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This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (policy). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.

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Special allowance of non-free lyrics on National Anthems

Hello. I've raised the question at the non-free content talk page regarding whether consensus exists to allow an exception to our prohibition against including the complete or extensive quotation of the lyrics of non-free songs in the case of national anthems. Guidance on this is currently somewhat contradictory. If you have an opinion on the matter, your feedback there would be welcome! --Moonriddengirl ^(talk)

Well, perhaps you could begin by saying why an encyclopaedia needs to include the full text to a national anthem? Djonesuk (talk) 00:13, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

Moonriddengirl, who is one of our best and most active editors in cleaning up copyright problems on wiki, has not expressed any opinion about whether it is either necessary or desirable. She is only trying to get clear guidance to prevent copyright violations. If you have an opinion on the subject, or any knowledge about it, then you should join the conversation over there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:18, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Labeling sources

It's common practice, on and off WP, to attribute certain positions to sources when necessary for context. For example, we talk about white nationalist author Jared Taylor, and about a study from the right-leaning Heritage Foundation think tank.

In some cases, though, such labels are inappropriate. They may give the impression of false balance, as in round-earth geologists for mainstream geologists, or simply not reflect the balance of sources, as Former U.S. President and alleged draft dodger George W. Bush.

I was recently in a discussion in which editors disagreed on whether such labels were appropriate in a particular context. One position held that, when sources make their politics explicit—as when a pair of sociologists writing about veganism state, "Our discourse analysis is informed by an animal rights perspective that acknowledges that nonhuman animals are fellow sentient individuals who deserve to be valued inherently rather than instrumentally as tools/property,"—we should never cite that source without labeling the authors "animal rights advocates". Others held that such labels inappropriately otherized the researchers and were unfair to the source, especially if the source is only used lightly.

The only policy I've found on this is WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV, which seems to be mostly a mere restatement of WP:SUBJECTIVE: don't say that Derek Jeter is the best ballplayer, say that Joe Torre, who ought to know, thinks so. That doesn't really solve the problem, since it only applies to "biased statements of opinion", and the discussion was about more substantive material.

Am I missing a guideline here, or do we need a new one? FourViolas (talk) 16:23, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE. If such a label is used to give/justify a source excessive weight in an article it can violate this principle. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 16:37, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

The problem was in the opposite direction—several sources in the article called themselves pro-animal rights, none called themselves anti-animal rights, and some editors wanted to label the sources which had labeled themselves. The labels would have served to block the default assumption that the researchers were mainstream within their field, and would therefore have reduced the weight readers who opposed the animal rights movement would have given them. FourViolas (talk) 16:55, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

In the context of a topic article about the source, it's entirely appropriate to give the view of other publications on the topic (e.g. that Heritage Foundation publishes conservative viewpoints on its research). By the same token, in the context of an article far-removed from politics, it would be entirely inappropriate. The middle lies on a spectrum and relies on local consensus probably, but should probably favor not using the descriptors. (It's not uncommon for monographs of a particular subject ["abortion" or general "public policy in the US" for example] to note whether a particular viewpoint is coming from a source with a particular bias.)

This can also be handled separately within say a section by organizing the section in a fashion which groups related viewpoints together, which avoids the use of words which may be associated with WP:Words to watch. (It introduces the separate potential issue of a broader failure of an article/section to meet WP:NPOV.) --Izno (talk) 17:16, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

3RR vs protecting the article

Although this is a question about 3RR, and does not involve a policy change proposal (necessarily), this seems like a more suitable venue than WP:ANEW.

I'm turning myself in on a severe 3RR violation. By my count I have performed eight (8) reverts at Death of Sandra Bland in the past 24 hours. I wasn't even thinking about 3RR, and it didn't occur to me until just now.

The article is a controversial current event topic and has suffered the usual traffic of POV drive-bys, mostly IPs with very little history, but not frequent enough to justify semi-protection. Of those eight reverts I would count only one as clear vandalism, and the rest are just people who don't know Thing 1 about editing and are making edits that are very POV or otherwise unacceptable and unsalvageable. None of the reverts were against any of the experienced regulars at that article.

If 3RR is in fact a bright line, I did four too many reverts and anyone could take me to WP:ANEW at any time. My question is what I should have done instead; there was no one else around to help. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:17, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Well, Doug Weller semi'd the article soon after I posted this, so apparently I was wrong about that not being justified. I guess the moral is: If you can't protect the article without violating 3RR, visit WP:RFPP, full stop. While waiting for the protection, allow bad edits to continue. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:52, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Not at all. Death of Sandra Bland is one of those articles which certainly falls under WP:BLP by way of WP:BDP, and the sorts of reverts you described are exempted from WP:3RR by way of WP:BLPREMOVE. So carry on, and well done. Going to WP:RFPP is also a good idea in those cases. Ivanvector 🍁 (talk) 18:04, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

There should probably be something in WP:3RRNO for test edits or maybe even something about Today's Popular Article; I'll also note item 7 therein regarding BLPs. The majority of reverts you made seem to count under item 7 as I count more than one instance of clear vandalism. WP:IAR is still a thing. WP:ANI might be better for the future for self-reporting since it allows for more nuance in discussion than the templatey-nature of AN3. --Izno (talk) 18:09, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

But yes, RFPP is definitely a place to head when you are having trouble holding the fort yourself. --Izno (talk) 18:10, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

If you think you have an emergency on a highly visible article, try to find an admin by displaying the deletion log and get the name of one or two admins currently active. EdJohnston (talk) 18:20, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

WP:3RR is only a problem here because reverting "the same or different" material is considered a problem. So one editor changes "March" to "June", and you (correctly) revert the introduction of this factual error. Then another removes sourced information about her history with traffic stops, and you revert it. And a third says that she was murdered, rather than merely died, and you revert it. And that's "three" under the modern wording of 3RR, even though nobody could possibly claim that this scenario is what we were thinking about when we said "no edit warring". IMO 3RR is poorly written. Also, I have no hope of it being improved. We haven't even been able to get a clear statement that "reverting" actually involves undoing someone else's intended result, and that, say, expanding on their idea or fixing their typos is absolutely, categorically not a reversion under any circumstances.

(BTW, I could two clear instances of vandalism; I count the libelous statement that she was doing illegal drugs in jail as plain vandalism.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

How many people are needed for consensus?

There was a suggestion to merge the two pages jumpsuit and boilersuit. Two users supported the idea, none was against. Now, the merge template has been removed without any merge being made, because there was "no consensus". How many users are needed to form a valid consensus? Snowsuit Wearer (talk|contribs) 00:37, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Three for (including Snowsuit Wearer) and none against is sufficient for consensus. Oknazevad was mistaken in referring to the proposal as "no consensus" rather than the request simply being stale. It just needs someone to merge the content and make one page a redirect to the other. —sroc 💬 15:07, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

There is no magic number or percentage. Consensus is not a vote... consensus is a discussion. Consensus is not achieved by just counting heads... consensus is achieved by evaluating what those heads say. A few naysayers who make sound arguments (arguments backed by a well reasoned analysis of of our policies and guidelines) can "out weigh" a whole bunch of supporters who don't (and vice-verse). Blueboar (talk) 16:46, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

I go into a lot of detail on this issue in my essay at WP:1AM. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:25, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

Guy... Just so you know, I love your essay... but don't like the short cut "WP:1AM"... every time I see it, I expect to be directed an essay advising people not to edit at 1:00 AM (when they are either tired or drunk). Just saying :>) Blueboar (talk) 00:48, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
Me, too. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:13, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Me either. Might I suggest a better shortcut would be WP:1vM or WP:1vsM?... --IJBall (contribs • talk) 07:12, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I just created a new shortcut. The shortcuts are currently WP:1AM, WP:1vM, and WP:ONEAGAINSTMANY. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:41, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Template to help keep !vote sections cleaner

For everyone's enjoyment, I hope, I present Template:Rationale discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  20:43, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Expanding notability policy to cover judges

Please see WT:Notability (people)#Proposed addition to WP:Notability (people)#Politicians. North of Eden (talk) 19:03, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Protected Class and non choice characteristic defined groups

See also: Wikipedia talk:Harassment § Sexual harassment policy

Protected Class and non choice characteristic defined groups may need greater policy support within Wikipedia content creation. Protected class is a legal definition which informs Wikimedia wide policy WP:NDP. Not all Protected classes are non choice defined groups, non choice classes include gender, race and disability, where a characteristic places an individual in a group beyond any consideration of personal choice. It is notable that WP:BIO would provide significant protection for an individual where content dealt with an issue realted to their belonging to a Protected Class, including any non choice characteristic defined group. By comparison unnamed people who are accorded membership of a non choice characteristic defined group receive no such protection despite the fact that this may allow aspersions to be cast on the group as a whole. Sources, through use of poorly defined collectivising terms such as “community” can present a story in which a whole category of people is presented as harbouring or supporting extremists or persons comitting or intending criminal acts. WP:LABEL offers some guidance, but unless a specific term is used it may not apply and WP:WEASEL provides that: “a reliable source may use similar expressions if they accurately represent the opinions of the source.” Thus while Wikimedia has protective policies on groups of people WP:NDP, and Wikipedia has protection for individuals WP:BIO as well as policies that in some part protect oppressed groups– there exists gaps in which Wikipedia content allows the collective impugning non choice defined groups. For an example see discussion at: [[1]]

Resolving this apparent lack in Wikipedia policy might perhaps be achieved by extending the relevant parts of WP:BIO to non choice characteristic defined groups. There are good reasons not apply this extension to, for example religion which although it is a Protected class, must be assumed to attach a large measure of personal choice to an individual, it would also not apply to named organisations per WP:BLPGROUP. The problem overall may be assumed to be small, however as things stand there does exist the capacity for Wikipedia to act as a propagator of discrimination on the basis gender, race, disability and illhealth with its process of content generation. --In Vitro Infidelium (talk) 11:38, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

The classifications to which WP:NDP applies have virtually nothing to do with "non choice characteristic defined groups". I cannot make sense out of this, so I cannot comment on whether this might lead to a reasonable proposal. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:18, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

To repeat from above - "non choice classes include gender, race and disability, where a characteristic places an individual in a group beyond any consideration of personal choice." Gender, Race and Disability are all covered by WP:NDP. None of us can chooose, at least not at birth, our gender or race and few people would regard disability in whether acquired childhood or aduthood as a 'choice'. What matters in policy terms is whether the protections of WP:NDP, together with WP:BIO should have some application to WP content which deals with members of non choice classes, where content may otherwise promote discrimination against such a class, both individually and collectively. This is surely not a difficult to grasp concept ? --In Vitro Infidelium (talk) 13:41, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Thinking over Jewishness, Apostasy in Islam, neurodiversity, autogynephilia, paraphilia, Rachel Dolezal, race, etc... I foresee absolutely massive shitstorms being the result of defining official policy on whether different group identifications are voluntary or not. Rhoark (talk) 16:45, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Wikimedia's nonsdiscrimination policy has nothing whatsoever to do with the content of Wikipedia articles. It's talking about the conduct of the Foundation, whom they hire and so on. The protected class notion is specifically from United States law (of special relevance to WP because of the location of most of the servers), but US law has the First Amendment, which protects content. So there is no legal issue related to "protected classes", and the remaining points have to do with WMF policy, which In Vitro Infidelium has misinterpreted. --Trovatore (talk) 17:05, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Yep. WMF policy is not about WP article content, with is determined by reliable sources (and where malfeasance in editing makes that temporarily untrue we already have policies that steer the community to fixing those cases).  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:16, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

• Note: This thread overlaps with #Adoption of a non-discrimination policy, below.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:16, 16 July 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose: Thought this over (in relation to the related thread and the "essay"/debate page it's spawned). I have to occur with Arthur Rubin that isn't really cogent, and with Rhoark that this is a "shitstorm" factory (even aside from the fact that WP editor interaction has nothing to do with WMF's internal employee policies). The entire notion that all innate qualifies of someone are somehow special and immune to criticism is a non-starter. Lots of people appear to be congenitally stupid or douchebaggy, but this doesn't even anyone a magical right to be moron or flaming jerk as an editor, nor to have articles about them stripped of RS'able coverage of their encyclopedically relevant blunders or asshattery. Some legal systems, and some international accords of varying levels of ratification (and near-zero enforcement) treat certain characteristics (sex, ethnicity, etc.) as thing to not persecute people for. But WP has a far broader set of policies against persecuting people. Finally, the bureaucratic/legal concept of "protected class with non-choice characteristics" simply isn't relevant to WP, within with bounds of legal expression (i.e. short of libel, incitement, privacy law violations, etc.) There is no "lack in Wikipedia policy" to "resolve" here. That someone thinks there's an "apparent" one is an individual perception problem.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  04:15, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose. I am an avid supporter of civil rights and applaud efforts to explicitly prohibit sexual harassment, but this reaches the level of WP:CREEP. There is a degree of anonymity associated with editing on Wikipedia that differentiates it from a physical-world community, and which largely invalidates concerns about protected-class discrimination. North of Eden (talk) 01:12, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose per the last sentence of North of Eden's rationale. Not much I care to add to that at this time.—Godsy^(TALK_CONT) 07:07, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Requesting closing statements for archived discussions

Un Archived SPACKlick (talk) 13:44, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

MOS:IDENTITY clarification

The following discussion 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.

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As is to be expected, there's some issues brought up at Talk:Caitlyn Jenner on how to handle certain aspects of self-identity in Wikipedia articles. MOS:IDENTITY clearly indicates that in issues of self-identified gender, Wikipedia defaults to the most recently expressed wishes of the subject of the article. The question is, to what extent does MOS:IDENTITY apply. Does it apply only to the article about the subject, or does it apply Wikipedia wide, to every article, and in every context. The specific question came up with how to identify Ms. Jenner in regards to her participation at the 1976 Summer Olympics, she identified at that time as a male. We know that in the article about her, we use her preferred name and female pronouns throughout. The reasonable question becomes, in articles where the time period in question does not include the phases of her life where she self-identified as female, do we use her current identity or her historic identity? To put this up to a !vote:

Option 1)

• In articles outside of the biography itself, the timeframe of which only covers the period when the person self-identified as one gender, with a particular name, default to the historic name and gender

Option 2)

• In every article across Wikipedia, all mentions of the transgendered person should use their current name and gender identity.

I don't really have a horse in the race, but I wanted to see what the consensus was, so it could be clarified in the relevant guidelines and policies. --Jayron32 02:35, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

This RfC illustrates recent consensus (or lack thereof) about MOS:IDENTITY, it's worth giving a look. Diego (talk) 12:24, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Adding a third and fourth option per suggestions in the general discussion below. They seem to be a viable compromises between options 1 and 2 above.

Option 3)

• In articles outside of the biography itself, use the person's chosen name, but include previous name in parentheses if directly relevant or when discussing events for which the person was notable and known by their previous name (e.g., athletic awards) prior to name change. Example, in a list of Olympic gold medalists, the entry Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce Jenner) would be used.

