Template talk:Anti-war/Archive 1

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents 1 Work in progress 2 Our template is too fat 3 Fixed "fat" template 4 "Afghanistan War Protests" widest thing on the template 5 Organizations 6 Individuals 7 Opposition to the Second Boer War 8 Thicker peace sign... does it "work"? 9 centered text 10 Q.U.E.S.T.I.O.N. 11 Duplicate link re: "Copperheads" 12 Added text snippet 13 Split 14 reorganization 15 Discussion from my talk page 15.1 Fellow traveler 15.2 Discussion 16 Geographical bias 17 Requested move 17.1 Survey 17.2 Discussion 18 Template redesign

Work in progress

At the moment, this seems to focused on the U.S. and too focused on recent events.

Also, is this to be specifically opposition to wars or also to militarism? I ask because there is a lot related to the Middle East peace movement that is not so much in opposition to some particular war as pro-peace. I think some of that belongs here. Consider, for example Geneva Accord. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:45, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Our template is too fat

Our template is too "fat" - too wide side-to-side. I'm going to see if I can make it skinnier, because I think it has too large of a horizontal footprint on the top of the articles, which is causing me considerable frustration in trying to stick images up there and format everything properly.

So we shall see what I come up with. Trying to make it a little smaller and neater like Template:Anarchism.

Schuminweb 00:24, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Fixed "fat" template

Fixed the old "fat" template. What I did is I took the anarchism template and built a new template for anti-war based on that one. It is definitely a lot more streamlined, though it is longer than before. It's also locked to the right side now, where it used to be variable. Provides some uniformity. I'm going through now to fiddle with a number of the pages that this template resides on in order to make them all look right. Schuminweb 01:15, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I think you were right to but the template on a diet as it was hard to fit it in with articles with pictures. Its a shame though as it was more sexy before the diet. Ohh the pains of beuaty verses utillity.--JK the unwise 12:43, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

"Afghanistan War Protests" widest thing on the template

In order to keep the template down to size, at least as far as width is concerned, let's agree that the link to "Afghanistan War Protests" will be the widest thing on the template, and that anything wider than that gets a line break to bring its width back a bit.

Hopefully this will continue to help keep our template from getting too "fat" again. SchuminWeb (Talk) 21:22, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Organizations

The section on Organizations is getting huge, it might be better if we created some articles on the varrious anti war groups (say U.S anti-war groups, U.K. anti-war groups etc.) and had those pages listed on the topics bar.--JK the unwise 13:10, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

If we're going to go that way, we ought to do articles like List of US anti-war organizations and List of UK anti-war organizations. SchuminWeb (Talk) 11:29, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

Whilst I agree in principle that the list needed to be trimmed down, the organisations that have been left seem rather abitary.--JK the unwise 07:46, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

My intent was to try to have the "big ones" listed directly on the template and then have the link to the list. Thus why I put ANSWER, UFPJ, etc. on there. I'm open to further refinement on that front, since I was kind of like, "umm, sure" on some of those. SchuminWeb (Talk) 06:17, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I have removed Not one more! from the template (and placed it on the list page) as it dose not appear to be one of the "big ones"--JK the unwise 12:20, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I have added Students for a Democratic Society - historically very notable US group. I'm going to try to improve the "Anti-War Coalition" (South Africa) article, which is a stub and POV. Kalkin

Well, actually it's not that bad. And there's not much I can do with what I know anyway.Kalkin

Individuals

How about adding entry Cindy Sheehan to the list?

The template isn't on her page yet, but should be put there too, not?

ActiveSelective 15:43, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

For the template? I don't think so. She's one individual, and no other individuals are listed. Is she that uniquely important? Kalkin 00:18, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, she as a person is undeniably notable and anti-war, not?

But, okay... no individuals or more indivuals.

How about also adding George Galloway and Michael Moore?

By the way, these are not just any anti-war individuals. Specifically, each of these individuals has the same impact on the general opinion as anti-war organizations have / are trying to have: Seehan's campaign at Bush's Ranch, Galloways campaigns and US hearing, Moore's 'Fahrenheit 911'.

ActiveSelective 01:31, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not necessarily opposed - that's a decent list - but the template is already pretty large, and if we add individuals we ought to add historically important individuals as well as currently important ones. Who that means, I don't know, necessarily, but we've already got too much of a current-events bias in this area. Kalkin 22:33, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

(1) I agree. A wiki-template should not cause disorder on wikipedia: by being too large for a page, or by causing endless discussions about who to include and who not to include. Let's leave it this way.

(2) How about adding the template to the three persons pages?

(2+) and to other pages? We have to be careful, and not add the template to just any wikipage about a person who is opposed to a war! Spike Lee, for example, is opposed to the current American war in Iraq. He is known for his anti-racism and deserves an anti-racism template, but only when asked does he speak out against the current war. So he's not notable in the anti-war movement. Marlon Brando, however, was opposed to the Vietnam War, protested, played in an anti-war movie Burn!, and financially supported the latest anti-war movement (just before he died). I think he is therefore a candidate for an anti-war template.

