Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies

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[edit] Spin-offs from the Homosexuality article

If I can be so bold as to make some suggestions . . . First of all we should view much of this material as "legacy" material since it has cost a significant amount of work by a lot of very dedicated and judicious editors to bring it to this stage. Perhaps we can remove the bulk of the history section and make that into an article of its own. I never understood the logic of trying to shovel all that material into the generalized History of human sexuality article. We need to have a dedicated History of same-sex relations article, and I would even venture to say there should be two articles, History of male same-sex relations and History of female same-sex relations.

So a good one-paragraph abstract should be left at the homosexuality article, and a new article started. Also, the History of human sexuality#Same-sex relations section could be mined for info or parts removed as necessary (while leaving summaries and consolidations) and that material folded into the new article(s). Haiduc 13:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Two things:
  1. Not all of it is legacy information. Upon the suggestion to CoM the Homosexuality article, I watchlisted it. There's still lively discussion going on, though much of it is not very civil... In fact, wading in to that morass is a bit daunting to me...
  2. Would it make sense to start the new pages and work for a week or two on them before abstracting and wikilinking the old one? I'm not entirely sure how this works, so that's just a newbie suggestion.
-- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 15:44, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
There's always minor griping and vandalism there, though from what I can see things have been relatively stable for some time now. There is nothing wrong with doing things in the order you suggested, though doing it the other way may entrain a number of users currently watching the page into the process at an earlier stage of the game, which may well be very beneficial (as opposed to presenting them with a fait accompli and then possibly having to redo a lot of the work). Haiduc 18:20, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
If you want to separate the male and female parts, start by doing an edit to the Homosexuality article, in which you create separate History of male same-sex relations and History of female same-sex relations and separate the content there before splitting off.
I would suggest creating each new article, into which the section of the existing article would be moved verbatim. That gives the tracability of edit history. Save that new article, and the existing article with only a {{main|History of male same-sex relations}} tag in the space that it was cut from. Then go and edit both articles, adding the synopsis under the tag line in the existing arcticle and doing whatever restructure is needed in the new article.
Alternately, create an empty 'template' frame in the new article, which you save before pasting in the moved content. Look at the history of Passing (gender) (which I still need to get back to) for an example of this. --AliceJMarkham 23:02, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] {{LGBT_Current_collaboration}}

As a start, I've just created the LGBT Current collaboration template. If it looks okay, I'll give it a couple days and then put it on the Homosexuality article.

As an aside, we probably need some collab guidelines, etc... :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 16:00, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I've created the collaboration page - it's a bit short, so if someone wants to add to it feel free. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
What collaboration guidelines do you think we need? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 10:27, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Good article promotion

I've added my article Lesbian American history to the good articles list on the project page as it was promoted today. Have a look and let me know what you think. :) Cheers! Chuchunezumi 16:32, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Congratulations - and good job!! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 19:43, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Abraham Lincoln?

Just wondering what Lincoln is doing among Wilde, Socrates and the rest of the usual suspects in the Core Biographies part of the project page. I am not particularly familiar with the details of Lincoln's personal life, and a cursory inspection of the Abraham Lincoln article doesn't help, either.--GuillaumeTell 18:07, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

He is alleged to have been bisexual by queer theorists. Apparently whenever his wife was away from home he used to invite this man he knew to share his bed. 18:38, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] {{LGBT Navigation}}