Option 4)

• In articles outside of the biography itself, use the person's previous name, but include current name in parentheses. Would be used when previous name is relevant or listed in a historical context (e.g., list of sports awards). Example, in a list of Olympic gold medalists, the entry Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner) would be used. (3 and 4 added by EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 20:32, 2 June 2015 (UTC))

Sorry for coming a bit late to this party but I added a fifth option down below:

Option 5)

• #Option 5 (no new rule, treat on a case by case base): avoid a "one size fits all" solution for the subsidiary, event and overview pages mentioning the person exclusively in an earlier period: approach these in a case-by-case logic, exerting caution, good taste, editor discretion – for clarity: without amending or cutting back any of the existing rules like MOS:IDENTITY that seem to work fine in the surroundings for which they were devised. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:39, 10 June 2015 (UTC); updated for clarity 08:03, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Option 1 (preserve historic gender)

1. Support - Thanks for starting this! I support this for historic purposes, such as athletic accomplishments, as well as for past relationships that are over (Kris Jenner was married to Bruce Jenner; she was not married to Caitlyn); but not for continuing relationships (ie Brody Jenner's parents are Caitlyn Jenner and Linda Thompson) —Мандичка^YO 😜 02:55, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   To add on to Wikimandia (—МандичкаYO)'s point, something definitely needs to be done regarding the marriage aspect; see this edit, where Andreas11213 understandably stated, "This implies that she was in a lesbian relationship when she was in fact not. She was married to Bruce Jenner not Caitlyn Jenner." Flyer22 (talk) 04:48, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   The major factor to consider with these other articles is that, as we do our best to get it right with Caitlyn Jenner, we must also get it right with Kris Jenner as this is also a WP:BLP. So on Kris Jenner's article, it would not be particularly fair or accurate to say her wife for 20 years was Caitlyn Jenner. That would be very misleading in a biography about her, because yes it does imply she was a lesbian, or she that knew Bruce identified as Caitlyn even though she claims she didn't, or any of of the complicated things that we have no business trying to work around. —Мандичка^YO 😜 05:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   @Wikimandia: Kris Jenner's page would state that she was married to Caitlyn Jenner while she was living as a man. Ogress _smash! 22:02, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   That would be incorrect. It would also be incorrect to list "Caitlyn Jenner" as Brody's father. Kris and Brody might not support the use of female pronouns or "Caitlyn" to describe their husband/father respectively. There is no reason to favor Caitlyn Jenner's transition name and gender over the historical name and gender that they presented to other living people or where historical events make the name and gender relevant such as the winner of the Men's Decathlon and credits in movies long since finished. --DHeyward (talk) 10:52, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

2. In general support but there are complications. Jenner's interview mentions being dressed in women's underclothes in the past when presenting as a male publicly, so there is the issue of what gender they considered themselves at what times. Gaijin42 (talk) 03:28, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Not really. We only deal with the public aspect that is covered by reliable sources. Most likely she identified as female from very early in her life and I've not seen anything mentioning a fluid gender where she identified differently. Regardless of what underpants she wore, she was publicly male, won the Men's Decathlon, played multiple male roles in media, fathered multiple children, etc, etc. Whether she wears boxers or briefs or can still pee while standing up is not relevant to historical and public facts. Nor is it relevant to current events where she identifies as female and her name is Caitlyn. --DHeyward (talk) 10:39, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

3. Support - I think it would be silly to start listing "Caitlyn" as a medalist in the "Men's" event. Alternatively, in cases where it's ambiguous which is more appropriate, she can be listed as Caitlyn (formerly Bruce) Jenner? Just a thought. -War wizard90 (talk) 04:08, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Not sure where I stand yet, but could it not be listed as Bruce (now Caitlyn) Jenner? Vyselink (talk) 19:46, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   It's called a "redirect". Ogress _smash! 20:50, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

4. Support - It makes no sense to refer to Jenner as a "she" when Jenner was legally a Male. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:4a:101:8610:99fa:284d:2c1d:1380 (talk • contribs)

   'legally' is not the threshold under our policy around biographies of living people. To make it that threshold would be to draw an entirely uneven and artificial line (as well as a tremendously unfair one) Ironholds (talk) 07:26, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Should we base Wikipedia on legal definitions, then? A tremendous number of things would need to change. Also, which legal system did you mean? Ogress _smash! 20:50, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

5. Support - She's drawn her own line of demarcation for us. Before today, his accomplishments were as Bruce Jenner; from today onward, her life is as Caitlyn Jenner. --Drmargi (talk) 04:49, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Did she? Awesome. Just when I thought I couldn't like her more, she does that for us!!! —Мандичка^YO 😜 05:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

6. Support obviously this may not apply to every case, but generally pre-Caitlyn Jenner articles and links should be Bruce Jenner articles, links, or accomplishments. That's what redirects are for. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:19, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
7. Support During the times of his major public appearances, the Olympics (and all of his athletic career) and all of his post athletic movie and TV career, and celebrity existence until 2015, HE was known as Bruce Jenner, performing in male roles and events. To ex-post facto refer to such a notable identity in a new transgendered identity is to go back and rewrite history. That is not wikipedia's role. In fact, we are specifically supposed to follow sources. The reporting of his accomplishments in anything written before 2015 refers to this individual in a male identity. Before we change every record of his appearance before 2015, somebody please show a source contemporary to those activities using the new female name. Its is clearly impossible because the name did not exist publicly until a few days ago, so all of this change to content is unsourced and against key wikipedia policy. That goes the same for any individual undergoing the transgender change. If they have a historical public identity, we should follow that up to the point in time they announced their change. Certainly we can cross link so we can see who they are now, but for example Chaz Bono was seen millions of American television viewers as Chastity. Bradley Manning is the name reported of the individual originally charged with espionage. These situations are confusing enough to follow, obviously beyond the norm. Repeating: To artificially rewrite history, against the reporting of sources is not wikipedia's role. Trackinfo (talk) 05:45, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Neither is deadnaming or denying a BLP's right to self-determination and self-identity, so your emphasis of male pronouns is unnecessary. I'd suggest revisiting it. Ironholds (talk) 07:26, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Support - Agree that it would be entirely confusing to refer to Caitlyn Jenner competing in male sports. Are we to assume that official Olympics records have been updated to change Bruce to Caitlyn? Seems very unlikely to me. I wouldn't see a problem with the form "U.S. track and field athlete Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner) won the gold medal for decathlon, setting a world record of 8,634 points." That form could be mentioned in the guideline, but it should be a tentative mention. It should be clear that the new name may be shown following the then-current name, but that it's local discretion. And that form is much preferable to "Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner)" in a male context.
   Additionally the question of which name to link when both are given is closely related to this question, is almost as important, and probably should be addressed in the guideline as well. "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)" or "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)"? Or, for that matter, "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)"? This will be a battleground issue and will need resolving before long, but I guess we don't need to complicate this discussion further. ―Mandruss ☎ 07:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC) Moved to Option 4. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:12, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

8. Oppose per WP:BLP - The concerns expressed at MOS:IDENTITY apply to all content about the person, not just the biography article, as being the safest with respect to protection of the living person. Talking about "the historic gender" or "historic identity" is one of those misconceptions that the rules in the guideline try to address - gender identity has a biological component, so self-identification is the most reliable source, and in transgender persons often goes all the way to when they presented a different public identity. If the problem is one of using female to someone competing in male disciplines, that can be explained by mentioning the fact that she's a transgender woman - which would be relevant in that context (Transgender in sports is a notable topic). I think using the name used at the time would be OK (in this case Bruce) as it was the name used for registration in the competition, but not using the male pronoun. See Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBT studies/Guidelines and the proposed Wikipedia:Naming conventions (identity)#Sex and sexual identities for criteria commonly used by the LGBT wikiproject. Diego (talk) 09:17, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
9. Support - I also think War wizard90's additional idea is even better, listing in some cases "Caitlyn (formerly Bruce) Jenner". As currently in her article (and infobox) it would seem Caitlyn Jenner was married in a lesbian relationship, which is not the case. --Gonnym (talk) 10:04, 2 June 2015 (UTC) Moved to Option 4. --Gonnym (talk) 09:41, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

   You don't need to repeal MOS:IDENTITY to avoid that problem as this option proposes, just clarify the sentence. Diego (talk) 10:07, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

10. Support using the Caitlyn name in some form in all body-text. For more constrained historical situations (tables, lists, etc) it may be better to use Bruce Jenner with a footnote (or similar) containing the new name and potentially a longer explanation. Stuartyeates (talk) 10:35, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
11. oppose a blanket "preserve historical gender" as a clear conflict of Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Identity. But we do need to be clear about things - a Caitlyn - Kris Jenner marriage would still be illegal in about half the states. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 12:23, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    @TheRedPenOfDoom:: legal standards may not be the best standard to use here, as even the law is not entirely clear on what happens assuming you are just talking about the US. Ogress _smash! 21:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    The legal implications are of a concern to us via BLP - implicating that living people were in a "same sex marriage" when such were illegal in all 50 states. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 22:20, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    No offense, but this seems like concern trolling: how does this affect Wikipedia, exactly? You are suggesting a BLP about a living person can't state they were married and use pronouns because same-sex marriage was illegal? What does that even mean? What concern is that? Ogress _smash! 21:59, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    WP:BLP is quite clear that we do not propagate improper implications about living people. Making claims/implications that someone was in an illegal marriage is one of the many things that we should be quite concerned about. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 16:16, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

12. Support for all historic cases. The person's name at the time of the event is the name that should be used in our articles. ¡Bozzio! 13:24, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
13. Support using historic gender and name in articles talking about past events, although I like the idea of a parenthetical like, "Bruce (now Caitlyn) Jenner." For examples where we already follow this format see Metta World Peace formerly Ron Artest. When discussing his career prior to the name change is is referred to as Artest. After the name change he is referred to as World Peace. We should do the same thing with Jenner. When discussing his previous life and accomplishments, refer to him as a male named Bruce. When discussing her current life and accomplishments, refer to her as a female named Caitlyn. Explain the situation wherever clarification is needed. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 14:57, 2 June 2015 (UTC) (Moving support to Option 4; since that's essentially what I'm arguing here.)~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 18:17, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
14. Support. Kris married, um, the other person when that person went by "Bruce", and they divorced while the other person still went by "Bruce". Kris was never married to the other person when the latter was known as "Caitlyn". To say that Kris married Caitlyn is like saying they are a lesbian couple, which is patently false and thus a BLP violation. Besides, it would be confusing to say, "Caitlyn competed in male sports". It just doesn't happen. Epic Genius (talk) 16:30, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
15. Support. It is way too confusing and contradicts the historic reliable sources otherwise. I'm sure there will be exceptions, but the general rule should be to use the historic gender and name outside of the main bio article when referencing the past. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:50, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
16. Oppose - MOS:IDENTITY is policy and specifies that we use the current gender identity throughout the article. The subject's preference overrides any and all arguments. WP:BLP does not leave us the option to choose this. Skyerise (talk) 16:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    WP:SOURCE is also policy, a policy I would suggest is an even bigger policy. We have a dispute between policies and it should be settled by a discussion, and hey look at this, Here's a discussion. Your policy does not trump seeking a solution. As I suggest elsewhere, nobody can produce a historical source for the names and gender identity that were revealed later. In the case of Jenner, "Bruce" is documented winning the Olympic gold medal, "Bruce" was the celebrity, TV and Movie star. "Bruce" is in the opening credits of the Kardashians. Caitlyn appeared into the public's view of this individual in 2015. If Caitlyn is the chosen identity, it was not revealed to the public until 2015. Until that time, based on sources, we should not go back and rewrite information that is contradictory to the existing sources. To do so would be . . . what's the word? . . . its our favorite word on wikipedia: UNSOURCED. Trackinfo (talk) 08:45, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    Trackinfo, like I noted in the second subsection, MOS:IDENTITY is a guideline; it's not yet policy, and might not be policy in the future. Flyer22 (talk) 01:07, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    I'm not even sure the difference, though Policy sounds more important. Whatever hierarchical level, I have suggested on the Caitlyn Jenner talk page that this MOS needs to be revisited in light of the crazy effect its application is having. Trackinfo (talk) 06:20, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    Trackinfo, WP:Policies and guidelines explains the difference. Flyer22 (talk) 11:15, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    MOS:IDENTITY is NOT policy, it's only a guideline. That's even stated at the top of the page. --AussieLegend (✉) 13:56, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

17. Support for historical events per WP:V. The preponderance of reliable sources would say that Bruce won the decathlon, or married Kris, or won the "Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year", not that Caitlyn did. --Ahecht (TALK
    PAGE) 16:54, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    Note that the concerns of harm towards living people justify the exception to using the common name, as WP:BLP override other policies regarding the amount of detail from sources to use in such cases. Diego (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    For my enlightenment, and possibly that of others, please explain how Ms Jenner will be harmed by our acknowledgement that she won gold in men's Olympics as Bruce, especially if we acknowledge her current name at the same time. Does avoiding harm mean the eradication of any mention that a man named Bruce Jenner ever existed? What policy support exists for that, that doesn't require a ton of subjective interpretation? ―Mandruss ☎ 17:34, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    The problem is not in the verifiable fact that Jenner won the competition under the name of Bruce (nor hiding that fact is mandated by the guideline); the problem is using the male pronouns "he, him" on someone who identifies as a woman. See Wikipedia:Gender identity#Self-identification and Wikipedia:Gender identity#Retroactivity (which explains it better that I could), and the various statements by official psychiatric organizations linked from it. As for whether the person named Bruce Jenner that won the Olympics was a man, that's something to ask miss Jenner herself; common courtesy as well as WP:BLP and WP:NPOV require that we don't assume that she was a man merely because other people said so, nor because she looked like one. Diego (talk) 18:09, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    I don't think it's proper to use pages classified as essays as bases for arguments here. They are someone's opinion and lack community consensus; that's why they're only essays. As for BLP and NPOV, I said "doesn't require a ton of subjective interpretation". You can't just throw policy links around, please point to specific language in either policy that clearly supports your claims. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:16, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    In more ambiguous cases I might agree, but in this case we don't have to ask Ms Jenner now because we know that at the time the person named Bruce Jenner publicly self-identified as male and entered the Olympics as a male. --Ahecht (TALK
    PAGE) 22:14, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

18. Support as a general rule. We shouldn't go back and anachronistically change the maiden name of an athlete to their married name. Nor would we go back and change all mentions of Ron Artest]] to Metta World Peace from the point before he changed his name. The same should be true here. Of course, if the IOC were to go and retroactively change this, then we have an entirely different discussion on our hands. Resolute 17:19, 2 June 2015 (UTC)<

    Strike that, I misread the question. Resolute 17:21, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    Strike my strike. I think it remains relevant. Resolute 20:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

19. Support Jenner should be referred to as "Bruce Jenner" when discussing events that happened before June 1, 2015 and as "Caitlyn Jenner" when discussing events that happened afterwards. It is the same reason we have articles called Fall of Saigon, Battle of Königsberg, and Battle of Stalingrad instead of "Fall of Ho Chi Minh City", "Battle of Kaliningrad", and "Battle of Volgograd". [[[Kris Jenner]] was never married to a woman named Caitlyn, only to a man named Bruce. Bobby Martnen (talk) 17:56, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
20. Support - It was Bruce who won it at the time. It would be confusing to say Caitlyn as it would give the appearance that Caitlyn actually competed and won it. Keep it simple and preserve what has actually happened and move foward from there.AlaskanNativeRU (talk) 19:04, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
21. Support - This seems to be the sensible approach. I can't imagine that other encyclopedias, almanacs, and various information repositories would revise their historical coverage of subjects to align with their current gender identity.- MrX 19:12, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
22. Support - Although I'd be in favor of a clearer proposal, I feel inclined to this proposal on the hand. I think the issue is pretty clear-cut: we should use whichever name juridically in force at any given peculiar moment (e.g .Bruce Jenner in 1976, Caitlyn Jenner in 2015). That's a juridical issue, and we hardly can fight against that.
    