(3) We have a list of anti-war organisations. How about compiling a list of prominent anti-war individuals? (maybe the same page?)

-- ActiveSelective 04:07, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

(2) I agree.

(2+) I think that the criterion for inclusion of the template - or on a list of anti-war individuals - should be that the person is primarily known for their anti-war position, or at least as known for that as for anything else (which would mean that, say, Moore and Howard Zinn would be included). Brando is known significantly better as an actor than an anti-war figure, so I don't think that he should get the anti-war template.

I've now added the template to Sheehan, Galloway, Moore, and Zinn. We'll see whether it stays. The problem with adding it to individuals is that its default space is also where their picture defaults to, so one ends up getting pushed way down the page. I don't know if this is avoidable, or how much it matters. Kalkin 17:29, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

(3) I am strongly in favor of this. It should be a seperate page, IMO, because the organizations page is already quite long and, if it ever gets decent coverage outside the U.S., will be much longer. Kalkin 17:19, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

There's already a category, "Anti-war people". It's not very full, but we could take advantage of it. I would imagine that the number of people included in this category would also be larger than the number included in a list/with anti-war templates. Do you agree? Kalkin 17:29, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Ah, a category is even better! The category list updates itself everytime a person page is categorized as anti-war. Then there is no need for making a list of persons. Adding cat to a page is also less intrusive because the template is not inserted. (some pages do need the template, though) I would suggest to add one single link in the template: a link to the anti-war persons category list. And place it just below "other anti-war organisations". (and "other anti-war organizations" should be "other organizations" for reasons of size and obviousness) -- ActiveSelective 07:25, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Ok. Want to go ahead and add the category link? We can then make an effort to increase the coverage of the category. Right now very few people are in it. Kalkin 16:03, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I am not sure whether the anti-war topic template should be added to the Galloway article as it is about all of his activities not all of which have been concerned with opposing war. C.f. Cindy Seehan, all most all of her artlce is about her opposition to war. I have made a coment on the Galloway page--JK the unwise 14:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Let's remove it. As someone pointed out wrt the template I added to the Zinn page, since it doesn't list individuals specifically it's out of place unless someone is known pretty much exclusively for anti-war work. We should be very sparing in adding it to bio pages. Kalkin 15:41, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Opposition to the Second Boer War

I've gone ahead and removed Opposition to the Second Boer War from the template for now, since at this point, it's a red link. I'm all for having the article listed on the template, but we do need an article there first. SchuminWeb (Talk) 22:35, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I was in the process of writting the article as you were editing. Its still a bit rough and ready at the mo as I am in a bit of a hurry. take a look at Opposition to the Second Boer War.--JK the unwise 22:38, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

If we're going to include opposition to all individual wars large and small for which there are articles, the template will get unmanageably large. I suggest removing the Events subsection as a compensation, since it mostly has links to Protests Against... which are subsets of Opposition to... Kalkin 02:56, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

No one's commented so I'm going to go ahead and do it and see if anyone wants to argue. Kalkin 15:45, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Thicker peace sign... does it "work"?

Does the thicker peace sign "work" in the template? If you look at Template:Anarchism, which is what this template is based on, I think it was designed for a thicker image than we had. What do you think? SchuminWeb (Talk) 01:44, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Thicker looks better then thiner. I made it a bit smaller though.--JK the unwise 09:31, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

centered text

...looks nicer. I approve. Kalkin 14:56, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Q.U.E.S.T.I.O.N.

I'm a little surprised to see ANSWER Coalition removed from the template. I'm no fan of theirs, but they have been one of the three most important U.S. anti-war organizations in recent years (the others being NION and UFPJ). - Jmabel | Talk 05:00, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that's very strange. One of two, actually - NION's been relatively inactive for some time. It was taken out on April 12 by Vfp, without explanation. I'll restore it. Kalkin 15:17, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Yes, if we are looking only at the present, one of two; if we are looking over the course of five years, one of three. - Jmabel | Talk 07:21, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

Duplicate link re: "Copperheads"

First off, I have no problem with the link to the Copperheads (politics) article. In fact, I think it's a great addition to the template. I do, however, have issue with it being listed in two different places. It's listed by name as an organization, and also listed at the top under opposition to the American Civil War. My issue is that this is redundant, and makes our template unnecessary long, thus one should be removed. Thoughts? SchuminWeb (Talk) 13:22, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that the Copperheads really count as an organization. That was, after all, a label attached to a faction of Democrats and others by the Republicans. All the other groups listed as organizations are actually formal/legal organizations. So I think that's the Copperhead location that should be removed. Kalkin 14:38, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

No objections apparent. Done. Kalkin 17:51, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Copperheads (Politics) should be re-added. Here's why. The topic shows the historical context of why some take an antii-war position to gain political power, regardless of whether it is best for the nation or not. In the Civil War, the Copperhead Democrats were willing to allow the Union to disolve and allow the continuation of slavery to regain the White House from President Lincoln.

