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== RfC: What should be in this article: a short summary of ], or a longer version? ==
== RfC: What should be in this article: a short summary of ], or a longer version? ==
{{RFC|bio|pol|rfcid=6231E0A}} Given that ] contains the information in both proposed versions, what should be in the ] of this article? The two proposed versions are: and . ] (]) 00:36, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Given that ] contains the information in both proposed versions, what should be in the ] of this article? The two proposed versions are: and . ] (]) 00:36, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
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This article is not overly long and the information is fairly brief. IMO it fits very well into this article and should be left where it is, though I would not feel bad to see the Native American controversy go to the other article. :) Gandydancer (talk) 14:46, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
I think the Native American controversy content deserves to be on her personal page. Back to the RfC–––the information should be briefly summarized with a link to the other page. Meatsgains (talk) 17:41, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
The false claims of Native heritage need to be on both pages, assuming there is a separate article on the election. - CorbieV00:54, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
United States Senate election in Massachusetts, 2012 is not a sub-article of this one, so "splitting" doesn't apply. It's an article about something Warren and several other individuals were involved in, and this article covers her part of it. The text is too heavy on Warren to just be plopped into the other article. By analogy, World War II is not a sub-article of Winston Churchill and we don't reduce that part of his career to two paragraphs just because the other article exists. Due weight applies to each article as a whole, regardless of what other articles overlap with it. The election section should be a little shorter than it was, but Darx's version is far too simplified. —Designate (talk) 02:00, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
Undue weight is an issue here. Though the 2012 election is a very important part of why she is famous (and deserves a wiki page) this is a biography of her whole life. I'm in favor of a summary of the main article. JamesRoberts (talk) 02:02, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
I agree with JamesRoberts about the concern of undue weight and favor a short summary, especially since the same information is repeated in the article linked to in the hatnote. LK (talk) 05:50, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
I agree with Designate; we want something a little shorter than the long version, but the short version leaves too much ot; if we needed to pick one I'd go with the long one. She's only stood one election, it's been an important part of her career. --GRuban (talk) 16:14, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
Per poster above. The section is not just about a past-and-gone event but tells us much about Warren's whole political position and some of the reactions to it, and should be substantially retained in this article: Noyster (talk), 12:15, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Issues raised in the election are very relevant to her career and positions, and need to be mentioned. However, as this is a large article already, and there is sufficient material for a standalone article on the election, WP policy is to concisely summarize the main points in the relevant section in this article, then link to the fuller article for more in-depth election coverage. - CorbieV00:54, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
I was picked by a bot at random to comment. The article is at 17kb of readable text, its not to big. The 2012 election section looks good as it is. AlbinoFerret00:18, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
The bot sent me. I agree with Designate and Gruban. It's needs to be shortened a wee bit, but the short version above removes too much. She's only stood one election and everything in that election is relevant. If we can only choose one, then I'd choose the long version. SW3 5DL (talk) 03:19, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
I don't have strong opinions on the length of the description of 2012. But the Native American issue deserves a couple paragraphs, since Warren has been dogged by that continuously since the election. (She devoted a section of her 2014 autobiography to trying to debunk the allegations of credentials fraud.) Steeletrap (talk) 04:28, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
The old biased version makes it sound like Warren "self-identified as Native American" in a casual conversation. Instead, she listed herself as a racial minority in a law school directory used by job recruiters. (The directory did not specify which race one was. An Arab American who does not identify as Caucasian would be listed alongside an Asian American, African American, and Native American, with no clarification.) She stopped doing so when she got tenured at Harvard. These facts are documented by the WaPo RS. These facts, paired with the fact that she has no documented Native American heritage (though claims to be 1/32nd Native American), has led Warren to be accused of credentials fraud. Let's portray these facts accurately and let the readers decide what they think of the allegations. Steeletrap (talk) 21:06, 30 December 2014 (UTC)
All those sources are junk and can't be used as reliable sources. Daily Mail and HuffPo are tabloids, while TheBlaze is run by Glenn Beck. And Breitbart is an absolute non-starter. -- Calidum05:39, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