    When it comes to gender, we should distinguish between "gender identity" (subjective experience) and "gender" (an immutable biological component). Once an individual is born male, he will always remain a male. That's also the case with medical records. We can pay homage, however, to the individual's "subjective experience" by respecting and acknowledging one's right to choose his/her name. That's different from the biological gender (he/she), though. Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 19:41, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

    Individual's name is a juridical matter. When it comes to that, I think we should use whichever name in force at the particular moment (e.g. Bruce Jenner in 1976, Caitlyn Jenner in 2015). In technical terms, I think that "gender as a subjective experience" is mostly manifested through the choice of name, and by respecting this right we'll afford dignity towards these individuals the best. Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 15:53, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    Jayaguru-Shishya, perhaps read the Gender, Sex and gender distinction, Third gender, Genderqueer and Gender variance articles and some of their sources; gender is defined in a social context significantly more than it is defined in a biological context, and it commonly is not immutable. Flyer22 (talk) 14:52, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    If I wasn't clear, I generally adhere to the sex and gender distinction, "gender" often means "gender identity," and some transgender people consider being transgender a biological matter while other transgender people don't (or consider it a nature and nurture matter). If you reply to me on this topic, there is no need to WP:Ping me. Flyer22 (talk) 14:58, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Flyer22: Please see my recent post here: [2]. Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 15:33, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    Noted. Flyer22 (talk) 16:00, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    If names are a juridical matter, would you say that Marilyn Monroe be referred to as Norma Jean Mortenson?? --Alison (Crazytales) (talk; edits) 14:15, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    If Norma Jean Mortenson won a gold medal at the 1952 Summer Olympics, the winner's name should not be retroactively changed to "Marilyn Monroe" on Wikipedia to suit fan sensibilities. Same principle. Carrite (talk) 20:19, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    But surely a chart showing gold medalists would be much more informative to the reader if it conveyed that the person they know as Marilyn Monroe was one and the same as the Norma Jean Mortenson who won the medal. Similarly, this list of NBA MVPs relegates to footnotes and links the rather significant fact that the 1970-71 winner, Lew Alcindor, and the 1971-72 winner, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, are in fact the same person. It would give the reader a much more accurate picture of the true history if that were made explicit in the table itself.--Trystan (talk) 03:14, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

23. Oppose in current form. WP:Gender identity explains how names are retroactively changed for trans folks unless the individual specifies otherwise. As mentioned in the discussion below, something like Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner) would be a good compromise as it respects the person's identity while informing readers of the previous name. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 19:50, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
24. Support - It simply makes the most sense and is least likely to cause confusion. Clarity and accuracy should be our primary goal. -R. fiend (talk) 20:21, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
25. Oppose - this is transphobic as heck. I note the arguments in its favor are often, if I may quote above, "gender (an immutable biological component)", which is purely false. Gender is not immutable. Hell, sex isn't immutable. Also note harm and BLP issues. I also note that people who aren't transgender always get their wishes respected without comment, such as with Prince, or, more infamously, Drake Bell, who insists that he's going to keep referring to Caitlyn as "Bruce" - even though his own birth name is actually not Drake, it's Jared, and yet Wikipedia covers both individuals without comment. I could make a HUGE list here of people who use a different name than their birth name: essentially half of everyone famous changed their name. Exceptions to the use of old names, such as winning awards under another name, can be explained easily without insisting articles about Laverne Cox, Janet Mock, Carmen Carrera, Geena Rocero, Isis King, Gisele Alicea, Leyna Ramous, Dina Marie, Nina Poon, Juliana Huxtable, Niki M'nray, Pêche Di, etc. all insist on using male pronouns and names for them. Right now, Laverne Cox's article states she has an identical twin brother: did that make anyone's head explode? Do we need to go in and explain that they used to be identical twins because? NO. It's incredibly disrespectful; I'm actually outraged at the votes for this policy, and it sure doesn't make anything "more encyclopedic". Ogress _smash! 20:48, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
26. Support for sports achievements I think it is more misleading to list medals won etc. as Caitlyn Jenner as opposed to Bruce Jenner. The context of sports is a gender-divided one: nothing can change the fact that Caitlyn Jenner competed in the men's division as a man in her track and field career. Certainly her biography should not refer to her as "he" during this period, as a biography is more of a continuous narrative, rather than the historic one here. I certainly would not consider referring to her as "Bruce Jenner" on Athletics at the 1976 Summer Olympics as offensive without personal statements to the opposite. Probably a more sensitive approach would be to use the name as competed, but avoid the masculine pronoun where possible using a more neutral "Jenner" instead. In the biography I think we should make reference to her having "competed in the men's decathlon", which is a neutral statement of fact that clarifies the gender division yet subtly avoids making any explicit statement about her gender. SFB 21:23, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
27. Support It is misleading to say a female won a male's event in Jenner's case, it is also very confusing at bits for other instances. I feel this should be a case by case basis though. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:00, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
28. Support - . When it comes to name changes, we always take historic context into account. For example, Saint Petersburg (Russia) has undergone multiple name changes... and we (correctly) use the most modern one as the title of our article... HOWEVER we maintain the use of it's historic names when discussing the city in historic contexts (for example, when discussing the city during WWII, we talk about the "Siege of Leningrad"... we don't retro-actively "modernize" the name to: "Siege of St. Petersburg"). I understand the need for sensitivity where gender Identity is concerned, but accuracy in historic context is also important. So... in the Jenner case, I would definitely change the title of the Bio article - but I would allow the use of "Bruce" when talking about her in a historic context (such as her athletic carrier)... I would also use "Bruce" in other articles that mention her in a historic context (such as United States at the 1976 Summer Olympics) I think it would be historically inaccurate to "update" the name in those situations. Blueboar (talk) 13:08, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    I'm sorry but that is such innaposite or poor reasoning that I feel constrained to respond, a living person is not a thing - a city is a thing. This living person known then as X and now Y is not in the least innaccurate. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:00, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    Then let's take the example that is about a living person ... let's look at a woman athlete who, subsequent to her athletic career, changed her name. Look at Karyn Bye-Dietz. The bio article correctly uses her current married name (appropriate because that is her current name) but our article on United States at the 2002 Winter Olympics lists her by her historic name (ie her maiden name) in the team roster for the Woman's Ice Hockey team (appropriate because that was the name she had when she was on the team). In other words, we use historic names of living people when discussing those people in historic contexts. Blueboar (talk) 12:39, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

    That still makes no sense as a blanket rule. When discussing living people, it surely makes no sense to assume by rule they are historic things because they most certainly are not. We just cannot treat the widely commented upon and the not widely commented upon, or the controversial and the uncontroversial, or the usual and the unusual in exactly the same way everywhere, as that's so far from what writing an encyclopedia is about - to reflect the actual complexity of things as much as possible. The desire of some here to put their editing preference in a particular article into a general rule is bad for articles and bad for the encyclopedia. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:18, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

29. Support use of facts at the time rather than preferences afterwards. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
30. Support While a person can change who they are, that does not make the past change. We should describe things as they happened at the time. Chillum 18:10, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
31. Oppose I really don't see why this is necessary, and it seems to me that it basically invalidates people's identities. Cam94509 (talk) 18:28, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
32. Overwhelmingly support – Any other option smacks of pure "historical revisionism". And that's true, whether it's names of people, places, or things. --IJBall (talk) 20:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
33. Strongly oppose. The MOS is clear that whatever identity the person adopts should be used for every phase of their life. The guidelines couldn't be clearer. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:25, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    The guideline says specifically says "pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns". It says nothing about name. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 17:07, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

34. Support: Despite the shortcomings of MOS:IDENTITY, you can't erase the past. Life is a continuum. The Dissident Aggressor 22:13, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
35. Support: With the former name link working as a redirect, this sounds like the most practical option. If the person in question objects, I'd then support option 4. --Waldir ^talk 10:10, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
36. Support. Simply because the other options so poor. Kendall Jenner was not born to Caitlyn Jenner and Kris Jenner, because Caitlyn Jenner did not exist at the time. So Option 2 is historical revisionism and leaves the reader with more unanswered questions than answers. Option 3 is confusing (she was born to Caitlyn and then a second time to Bruce??) and Option 4 seems like a distracting tangent taking the reader off the article topic into someone else's life-story. Caitlyn's identity is fully recognised in her own article, that is her right. But why should anyone have the right to re-write history? --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 17:02, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
37. Support As others have pointed out, it makes very little sense to list Caitlyn as having won a men's event, but there are other issues. One editor is running around changing all instances of "Bruce" to "Caitlyn" citing MOS:IDENTITY (see example). I asked about this at WT:TV and a suggestion was to use "Caitlyn Jenner (credited as Bruce Jenner)". The problem with this is that at the time it was "Bruce Jenner (credited as Bruce Jenner)". Retroactively changing all occurrences of "Bruce" to "Caitlyn" is effectively changing history, like saying that American astronauts planted six international flags of surrender on the moon simply because the stars and stripes have now faded. Jenner has decided to identify as Caitlyn now, but does Caitlyn deny she was ever Bruce? It's fine to use the present name in the BLP but outside, we should be using what is verifiably correct back whenever, especially when it applies to something like 34-year-old episodes when Caitlyn Jenner did not exist. --AussieLegend (✉) 20:55, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
38. Support - Take the activism elsewhere. Records are historic and changing names on them to suit self-righteous sensibilities is anachronistic and makes us look silly, both. Carrite (talk) 00:59, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    Support - past accomplishments were awarded to Bruce Jenner. It makes the most sense to keep those events surrounding Bruce Jenner with Bruce Jenner's name. We can redirect to Caitlyn Jenner. Inks.LWC (talk) 04:12, 5 June 2015 (UTC) Apparently I !voted twice (I guess I forgot I came here the first time). My second !vote was lengthier and sums up my thoughts better than this one; I have kept that support !vote below, unstruck. Inks.LWC (talk) 02:01, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

39. Oppose - A trans person on here will have being trans associated with their past. It makes no sense deny a trans person's identity across their entire past until they come out. It's a serious breach of respect. Gwenhope (talk) 07:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
40. Oppose - It's important to note that most often, a subject will be referred to with their surname as pretext for a sentence. And on the issue of pronouns, only confusion and inconsistency comes from mixing it up. Wikipedia should be easily read and understood. These things can be dealt with in the lead. Cognissonance (talk) 10:56, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
41. Support Historical accomplishments should be attributed to the name in the historical records, that is what is verifiable. This is not just for this specific case but for all cases. We should not be rewriting history, but reporting things as they happened. -- GB fan 11:53, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    So basically you are saying that transgender people have no right to be credited by current name for their past accomplishments? They are to be ghettoized and have their accomplishments stripped from them simply because they changed their gender? Perhaps we should do the same to people who convert to Judaism. Or for black people. huh? Skyerise (talk) 12:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    No I am not saying that transgender people should have their accomplishments stripped from them. Their accomplishments are their accomplishments no matter what their current name. Their previous name should be retained for their previous accomplishments and their new name should be for all new accomplishments, that is what the reliable sources say and so should we. The same should be done for people who convert to a different religion. Let's say a Catholic priest converted to Judaism, we wouldn't say he was a Jew when he was a catholic priest. As far as black people, no one changes their ethnicity/color of their skin so I do not know what that has to do with this conversation at all. -- GB fan 12:27, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    So I'm sure you've taken the time to look into this deeply, read the psychological studies about the emotional harm and suffering that transgender people go through and which continues after transition when people insist on using their "real" name, and that because of this most major style guides have decided that they should always be referred to by their new name. And yes, to a lesser degree, we should respect anybody's name change. All it takes is an additional citation. But I guess that's too much work for you to respect people's current identities. Skyerise (talk) 13:14, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    I completely respect everyone's current identity, just like I completely respect their historical identity. -- GB fan 13:48, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

42. Oppose this retrograde nonsense. Protonk (talk) 13:06, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
43. Oppose. Protonk captures my feelings well (although I'd probably add more frustrated monosyllabic noises). Ironholds (talk) 13:26, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
44. Strongest possible oppose. Per Protonk and the current MOS:IDENTITY. This doesn't "clarify" MOS:IDENTITY, it regresses it. --Alison (Crazytales) (talk; edits) 14:15, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
45. Support. Seems to me the difficulties encountered in Caitlyn Jenner point to serious problems with MOS:IDENTITY. In both Jenner's Olympic record and marriages, the encyclopedic narrative gets blurred. There's no perfect answer here: we are bumping into the limitations of the language. But I think that, as a general rule, staying with the historical gender allows Wikipedia to be more faithful to the contemporary references we rely on. Barte (talk) 16:00, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    Oh yeah, it's way too difficult to add a second reference for the name change. Sorry to put you through so much bother to be respectful to other people. Skyerise (talk) 16:02, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    More faithful to the references? Because, what, the reference might have the wrong name? Like we had this conversation for Prince. Ironholds (talk) 16:36, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

46. Support per the several comments above of Wikimandia, War Wizard90, Fyunck, Trackinfo and MrX: this is a simple matter of historical accuracy. Retroactively renaming/regendering a person who has lived, worked and competed as a man for 65 years -- and for 40 of those years as a very prominent public figure -- is the worst kind of historical revisionism, and begins to take on unintended comical aspects when we attempt to re-write history based on an ideologically-driven public awareness campaign. I am all for acknowledging the present reality of Jenner's gender identity with a measure of compassion and sensitivity, but we must also acknowledge the historical reality that existed for most of the last 65 years. Doing otherwise is simply not factually accurate, and the idea of rewriting Wikipedia sports articles to suggest that Caitlyn Jenner won the Olympic gold medal in the men 's decathlon in 1976 is nothing less than bizarre. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:56, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
47. Support. We really can't say Caitlyn competed in the men's decathlon or that she was married to Kris Jenner, because both are false. But than again, I'm a male sports fan. Calidum T|C 17:23, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Calidum: Please explain in what way they are false. Are you saying that Bruce and Caitlyn are not the same person? A person won a decathlon and a person married. "Caitlyn Jenner" is a name that references that person and, at least on Wikipedia, is unique. So yes, the individual now named Caitlyn, the same individual, did those things. Why would a name be more important than personhood? Skyerise (talk) 20:29, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

48. Support I'm afraid that many editors care more about a specific POV and are using this issue as a means of advocacy. What is important is to write articles that are sourced and readable. Using a specific gender thoughtful articles to please activists is a disservice to the reader. Taking into account the timeline of transition (which this option does) is the only way to not confuse the reader. If the activists are offended by this, well tough shit.69.143.188.200 (talk) 19:16, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    If you think our readers are genuinely so incapable of thought that they couldn't understand the very rudimentary elements of gender transitions, it's you doing the disservice. People seem to be talking a lot about how this is "POV activism": if treating our subjects with human decency and respect is "POV", something is very wrong with what we consider neutrality. Ironholds (talk) 15:31, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

49. ***If you think the jarring pronoun usage employed in this article is comprehensible, then you should find a new hobby as you're a detriment to the project. 69.143.188.200 (talk) 22:24, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
50. Support - either this or option 3 (I think the person's chosen name and gender should be used, but possibly, in very unusual cases - such as in the case of winning an Olympic medal - the previous name can be denoted. TMagen (talk) 16:52, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
51. Support - for historical events. The source for the 1976 Summer Olympics decathalon says "Bruce Jenner", not "Caitlyn Jenner", so to change this from "Bruce" to "Caitlyn" violates WP:V and WP:SYNTHESIS. Until we have a source that says that Caitlyn Jenner won the 1976 decathalon, it is synthesis to take one source that uses Bruce Jenner as the winner and another source that says that Bruce Jenner identifies now as Caitlyn Jenner and then take those two sources to mean that Caitlyn Jenner won the decathalon. Inks.LWC (talk) 18:33, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    The suggestion that changing "Bruce" to "Caitlyn" (or changing other trans peoples' names) violates SYNTH and/or V has been made before, but is controversial and AFAICT not widely-held. Compare our articles on various chemicals, where sources saying "H2SO4" or "sulphuric acid" has a certain property are routinely cited in support of statements that "sulfuric acid has [such-and-such property]". -sche (talk) 20:44, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    I see no issue with SYNTH there, because the article would not be reaching a conclusion not explicitly stated by the sources. In those sources, H2SO4 is the same thing as sulphuric acid. In the articles regarding Jenner's accomplishments, they were written before Jenner identified as Caitlyn. In chemistry articles, H2SO4 was identified as sulphuric acid when the article was written; the same is not true of articles written about Jenner pre-transition. Inks.LWC (talk) 21:41, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

52. Support People in Wikipedia are notable and if there history is covered in Wikipedia it's generally notable and public. Jenner's transition is very public and virtually all of her public life has been portrayed as male to the public. We cannot rewrite history. Jenner's movie and TV credits will not be updated. Jenner was male when competing in the Olympics. There's no indication that Jenner wishes to separate her public life as "Bruce" from her public life as "Caitlyn." Sensitivities to deadnaming may not even be wanted or applicable to Jenner as she has chosen to transition in a very public way and her fame as "Bruce" is certainly a part of the notability of her transition. We should not be scrubbing her history as if being "Bruce" was shameful or hurtful. It is much more confusing to have names that don't match credits in media or history books. --DHeyward (talk) 10:25, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
53. Oppose. This would introduce a practice of misgendering into Wikipedia policy, which would be transphobic. The gender assignment done to a person by anonymous health personnel at their birth is no more valid (but rather less valid) than the gender identity a person chooses for themselves. And I find the term "historical gender" patronising and ridiculous. A transgender person has only one gender and that is the one that they say they have. Using outdated pronouns or names and inventing terms like "historical gender" take away transgender people's right to define themselves. - MellowMurmur (talk | contributions) 20:33, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
54. Mild Support Let's not introduce unnecessary anachronism. I don't see anything transphobic or discriminatory, when talking about past events, about mentioning the persona that the transgender person assumed publicly and socially at the time. It's a whole different matter than in an article where this person is the main topic, as many discussions here have established. Option 4 is descriptive and correct enough though. Place Clichy (talk) 12:09, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
55. Support - Caitlyn Jenner did not exist prior to the publishing of the Vanity Fair article. The former Bruce Jenner article is now correctly titled Caitlyn Jenner, and deals with the subject appropriately. All references in the future should refer to this individual as Caitlyn, and use the appropriate terms her/she, etc. Prior to this year, all references should reflect the accuracy of the history, that Bruce Jenner existed and accomplished those things under that name. I would oppose any of the other 3 alternatives. Onel5969 (talk) 17:42, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