One could argue that there are some polititians who seem to be taking the same anti-war positions now out of political expedience and to gain political power versus making a well thought out decision based on what is best for our national security.

People need to understand this historical context, and how elections and power can drive people to make decisions based on the wrong reasons. Whether you agree with the war or not, the practive of polititians taking postions for the sole purpose of garnering personal power is wrong.

V/R 160.149.77.68 07:09, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Sure. And since George W Bush would like the War in Iraq to be done with soon you'd probably consider him "anti-war" too. ActiveSelective 10:32, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I have no opinion on the question of whether a non-organization should be listed, but the analogy to G.W. Bush is totally flawed. The Copperheads were genuinely anti-war, whatever their motivations. Hoping for a quick victory is entirely another thing. - Jmabel | Talk 18:56, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Added text snippet

I took another cue from Template:Anarchism (which is what our template's design is based on) and added "Part of the Politics series on" to the top of the page. Hopefully this will make our template a wee bit less controversial. SchuminWeb (Talk) 15:13, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Split

At the currently ongoing TfD discussion [1] there has been suggestion that the template is too long. While I am not certain that it is too long, it is longer than templates like template:Christianity and template:Islam and template:Anarchism (from which this template's design takes much inspiration).

If it does need to be split, then I suggest that the possibly the best way to do this would be to split the anti-war organisations section (the longest) into a separate {{Anti-war organizations}}* template would make a useful template on its own, leaving a link to List of anti-war organizations on the main template and possibly a very few (about 3 at most) of the most notable (perhaps Not in Our Name, Stop the War Coalition and Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament).
*I've suggested the US English spelling as that is where the list of... article is located. Like that article it would have a redirect from the British English spelling. Thryduulf 12:25, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that a split is necessary at this point. We've been really careful about length and width on this template, and so unless there's some really compelling reason to break it, I see it as otherwise confusing the issue. I personally get the feeling that there was a bad-faith motive behind the nomination in the first place, but this is not the place to get into that discussion... SchuminWeb (Talk) 00:50, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I've just thought that some templates use a method that hides less used things until someone clicks "show". This could be a compromise way of keeping the template together but making it shorter - if someone knows how to do it (I don't, and can't recall off the top of my head a template that uses it so I can go and have a look. I suspect it might be javascript or something). I'm personally abviliant about whther it needs to be split or not, but the opinion has been expressed at the TfD. Hopefully those with such and opinion will come and give their input here as well. Thryduulf 23:09, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

It's an interesting thought, but I just fear that it would be very cheesy-looking and ultimately detrimental to the template. SchuminWeb (Talk) 23:40, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Anti-War topics

Image:Peace Sign 2.svg

Opposition to... War of 1812 - American Civil War Second Boer War - Vietnam War Afghanistan War - Iraq War War on Terrorism Organizations ....etcetera.... Media Books - Films - Peace symbol Protest song - Chants and slogans General anti-war Appeasement - Anti-imperialism Conscientious objector - Pacifism Peace churches - Peace movement

Politics Portal

On the right you see several possibilities to shorten the template without loss of info:

• two or three links in one line (books - films - peace symbol)
• smaller but still readable font size
• no horizontal lines between sections, only titles
• no open lines
• left out the very first line: "part of something on politics" because the bottom has the politics portal already
• (list of organizations should have been added in there... you get the pic)
• gain: 13 horizontal lines less. however: a little bit wider.

Remember the right reason for making the thing smaller. There's only been one user so far who says this template is "ludicrously" long. He nominated it for deletion straight away, without informing this discussion page, without making any suggestions, without giving advice, bypassing the users in the Anti-War portal concerned. If he was serious about the length, he would not have wanted this template deleted but shortened. Still he hasn't engaged in the discussion here. Are we shortening the template just for this one user? If the template is to be made shorter, it should be done so according to the Anti-War portal and wikiarticles requirements. -- ActiveSelective 19:05, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, I believe that this template wasn't actually nominated on its own merits. I believe it was nominated in retaliation for the successful deletion of the {{headgear}} template, over which the nominator and I had sparred in the past. Thus I feel this whole thing is more about revenge than anything to do with the box.

