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== Just to clarify. No need to reply ==

Re ‘victim’ in quotes:

<blockquote>Nishandi's perspective is a fringe one that, being so far removed from modern social consensus</blockquote>

As I stated way back, my personal perspective is actually more conservative than the ‘modern social consensus’. I don’t consider sexual relations where there is a large, decade-long gap, proper at all: because in the logic of things, it lends itself to the abuse of power and the erasure of responsibility for the young in the elder person (who function as role models) and can confuse the immature in a period when their psychological formation is labile. Nabokov's ''Lolita'' surely impressed that on my generation. To break a law/taboo, whatever the complicities, can have unforeseen and disastrous results on the naïve underage child, as on the unscrupulous adult.

Secondly, we often confuse ‘modern social consensus’ with Western norms, and one of my consistent points is to make[REDACTED] less prone to ]. Any orientalist like myself would see at sight that this doesn’t hold except by excluding as ‘modern’ China, Japan and South Korea, where the age of consent is 14. But that also holds for many European countries, so in my reading of this brouhaha was tinged with a sense that a certain cultural assumption behind the editorial challenges did not hold.

] states that ‘The ages of consent are currently set between 14 and 18. The vast majority of countries set their ages in the range of 14 to 16; only five countries, Ireland (17), Cyprus (17), Malta (18), Turkey (18) and Vatican (18), do not fit into this pattern. . All other jurisdictions in Europe have an equal and gender-neutral age limit.’ Nawi broke the Israeli statutory terms, and was rightly sentenced for his breach of the code.

In a sane world, these laws would be modified in a way that punished severely any cases where an adult over 5 years older that the minor engaged in such a relationship, even if the relationship were consensual, for the age gap gives a psychological preponderance of power to the older person.
I read the rush of editors to highlight the ‘criminal’ side of Nawi’s life, and accentuate the 1990 case (using the word ‘sodomizing’, for example- we don’t know what kind of behaviour was involved, and only Irish papers out to get at David Norris tended to stress this kind of language) as cued by a political desire to smear him on a ] page, something which, when I first sighted an editor , spurred me to intervene and give the whole record, warts and all. I saw the moralizing triumphalism and political point scoring as also homophobic, since similar abuses, which I duly reminded the talk page of, of the mass rape of Israeli girls or Palestinian boys by Israeli soldiers was never given the huge press exposure, nor the penalties, nor aroused editorial interest.He was targeted by editors for an old crime, which was technically judged ‘consensual’ because of his activism on before of the downtrodden.

People can of course strongly disagree with these several judgements I made at the time. But trying to shift the goalposts to make out I approve of Nawi’s behaviour in that incident jammed serious editing because anything I then added to the article could be reverted at sight by any of several editors with the same POV, on the grounds that, between the lines, I could be ‘read’ as acting as a spokesman for a thoroughly disreputable North American pro-paedophile association. In the latter regard, I appreciate your careful assessment. Regards.] (]) 11:14, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

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The Signpost
15 January 2025


Please comment on Talk:Bernie Sanders

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Bernie Sanders. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Refdesk Purpose

However it was started, the RefDesk is currently advertised as a service to readers.

On the main page of the encyclopedia there is a link to the Reference Desk with the description "Serving as virtual librarians, Misplaced Pages volunteers tackle your questions on a wide range of subjects.". If the Desk was intended exclusively as a service to editors, it would not even be listed on the Main Page.

When you click through to the ref desk you can see a slightly expanded version of that same description. The message is clear: the reference desk is being advertised as analogous to a Library reference desk where people can walk in off the street and ask for help finding answers to obscure questions.

Whether this is a good idea or not is certainly open to debate, but it's not as though answering questions from readers strays from the stated purpose of the RefDesks, or that it's a "dirty little secret" that non-editors use the desks. We tell them to. And we have been telling them to for as long as I can remember.