    Caitlyn Jenner has been in existence since October 28, 1949. She went by a different name publicly until a few days ago, but she was still the same continuous person. It is not historically inaccurate to credit the same continuous person under a different name, though per Options 3 and 4, it makes sense to me to include both names for clarity (but only because she was already publicly notable under her previous name). Funcrunch (talk) 20:04, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

56. Support Stick with what the references say and don't try to revise historical info. As for this being "offensive", so what. WP:NOTCENSORED applies here. There is a lot of stuff on wiki that is offensive some group or other, some stuff is personally offensive to me, and we have chosen to ignore those concerns when a valid encyclopedic goal is being met. Geraldo Perez (talk) 22:34, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
57. Support Caitlyn didn't win the decathlon -- Bruce did. It's fine to have a footnote indicating the gender transition and name change, but to suggest that "Caitlyn Jenner" won an Olympic gold medal in 1976 is simply not what happened. I don't see what's so hard about this -- when Caitlyn was Bruce, refer to her as Bruce (that's who she was at the time). To say that Caitlyn won the decathlon is as silly as saying that Bruce is being presented a special Espy for bravery. It's just not how it happened. 173.160.130.14 (talk) 23:37, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
58. Oppose. The other options would be preferable. Weakening MOS:IDENTITY like this opens the door to wikilawyering from trolls who insist on misgendering people. The status quo version has issues, of course, but they can be resolved through options 3 and 4. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 05:24, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
59. Support for sports achievements per the argument made by Sillyfolkboy above. Sideways713 (talk) 10:06, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
60. Support especially for sports achievements, per Knowledgekid87 and SFB (Sillyfolkboy) above. —Wasell^(T) 12:18, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
61. Support for sports achievements Jenner, as a man, won the Olympic medals in the men's category, and in retrospect saying that a woman won those events is historically and factually inaccurate. Randy Kryn 12:32, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
62. Oppose This option, which fails to even acknowledge the name the person has chosen after transitioning, is not consistent with the "high degree of sensitivity" mandated by BLP. Gender identity is a matter where this sensitivity is particularly important, considering the history of discrimination, prejudice and non-recognition that the trans* community has suffered. Neljack (talk) 07:43, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
63. Oppose using only historic name without reference being made to newly chosen designation.

    Where possible also oppose the making of any reference to gender where possible which may raise confusion for readers many of whom will have come to an encyclopedia article on a sporting event so as to read about that sporting event. Why say either she or he when "Jenner" is would be sufficient in most if not all cases. We are dealing with a person here and one who, while identifying as a female, was seemingly comfortable with the use of the male pronoun in the early June interview. GregKaye 14:55, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

64. Oppose using only the historical name; we should use both names. Even aside from the issue of respecting their choice, this could easily cause confusion when eg. someone searches for information about them using their current name. --Aquillion (talk) 07:09, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
65. Support, to preserve the historic record. The name and identity of the person at the time iscussed are simply facts, we must clearly report those. Using both names would be acceptable in some cases. DES ^(talk) 12:02, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
66. Oppose Per BLP and MOS:IDENTITY. Misgendering in general is highly insulting not only to the individual in question but also to all others in similar situations. Further this doesn't seem to match what is done in other cases of name changes based on the comments others have made about Muhammad Ali for example below. PaleAqua (talk) 17:16, 21 June 2015 (UTC)
67. Support to preserve history accurately, and not confuse readers.—Godsy^(TALK_CONT) 03:29, 22 June 2015 (UTC)
68. Support This is an encyclopedia and the facts should be presented accurately. As a reader above mentioned, we wouldn't call the Battle of Stalingrad the "Battle of Volgograd"...we use the historic name. If someone was known as one name for a particular event or at a particular time, that is the name that should be used. AHeneen (talk) 22:04, 22 June 2015 (UTC)
69. Support We should be writing about what actually happened. This is in keeping with the wishes of our current test case, and I don't see how anyone else in such a situation would take offense. DPRoberts534 (talk) 05:28, 28 June 2015 (UTC)
70. Support for historical events. I don't think the question of synthesis has been adequately explored to say that it has been rejected. To avoid questions regarding MOS:IDENTITY, pronouns should be avoided, and the article about the person should generally be under his/her current name (but see Cat Stevens for an exception to the general statement). — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:42, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
71. Support for historical events and other events prior to a name change. The person who won an Olympic medal in 1976 was Bruce Jenner, not Caitlyn Jenner. --Bookworm857158367 (talk) 00:04, 16 July 2015 (UTC)
72. Strong oppose' Routinely we referred to the pre-marriage achievements and awards of women using their married name for everything from high school and college degrees, sports honors and awards, winner of elections. That's because we're writing today about a one person's whole previous life. They're not a different person because they previously used a different name. Personally, I would find it absurd to write a current CV, biological profile, or autobiography where I referred to my early life event using my maiden name and my more recent achievements with my married name. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 02:56, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
73. Support As someone who wishes for an amendment to MOS:IDENTITY preserving the historic gender in the article, I find this proposal very charming.--The Traditionalist (talk) 16:20, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
74. Strong oppose' with only mild support for Option 3. Existing BLP and MOS:IDENTITY cover this situation adequately. Deliberately misgendering in general is insulting not only to the individual in question but also others in similar situations, and to perpetuate calling someone by a former name is just rude. If it is actually relevant, then note the former name/gender. Ashleigh Mitchell 22:42, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Option 2 (use most recent gender across all Wikipedia articles)

1. Support. This is the current consensus per MOS:IDENTITY, which has been thoroughly discused to its current form (search for 'identity' at the MOS archives for many of the arguments held in the Support section which have already been addressed). Diego (talk) 09:17, 2 June 2015 (UTC) - Moved to Option 4. Diego (talk) 13:44, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
2. Oppose. Deal with it on a case-by-case basis. There are many places where MOS:IDENTITY is guaranteed to be confusing. Epic Genius (talk) 16:32, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
3. Support - this is basically policy; MOS:IDENTITY specifies that we use the current gender identity throughout the article. The subject's preference overrides any and all arguments. Skyerise (talk) 16:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Note: MOS:IDENTITY is not yet a policy; it's a guideline. I'm not sure it will be policy in the future. Flyer22 (talk) 14:25, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

4. generally support as current policy. But there are places where the gender change will need to be made clear in articles outside of the subject themselves. the case of the Caitlyn /Bruce - Kris Janner marriage for example. We run into BLP issues from both parties involved. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 19:49, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
5. Support - it's incredibly transphobic not to use the preferred pronouns and name of the individual. No one blinks at calling Prince "Prince". There are only a limited series of spaces where the individual's birth gender or name need be indicated, and those would be specific exceptions. BLP is a big issue here, but it's not the only place it would be an issue. Ogress _smash! 20:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
6. Oppose. Per my comments above, that goes against what the sources said at the time. Going against what is reported in sources is a key wikipedia principle that should not be violated. It is essentially wikipedia rewriting history. Trackinfo (talk) 21:07, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
7. Oppose. Many media houses preserve historic gender and name when discussing a trans person's past. Wikipedia does not need to blaze a new trail in this regard. Binksternet (talk) 23:00, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
8. Oppose. I am with Binksternet on this one, we aren't here to break barriers we are here to write an encyclopedia. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:07, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
9. Support The only situation this causes problems with is when the subject waffles on whether they're transitioning or not, in which case it could turn into a chore constantly updating 'all references' to the subject in every article to be consistent with their current wishes. But I think that would be the exception, and were it to become an issue... WP:IAR. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:27, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
10. Oppose. Links to past articles should remain Bruce, or say Caitlyn, then known as Bruce Jenner. --Frmorrison (talk) 16:53, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
11. Support This is really the only way of looking at this that doesn't wind up being super invalidating, and is in line with previous consensus. Cam94509 (talk) 18:30, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
12. Oppose: Per binksternet. Take your activisim elsewhere. This is an encyclopedia. The Dissident Aggressor 22:13, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
13. Oppose - we shouldn't be re-writing history or using sources that aren't there. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:12, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
14. Oppose - The Decathlon was won by a man named Bruce, the same man who married Kris Jenner. The fact that he wants to be called "Caitlyn" now does not change historical facts. Bobby Martnen (talk) 02:18, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Bobby Martnen, the decathlon was not won by a name, it was won by a person That person is still living and has taken a new name. Are you denying that the person now known as Caitlyn won the decathlon? Are you denying their right to change their name? Or do you think "names" are more important than "persons"? Do you think a person should be denied being properly credited for their past accomplishments just because they changed their name? Or because they changed their gender? Or does the fact that she's now female squick you out and you'd rather not see it in articles you work on? No accusations here, just questions. Skyerise (talk) 19:38, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    the decathlon was not won by a name, it was won by a person More specifically, it was won by a person named Bruce, not by a person named Caitlyn and the name is important. That the person may have changed their name is irrelevant. I doubt Caitlyn Jenner can drive on Bruce Jenner's driver's license or travel on Bruce Jenner's passport and if Caitlyn Jenner was claiming she won the decathlon she'd have to prove that she was Bruce Jenner. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:06, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    Actually it is quite common for trans people to use drivers licenses and passports with their previous names on them for a period of time after beginning to use a new name, as there is a lot of paperwork and time involved; each agency has different requirements. I don't know if Caitlyn has changed any of her identity documents yet. But it hardly seems relevant to the discussion of whether to list her current name in a Wikipedia article that links to her biography which explains her gender transition. Funcrunch (talk) 16:01, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

15. Oppose - An over-the-top, extremist misreading of the MOS suggestions. Carrite (talk) 01:03, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
16. Support and suggest a couple of the people opposing read the discretionary sanctions in this area before hitting "save" again. Ironholds (talk) 01:57, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
17. Oppose - a blanket ban will produce situations where Wikipedia contains nonsensical or misleading statements. --Carnildo (talk) 02:54, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
18. Support - It's an issue of respect and simply that. A trans person's wikipedia article will have their transgender nature included. That clears up all the other issues (such as people listed as X gender having won Y gender's event, etc. etc.) Gwenhope (talk) 07:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
19. Support - MOS:IDENTITY reads like a guideline already grounded on the consideration of gender theory, e.g. just as with sexual orientation, gender identity was developed in the womb separate from the body. One wouldn't postulate that a gay man or woman chose to be this way; they must have always been. It's the same with trans people. As long as we point out the exact date of coming out in the lead—Prior to June 2015, Caitlyn Jenner was referred to as Bruce Jenner—there won't be any confusion. Cognissonance (talk) 10:04, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
20. Support as within the spirit of the current MOS:IDENTITY. I'm not quite sure how to handle the supposed thorny BLP issues with implying that Kris Jenner was in a lesbian marriage. I think that Caitlyn being trans and (at least publicly) identifying as male during their marriage is pretty common knowledge; I can't see how a commonsensical reading of anything around Kris and Caitlyn's marriage would be construed as Kris being in a lesbian marriage. --Alison (Crazytales) (talk; edits) 14:25, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
21. Oppose for the reasons of historical accuracy which I expressed under Option 1 above. When someone has been a prominent public figure as a man, we should not attempt to rewrite history to reflect later transgender revelations. We can and should acknowledge the present reality of Jenner's gender identity with compassion and sensitivity, but rewriting 65 years of the personal gender history of a prominent public figure is almost Orwellian in character. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:06, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
22. Oppose This standard appeals to activists who claim (without any merit) that misgendering a subject in an earlier phase of life harms all Trans people. That it bothers the activist is no concern of ours. Writing comprehensive articles is the only concern.69.143.188.200 (talk) 19:24, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
23. Support: As a transgender person myself, I hate being called by my birth name. Charlotte Allison (Allen/Morriswa) (talk) 20:54, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
24. *This of course has zero validity, unless you are Jenner. I fail to see how a few Trans people's personal preferences are used as the basis for a policy. 69.143.188.200 (talk) 01:22, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
    • • Probably because most trans people are in agreement on this topic. Easily verifiable on the internet and at Deadname. 03:02, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
        • Jenner answered the queston for her in the Vanity Fair article Bissinger apologizes to Jenner for repeated pronoun confusion and asks whether she is sensitive about it. “I don’t really get hung up,” she tells him. “A guy came in the other day and I was fully dressed—it’s just habit, I said, ‘Hi, Bruce here,’ and I went, Oh fuck, it ain’t Bruce, I was screwing up doing it.” Different strokes. The biggest difference with Jenner and most other people (not just transgender people) is fame and celebrity status for 40 years prior to transition. She chose to publicly transition in way that isn't available to hardly anyone. Also, celebrities manage their image. It was true before her transition and it is true after. Virtually everyone doesn't know Jenner any more after her transition than before her transition unless they are personal friends or family. --DHeyward (talk) 09:04, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
      • Now discarding someone's opinion because they are transgender is out of line, although that's not exactly what you wrote. Note that the discussion here is a general one, not about Jenner. Place Clichy (talk) 18:03, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
25. **** No, that would be sn ad hominem attack. But the flip side is "I is trans" is an appeal to authority, as if trans opinions should have more weight. They don't.69.143.188.200 (talk) 22:12, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
26. Oppose We shouldn't be changing history. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:16, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    @AussieLegend: presumably your next edits will be to rename the crap out of things at the article on Prince (musician) hmn? Ironholds (talk) 15:29, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    No, because that is the BLP and this discussion is about MOS:IDENTITY's application outside the BLP. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:37, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    @AussieLegend: So the album articles, then? I note that The Black Album (Prince album) currently describes itself as " the sixteenth studio album by American recording artist Prince" - this is ludicrous! It's rewriting history! He wasn't called Prince at the time! Why aren't you fixing it? Ironholds (talk) 15:41, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    There's a practical issue there. You can't really call him "unpronounceable squiggle" in the article. That's certainly an issue where things have to be handled on a case by case basis. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:52, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    There's no such thing as "outside the BLP" in Wikipedia. The BLP policy applies to all articles and non-article spaces, everywhere in the project. Diego (talk) 17:44, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    If you read the discussion again you'll see here that BLP refers to the subjects biographical article. --AussieLegend (✉) 12:43, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

    If you read the policy on which MOS:IDENTITY is based, you'll see that whether the content is located or not in the biography article is irrelevant to the protections WP:BLP provides. The reasons why MOS:IDENTITY is written that way do not dissappear when you move to a different article. Diego (talk) 12:50, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

27. Oppose. Deal with it on a case-by-case basis. Even if facts are offensive, they are still facts. We recognize more recent changes by acknowledging the current state, not by pretending that history was different than it was. Being deliberately offensive is wrong. Publishing false information is wrong as well. Jacona (talk) 15:54, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
28. Support this as my first choice, especially in articles that mention someone who subsequently became notable but who was not notable at the time the article is concerned with. For example (using a non-trans example): someone made the point (apparently in another discussion which has since been archived, or perhaps on WT:MOS) that Michelle Obama's article says things like "Obama attended Whitney Young High School, Chicago's first magnet high school", and Whitney M. Young Magnet High School's article mentions "Michelle Obama" among its alums, even though she wasn't "Michelle Obama" at the time she attended the school. For articles that mention someone who is now known under name Y, but who was notable under name X at the time the article was concerned with (like articles that mention Jenner's Olympic performances), I concede that using only the current name could be less clear than either of the options I have voted on below as my second and third choice options. -sche (talk) 17:58, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    Then this would also work in the theoretical since precedent is being set. If 20 years from now, former president Barak Obama remarries and decides to take his wife's legal name of Snickley, we would have to go back and change all references of the 44th president of the United States to President Barak Snickley. Sorry but I'm not ok with that. President Snickley pushed through Obamacare/Snickleycare? President Snickley was the first black President? Or other choices, even if mentioned in the article 100 times, every occurrence would be "President Snickley (President Obama)". Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:05, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