I've just created a template for navigation within the WP:LGBT scope: {{LGBT Navigation}}. If anyone has any comments or improvements, please feel free. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 22:30, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I have made the picture bigger than that, but besides that I have only one issue - do we really need a meet up thing? There's only 21 of us (though presumably not for long, as the rate we're gaining members), and I think we're flung out across the globe, from the Netherlands to Israel. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:42, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I've seen 500+ member, US-only online groups strive unsuccessfully to hold a meetup. And what would be the purpose of a WikiProject meetup, anyway? Would we all sit around in an internet cafe and edit together? - AdelaMae (t - c - wpn) 23:00, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
I was certainly planning to create a Wikipedian editing club in my library as soon as they get wireless... But no, you're right, even if we did meet up, I don't suppose we would actually have anything to say ("Oh, you're gay too? Wow! Let's talk about how oppressed we are for an hour!" or least this is my impression from Jeff's comments. :), so we may as well delete it until someone comes up with a fun trip. Maybe a mass meetup at Big Gay Out or national equivalents when we have enough people. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
Would that be such a bad idea? Anyone got a good coffee shop to recommend for this? Okay - so maybe we don't really need that in there.. I'll delete it :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 23:53, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Council

I have been invited to join the WikiProject Council to represent us all, so I am now semi-officially your Council delegate. Hope that's OK with y'all. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Hmm... I dunno. I mean, your userpage says you won't be editing until the 13th. Can we really have a rep that's going to be offline so much <grin> -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 23:59, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I think the key word there is trying, SatyrTN. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. :-) Jeffpw 06:45, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WP:LGBT and bias

After a year of mild involvement with LGBT-related areas of Wikipedia, I have accumulated an intense frustration. I am expressing my concerns here on the WP:LGBT talk page in the hopes that they will aid us in writing NPOV articles and avoiding knee-jerk deletion decisions.

I am a lesbian. I've had my photo on the front page of the paper for Coming Out Day; I've represented "the lesbian perspective" in round-table discussions, interviews, and even once on a radio show. I ordinarily refuse to mention this on Wikipedia because I don't think that my personal idiosyncracies and affiliations should have anything to do with how I edit here. For a long time I have been trying to bite my tonguge when I get accused of homophobia for my edits and deletion decisions.[1] [2] I've fumed over the way we could have ten or more pro-gay-marriage, pro-HRC, etc userboxes, but the one userbox promoting heterosexual marriage was immediately deleted by an angry mob. I've stood by with increasing frustration as I've watched editors get accused of homophobia, bigotry, bias, and POV for no other reason than that they nominated some LGBT-related article for deletion.[3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] It's time to stop biting my tongue for a moment. I think this is unacceptable behavior and I think that we, as the WikiProject dedicated to LGBT issues, should be on the front lines of the effort to do something about it.

I ask people on this project to please work to discourage the use of ad hominem attacks making unsubstantiated accusations of bias, and to be careful that your personal and political opinions don't lead to knee-jerk editing reactions. Thanks. - AdelaMae (t - c - wpn) 00:44, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Well said, AdelaMae! In fact, I was thinking earlier today that this project should have some specific guidelines on topics like this. Thanks for bringing up and un-biting your tongue - doesn't that feel better? :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:05, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Yes, well said. How would a guideline go? Perhaps any AfDs you see like that should be put on our AfD section, so we can vote and/or support good faith editors accused of homophobia? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 10:03, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Well said indeed, however I find that ignoring irritating users to be the best policy :). I think that wikipedia's Civility, Don't be a dick, and Assume good faith more or less cover everything, though being explicit about not accusing others of bigotry just because you can't think of a better counter-argument isn't a bad idea. Also, don't forget that the *fDs are not votes, so people who resort to character attacks and strawman arguments will simply have their opinions discounted.Koweja 20:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] {{Transgender}}

Contrary to my own expectations, I've today created the infobox {{Transgender}}. It is a fairly quick and rough creation and I have every reason to expect that others will find changes that need to be made. I will point out, however, that the term transvestite has been deliberately omitted in favour of cross-dressing because 'transvestite' is now fairly widely considered to be insulting and derogatory --AliceJMarkham 01:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I think the template looks great, Alice. And I thank you for explaining that transvestite is now considered an insult in many circles. I just read the article and learned a lot. Jeffpw 06:43, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Yes, I didn't realise that too. I will stop using it. :) I think that the template is very good. I've edited the template so the links don't break across lines, but I have two small points: do you know the colours of the transgender flag in hexadecimal? It would be nice to have the line dividers bearing the colours of the transgender community rather than the bisexual community :); Were you aware that you added Androgyne twice? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 10:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Hey, I said that it was quick and rough. :) I would have preferred one of the other TG symbols such as Image:A TransGender-Symbol Plain3.svg but chose to go with the flag for consistency. Yes, I admit that I copied some formatting from the Bi template rather than reinventing the wheel. :) --AliceJMarkham 22:09, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Why not add a new image imposing the symbol over the flag? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:11, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Boy Scouts article?

