that are to the benefit of Azerbaijan.

Professor Alexander Manasyan of Yerevan State University: "[Thomas de Waal] supports the point of view which is steered by the propaganda machine of Baku...[he] carries out [the] Azerbaijani position by distorting the essence of the problem, masterfully going around all the unfavorable to Azerbaijani position facts and events, skillfully offering lie as believable truth".[1]

Karen Vrtanesyan, an Armenian expert for the Ararat Center for Strategic Research, on de Waal's book Black Garden: "a banal propaganda but not an objective research on [the] Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict."[2] "Black Garden is not an unbiased work, neither can its author be considered a neutral observer."[3]

Armenian analyst and journalist Tatul Hakobyan accused De Waal of quoting Serzh Sargsyan out of context in the Black Garden regarding the latter's comments about the Khojaly Massacre, making it appear as if Sargsyan was boasting about killing civilians when he was actually criticizing Azerbaijan for using its own civilians as shields.[4]

A petition signed by several academics and human rights lawyers was made against both De Waal and Carnegie Europe (De Waal's think-tank employer), accusing both of tribalism, historical revisionism, and promoting Armenian Genocide denial.[37]

De Waal making a tweet in support of Ilham Aliyev during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war that is also passive aggressive against Armenia: "Gives insights into what Pres. Aliyev is thinking. At least he wants to talk about negotiations, although of course the Armenian side sees things totally differently..."[38]

In Black Garden, De Waal refers to Agdam as the "Hiroshima of the Caucasus". He is evidently feels very proud of the nickname, and openly admits to inventing it.[39] It occasionally is mentioned by journalists, often erroneously being attributed to the locals. The nickname has been heavily criticized because Agdam and Hiroshima have nothing in common. Agdam wasn’t hit with an atomic bomb or radiation weapon. On the contrary, Agdam hosted a large military base that was firing rockets at Stepanakert up until its capture.[40]

While De Waal sensationalizes a legitimate Azerbaijani military target into being a war crime, he often trivializes crimes against humanity committed against Armenians. In the 2003 edition of Black Garden, De Waal refuses to call the Armenian Genocide and genocide and refers to it in scare quotes:

I use the term "Genocide" without wishing to enter the historical debate as to whether it is the appropriate term for the mass slaughter of the Armenians. (page 306)
The comparison was immediately felt and expressed with the massacres of 1915, the "Genocide." Memorials were set up to the Sumgait victims. (page 44)

De Waal has called for France to leave its co-chair position in the OSCE Minsk Group in favour of another European country with "more balanced relations with Armenia and Azerbaijan", and suggests Germany as an example.[41] It is a Turkish/Azerbaijani nationalist position to accuse France of having an Armenian bias just because there are about half a million Armenians in France (yet there are over one million Turks). This same criticism of France being pro-Armenian was also made by Didier Billion, a fervently pro-Turkish French politician who promotes Turkish interests within the French Senate and is an Armenian Genocide denier.[42] It is also very telling that De Waal considers Germany, a country with 7 million Turks and Turkey's largest trading partner, to be a "neutral" country.

De Waal makes a biased accusation against Armenians in Black Garden, by claiming Armenians are trying to have the "Azerbaijanis of Armenia...written out of history" (page 80) by referring to the Blue Mosque in Yerevan as "Persian". However, the majority of neutral sources also refer to the mosque as Persian.[5][6][7][8] Yet another pro-Azerbaijani biased and undue position that De Waal has.

References

  1. ^ Manasyan, Alexander (19 February 2007). "Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict: on the Frontlines of the Information War, or the Last "Accord" of the Year". International Center for Human Development. Retrieved 30 September 2007.
  2. ^ "Studies on Strategy and Security", compiled and edited, with an introduction and commentary by Dr Armen Ayvazyan, Yerevan, Lusakn, 2007, 684 pp. , p. 657
  3. ^ Vrtanesyan, Karen. ""The Black Garden": In Search of Imagined Balance". Ararat Center for Strategic Research. Retrieved 29 September 2007..
  4. ^ Hakobyan, Tatul (26 February 2018). "Խոջալուի մասին Սերժ Սարգսյանի խոսքերը Թոմաս դե Վաալը ենթատեքստից դուրս է մեջբերել". aniarc.am (in Armenian).
  5. ^ Kaeter, Margaret (2004). The Caucasian Republics. Facts on File. p. 12. ISBN 9780816052684. The Blue Mosque [...] is the only Persian mosque in Yerevan still preserved.
  6. ^ Carpenter, C. (2006). "Yerevan". World and Its Peoples, Volume 1. Marshall Cavendish. p. 775. ISBN 9780761475712. ...only one large Persian mosque, the eighteenth-century Blue Mosque, is still open, now renovated as a cultural center.
  7. ^ Brooke, James (12 March 2013). "Iran, Armenia Find Solidarity in Isolation". Voice of America. In all of Christian Armenia, there is only one mosque: "The Iranian Mosque," restored 15 years ago by Iran.
  8. ^ Ritter, Markus (2009). "The Lost Mosque(s) in the Citadel of Qajar Yerevan: Architecture and Identity, Iranian and Local Traditions in the Early 19th Century" (PDF). Iran and the Caucasus. 13 (2). Brill Publishers: 252–253. doi:10.1163/157338410X12625876281109. JSTOR 25703805.

ZaniGiovanni (talk) 12:56, 14 March 2022 (UTC)

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