29. Support. Doing anything but this would constitute misgendering. The gender assignment done to a person by anonymous health personnel at their birth is no more valid (but rather less valid) than the gender identity a person chooses for themselves. And I find the term "historical gender" patronising and ridiculous. A transgender person has only one gender and that is the one that they say they have. Using outdated pronouns or names and inventing terms like "historical gender" take away transgender people's right to define themselves. - MellowMurmur (talk | contributions) 20:33, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
30. Oppose It will depend on the person. From GLAAD media guide -> "Unless a former name is newsworthy or pertinent, use the name and pronouns preferred....". In the case of Jenner, winning the Men's Decathlon as "Bruce Jenner" created her notability and both name and gender are newsworthy and pertinent. Articles that refer to Jenner's olympic achievement and are written historically should use the name and pronouns that are the most comprehensible to our reader. We should not have asterisks, parentheticals, explanations, (i.e. "as Bruce") etc, etc, to explain a transition which is not relevant to the notable historical event or use pronouns that would require such an explanation such as "she won the Men's Decathlon." The whole concept of "respecting the person" is thrown out the window when the focus of every achievement is solely viewed through theitr transition. The wikipedia articles mentioning Jenner are starting to read like "Psst, she's transgender" at every reference to their accomplishments which seems to be the result of activism without regard for the person. --DHeyward (talk) 08:38, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

    From a purely encyclopedic aspect, the fact that a woman won a male-specific category seems particularly relevant to the granting of the award. The explanation of how that happened (that the woman at hand is transgender, and was publicly standing as male at the time) requires more clarification than a mere psst, in my humble opinion - and certainly more than total silence or an unexplained redirect. Diego (talk) 10:06, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

31. Oppose per anachronism. Next we know, the Republic of Turkey was defeated in World War I, Napoleon invaded the Soviet Union, and Christopher Columbus discovered the United States. Place Clichy (talk) 12:09, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
32. Oppose. Revisionism, writing things directly at odds with the primary sources, is not scholarship. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:15, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
33. Oppose. Revisionism. We have sources for the info, stick with what they say. Geraldo Perez (talk) 22:40, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
34. Comment make use of current name in tandum with previous name where practical and where it doesn't conflict with another BLP. Avoid using gender pronouns using surname where practical. GregKaye 15:29, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
35. Generally oppose using only the new name. I'm divided on this one, since I think it's context-sensitive, but in general in historical contexts it seems to me that there's a good chance that people will come to the article knowing or searching for their old name; if we don't include a clarification, they could be confused if they don't find it. However, the old name could be omitted in cases where it's unlikely that they have any particular fame under that name (eg. if for some reason an article is discussing them before they were famous, mentioning their old name might be unnecessary.) --Aquillion (talk) 07:12, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
36. Strongly Oppose This simply blurs, distorts, or even falsifies history. The name, identity, and gender that were in effect at the time being discussed in an article are facts of history. To omit or change them is out-and-out wrong. Acknowledging the new name and identity also is another matter. DES ^(talk) 12:11, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
37. Strongly Support I'm not sure why this is such a big issue. If Jenner had changed her last name, then it would have absolutely appropriate to make retroactive edits. I don't see how this is any different than a change in her gender identity and first name. While we are on the topic, somebody definitely needs to change her picture at the top of the page! It is nothing short of ridiculous that a dated picture is still up there, given that she has made such a dramatic change in appearance. I know this has been recently changed, and I think it is disrespectful that the editor did not use a picture of Jenner as female-presenting. ralevudwu ^(talk) 10:10, 02 July 2015 (UTC)

    This "un-option" has been superseded by Option 5, below

38. Oppose as historical revisionism. We must include the name the person was using at the time in most articles. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:45, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
39. Oppose as frequently misleading, in that it would imply the spouse of the earlier time was in a homosexual relationship, or that a sports team was coed or that a military unit was coed. It would make some "The first woman to " do something like make a pioneering flight or achieve something impressive like climbing a mountain or winning a prize. The Vanity Fair article about Jenner used Bruce and "he" for historic events and Caitlyn and "she" for recent events. I favor using the previous name and pronoun for historic events, with the subsequent name in parenthesis: Bruce Kenner (later Caitlyn Jenner) won an Olympic medal and fathered several children. Edison (talk) 22:27, 15 July 2015 (UTC)
40. Oppose per my above comments. It causes confusion and contradicts reliable historical sources. When referencing historical events, the historical gender of that time should be preserved. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:24, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
41. Support As a general rule, the current name and publicly stated gender identity should be used in all cases when speaking of someones's current and past life events and accomplishments. Not all that different than speaking of a woman's life before and after each marriage with a name change. We wouldn't make a point of saying "then single Sydney Edmonds was licensed to be a Registered Nurse" repeatedly in articles. Like all other information that is significant, a new name or gender identify might be mentioned once to explain the change. Although there are inconsistencies, the majority of the articles that I looked at about woman did not mention their accomplishments under a previous name or pointedly referred to them under their previous name throughout the article unless that name is retained as their public name. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 13:56, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
42. Strongly oppose It is confusing, misleading and historically inaccurate. It is not appropriate to change history for the sake of current views. --Bookworm857158367 (talk) 18:32, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
43. Support. Outside of a few isolated cases, Wikipedia has opted against using contextually-appropriate names as opposed to global names (see for example the recurrent disputes over the use of "Sea of Japan" in Korea-related articles, which is of course a ridiculously inappropriate name in that context but has been repeatedly upheld by the community). Hard to see why we would make an exception for this case, merely (AFAICT) to gratify the transphobic. -- Visviva (talk) 15:55, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Oppose both

1. First of all, it has to be a bad idea to say we need a policy rule now to deal with this one subject's emergency case. We should approach this on a case by case basis in various dispute resolution forums, if need be, before we jump to straight-jacket policy provisions, in that way experience will guide consensus, and perhaps down the road we may make a reflective policy. Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:40, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   We have a policy; it's MOS:IDENTITY. Oddly enough Wikipedia has included articles about transgender individuals before this. Ironholds (talk) 01:56, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

   Sure we have, and we don't need new policy, for all articles because some want a Jenner rule. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:45, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

   @Ironholds: MOS:IDENTITY is only a guideline, it's NOT a policy. WP:V is a policy. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:13, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   There's no need to use EXTRANEOUS CAPS LOCK. WP:V is indeed a policy! WP:BLP is also a policy. One of those two is associated with a Board of Trustees mandate to treat article subjects with respect and human decency; guess which? Ironholds (talk) 15:28, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   This isn't about WP:BLP, it's about the applicability of a guideline. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:41, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   It's absolutely about WP:BLP, which mandates treating subjects with respect, when you start arguing that we have to rely on the old details because verifiability is The Most Important Thing. In BLPs, verifiability is not the most important thing. Ironholds (talk) 17:29, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   No, we're not talking about BLP. We're specifically discussing how this guideline should be applied. The outcome of this discussion will have absolutely no effect on WP:BLP or how it is applied. --AussieLegend (✉) 09:16, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   Yes, it's about BLP. Basically, it would be changing the combined effect of MOS:IDENTITY and BLP from saying that we must treat all living subjects respectfully to saying that we must treat all living subjects respectfully except transgender people, authorizing transphobes to deadname and misgender them, things which are known to be emotionally harmful to transgender subjects. How is that not a BLP issue? Skyerise (talk) 15:44, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   But it's not about WP:BLP. MOS:IDENTITY is a guideline extraneous to WP:BLP, which doesn't even mention it. Your argument that the combined effect would be "except transgender people" is absolutely incorrect. Transgender people will be treated with the same respect as anyone else, but without denying history. You have, for example, absolutely no evidence that Jenner wants now to be referred to as Caitlyn for past achievements. That's merely your assumption and you're making the decision for Jenner without considering her personal preference. That's incredibly disrespectful. --AussieLegend (✉) 16:03, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

I think your rationale is quite offensive, harmful and irrespecive against trans-people, Skyerise. Jenner gained his merits in the field of sports as a male, and now without even asking, you'd like to change that? Have you ever considered that gender identity might not be an on/off switch? Jenner, indeed, might have achieved a lot while still cherishing his male gender idenity, and only later had the urge to change his gender, Caitlyn, as nowadays we call her. We should respect that and not look down on the person's identity in play. Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 19:23, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

1. Disagree. We simply have to make the choice that causes the "least harm". The harm of deadnaming is documented. Applying BLP would say that we do not deadname unless the subject has specifically said they want to be identified by past name and gender pre-transition. Jenner has not issue such a statement. Skyerise (talk) 16:15, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   Who are you to say that this does no harm? Jenner might be proud of past achievements regardless of the name. She might see the recent name change as an achievement in itself, she may even want to keep the the old records as they are. The point is that you don't know and arbitrarily making decisions for people when they haven't asked you to is grossly disrespectful, as well as violating WP:NPOV. Your decision to decide what Jenner wants without asking her may be doing immense harm. --AussieLegend (✉) 16:24, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   Since when did we get out of the encyclopedia business and start judging harm in relation to factual information? If some dude is convicted of murder we certainly say so even if he claims he didn't do it and it hurts him emotionally to read about it. We simply go with sources regardless. Fyunck(click) (talk) 16:46, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   In the cases of interaction with others, misrepresenting the gender of one, then misrepresents the gender identification of all others involved. Certainly that is a violation of WP:BLP. In Jenner's case, saying his three wives married a woman, his six children were fathered by a woman, and in the mis-representation of Jenner's athletic performances, are some are using the MOS:IDENTITY guideline to claim (in Wikipedia's voice) that Jenner surpassed and preceded many women's athletic performances, thus denying each of other the women who achieved their record setting performances their position of notability. That is a giant snowball of individuals potentially displaced or offended by people using MOS:IDENTITY to rewrite history. I'm also going to say for the record. This is not about transphobia, it is about accurately reflecting history. But that term is getting thrown around, including at me. While my own reputation is not subject to BLP, I'm certainly offended at the base level of name calling that is part of this argument. Stick to the facts. Trackinfo (talk) 17:17, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

From GLAAD media guide -> "Unless a former name is newsworthy or pertinent, use the name and pronouns preferred...." For someone like Jenner where, who in 1976 won a gold medal in the "Men's Decathlon" and the name "Bruce Jenner" is well-known throughout the U.S. as one of the greatest Olympians of all time, both the name and gender are newsworthy and pertinent. It is true that we try to do the least harm and articles in present tense should not be written with wrong names or gender. To the extent that deadnaming is harmful, we should limit it to places where it is newsworthy or pertinent such as in the articles regarding notable historic events. What we should also call out as harmful is the parenthetical/asterisk/"pssst" campaign to make sure that Jenner's transition is mentioned as far and as wide as possible by misusing pronouns such as "she" when discussing the "Men's Decathlon" or deliberately calling out the name in the source and also the chosen name in articles that cover 40 years (such as "Caitlyn Jenner (as Bruce Jenner)" in the olympic articles. These actions don't represent a "minimal harm" activity, they represent an activist approach to making gender transition the only relevant fact in Jenner's life extraordinary life. These activities don't reduce deadnaming and don't reduce harm. Instead, they shrink the person's lifetime of accomplishments into a whisper that sounds like "pssst...she's transgender. did I mention she's transgender? you should know she's transgender" at every turn. That's harmful and counter to the objective of doing the least harm. --DHeyward (talk) 09:44, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

• Agree with what DHeyward wrote above [3]: Use the GLAAD guidelines. Softlavender (talk) 12:45, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

DHeyward I have similar views as you have presented above and wondered how you would view a proposal, where ever possible, to refer to Jenner as "Jenner" where practical in instances in which a personal pronoun might otherwise be used. GregKaye 15:33, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

That's fine except it's often difficult in a narrative. I'd prefer narratives that are present tense first. In credits and tables, though, the sources aren't changing. For example, the credits in all the kardashian episodes are "Bruce Jenner as Himself." That won't be updated by the producers and creates a quandary for sourcing and I'd rather just see the historical credit as it appears on the show with the correct wikilink back to Caitlyn Jenner. There's nothing we can do about the credits that show up in the films, records, shows, etc. How do we deal with that case? "Caitlyn Jenner as Herself (credited as Bruce Jenner as Himself)" or even "Caitlyn Jenner as Bruce Jenner" is just too much and doesn't do a thing to reduce the use of the deadname and gender identification because it's a permanent fixture of the episode - mixing names and gender calls even more attention to the deadname and gender. I'd prefer not making a big deal out of it and she is certainly aware that all the credits and memorabilia use her previous name. She's not abandoning her old name and life as much as embracing her new one and this is apparent in her childrens use of "dad" to refer to her. the gender connotation is less than the historic value as a term of endearment. We seem to be losing sight of how she is reacting in order to fit a preconceived idea of how to treat every single transgender person. --DHeyward (talk) 23:01, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Option 3 (use both names, current name first)

1. Support - Seems like a good compromise that respects the person's identity but informs readers of the historic name. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 20:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
2. Oppose having the Olympic records say "Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner)" is a terrible idea. He won them as Bruce Jenner but now she is Caitlyn Jenner. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:46, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Yes, both names with the then-current name first keeps things in the correct time context, which sounds more natural, while acknowledging and showing respect for the change. It's the sensible middle solution. This is what I suggested in my Option 1 !vote, and I don't think we need an Option 4 to cover that solution. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:00, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   @Mandruss: So previous name first, current name in parentheses? That would work too. Honestly I think a 4th option like that would be better than having people who like that idea peppered through option 1. When this many folks are commenting, keeping things clear is useful imho. I'll make a fourth option unless someone strongly disagrees. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 21:46, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   @EvergreenFir: Yes, "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)". Which will read better and without the linking problems of "Bruce (now Caitlyn) Jenner", by the way. I'm all for an Option 4 if you want to do it. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:51, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   @Mandruss: Done! EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 22:08, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   (edit conflict)@Fyunck(click): Do you mean like Cassius Clay oops I mean Muhammad Ali and Lew Alcindor (now Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) or Ahmad Rashad oops I mean Bobby Moore. Looks, we currently have no system. The three examples I just cited show three long-standing Wikipedia articles which deal with name changes in 3 different ways. The first notes the person's current name (ignoring the name they went by during the time period of the article in question) the second notes both names (but gives primacy to the name they were known by at the time) and the third notes only the name they were known by at the time, ignoring the current name. At the very least, Wikipedia should have some guidance for these situations. I'm not saying this solution is the best of the three (or perhaps more to come) options, but there needs to be some standard, which is better than no standard. --Jayron32 21:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   A lot of tables don't have that kind of room. You also have to take context into it. For way more than half of Ali's boxing career he was known as Muhammad Ali, not Cassius Clay. Same with Abdul-Jabbar (Lew Alcindor). In their field they had dual names and it makes sense to choose the more prominent one in their field. Jenner in sports was only known by one name, Bruce Jenner. The sports fields should reflect that and it's why there is notability in the first place. Just redirect to her current name of Caitlyn Jenner and all will be well. Fyunck(click) (talk) 05:03, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   Yes, by wholesale ex post facto name changing, wikipedia has the FACTS wrong at your link, against the sources at the time. Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. won the Olympic gold medal. Under that name, he had a building professional career until he defeated Liston and publicly changed his name. The name Muhammad Ali was publicly unheard of, associated to that individual, until AFTER the Liston fight. I dare anybody to find a source written before the Liston fight that refers to him that way. And the wikipedia article for Ali correctly reflects that history. Same story with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar; find any coverage written during his UCLA career under that name. John Wooden referred to him as Lewis his entire life. Find a 1969 source reporting the NBA draft, what name goes #1? In other places I have shown Olympic athletes, particularly females, change their public names at given points in their career; Mary Decker -Tabb -Slaney,.and we report their name at the time. Trackinfo (talk) 21:48, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   @Fyunck(click): Please use the correct pronouns. Even when speaking of Caitlyn in the past, the pronouns are her/she. We had major problems with this during the Manning dispute. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 21:43, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   What? Bruce Jenner was a he when he won the decathlon. Bruce Jenner was born a he. Today Caitlyn is a she. That is proper enough by my book. You can put in this encyclopedia whatever you'd like, but I won't be bound to it on a talk page. Back to the story at hand, in tennis the ladies get their names placed in charts as they were at the time they won tournaments. If they later get married and change their names, their main bio may or may not change with the marriage, but the tournaments keep the old name that they played under. If they married while still playing tennis we weigh the proportion of tournaments played under each name in deciding what to use throughout wikipedia. Keeps it simple and easy. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