ApLundell (talk) 07:07, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

Hello, ApLundell I think perhaps you've mistaken the purpose of my comments (and I'll link to the relevant discussion for anyone interested); I really have no objection to anyone seeking insight on the refdesks, and as my comments reflect, I think it's obvious that requests for personal purposes outnumber those which are meant to help augment articles by a significant ratio, and this doesn't stop our answering them, yours truly included. What I do find deeply problematic is that some contributors have taken the unique role on the desks as an indication of the notion (validated nowhere by the community) that they are somehow exempt from the usual rules of the project, WP:NOR and WP:NOTAFORUM especially. Whether we are answering a question for on- or off-wiki purposes or simple edification, our answers, as with any other forward-facing material on Misplaced Pages, must be sourced reliably and not predicated on personal perspectives, speculation, or synthesis. Those of the refdesk regulars who indulge in this kind hubristic indulgence are very few in number, but incredibly and problematically persistent. This is not Reddit, and even on the refdesks we are not here to discuss at speculative length how things might work according to our best guesses. We're meant to be relaying the understanding of topics as represented by reliable sources, whether this be via summary in an article or direct presentation of the reference at the refdesks. Each involves a different methodology for contextualizing that information, but Misplaced Pages is not the place to try to synthesize new knowledge or entertain ourselves with open-forum discussion. There are plenty of places to do that online for those who seek that kind of activity; WP:here we work on an encyclopedia. Snow 08:22, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
Fair enough. I absolutely agree with all that.
I only disagree with the assertion that the RefDesks' purpose is to improve article-space, when it's stated purpose seems to be to provide a secondary service to readers, separate from the article-space. ApLundell (talk) 08:31, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
Well, I'm not sure I entirely share that interpretation; librarians working at conventional RefDesks generally do not spend their time answering the broad questions of those who wish to use the library's resources; rather they help the visitor navigate those resources. More so than that, the RefDesks were definitely meant to assist in the construction of the encyclopedia by helping to drum up and contextualize sources (hence the name); the fact that some regulars have subtly misconstrued that purpose telephone-style, leading to a confusing forward-facing message doesn't really change the fact that the broader Misplaced Pages community never gave them a mandate to do any more. But those are all very minor differences of opinion, as far as I see it. As a practical matter, I am happy to answer any inquiry (which I know I can reference) and rarely care to look into whether that answer benefits content in articles-space (or any other area of the project), though I sometimes take the initiative in doing so myself, after a question reveals an article that could use some augmentation. The most important thing to me is simply that answers be predicated on reliable sources, employ no original research or speculation, and just generally are neutral and do not to any significant extent involve our own ideas. Snow 08:46, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
(Preface : I don't know why I'm arguing this. I'm just intrigued by the received knowledge that the reference desk is for finding sources that can later be placed in articles. Having researched it, I felt the need to share.)
I've heard people say that the refdesk is intended for the upkeep of the article space, but I'm not sure I've ever seen evidence that that isn't the game of telephone. So I've researched it a bit.
I can't find any discussion leading to the creation of the desks. That's either lost in the spotty archives of that old system, or was decided on IRC and not on wiki.
The early refdesk has since been renamed to the misc desk. Archives go back to October 2001, which seems to be a few months after the desk's creation. Interestingly at this time, the ref desk was already described as a service to readers, but the clear intent was that the questions would prompt the creation of new articles. (After all, who would ask a question if there was already an article! Ha ha. Simpler times!) This is the closest historical events I can find to the story that the RefDesk was created to find references to put in articles. It's actually more to find topics for articles! Interestingly, many of the articles created or updated by this process are unreferenced. I guess the RefDeskers were answering off the top of their heads even then?
This way of creating articles caused some weird oddities, like how the copraphagia article started off being entirely about dogs. Not because dogs are particularly copraphagic, but because the question-asker had asked specifically about dogs, and it was considered good form to answer a question by creating a new article. Although I shouldn't be too critical, a lot of the articles from that era were weirdly written. (At least that one is well referenced.)
What's interesting about this 2001 version of the ref desk is that there's almost no back and forth discussion. If you're lucky, one person would answer and then that's it. If the answer is incomplete or wrong, tough luck. Nobody touches the question once it's been answered once.
By early 2006 the Refdesk has transitioned to more or less what we know now. That's when the Main Page of the entire project started linking to the desks ("Serving as virtual librarians, Misplaced Pages volunteers tackle your questions on a wide range of subjects.") and the first version of the RefDesk guidelines was agreed upon. That first version of the guidelines wouldn't even mention improving the article space! Though they were soon edited to point out that questions could indicate areas where "Misplaced Pages lacks coverage".
In summary, it seems like the RefDesks have always been an odd duck that is billed as a service to readers, and provides little service to article-space, except as a way of pointing out missing articles. (And by the time there was any serious volume of questions, Misplaced Pages was already well on its way to having the remarkable coverage it's so famous for.)
Having spent far too much time researching this, I'm not even sure what conclusions can be drawn from it. But I found it interesting regardless. ApLundell (talk) 12:29, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
I think it's very interesting as well, and I appreciate the effort you've gone through to identify the trends here. I think it's worth remembering that the Reference Desks go back nearly to the genesis of the project and that some of the lack of conformity of those operating in that space with basic community guidelines can be explained as a historical issue--rather than a conscious decision to avoid comporting to community standards. I would add only the caveat that, having evolved in the larger context of the project, not all discussions about how the desks should operate necessarily took place in that space; indeed, many central and landmark community decisions which should govern the way editors behave with regard to the issues at hand may not even explicitly reference the desks at all, despite their relevance to all community spaces--I think I'm probably preaching to the choir on that point, but it's worth saying outright all the same.
One thing that I think is hilighted by the links and points you raise here is that the RefDesk guidelines have just not been kept up very well with regard to the general Misplaced Pages procedure and community consensus that evolved around them. As our process and values became more and more clear and precise, it sufficed for most RefDeks regulars to know that the desks had to obey community standards; they avoided behaving like they were on an open forum and kept the process of supplying and contextualizing sources free of original research and speculation. They didn't see the need to mark these responsibilities in the desk guidelines because they knew it could lead to a lot of micromanagement and extra work, and they trusted they could walk that line in a way with comported with both the needs of the desks and Misplaced Pages's content/procedural standards.
Unfortunately, in the absence of explicit guidelines, a handful of regulars (perhaps as a consequence of not really understanding the broader community standards and process; it may not be coincidence that some of these regulars do not contribute to the project outside the desks at all) have shown an utter lack of restraint and deep confusion about what separates the reference desks from any random open forum in which they can indulge in boundless discussion for it's own sake, often further complicated be delusions that they are capable of answering just simply any question with some degree of expertise, leading to answers that are not just original research, but often guesswork which is just demonstrably incorrect and misleading. Certainly I wish we could all be mature about this issue, and answer only questions which we know we can source without synthesis, but the persistent inability of some contributors to self-regulate in this regard makes it clear that we are years past the point where firmer guidelines (and maybe even broader community oversight) are a necessity. Snow 23:48, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 03 February 2016