I'm really surprised that anyone would suggest that the Daily Mail is RS - it is generally really scraping way down to the bottom of the barrel if one needs to resort to it for a source. HuffPo may or may not be, depending on who wrote the article. Gandydancer (talk) 11:44, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
What we are seeing here, is something that has been seen on many politicians' and political activists' pages. A persistent campaign by partisans to include every negative thing ever written about a person into the person's biography, regardless of weight, reliability, notability, or BLP issues. This has to stop. LK (talk) 05:01, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
Perhaps Steeltrap does not realize that it took editors a very long time to finally come to an agreement that resulted in this long-standing version of the Native American section. I was never satisfied with the length of the coverage, but when one agrees to use consensus for our articles one must always be willing to accept that we can never expect to have our way and ignore the opinions of others. Lawrence was correct to restore to something similar to the long-standing wording. Gandydancer (talk) 11:54, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
My recent revert
I just reverted what I consider to be an egregious POV skewing of the facts that breaks our policy on WP:BLPs. As an example of the skewing, the edit by User:Steeletrap introduces (as fact in WIkipedia's voice) statements that are only sourced to blog entries, one by a known political opponent of Warren's. If blog entries were suitable, I would suggest including this from a Chicago Law professor that explains why the 'Native American controversy' is not a controversy. LK (talk) 04:51, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
Edited down to reasonable levels - I found "POV smear" to be unartful in any edit summary, and the current version should be suitable to all. Collect (talk) 13:15, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
I've reverted you. There was never a conensus for the changes made just three days ago. Todd Zwycki, who was cited in that editing for accusing Warren of credential fraud, is a political opponent of hers. -- Calidum16:03, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
That someone is a "political opponent" makes them a non-person? I suggest my compromise edit was correct and proper, made no unsupported contentious claims, and accurately represents facts as nearly as possible. Nor did I use Steeletrap's edit here -- thus reverting me because a prior edit had a problem not found in my edit is outré. I note the discussion about Volokh Conspiracy as follow:
The "blog" is physically on WaPo's site - thus it is "republished" by WaPo and is not a "personal web site" by a mile. WaPo quite apparently pays for this right (VK specifically gets a share of the WaPo ad revenue at least per LA Observed - if a publisher pays to carry something you wrote, it is clearly republishing what you wrote. Thus the "SPS = personal web site of a non-notable person" argument fails, as it has always failed. It is widely cited by lawyers, scholar.google.com shows it as being mentioned and used in many law journals including Virginia Law Review, HeinOnline , Washington University Law Review, Alabama Law Review, Drexel Law Review, Georgetown Law Review (actually a slew of law review journals), American Association of Law Libraries, and roughly one thousand other sites (scholar.google.com stops at page 100 of results). With such stature, the cavil that it is a "personal blog" fails with a resounding thud. Consider this from the ABA Journal. "Volokh Conspiracy" is not a trivial "SPS blog" it is a major resources cited in over a thousand scholarly articles. Cheers. Collect (talk) 12:34, 2 January 2015 (UTC) from WP:BLP/NCollect (talk) 20:21, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
The tone of your response suggests that you have a strong POV on this issue. Suggest that this issue be taken to RfC, with input from people at WP:WPBLP, before you reinsert that material again. Darx9url (talk) 07:41, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
Congrats on reading a "strong POV" into the comments of an editor who also supports using "Russia Today" (RT) as a source on the same basis. Perhaps I am a crypto-Communist as my POV? LOL! I endeavour to use the exact same standards for all sources in BLPs. And where in hell do you get "re-insert the material again" - I edited the objected material down very substantially, removing what I considered might have been BLP violations - but I was not the one to insert that material in the first place, nor did I support the full material as evinced by my edit of it. Cheers. - Collect (talk) 12:39, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
Why do you bother to claim something that's easily shown false? Here are the two times that you reinserted the material that was first inserted by Steeltrap a few days ago . Take a step back, and look at the language you're using, you're not emotionally detached from this topic. Darx9url (talk) 13:02, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
And you forgot to mention my major trimming of all the possibly objectionable material immediately following what you assert to be my second re-insertion -- note that proposing compromise language is specifically promoted by WP:CONSENSUS. And again - I do not give the proverbial rat's ass about Warren - I only care about following Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. You might also note that Steeletrap has most typically been adversarial to me <g>. And by the way, accusing editors of writing falsities is considered a violation of WP:AGF as a bare minimum. Cheers. Collect (talk) 13:11, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