Can we claim Boy Scouts of America membership controversies (talk) as part of this WP? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 15:46, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I think so, SatyrTn. there are several sections that detail the Scouting Association's discrimination, and lawsuits arising out of it. I note, also, that the Atheist group has tagged it. I have already gone there and applied our template, though I didn't want to rate it. Is there any to just add the tag without the rating section being included? Jeffpw 16:07, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I've rated it at FA, so a fairly easy rating. :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
As an outsider butting in to a discussion, I've recently found it easiest, in cases of possible contention like this, to formally define on the project page which categories fall within the specific scope of this project, and then, if you think an article does qualify as within your scope, to put it in one of those categories. If the article clearly falls within one of the categories which fall within the scope of the project, it would be a lot harder for any other group or individual to argue that you can say that it falls within your scope. Also, in such cases, stress that you are stating only that it falls within your scope. Make it clear that you are not seeking to lay any sort of "claim" on the article, but just indicating that at least some of its contents are relevant to your project. Badbilltucker 16:58, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Badbilltucker, why would anybody think we (or anybody) was "claiming" an article? We were accused of that on another article page only an hour ago--though they would not have minded (I think, judging from the comments) had the article been assessed higher. To me, we are all working towards the same goal. The LGBT Project tag only shows that the article relates to what we are focusing on. And just to be perfectly clear, I would object if we tried to include this particluar article as an "FA article" for our project. We had nothing to do with its promotion. I think we can only include articles on our list if we created or significantly improved them ourselves. Jeffpw 17:22, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I'm not so sure about that, Jeff. I mean, especially now when we're just starting out, we're tagging articles within our scope as part of the project. Since the project itself wasn't particularly active when the article was raised to FA, there's no way we (as a project) could have participated. But now that the project is gaining steam, it seems logical to say - here's an article... it's in our scope... and it's rated FA. The alternative, it seems, is to rate every article in our scope as stub until the project has put in any work - and that seems kinda silly.
Just my $0.02US... -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 17:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Satyr, it just seems kind of tacky to me to claim credit for an artiucle we had nothing to do with. I didn't mean not rate it on the template (though that could be argued as well, I think), but rather not to list it on the Project page as a FA. I think that should be done only to articles we are substantially involved with. Otherwise it seems almost like poaching. Jeffpw 17:46, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
One particular point of controversy happened when an editor who struck me as being rather fond of himself removed a Cats banner I had placed from an article which his Animal Rights project had created. I had placed the banner there because a significant section of the article dealt with cats. He removed it because he stated that he could not see how our having anything to do with the article could in any way increase the possibility of its improvement. It should be noted that the Cats project has until only recently been perceived as a bit of a joke, basically a bunch of cat-lovers who never actually did anything. In fact, it was even nominated for deletion at one point on that basis. In the case above, the other editor struck me as being one who was showing excessive proprietary interest in the article who didn't want a bunch of useless losers (like he might have thought the Cats project was/is) perhaps ruining the article. This attitude is a clear violation of WP:OWN, but it is one that I have repeatedly seen displayed in wikipedia anyway. I would also note that, to many people, your group here, which also can be seen (rightly or wrongly) as a bit of an advocacy group, might be one they want their content to be distanced from to prevent addition of POV or other information. I want it understood that I am not myself saying you would do that, simply trying to perhaps consider their thinking. They might object on that basis. Also, I personally have no objection to seeing as many banners relating to the article on the talk page as are warranted. The greater number of hands potentially involved in a Start or B class article, the better the chances of improvement. The greater number of projects overseeing a GA or FA class article means the less chance there is of that article being damaged to the point of being delisted. Other people, however, do occassionally display a more parochial view. Having reviewed your banner, I think it might be possible to decrease the possibility of this happening by perhaps changing some of the phrasing. I personally (surprise) like the phrasing of the Cats banner and Germany banners. Yes, I was involved in the creation of both. But you will note that both banners avoid giving any impression of property, one using the phrase "is within the scope" and the other "is supported by". Personally, I prefer the latter, as it gives the impression that the goal of the project is to support the article, support being something few people can object to. In any event, many people do display an unfortunate, violation of guidelines sense of ownership of articles, and I think you might encounter a few more like that. If you make it clear that you seek only to support the article, and also (possibly) place your banner below their banner, if they have one, on the talk page, implicitly acknowledging their greater "claim", I hope you will find the number of times this happens drop. Hope that was some help. Badbilltucker 18:12, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I'm halfway on this one. I think we should tag all articles, regardless of how much effort we put into them, but add only articles to the mainpage that the WikiProject, or members who consider themsleves part of the WikiProject, have improved. That's why, although I have tagged Paragraph 175, I haven't added it to the main page - I didn't think it was right. If we do need to change the banner, it should be "supported by" rather than "within the scope of" - for the simple reason I really hate the word scope. : ) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:23, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bisexuality guideline