   Again, please don't misgender. I'll post info about the arb com case related to this FYI. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 00:58, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   Don't order people around. If he wants to call him Bruce and "he" that's his business.69.143.188.200 (talk) 01:26, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   No, it isn't "his business". Intentional misgendering is not acceptable on Wikipedia. There's a reason that administrators have authorized discretionary sanctions for misgendering on articles and talk pages referring to transgender people. Funcrunch (talk) 02:19, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

   I suggest you read the sanctions again. Your interepeation is faulty. Sanctions are for willful disruption. Eg tranny, heshe name calling.69.143.188.200 (talk) 02:21, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

   I read it, and I don't see it there or listed in Wikipedia policy. I don't feel I'm misgendering but I do feel you are if referring to the winner of the Olympic decathlon as a woman/she/her, since that's probably against the Olympic rules. But it doesn't bother me at all how you want to refer to Bruce or Caitlyn. It only bothers me if you start putting warning notices on my talk page about sanctioning me for some odd reason. I'm only trying to help here, but if I have to adhere to some odd political correctness when I feel I'm helping, or I have to walk on glass whenever I post... then it's probably not worth my while to lend a hand. Fyunck(click) (talk) 01:49, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   IMO, the notice was deserved for misgendering. Here's the applicable quote from MOS:IDENTITY (emphasis added): "An exception to the above is made for terms relating to gender identity. In such cases, Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise. Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns ... that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. Direct quotations may need to be handled as exceptions (in some cases adjusting the portion used may reduce apparent contradictions, and "[sic]" may be used where necessary)." Skyerise (talk) 14:12, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

   You'll notice it was talking of titles and prose, and did not say discussion pages. It's different from your WP:Battleground notice and probably why you threw it at me. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:53, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

3. Oppose. Introducing anacrhonisms degrades the historical accuracy, and therefore degrades this project. Resolute 16:11, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
4. Support 3 and 4 This strikes a good balance between accuracy (which requires using the current name) and readability (which requires including the previous name). Regardless of whether Jenner was really born he and changed, really born he and didn't change, or really born she and mistaken for he, the jury's still out on the truth of it. The polite thing to do in the meantime is take Jenner at her word. We can always change it back to "Bruce" if hard evidence ever proves us wrong. Darkfrog24 (talk) 18:27, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
5. I'm not expressing a specific support or opposition to this proposal. There are probably times, specifically in an introductory situation to a longer paragraph, where this might be appropriate. As far as for athletic results or other involvement in timely events, we should be consistent across all of wikipedia and use the name that was published at the time. To do otherwise violates the sources at the time and would put wikipedia at odds with reports of the events. We can wikilink to the article that will further explain the name changes these individuals have adopted later in life. That would go for athletes who changed their names for any reason religious (Cascius Clay, Lew Alcindor), marriage or theatrical purposes (Chad Ocho Cinco). And so if it is a potentially confusing situation, we should have the option to explain where needed. That absolutely does not mean, in the Jenner situation, that we need to put Caitlyn in every result or credit. As I posted into Talk:Caitlyn Jenner, those marks were set by a male athlete named Bruce Jenner and will never qualify to be accepted as women's marks, no matter what the current chosen name is. To put wikipedia policy above what the press reported and what the world governing body accepts means wikipedia policy needs to be changed to adopt to us reporting reality. We should all know; failure to report proper information; to report just what the primary source wishes to be published without perspective is wrong. Trackinfo (talk) 23:40, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
6. Oppose a general rule like this. Case by case, use common sense. Carrite (talk) 01:02, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
7. Support 3 or 4 without preference (I'm double-voting, sorry, but this discussion looks like it can't be tallied by # anyway). Either "Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce Jenner)" or "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)" seems fine to me. The important thing here, as I see it, is to write in a way that is respectful of her identity but still useful and clear to Wikipedia editors, and omitting the male name from athletic events that were and still are male-only doesn't serve the latter goal. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 13:45, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
8. Support in context of athletic accomplishments, as a compromise between respect for the athlete and accuracy to the sources. I slightly prefer this option over option 4 because it places respect for the athlete first. --Alison (Crazytales) (talk; edits) 14:27, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

   Clarification: I think this should apply to athletes who change their name for non-gender-related reasons too, like the oft-aforementioned examples of Mohammed Ali, Karim Abdul-Jabbar, and Metta World Peace. --Alison (Crazytales) (talk; edits) 14:30, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

9. Support along with option 4. With both names listed and a footnote explaining the transition, there will be no confusion and it is not "rewriting history". Funcrunch (talk) 15:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
10. Oppose per Fyunck and Resolute's comments above. Historical reality is what it was; present reality is what it is. Change is a universal constant, and life is messy. Imposing retroactive and anachronistic solutions on history is a bad idea; and it's an even worse idea when it's ideologically driven. Bruce Jenner now redirects to the Caitlyn Jenner-titled article; let the bio article explain present reality, and leave the past reality alone in our sports history articles. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:12, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
11. Support 3 or 4 without preference per Roscelese. We are in the business of clearly and concisely conveying information. We should convey what name was in use at the time. We should also connect that to the current name. We should avoid making any assumptions about how familiar people might be with the subject, or assume that they will follow every single link. I don't see how indicating "Her name was X at the time, but you may now know her as Y", is anachronistic, and it can be done clearly and concisely in two words.--Trystan (talk) 18:54, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
12. Support along with option 4. I would prefer this option but I would be satisfied with either. This avoids confusion and respects her identity. If people want to put her former name for verifiability purposes, I would be fine with that. Options 3 and 4 don't bring up a "historical revisionism" argument or a "not respecting identities argument", and both are relatively concise and easy to do. BenLinus1214^talk 20:35, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
13. Oppose We don't need both names. We have redirects to avoid that. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:09, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
14. Support along with option 4, per Roscelese. I have a slight preference for this option as it puts her current name first but I would be fine with option 4. These two options avoid rewriting history, accurately summarize the situation as it happened (which is that she won the medal while competing as Bruce Jenner), and respects the person's gender. Ca2james (talk) 16:08, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
15. Support This option or option 1. People change their names for all sorts of reasons, including having different names in different languages, marriage and divorce, gender transition, personal beliefs, or for career purposes (like actors). Beyond the most important reason, of respecting a person's chosen identity and gender, flip-flopping between names is cumbersome, confusing, and prone in inconsistency. If it is truly important, a person's former name can/should be noted - but they should not be identified by that name (or certainly the adherent gender). TMagen (talk) 16:50, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
16. Support this (as my second choice); see my comments above about option 2. -sche (talk) 17:59, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
17. Support: Good compromise between identifying people by what they are called today and not confusing readers who know them by a previous name. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:06, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
18. Oppose Why should articles, that aren't even about a particular person, have to include a history of that person's name/gender changes? Surely the only relevant name/gender is the one they had at the point they are relevant to the article? Anything further is setting off on a tangent leading the reader away from the point. Do we have a policy like this for those who change name through multiple divorces? --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 18:22, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
19. Oppose This is incorrect for the same reason as Option 2: anachronism. I don't see anything transphobic or discriminatory, when talking about past events, about mentioning the persona that the transgender person assumed publicly and socially at the time. It's a whole different matter than in an article where this person is the main topic, as many discussions here have established. Option 4 is descriptive enough, and corrects this issue. Place Clichy (talk) 12:09, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
20. generally acceptable particularly in cases where the person was significantly notable before "coming out" or where BLP concerns about other living people are involved. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 20:11, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
21. Support in Jenner's case and within sports related articles. I don't think that this applies will apply to all other biography related articles. I think that all pronoun use should be avoided as confusing for readers if an unexpected pronoun is used and potentially offensive if it is not. 14:29, 12 June 2015 (UTC) revised GregKaye 15:47, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
22. Support This seems like a sensible compromise that balances the "high degree of sensitivity" required by BLP with the need to avoid confusion. Neljack (talk) 07:47, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
23. Support per Neljack. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:41, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
24. Support, with the conditional that it's context-sensitive and the old name could sometimes be omitted (and probably only needs to be mentioned the first time they come up in an article.) In general this seems like the best compromise; it clearly respects their identification, while providing enough information that people who are only familiar with that section of history using their old name will be able to follow the article. As I said in my comment for option 2, though, I feel the old name could be left out in situations where there's unlikely to be any serious confusion. --Aquillion (talk) 07:14, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
25. Oppose for the same reasons I oppose option 2. The historical name should be used for referencing historical events. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:26, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

Option 4 (use both names, previous name first)

1. Support along with option 3. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 22:07, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
2. Support - Agree that it would be entirely confusing to refer to Caitlyn Jenner competing in men's sports. Are we to assume that official Olympics records have been updated to change Bruce to Caitlyn? Seems very unlikely to me. Both names with the then-current name first keeps things in the correct time context, which sounds more natural, while acknowledging and showing respect for the change. It's the sensible middle solution. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:12, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
3. Support. This is how a majority of publishers handle the issue. Wikipedia should not blaze a new trail on this issue. Binksternet (talk) 23:02, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
4. Support I would support this proposal as well as it lies in the middle more. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:02, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
5. Support The talk page for the article on the Decathlon now has this: We can debate the name, but there's no question that Caitlyn is a notable exception to the statement that men typically compete in the decathlon and women in the heptathlon. A woman who has accomplished the amazing feat of winning the Olympic decathlon - an event completely dominated by males -deserves at least a statement about it in this article. Simply putting Caitlyn Jenner would encourage such thinking.Richardson mcphillips (talk) 02:18, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
6. Support Although I personally prefer Option 3, per my note in the General Discussion about how cis athlete name changes have been handled on Wikipedia, I think this option is a reasonable compromise. Funcrunch (talk) 04:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
7. Support. This is the compatible with MOS:IDENTITY, factual and informative, so I don't think they are disrespectful. I don't care much between options 3 and 4, though this one is gaining traction and more likely to lead to consensus (see that many people supporting Option 1 agreed to use both names, and were made bephore options 3 and 4 were created). Diego (talk) 13:44, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
8. Support. In the 1976 men's Olympic decathlon, Caitlyn Jenner competed under the name "Bruce Jenner". Excluding "Caitlyn" from the article could be taken as an affront to Jenner (and would likely lead to well-meaning new users putting "Caitlyn" back in). Excluding "Bruce" would create unnecessary confusion (and would also likely lead to well-meaning new users putting "Bruce" back in). The name that Jenner competed under should be listed first, followed by her current name. Howicus (Did I mess up?) 16:20, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   Wait. Are you seriously proposing to alter history on the basis of not "causing affront"? Do you realize just what kind of slippery slope that is? Resolute 16:30, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   Compiling new knowledge is not rewriting history, it's adding to it. Please don't use such hyperboles. Diego (talk) 16:37, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   It's not hyperbole. Retroactively changing names of historical record is rewriting history. At the very least, if you are going to do it, do it consistently and go retroactively change the name of every person who later changed their name - either by marriage or for other reasons. Resolute 16:54, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   There are countless examples of names being updated in historical listings after an athlete, actor, or other public figure changes their name. I cited one example in the General Discussion below: Muhammad Ali's name listed with Cassius Clay in parentheses for the list of heavyweight boxing champions. Go to a few movie cast listings and you'll see "Joe Schmo (as John Schmo)". Cis people change their names all the time and get acknowledged without people complaining about "rewriting history". It's really not that different here. Funcrunch (talk) 03:36, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

   And as was explained before, Ali was notable because he was a boxer. We only get one title and Muhammad Ali was chosen over Cassius Clay because it was much more notable. In lists where people are counting victories and stuff it is much better for readers to be consistent instead of putting in both Cassius Clay and Muhammad Ali. If Jenner had also competed a good chuck of her sports lifespan as Caitlyn, then we would have to decide which is better for our readers to follow. Which was more notable in sports/Olympics/track and field events, etc... But that's not the case here. We had to make decisions about tennis great Helen Wills notability and whether we should title her article that or Helen Wills Moody. We went with the former because it was more notable. These decisions are made all the time and editors are usually pretty reasonable on coming to a conclusion. But forcing a conclusion on past historical events because of a sex-change that happened long after sports retirement, doesn't sit too well with the wikipedia way of doing things. At least not from my vantage point. Fyunck(click) (talk) 09:11, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

   Actually, I would disagree with both of you and offer a more simple reply: The existence of a mistake made in the past does not represent a justification for repeating that mistake in the present. The proper solution here is to correct those other anachronisms, not create more. Resolute 13:29, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

   Excluding "Caitlyn" from the article could be taken as an affront to Jenner... Not to mention that excluding it would also be confusing, since Caitlyn Jenner is the title we use for the biography. Both names need to be connected for the sake of those of us editors who have first learned about this person from her Wikipedia article. Diego (talk) 16:35, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

9. Oppose. Introducing anacrhonisms degrades the historical accuracy, and therefore degrades this project. Resolute 16:12, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   That would be a decent argument to oppose Option 2 or Option 3, since they both would state that Caitlyn Jenner won gold in the decathlon. It is not anachronistic to say that Bruce won the medal and is now named Caitlyn, any more than it would be anachronistic to update Thomas Jefferson with facts related to Jefferson's legacy in the 21st century. Articles are not frozen in time. ―Mandruss ☎ 16:32, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   We're talking about different things here. Updating Jefferson's own article with changes to his legacy is not the same as altering the historical record of articles about the 1976 Olympics by introducing an anachronistic name change. I completely understand that people want to avoid a repeat of the Chelsea Manning mess; respecting the individual as she wishes to be viewed in her biography, and in other articles related to her person, is laudable and desirable. But changing the historical record of her competitions respects neither WP:BLP nor the individual. Rather, it is a violation of WP:SYNTH, WP:POV and others. Resolute 16:54, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   I'm sorry, but I still think you're arguing under the wrong Option. Option 4 does not change anything about the competition, it merely inserts a parenthetical note about a later name change. There is nothing even remotely improper about doing that. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:26, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

   No, I am arguing under the correct option, and I maintain my opposition for my stated reason. Resolute 18:41, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