You are trying to side-step the issue. I didn't say anything about your not trimming the worst parts. You stated that you did not reintroduce controversial language. I showed that you did, twice. That is all I said. Darx9url (talk) 15:28, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Read what I wrote as I removed what appeared to be the contentious claims. Is that clear? In fact, I removed about half of the entire edit, seeking a compromise in accord with WP:CONSENSUS Is that also quite clear? Collect (talk) 16:02, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Major weight and notability issues with Native American controversy section
I'd like to repeat what was said above by LK: A persistent campaign by partisans to include every negative thing ever written about a person into the person's biography, regardless of weight, reliability, notability, or BLP issues. This has to stop. I fully agree with this statement. The rather awkward truth about Misplaced Pages editors is that we have no credentials and yet we can "publish" our views in a widely-read source. By the amount of copy devoted to the Native American incident presently included in Warren's article, about the same amount as devoted to her entire career, one would think that it is a major part of her life. As unknown editors, of unknown political leanings, or any sort of expertise at all, we have no right to allow politics to influence our articles. In Warren's most recent book she does not devote more than a mention of this incident and when I searched for reviews of her book, I did not find reviews that criticized her shocking, just shocking!!!, avoidance of fraud!!!, etc. See, for instance: No mention at all. What we really should be arguing about here is whether or not the incident deserves more than a few lines at most, or even that - certainly not an entire section. Gandydancer (talk) 16:51, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
You guys probably have a point generally, but specifically, you are mistaken in this case.
"Polling conducted after the story received nearly daily coverage in the Bay State’s most prominent media outlets for about a month showed – somewhat surprisingly – that Warren was largely unharmed by the scrutiny her heritage received. Brown’s camp chalked the numbers up to being outspent on TV by the Democrat. For Warren, much of May was spent on defending herself and the heritage debate was still a distraction from her message, if not a clear negative in the polls." This is on the Washington Postpolitical blog by a professional journalist.
The Boston Globe gave heavy coverage to the issue. MotherJones reported, "The Boston Herald has been going after Warren for identifying herself as 'Native American'. . ."
Nor was this merely a local spat. On the national scene, the issue was covered by:
The NYT, noting, "The still-simmering controversy over Ms. Warren’s self-proclaimed American Indian heritage has chased her from the campaign trail in Massachusetts to the convention hall, resonating with a small but vocal constituency: American Indian Democrats."
The CS Monitor, which notes it was a big enough deal that Warren went to the trouble of making a 30-second video to respond.
The Atlantic: "Despite a nearly three week flap over her claim of "being Native American," the progressive consumer advocate has been unable to point to evidence of Native heritage. . ."
And many, many more, virtually the entire MSM.
A review of her book in USN&WR mostly agrees with you, Gandydancer, that the press is giving her a pass on the issue.
"In a new book released today, Massachusetts Democratic senator and potential presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren attempts to rewrite history regarding the controversy surrounding her “Native American” ancestry that emerged in the 2012 Senate campaign. What’s remarkable is that, at least in the initial book reviews, the press largely allows her to get away with it. In fact, it’s virtually ignored that to this day Warren still refuses to release any law school records that may shed light on this controversy."
But just because the furor has died down doesn't mean it wasn't a big deal at the time. It's historical and was important, not trivial. In fact, despite what reviewers highlighted, Warren dealt with it in detail in her book, pp. 235-259, plus copious endnotes.
Perhaps I misunderstand - are you saying that Warren devoted around a third of her chapter on her senate run to covering the Native American controversy? Gandydancer (talk) 20:15, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Where did I say that it was not well-covered during her run? Of course it was. Please read my post again. What I am saying is that if mainstream media has not continued to see the controversy as a major incident, neither should we. The fact that Brian Walsh, a political strategist who wrote an article, says that "the press largely allows her to get away with it" in no way suggests that WP editors, who are supposed to be editing without a biased POV, should decide that, by god, we're going to see to it that she doesn't "get away with it" too. Gandydancer (talk) 20:48, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
You did not say it was not well-covered during her run. You said, "What we really should be arguing about here is whether or not the incident deserves more than a few lines at most, or even that - certainly not an entire section." I argued that yes, it does deserve an entire section. What I should have said--what I meant--was that it deserves its present subsubsection.