There has been some discussion at Talk: List of bisexual people, as to what counts as "bisexual". To prevent repeated debates, we figured that it would be best to develop a guideline for the whole Wikiproject to use, so your comments and input there would be appreciated. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:26, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Are there any german speakers in the house?

...cos Transgender over at the german Wikipedia is Featured. Not sure what their standards are over there, but if we translate it, it will surely give us a good grounding for FA, no?

Actually, this raises an idea I've been thinking about. Should we develop a translation section? I suggest this because we have a few non-Native speakers amongst us, and from my limited French and German there are some good LGBT FAs over there we could use, and vice versa. Maybe we could hook up with the othe LGBT WikiProjects as well? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:00, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I speak some German, Dev, and my husband is fluent, so we can probably translate it well enough to at least use it as a guide for our article. Sadly, though, I don't think that would ground us for FA status, since none of the Wikis except the English one require references. I noticed the German article doesn't include even one.
As to translating, I could look at the Dutch Wiki for articles that relate to our project, but (he says with chagrin) it is not even as well developed as the German site. But it would give us some direction for expanding the knowledge base here. Jeffpw 17:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Ooh, can you translate Oscar Wilde? FA over there...GA here.
But yes, it is quite strange that they can get away without references over there. Do they not have massive edit wars? Still, if the information's correct, then references are easy. Maybe we should translate a draft article on a "Translation" subpage and then merge useful content either way, depending on whichever is better quality? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:23, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Lord, Dev, that article might make it to "B" here! LOL! I'll translate it tonight, and put it on a sandbox or translation subpage if you make one for the project. Jeffpw 17:27, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Created a Translation page for you - wow, we're racking up the departments now... Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:16, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
There are groups out there several groups that deal with foreign languages (many of the national projects) and also a Wikipedia:Translation into English group, which offers to assist in translations. Maybe you could see if there are any people there who would be willing to assist you in translations. Badbilltucker 18:23, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I will bear that in mind, Bill, though I admit that the low level of LGBT articles on other wikis means we probably won't need them. Given the number of comments you've made here, why not join the WikiProject yourself? Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:14, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
I appreciate the offer, but have only actually contributed about three paragraphs of article text in the past two or three months. I've actually already formally withdrawn my membership in several projects on that basis already. Doing assessments and other things seem to keep me away from doing any more. Also, the majority of the projects I work with are severely understaffed, which, thankfully, this one doesn't seem to be. If and when I get through all my personal backlogged to-do list, though, I certainly wouldn't have any reservations about joining what looks to me to be one of the better functioning projects around, which this one clearly appears to be. Badbilltucker 20:41, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Translations into English would be great, but it would also be great to go the other direction and translate our articles into other languages. I'd help but I don't speak any other languages well enough. Koweja 20:20, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
Not to be an egocentric, self-centered son-of-a-bitch, Koweja, but what would be the benefit in that for us? :-) Jeffpw 21:02, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
OMG, Jeff - that made me laugh! A lot! :) -- SatyrTN (who's willing to translate, but only moderately knowledgeable about French)
What's the benefit for editing the English Wikipedia? Same as the benefit for editing other languages. Koweja 21:13, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
While I admit I had never even thought of it like that, I have barely enough time to edit here. I am willing to translate articles from the Dutch or German sites if they will help our project, but I won't be translating the other way around any time soon. Perhaps if they other Wikipedias start raising their quality standards I would reconsider. Jeffpw 21:21, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
Fair enough, I'm certainly not involved in all wikimedia projects so I can't expect anyone else to be. I was just throwing the idea out since many editors are more concerned with a wikipedia process (translations, etc) than specific topics. Besides, one of the best ways to get an project to raise their standards is to raise the quality of their articles (en.wikipedia's standards have certainly gone up over time). And since our articles are so much better, moving ours over would be a fast way to raise that quality. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Koweja (talk • contribs) 23:16, 11 December 2006 (UTC).
Good Lord, you're fast. The page hadn't even refreshed :P Koweja 23:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Talk:Civil partnerships in the United Kingdom