In short, I think the template as it presently exists is fine, and we're giving too much sway to this one editor who seems bent on revenge. The proposed revision that's displayed at right seems too wide, and keeping it narrow has been a big thing with this template, as that's where its beauty lies. SchuminWeb (Talk) 04:01, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

reorganization

The template needs some kind of reorganization of the categories. I think that Stevertigo was right that the number of organizations listed was getting out of control, but the only non-arbitrary solution I can see, since we don't have a good way of comparing organizational importance and picking the best 5-7, is to just link the list. But now we need some other way of organizing the template - it's silly to have an 'organizations' category with only one member. And the other existing categories have problems as well - "General Anti-War" is explicitly a lump, while "Criticism of Anti-War" is badly named, because the senses in which an article on militarism and an article on appeasement contain criticisms of anti-war movements are opposite. Any suggestions for a new set of categories? Kalkin 00:20, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to remove the "Criticisms" section entirely, because I think that the articles therin a bit of a stretch in the first place, regardless of what you call it. I'm going to wait to see what others think on that one, though. Otherwise, I like the fact that the list of organizations is now entirely on the list and off the template. That fixes a lot of our length problem right there. SchuminWeb (Talk) 00:34, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I've recombined "General Anti-War", "Organizations," and "Criticism of Anti-War" into "Sources of opposition" and "Related ideologies". I think this is an improvement, but I'm not entirely happy with it. Lets see what people do with it. Kalkin 00:39, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Seems to work for me. Maybe a few minor tweaks here and there, but all seems well. SchuminWeb (Talk) 00:59, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Discussion from my talk page

Originally posted on my talk page:

Fellow traveler

Schuminweb,

Why was "Fellow Traveler" not "close enough"? 90 percent of the people who are ensuring the list is biased have self-proclaimed Socialist or Commumist worldviews that are their "sources of opposition". The term "fellow traveler" seems to be the best descriptor to capture this wide ranging source of opposition. Thank you for your time.

Have a great 4th of July and enjoy the fireworks in D.C.

V/R

160.149.77.68 05:19, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

It's not specifically anti-war, but seems to be much more a general thing. I would, however, consider myself a "fellow traveler" for a number of anti-war and activist organizations in the DC area, but as it's not specifically an anti-war concept, it's not template material. SchuminWeb (Talk) 05:22, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Schuminweb,

I would propose that if being a "fellow traveler" is the "source of opposition" for large portions of the Anti-War proponents, then it fits. For the listing to be neutral (as many people have used for their reasoning) then it should list all the primary motivating factors in the "source of opposition" list.

For example, if you look at the "User pages" for those in the "history" editing list, almost all of them are self-proclaimed Socialists, Communists, followers of Trotskyism, etc.. All the edits they make could be what wikipedia calls "vandalism" since they have a set agenda in only showing one side, versus listing the other links that would not be a palpable.

For example, "consciencious objector" is listed, however "draft dodger" is not, nor is "deserter". "Anti-imperialism" is listed, however "Socialism" doesn't get the green light...and yet "militarism" does? "Peace movement" can be listed, and yet the Socialist leadership behind many of these organizations is never addressed?

Again, I would propose (for neutralities sake) if we are going to have an Anti-war list, it is only fair to address the 'fellow traveler" angle under "sources of opposition".

Let me know what you think.

V/R

160.149.77.68 05:57, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to repost the whole thing to the template talk page and put it to the group. SchuminWeb (Talk) 05:59, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Schuminweb,

Thank you for your consideration. Admittedly when I first came across the "Anti-War" links page, I was thrown aback by my precieved bias in the list. As such, I did make a few changes that were admittedly out of line and for that I can only apologize. At this point, I am trying to contribute and ensure the content is is balanced and neutral.

Have a great 4th of July.

Thanks again.

V/R 160.149.77.68 06:09, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Discussion

Your thoughts? SchuminWeb (Talk) 06:27, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I get what this has to do with the template. For example, a draft-dodger (currently in the template) is not necessarily anti-war, he just doesn't want to go (look at Dick Cheney; no, on the second thought I'd rather not). "Fellow traveller" is about a political relationship to a party. In the period of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, I suppose that could have made some people temporarily anti-war, but a year later it would have made them pro-war. (Insofar as there is a specifically socialist opposition to war, it falls under the heading of anti-imperialism, already in the template.) If we are going to add things like that, we'd have to add every political party that ever opposed a war: there are a lot of those, but if they weren't reasonably consistently anti-war, it seems off-topic to me.

I'm perfectly open to adding to the template other less "honorable" terms (e.g. appeasement), but they should be on-topic. - Jmabel | Talk 19:05, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Geographical bias

Missing in action:

• Opposition in Russia to the Chechen War
• Opposition on various sides to the various wars in the former Yugoslavia

I'm sure there are tons of others, but these leap to mind. I don't even know if we have articles. - Jmabel | Talk 06:08, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Requested move

Template redesign

Would anyone be averse to a redesign of the template to give it an appearance similar to that of Template:Anarchism? I think it would make our template look quite sharp... SchuminWeb (Talk) 01:57, 4 November 2006 (UTC)