Just to clarify. No need to reply

Re ‘victim’ in quotes:

Nishandi's perspective is a fringe one that, being so far removed from modern social consensus

As I stated way back, my personal perspective is actually more conservative than the ‘modern social consensus’. I don’t consider sexual relations where there is a large, decade-long gap, proper at all: because in the logic of things, it lends itself to the abuse of power and the erasure of responsibility for the young in the elder person (who function as role models) and can confuse the immature in a period when their psychological formation is labile. Nabokov's Lolita surely impressed that on my generation. To break a law/taboo, whatever the complicities, can have unforeseen and disastrous results on the naïve underage child, as on the unscrupulous adult.

Secondly, we often confuse ‘modern social consensus’ with Western norms, and one of my consistent points is to make[REDACTED] less prone to WP:Systemic bias. Any orientalist like myself would see at sight that this doesn’t hold except by excluding as ‘modern’ China, Japan and South Korea, where the age of consent is 14. But that also holds for many European countries, so in my reading of this brouhaha was tinged with a sense that a certain cultural assumption behind the editorial challenges did not hold.

Ages of consent in Europe states that ‘The ages of consent are currently set between 14 and 18. The vast majority of countries set their ages in the range of 14 to 16; only five countries, Ireland (17), Cyprus (17), Malta (18), Turkey (18) and Vatican (18), do not fit into this pattern. . All other jurisdictions in Europe have an equal and gender-neutral age limit.’ Nawi broke the Israeli statutory terms, and was rightly sentenced for his breach of the code.

In a sane world, these laws would be modified in a way that punished severely any cases where an adult over 5 years older that the minor engaged in such a relationship, even if the relationship were consensual, for the age gap gives a psychological preponderance of power to the older person. I read the rush of editors to highlight the ‘criminal’ side of Nawi’s life, and accentuate the 1990 case (using the word ‘sodomizing’, for example- we don’t know what kind of behaviour was involved, and only Irish papers out to get at David Norris tended to stress this kind of language) as cued by a political desire to smear him on a WP:BLP page, something which, when I first sighted an editor concentrating on, spurred me to intervene and give the whole record, warts and all. I saw the moralizing triumphalism and political point scoring as also homophobic, since similar abuses, which I duly reminded the talk page of, of the mass rape of Israeli girls or Palestinian boys by Israeli soldiers was never given the huge press exposure, nor the penalties, nor aroused editorial interest.He was targeted by editors for an old crime, which was technically judged ‘consensual’ because of his activism on before of the downtrodden.

People can of course strongly disagree with these several judgements I made at the time. But trying to shift the goalposts to make out I approve of Nawi’s behaviour in that incident jammed serious editing because anything I then added to the article could be reverted at sight by any of several editors with the same POV, on the grounds that, between the lines, I could be ‘read’ as acting as a spokesman for a thoroughly disreputable North American pro-paedophile association. In the latter regard, I appreciate your careful assessment. Regards.Nishidani (talk) 11:14, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

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