You said, "In Warren's most recent book she does not devote more than a mention of this incident." You are mistaken about that, as I point out above.
You said that this article includes "about the same amount as devoted to her entire career." You are very mistaken about that. Excluding titles and footnote numbers, the "Career" section has 545 words; the "Native American controversy" subsubsection has 256. The subsection "2012 election" has 468 words besides the subsubsection on the controversy. For clarity: by "section" I mean a title set off with double ==. "Subsection" is set off with 3 ===. "Subsubsection" is set off with 4 ====. I think the headings as used in the article give proper weight to aspects of Warren's life.
I would not support trimming the subsubsection on the Native American controversry to less than 150 words.
I am not the least bit partisan; I have no agenda of not letting her "get away with it." I quoted Walsh simply to show some support for your assertion that the MSM has largely ignored that part of her book in their reviews. What I won't meekly abide is throwing history down the memory hole. Yopienso (talk) 21:37, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
I did not count the words, however the career section and the controversy section both contain the same number of copy lines. Almost identical. Gandydancer (talk) 22:35, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
You're obviously grasping at straws; a simple glance at the page shows the Career section is longer. I copied the mark-up text including refs, links, and titles into Microsoft Office and got almost 3 full pages using Calibri font size 11 with 1-in. margins. Using the same parameters, the controversy section yielded about a 1 3/4 pages. That's misleadingly long because the controversy section is chock full of refs that contain many characters.
A "simple glance" at the article shows me that both sections contain the same number of lines of copy. If there is some sort of "Calibri font size 11 with 1-in. margins" method that I should be using, it is news to me and beyond my level of competence and I will need to ask for assistance in understanding it. Gandydancer (talk) 20:10, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
The material gained very wide national coverage, and as long as we seek NPOV in a section, we should also abide by WP:BLP which states:
If an allegation or incident is noteworthy, relevant, and well documented, it belongs in the article – even if it is negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it. If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out.
In the case at hand the allegations were very widely covered; there are a multitude of third party sources; and the material is not on the level of rumour or the like but is "well documented." This has nothing to do with liking or disliking Warren, but with abiding by policy. Collect (talk) 22:14, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Thank you, Collect; in this case the subject addressed the incident head-on in speeches, interviews, a brief video at the time, and just now more recently in her book. It's Gandydancer who dislikes mentioning it. Yopienso (talk) 23:03, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Once again, I have not suggested that it was not well-covered during the campaign. Please see my above posts. This is a discussion about the weight of the issue. Gandydancer (talk) 20:24, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
I'm not going to edit war (or even, edit at all). But one thing I don't understand is why the fact that she listed herself as a "racial minority" in an employment directory (used by law schools for recruitment) keeps being removed. This comes from the WaPO RS. She did not list herself as Native American in the law school hiring directory; she listed herself as non-white/a racial minority (her justification for identifying as non-white/a racial minority was that she is Native American). That was the source of the controversy. 159.63.167.133 (talk) 23:21, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
This discussion is about weight. Even at the time of the controversy, polls showed that "the vast majority of voters did not feel it was a significant story", and since that time Warren has frequently been in the news but not once has there been mention of it that I'm aware of (other than as noted above). It is only Misplaced Pages that still believes that it is a significant event to the point that, judging by the amount of copy devoted to it, it is as significant as her entire career history. Gandydancer (talk) 22:28, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Semi-protected edit request on 4 January 2015
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Any persons with Native Ancestry in Oklahoma who belong to any one of the 38 federally recognized tribes can apply for a CDIB card, which processes their birth certificate showing they are at least 1/32 native American.
77unionstation (talk) 23:05, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Cannolis (talk) 00:16, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
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Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Cannolis (talk) 00:16, 5 January 2015 (UTC)