There is some rancor on this page about Dev's (appropriate) rating of this article as "B". In fact, they have removed the rating and tried to remove the tag, which I reinstated. Perhaps some of our members could go there, read the article, and give some constructive feedback. Jeffpw 17:49, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template rewording

So I've been thinking about BadBillTucker's comment that maybe we should reword the {{LGBTProject}} template. Does anyone object to saying "This article is supported by WikiProject LGBT studies" instead of "covered by"? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 00:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, saying "is supported by" suggests that the page is actively edited by members of the Project, which isn't always the case. However, I would agree that it is better than "covered by" as it implies that this Project has control over it. In any case, both are better than "is part of" which is very territorial (and sadly the most common form). Personally, I like what the Television, Military History, Politics, and other Projects use: "This article is within the scope of..." which lets people know that it is of interest to the project but doesn't come across as laying claim to the article.
So, from other banners, our options are:
  • "This article is part of WikiProject LGBT studies"
  • "This article is covered by WikiProject LGBT studies"
  • "This article is supported by' WikiProject LGBT studies"
  • "This article is within the scope of WikiProject LGBT studies"
Of course, we could always go with something else entirely. Koweja 00:49, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
"Within the scope of" works, too. Or "This article is painted with the rainbow of WikiProject LGBT studies." But maybe that's overkill? -- SatyrTN (who sometimes gets a bit silly :) ) 01:40, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I prefer "within the scope of...", myself, primarily out of my experience when an article I wrote achieved FA status. Suddenly there was a "this article is supported by..." tag slapped on it, when the members had done nothing to support it through the arduous process. "Within the scope...", to me, implies that it relates without our having actually responsibility for its creation. Jeffpw 07:56, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I was looking at the TG template just after I created it and thinking that all of our templates should have a common statement about their connection to the wikiproject. I lean towards the within the scope of option. --AliceJMarkham 07:33, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I like is supported by. It gives off a much better impression of the project (we're there if you need us, just call) rather than (the article is part of our project, but we don't really care all that much). Also, my synesthesia, makes my head hurt when I see the word scope... Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 08:02, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
Purview? Domain? Sphere of influence? Demesne? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 17:31, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
Domain would be best. Support gives me warm fuzzies though, so I hope you go with that. :) Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 18:23, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
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