10. Support using historic gender and name in articles talking about past events, making note of the new name/gender in a parenthetical. I find it preferable to have the past name first in these situations hence, "Bruce (now Caitlyn) Jenner" or "Ron Artest (now Meta World Peace)". With Artest, since his career in basketball continues, I would even be inclined to use that format for things he did before the change, and for things he did after the change say "Meta World Peace (formerly Ron Artest)" to preserve the continuity and make clear that this is the same person; but I wouldn't necessarily connect Bruce with Caitlyn going forward - just backwards, as she's no longer a competitive athlete; I'd only do that where relevant. To be clear, what I'd like to see with Jenner: when discussing his previous life and accomplishments, refer to him as a male named Bruce and note that she is now a female going by Caitlyn. When discussing her current life and accomplishments, refer to her as a female named Caitlyn. Explain the situation wherever clarification is needed. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 18:18, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
11. Support 3 and 4 This strikes a good balance between accuracy (which requires using the current name) and readability (which requires including the previous name). Regardless of whether Jenner was really born he and changed, really born he and didn't change, or really born she and mistaken for he, the jury's still out on the truth of it. The polite thing to do in the meantime is take Jenner at her word. We can always change it back to "Bruce" if hard evidence ever proves us wrong. Darkfrog24 (talk) 18:29, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
12. Oppose - there would be times that this format would be helpful, but not as blanket coverage for all things in her past life. Especially not for Olympic records and such. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:18, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Fyunck(click): In your Option 3 oppose you say, "He won them as Bruce Jenner but now she is Caitlyn Jenner." That is precisely what Option 4 says, so I don't understand your oppose here. Further, the description of Option 4 is quite clear that it is not "blanket coverage for all things in her past life". ―Mandruss ☎ 08:32, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    That was simply a statement, not what should be done to every article. And it's quite clear that it is blanket coverage so I'm not sure what you're reading. The description says "In articles outside of the biography itself, use the person's previous name, but include current name in parentheses. Would be used when previous name is relevant or listed in a historical context (e.g., list of sports awards). Example, in a list of Olympic gold medalists, the entry Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner) would be used. That is pretty much every time as far as I can tell. The Olympics in particular should say simply "Bruce Jenner" and the redirect will take care of the rest. Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:53, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Fyunck(click): Maybe the language could be clarified even further, but I don't read it as applying to all references prior to June 2015. My clues are "when previous name is relevant" — it won't be especially relevant in all cases — and "e.g., list of sports awards" — it's relevant in our example case because of the official records and widespread news coverage using the old name. In other words, if we currently mention somewhere (outside Caitlyn Jenner) that Bruce Jenner broke his arm in 1970, I don't have a problem with changing that to "Caitlyn Jenner" or "Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce Jenner)", and I don't think Option 4 would preclude that usage. That would be a case not covered by guideline and therefore local discretion. EvergreenFir crafted the Option 4 language, so perhaps s/he would care to weigh in here. As for whether to include "(now Caitlyn Jenner)" in the Olympics reference, see the comment in my !vote, "It's the sensible middle solution." What I meant by that is that some give is required on both sides if we're going to reach a consensus here. Option 4 requires one side to mention the name "Bruce" in that case, despite their desire to omit it, and requires the other side to mention "Caitlyn" in that case, despite their desire to omit it. It's a compromise, and that's not the dirty word that many seem to think it is at Wikipedia. "The redirect will take care of the rest" assumes that the reader will click through to the target article, and that will often not be the case. ―Mandruss ☎ 10:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    @Mandruss:I agree 100% with you that compromise is not a dirty word (like it has often become on wikipedia). Here is how I read Option 4 (and I don't see any other way to interpret it). "We always use Caitlyn Jenner in place of Bruce Jenner. But in rare cases outside the biography, when relevant, it will be ok to use Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner). That's it... no other options." To me that's not right and is blanket coverage. Now if it had said something like the following I might be more likely to support: After June 2015 we will generally use 'Caitlyn Jenner.' There will be some uncommon times after June 2015 where it will be appropriate to use 'Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner).' Prior to June 2015, when dealing with sports in lists, she will be shown as 'Bruce Jenner.' When talking in prose about the sports achievements, the first mention should be 'Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)' and all subsequent use should simply be 'Bruce Jenner.' When not talking about sports achievements, prior to June 2015, it will depend on the situation as to whether first use should be 'Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)' or 'Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner)', but usually Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner) will be preferred. As in saying in '1970 Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce Jenner) broke her arm.' But perhaps also '100 year old farmer John remembers sitting little 2-year-old Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner) on his knee and telling the boy about how fast he ran when chased by a bull." This allows some flexibility in usage. To me that's more like compromise. But I didn't write the options nor did I come in here with an agenda. I happened to notice it when dealing with a different situation. That's my two cents, but as it is written I can not support this option. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:56, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    Something tells me some clarification is needed, if we disagree this much on the meaning of three sentences. But your proposed interpretation would be incomprehensible to the average editor. Try putting that in a new Option 5 and see if you get any !votes besides your own (include a flowchart please). Nothing like this ever needs to be that complex, and complexity is our enemy when it comes to guidelines. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:06, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    Well, @EvergreenFir: wrote option 4. Ask her to clarify the exact meaning since you might be voting for something you don't want. You had asked for compromise and mine is a compromise. It is long but could certainly be shortened. I was simply trying to convey how I thought the usage of Jenner should be handled in a way that I could support it. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:25, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

    Pinged with no answer so I'm thinking it's probably what I had said. Fyunck(click) (talk) 16:50, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

13. Support: I think option 1 is the most practical (since a redirect --or a piped link-- ensures the later identity is correctly indicated), but if the person in question expresses that such treatment would bother them, then this is the right compromise, I think. --Waldir ^talk 10:14, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
14. Oppose a general rule like this - Case by case, use common sense. Carrite (talk) 01:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
15. Oppose. Ironholds (talk) 01:55, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
16. Oppose One of our roles as Wikipedia editors is to get the facts right. The fact is Caitlyn Jenner has always been a woman, was a woman when she competed in her various Olympic events, and should be recognized as a woman. I see that some are objecting to this on the basis that it's just self-evident that a woman could not have won the decathlon competition in 1976. While it's completely up to the IOC to list the winners how they wish, it's up to use to get it right. There's no real debate that Caitlyn won the Decathlon in the Montreal Olympics. We need to recognize that fact and let people know of that reality. Listing "Bruce Jenner" as the winner is revisionist history - it's pretending that someone besides Caitlyn won. Similarly, Caitlyn needs to be recognized for her other athletic accomplishments. Among those are:

    1) Being the best female performer over 100 meters in 1976

    2) Being the best female performer over 400 meters, ever

    3) Being the best female performer in the high jump in 1976

    4) Being the best female performer in the long jump in 1976

    5) Being the best female performer in the decathlon, ever.

    Again, it is up to the IAAF to ratify times how they see fit. However, it's our duty to note the facts - (1) Caitlyn is a woman, (2) Caitlyn has always been a woman, and (3) Caitlyn actually achieved all these performances.

    One of our other important roles as Wikipedia editors is to be effective advocates for social justice. We cannot do this if we commit violence on trans* people by misgendering or deadnaming them. By denying Caitlyn - and the trans* community as a whole - ownership over her own athletic performances, we are erasing her identity for our own comfort. I strongly strongly strongly urge that "Caitlyn" be used universally. 2602:306:808C:2100:7D00:A53D:7E6:9379 (talk) 15:12, 6 June 2015 (UTC)CaitlynFan

    You seem to be under the misinterpretation that the role of " Wikipedia editors is to be effective advocates for social justice". It is not. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 16:03, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

    We can advocate social justice while still staying within those suggestions. Reporting the facts - as relayed to us by reliable media sources - can be social justice advocacy. For instance, saying "Caitlyn Jenner had the fastest 100 meters of any woman in 1976" is NOT original research. If we said "The IAAF should ratify Caitlyn Jenner's 1976 100 meters as the fastest by any woman in that year" we might be taking it too far. However, simply stating the facts - (1) Caitlyn is a woman, (2) Caitlyn ran faster than Annegret Richter in 1976 - is not going beyond any rule you cited to. 2602:306:808C:2100:7D00:A53D:7E6:9379 (talk) 16:12, 6 June 2015 (UTC)CaitlynFan

    I'm sorry, but that's just ridiculous. You are first of all an obvious sock since that user's only edits have been to vote here, and second, you are an obvious troll as well trying to delegitimise the conversation by saying extremist things that transgender women would never claim. I'm trans and I think you're trying to dirty the pool to make trans people look both extreme and kind of awful as well. Ogress _smash! 08:40, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

    I believe that the original piece was second-degree humour, and/or reductio ad absurbum. In this light, I enjoyed reading it. However, for the sake of clarity and now that the IP is blocked, it may be a good idea to bar the vote. Place Clichy (talk) 12:09, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

17. Oppose, forces transgender individuals to be identified using a name that emphasized their past gender first. Uncool. Skyerise (talk) 12:03, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

    That's a seriously problematic phrasing. There is no "past gender." She was always a woman. It's this sort of clueless phrasing that makes dealing with allies so difficult. 162.235.91.193 (talk) 20:35, 5 June 2015 (UTC)CaitlynFan

    +10,000.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  03:55, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

18. Support 3 or 4 without preference (I'm double-voting, sorry, but this discussion looks like it can't be tallied by # anyway). Either "Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce Jenner)" or "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)" seems fine to me. The important thing here, as I see it, is to write in a way that is respectful of her identity but still useful and clear to Wikipedia editors, and omitting the male name from athletic events that were and still are male-only doesn't serve the latter goal. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 13:45, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
19. Oppose per Fyunck and Carrite, and for the reasons of historical accuracy which I expressed under Option 1 above. When someone has been a prominent public sports figure as a man, common sense suggests that we should not attempt to rewrite history to reflect later transgender revelations. We can and should acknowledge the present reality of Jenner's gender identity with compassion and sensitivity, but attempting to rewrite 65 years of the personal gender history of a prominent public figure is divorced from reality. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:22, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
20. Support along with option 3. See my comment there. Both make sense to me. BenLinus1214^talk 20:36, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
21. Oppose We don't need both names. We have redirects to avoid that. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:11, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
22. Support along with option 3, per Roscelese. I have a slight preference for option 3 as it puts her current name first but I would be fine with this option, too. These two options avoid rewriting history, accurately summarize the situation as it happened (which is that she won the medal while competing as Bruce Jenner), and respects the person's gender. Ca2james (talk) 16:09, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
23. Support this (as my third choice); see my comments above about options 2 and 3. -sche (talk) 18:00, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
24. Oppose Per my opposition to Option 3. Why should articles, that aren't even about a particular person, have to include a history of that person's name/gender changes? Surely the only relevant name is the one they were known by at the point they are relevant to the article? Anything further is setting off on a tangent leading away from the point. Do we have a policy for this for those who change name through multiple divorces? --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 18:24, 6 June 2015 (UTC)
25. Support Although it is wrong to say that a person (actually, a persona) participated in an event when they didn't, it is perfectly relevant to mention their subsequent change. Place Clichy (talk) 12:09, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
26. Support as "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn Jenner)" Oppose use of pronouns when practical and when "Jenner" would suit. GregKaye 15:50, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
27. This would also be an acceptable compromise, though I prefer option 3 since it puts the emphasis on the subject's self-identification and thus better fulfils BLP's requirement of a "high degree of sensitivity". Neljack (talk) 07:52, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
28. Weak support. I prefer option 3, since it respects their self-identification more clearly, but in terms of clarity this would at least be better than using only one name, and it doesn't ignore their self-identification entirely. --Aquillion (talk) 07:16, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
29. Partial support: I'm mostly going with Option 5, but my reasoning there makes Option 4 the default for most cases that fit the criteria a) context pre-dates the name change, and b) the name-at-the-time is important; for other cases see my Option 5 comments. Also, don't be hidebound about it; the exact formatting and wording need not be set in stone; sometimes a simple piped link will work fine, especially in lists and tables.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  17:26, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
30. Support as most closely satisfying the condition that we recognize the subject's current identification (as Caitlyn) and that we provide accessible information (and so a person who has seen the name Bruce Jenner in an article about those olympics someplace should not be thoroughly confused). To those people who believe this is incorrectly gendering Caitlyn; we cannot speak to how Caitlyn experienced gender back then, but Caitlyn did present the name "Bruce" to the world, and that's all we are saying, I believe. Vanamonde93 (talk) 03:31, 15 June 2015 (UTC)
31. Support per Roscelese and others (I'm also good with option 3 if the consensus it for that). I believe that without this, the information in sporting events (as an example) would not make sense to a reader not familiar with their recent lives. --Gonnym (talk) 09:50, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
32. Strongly Support This, or perhaps option 3, is probably the best choice in most cases. It preserves historical accuracy by clearly indicating who was identified, and how, for historic accomplishments or as a participant in historic events. Yet it also makes a clear link to the preswent, and provides a rader with both possibly useful search terms to learn more about the person involved. This is they way we should help our reders, by presentign the full facts, not a distorted revision of them, nor one thast ignores relevant later developments. DES ^(talk) 12:28, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
33. Oppose for the same reasons as I opposed options 2 and 3. The historical name should be used when referring to historical events. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:27, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
34. Oppose for Resolute's reasons above. I also agree with RReagan007. --Bookworm857158367 (talk) 18:35, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
35. Strong support - the body of the article, excluding the parentheses, should represent the data as of when it happened; the parentheses should be used to allow readers to make connections between the same person in different parts of his/her lifetime. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 06:47, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Option 5 (no new rule, treat on a case-by-case basis)

• Support option 5: no way the 1976 Summer Olympics article is ever going to be *exactly* the same as the United States v. Manning article or Rape in Germany (§ Notable offenders, third bullet), or 1968 in music (§ Release Date Unknown, last of the entries starting with S), or 12th Annual Grammy Awards (§ Classical, 5th bullet), etc., so any new rule that is passed as an "ad hoc" solution for the first case is going to have a destabilising effect on other pages that seem to have found some sort of equilibrium the way they are now, but with different solutions. Editor discretion is what is needed in all of those cases, not bulldozering in a new rule, which to all extents and purposes would be instruction creep. So if this RfC comes to a conclusion w.r.t. Jenner in the 1976 Summer Olympics article I'm fine with that, but I don't see any reason to extrapolate to remotely similar cases. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:39, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose. The current set of rules are not broken and do not need fixing. --Guy Macon (talk) 02:36, 11 June 2015 (UTC)
  • ? exactly what I meant: don't change the current rules (they seem to work pretty well for the main biography pages, and that includes the rules I added [4]), don't add new restrictive ones (for the subsidiary, event and overview pages mentioning the person exclusively in an earlier period: approach these in a case-by-case logic, exerting caution, good taste, editor discretion) – nothing broken, nothing needs fixing. --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:57, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

  Also: keep current specific guidelines where they are now, i.e. below "policy" level, thus allowing for the occasional exception when circumstances warrant it (per usual guideline provisions). --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:40, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, Macon clearly meant "oppose new rules".  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  17:20, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

• Support, but explain the options: Not a "rule" per se, just give examples. I'll draft them right now: Don't be hidebound about details; the exact formatting and wording need not be set in stone. Original-then-current works best when the context pre-dates the name change and in which the name-at-the-time is clearly important. When it's not (but still pre-dates the name change), use current-then-original in most cases, though current-only can work in cases where the name/gender is totally irrelevant (to everyone, not just gender language activists). When it post-dates the name change, use current-only, unless the former name is genuinely relevant, in which case use current-then-former. Former-only is never appropriate, in the form [[Bruce Jenner]] but may work fine as [[Caitlyn Jenner|Bruce Jenner]], especially in tables or lists. Inserting "now Caitlyn Jenner" or whatever at every single instance would be WP:POINTy browbeating; do it once per article (or occasionally more frequently; use the same rubric as for appropriate vs. over-linking). Avoid gender-specific language in all these cases, so the he/man vs. she/woman issue simply vanishes. Short version: Use common sense and rational thinking, focused on reader's needs and expectations, not how you personally want to change the world. PS: This analysis doesn't even have anything (other than the avoid gender-specific language bit) to do with gender. I would treat David Johansen vs. Buster Poindexter exactly the same way. [Or would; looks like he's gone back to Johansen after becoming mostly-independently notable under the later name for a while. That actually makes him an interesting test case, but I don't want to lay out a big logic tree about how to treat coverage of him in three different periods but under two names, right in the middle of this more focused discussion.]  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  16:53, 14 June 2015 (UTC)
• Don't let this proposal distract us. The current rules were clearly written by a consensus tipped by advocates in violation of WP:SOURCE amongst other policies. They knew they were violating a policy at the time and had to write the exception into the guideline. Some cases are more equal than others. The rules are broken and need to be fixed. A band aid doesn't fix the problem, in fact a temporary solution only lasts until someone rewrites each article affected. We need a policy ground to stand on not excepted by a misguided guideline. Any other identity change, essentially name changes, are treated with a time base. There is an announcement date for the new identity. Usually it can be precisely defined though some cases come out of the closet more ambiguously. Sometimes nicknames evolve into a notorious stage name over a period of time, but even then, there is a range that can be defined and frequently there is a story behind it, which wikipedia should tell. Back to the original point, the information is there in contemporary sources. They don't go back and reprint newspapers with new names.

We've dealt with this before, we have examples and a precedent. Not even his birth name, "Duke" Morrison was credited in his first movie in 1929, John Wayne became the credited name in 1930. We've discussed before, Cassius Clay won the gold medal and beat Sonny Liston. He went by Cassius X. for a month but Muhammad Ali is the boxer the world came to know. If you were alive at the time, you would remember that was contentious too based on different prejudices than the current transgender situation. The point is, we should not go back in time and rewrite history. This is not fiction. We/wikipedia should report accurately what happened. The MOS:IDENTITY should be rewritten to conform to current policies. Trackinfo (talk) 08:10, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Maybe there's a conflation of two different issues here, falling under different sets of policies/guidelines:

1. Article title, falling under WP:AT, and particularily relevant, under WP:SPNC:
   • *moved* to new name:
     • Cassius Clay → Muhammad Ali
     • Walter Carlos → Wendy Carlos
   • *not moved* to new name:
     • Cat Stevens
     • Wolfgang Schmidt

   → all following the same rules, whether there's a physical sex change or not: such change does *not* automatically lead to the article being moved to the new name (FYI, Beate Schmidt for the last of the examples listed above). As such not falling under whatever the MOS page WP:IDENTITY has to say on the topic.

2. How the subject is referred to in secondary articles:
   • "Walter Carlos" in 1968 in music (in 1968 there was no "Wendy" printed on the sleeve of the record)
   • "Wendy Carlos" in 12th Annual Grammy Awards#Classical (the "person" gets the prize, not a printed name)

   → Works fine without the MOS needing a rewrite...; the MOS doesn't even say anything about which first name should be used where, editor discretion rarely leads to problems here (see for example "Schmidt was sentenced to 15 years in prison and detention in a psychiatric hospital" in Rape in Germany#Notable offenders avoiding to use "she" in combination with "Wolfgang"), and certainly not something to write a new "one size fits all" rule about. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:20, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Common sense would certainly be the correct option. We don't have that. We have people actively trying to post ridiculous statements like Option 4 #16 above into the wikipedia voice, using MOS:IDENTITY as the justification. Sure, the IAAF won't recognize those statements, I've explained why. Of course other sources don't report this. But those are only facts, which wikipedia should ignore in order to conform with this altered reality. It has a cascading effect. WP:BLP this affects every other displaced, legitimately female (XX) athlete over a 40 year history. Trackinfo (talk) 19:01, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Well good, reason it out then on the page or use WP:DR, and common sense will prevail then - there will probably be several common sense solutions depending on the context -- so, you don't need VPP intervention from the top down. Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:10, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

I'll argue, others have been reverting. The problem is, and the reason I came to this discussion, MOS:IDENTITY is a current guideline that gives them the right to ignore sources and write what they want, in order to prove their WP:POINT to the general public. Fighting against a WP:POV written policy makes it harder. Trackinfo (talk) 09:25, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

MOS:IDENTITY doesn't give a right to ignore sources, the new name needs to be exquisitely sourced before it can be used. What the guideline does is encouraging editors to use more recent, up-to-date sources over older, obsolete ones that didn't know better when they were written. Diego (talk) 09:32, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Getting Trackinfo's issue (I think), here's my response --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:04, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Unilateral changes to MOS:IDENTITY

Francis Schonken made a bold edit to MOS:IDENTITY while this discussion was still ongoing (unclosed). I reverted it because I see no consensus for it here (and it would be best for us all to wait until this RFC is closed to see what consensus is, rather than for one involved participant to try to judge that consensus is in his favour); I also think the edit effectively repeals MOS:IDENTITY (which I see no consensus for in this discussion) and fails to understand that it is explicitly set up as "An exception..." to other criteria; it also controversially suggests that saying "she [trans woman] did x" would violate content policies — a notion which has been suggested before by a few users, but has never AFAICT gained anything even approaching consensus. Rather than proceed to discuss his edit per BRD, the same user re-inserted it, citing WP:VPP#Option 5 (no new rule, treat on a case-by-case basis, which shows two users supporting and one user opposing his idea, and which doesn't come close to the level of support other options in this thread have. The user has yet again inserted his preferred version in what certainly resembles and attempt to prejudice the outcome of this RFC, and has told me to "take it to talk", getting WP:BRD quite backwards. Can someone else look into this? -sche (talk) 18:05, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

WP:BRD? Really? see below... --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:00, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

As remarked above, MoS, a guideline, was written as to override policy. There's no policy-level agreement to do that. I removed the policy infraction, while my first attempt to only mitigate the policy-infringing statements was reverted. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:20, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

From WP:NPOV, second and third paragraph of the lede:

NPOV is a fundamental principle of Wikipedia and of other Wikimedia projects. It is also one of Wikipedia's three core content policies; the other two are "Verifiability" and "No original research". These policies jointly determine the type and quality of material that is acceptable in Wikipedia articles, and, because they work in harmony, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one another. Editors are strongly encouraged to familiarize themselves with all three. This policy is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus.

I bolded cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines in the above – as such a no-brainer to remove from a guideline any statements that explicitly try to supersede this.

Further: "When there is a discrepancy between the term most commonly used by reliable sources for a person or group and the term that person or group uses for themselves, Wikipedia should use the term that is most commonly used by reliable sources; if it isn't clear which is most used, use the term that the person or group uses." is an erroneous and misleading summary of the quoted policies. These policies don't let themselves be condensed to a few soundbites, otherwise these policies wouldn't have so many ifs and buts. Remove summary that only leads to non-comprehension and discussion.

Also: "Wikipedia favors self-designation" is bad style (Wikipedia is not a sentient being that can favor or disfavor whatever); and infringes both WP:NPOV (if anything Wikipedia should be neutral on the topic of self-designation) and WP:NOT (e.g. WP:NOT a means of promotion). So, remove until a more appropriate way to express this has been found. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:46, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

You are entirely misreading IDENTITY and going against a couple years worth of discussion. Take up your beef at the village pump. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 21:21, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

This is the village pump. --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:40, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Lol so it is. Well then let the discussion continue here. I see no issue with NPOV, V, or OR and the IDENTITY text. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 21:47, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

WP:IDENTITY as written is unreconcilable with WP:V. --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:50, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

This is what I have been arguing in as many places as possible. The current version of MOS:IDENTITY deliberately goes against core policy. It is written to nullify policy because this case is so exceptional. Transgender people are more equal than others." The WP:ADVOCATES got what they wanted written. They knew it was wrong when they wrote it so they had to write grammar to build in the exception. even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise, nullifying WP:SOURCE, WP:V. They even had to put words into wikipedia's voice. "Wikipedia favors self-designation," This exception is the cause of our problem. It clearly has to be changed. How do we change it to something that conforms with existing policy? Francis Schonken made a bold move to try to fix the problem. If not Francis, when will someone come in here and settle the issue? Or will this discussion just hang around until it drops off into the archive with no decision and is forgotten? That's the ticking time bomb I've been expecting already. We've been at this since June 2. Trackinfo (talk) 22:36, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

MOS:IDENTITY is perfectly fine with WP:V, specifically the section of WP:V about individuals being experts on themselves: WP:ABOUTSELF. There's nothing wrong with saying WP favors self-designation for certain things (religion, gender identity, etc.) as it can still be verified with statements by the individual themselves and that they would have the most recent and accurate info on the topic. Perhaps your concerns would be fixed if we update WP:ABOUTSELF to say that self sources are preferred in specific, limited cases like sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, etc.? EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 22:59, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

About themselves is fine. The conflict, with sources, is when it goes against their interaction with others, which affect WP:BLPs of the others; when it goes against sources, causing wikipedia to misstate historical facts, as in purported females acting in male roles. If the transgender people have no established history and can operate in their own bubble, there is no conflict with sources. But with notable figures, the kind of people we deal with on wikipedia, when they have a known public history but wikipedia reports the story differently, it damages the entire credibility of wikipedia's ability to report any fact correctly. Trackinfo (talk) 23:22, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

It's not difficult to reword stuff to avoid confusion. If your issue is with pronouns, that's a different issue. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 23:59, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

It's not about pronouns. And on Jenner, I was finally the one to gender neutralize a bunch that nobody else seemed to tackle. I'd invite you to tackle the sentence: "Jenner contended that she likes the cereal and eats the breakfast cereal two to three times per week." with time appropriate language. The issue I have raised is about reporting historical fact. We have editors trying to report in the wikipedia voice that Caitlyn Jenner achieved female athletics records that (XY) Jenner would never be qualified to hold, WP:BLP displacing decades of legitimate (meaning XX) female athletes; plus that Caitlyn Jenner married three women; fathered 6 children (4 of them notable); that Caitlyn played male roles on television and in a couple of bad movies. Those things were accomplished by a person representing to be a male by the public name of Bruce Jenner. If Bruce was Caitlyn at the time, perhaps Jenner wouldn't have been nominated for the 1980 Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actor, because she was doing a much better job pulling off the male part than the ex-jock, male actor Bruce Jenner did.. And in the other film, it was Adam Sandler who transgendered the award by winning the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actress. OK, I digressed. Sources throughout that era report Bruce's name, its engraved on the many awards. Wikipedia reporting otherwise, because the current draft of MOS:IDENTITY allows it to, means we are not reporting the true facts that are known to anybody who has followed this story through time. You will not find a source written before 2015 that mentions the name Caitlyn Jenner. Until we fix the problem, the loophole in MOS:IDENTITY is inviting editors to insert incorrect facts. Trackinfo (talk) 11:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

She (Jenner) was always a woman. If you identify as a woman (meaning you consider yourself to be a woman), you are a legitimate woman. Adam Sandler was not "transgendered," the Worst Actress award was a joke and not serious self-designation. Read WP:ABOUTSELF. Clr324 (say hi) 15:16, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

Clr324, do you have a reliable source for that assertion about this BLP? Not every transwoman subscribes to the story that "I am a woman, therefore I have always been a woman". Some of them take a more genderfluid approach, some believe that they were once male and have changed, and still others have other stories about their personal experiences. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:25, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing: Is Caitlyn genderfluid or views herself as changing genders? If so, and she prefers the past tense he, yes it would be best to use the past tense he as per the MOS. Ms. Andrea Carter here (at your service) 18:32, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't know, as "celebrity gossip" is a section of the newspaper that I can't be bothered to read. I've noticed a lot of people making assumptions, but I've not seen anyone producing any sources on it. Perhaps nobody knows. Jenner may not have it all formulated into media-friendly soundbites and conveniently labeled pigeonholes yet (if ever – there is no rule that says you must have a story that makes sense to other people, or that the story you identify with today must be the story you stick to until death). But in the absence of sources directly addressing the issue, I believe we should be cautious about assigning life stories and personal beliefs to anyone. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:58, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing: I do agree. However, the MOS says to use the current gender self-identification in the past tense and the only objector has removed their objection. Ms. Andrea Carter here (at your service) 20:29, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

1. Move the first sentence of the first paragraph ("Disputes over how to refer to a person or group are addressed by Wikipedia content policies, such as those on verifiability, and neutral point of view (and article titles when the term appears in the title of an article).") down, i.e. below "An exception to the above ...". (side remark: besides overcoming the unwanted exception to core content policy, it is also maybe better not to start a section with "Disputes...", so moving the sentence about how to resolve disputes – not assuming "dispute" is necessary to continue reading - down, so that it concludes the section, seems like a better idea from that perspective too).
2. insert the qualifier "most of the" in "..., even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise", thus: "..., even when usage by most of the reliable sources indicates otherwise", indicating that this can't be done when all of the reliable sources indicate otherwise.
3. As for getting rid of "Wikipedia favors ..." (which is unreconcilable with WP:NPOV), replace it by "give precedence to ..." --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:52, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

OK then for this implementation in three steps of "It's not difficult to reword stuff to avoid confusion"? --Francis Schonken (talk) 22:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with the first point; I think the second sentence is the main point for the first bullet, and the current first sentence works better as an independent third bullet. As it is currently written, I don't read the "exception" language in the second bullet as being an exception to core policies, because nothing in WP:MOSIDENTITY conflicts with core policies.

For suggestion 2, I don't understand the point of it; it seems like unnecessary added words. If there are reliable sources as to someone's self-identification of their own gender identity (as we of course require), then it can't be the case that there is zero usage of that identity in reliable sources.

I don't have any objection to the wordsmithing suggested in point three. Phrasing a style guideline as an imperative (with Wikipedia as the implied speaker) or as "Wikipedia <verb>" is all the same; neither is plausibly a violation of NPOV. The imperative formulation is probably, clearer, though both formulations are found in the MOS.

It would probably be best to wait for a few more people to comment and a clear consensus to develop before making any changes.--Trystan (talk) 00:20, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

OK, I don't see a problem splitting the first and second sentences of what is currently point 1 into separate bullet points and moving the first sentence to the end of the section. (Alternatively, indent and italicize the first sentence at the top of the section à la the "For results of past discussions" and "See also" pointers at the top of other sections, leave the second sentence as bullet point 1, and reword "exception to the above" to "exception to the preceding point" or such.) (Straying off topic: do people confuse Arab and Arabic so often that the main MOS needs to explain the difference between them, as it does now, or could we move that point to a subpage?) I think the second point is unecessary for the same reasons as Trystan; if one does want to add "most", I note that one could say "in most reliable sources" more concisely than "in most of the reliable sources". For for point three, as Trystan has said, either formulation is fine, "neither is plausibly a violation of NPOV [and] both formulations are found in the MOS", in fact there's another "Wikipedia [verb]s" phrase in the first bullet point we're discussing: "Wikipedia should use the term..." (which one could trim to just "use the term..."). -sche (talk) 06:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

• OK, will proceed with first point, seems uncontroversial
• Second point:
  • "(write something in the encyclopedia) ...even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise" is in direct conflict with WP:V. WP:V is one of the three core content policies. so "is in conflict with core content policy" is a correct appreciation.
  • "in most reliable sources" could (and will by Murphy's law) be read as "in the most reliable sources", so incites to give precedence to less reliable sources. We're going for avoidance of confusion here – I'm no fan of overly long formulation either (I'd cut the whole sentence – in fact it contributes nothing), but "most of the" doesn't have this ambiguity.
  • reformulate as "... even when only covered by a minority of the reliable sources." would avoid the confusion too, so maybe that's preferable.
  • or, as "... even when only covered by recent reliable sources." shorter, more to the point, no bloat.
• "Wikipedia <verb>" is not the problem. "Wikipedia favors" is: if Wikipedia favors something over something else it is not neutral, so direct conflict with WP:NPOV. The only "Wikipedia favors" sentence I see possible is "Wikipedia favors neutrality". --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:04, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Both WP:V and WP:NPOV (including DUEWEIGHT) allow for giving more weight to the "best and most reliable sources". The best and most reliable sources recommend, as a general practice, respecting individuals' expressed gender identity when using gendered terms. The best and most reliable source for a specific person's gender identity is that person's self-identification (as quoted in reliable sources such as the mainstream media). All MOS:IDENTITY says is not to override the best sources with a less discriminate tally of gendered-language usage across every source that could be considered reliable. There is no conflict.--Trystan (talk) 14:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Re. "All MOS:IDENTITY says is not to override the best sources with a less discriminate tally of gendered-language usage across every source that could be considered reliable." – that's what we want it to say, not what it actually says. It says "Wikipedia favors (some type of content), even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise".

Then of course deciding that a source is more reliable depending on what that content is (not in the MoS, but in Trystan's comment above) is even worse WP:V-wise. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:53, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I said nothing of the sort. The best and most reliable sources on this issue are determined by professional and scientific expertise (e.g., the American Psychological Association), not by their position on the issue. I was summarizing what they do in fact say, not providing criteria on how to select them.--Trystan (talk) 18:00, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You are suggesting a broad generalization based on one aspect suggesting American Psychological Association might have an opinion on other subjects. My concern is that backwards rewriting of historical events. We have a name (and gender representation) associated with historical events. To say that American Psychological Association, now, has an opinion on a name or gender dating back years, decades or longer, and that overrides what was written at the time will cause wikipedia to disagree with those historical sources. That's a lot of overriding because of one expert. Trackinfo (talk) 16:48, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

We often disagree with historical sources when they turn out to be wrong. We have 76 years of sources treating Pluto as a planet, but even in historical contexts, we make it clear that it is a dwarf planet that was previously considered to be a planet. We don't write in a way that suggests it was a planet and then stopped being one.

Where a person's previous gender expression is relevant, it can be made clear what gender they represented as at a given time while also respecting their later statement of their gender identity.--Trystan (talk) 15:15, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

All you want the MoS to say is "...follow the self-designation as contained in the most up-to-date reliable sources" instead of "...Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise". Is that a correct summary? Anyway less charged with hyperboles that go against the grain of WP:V/WP:NPOV/WP:OR, and also using a language that is more becoming to a style guide. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:48, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

• I have mentioned this elsewhere, but I think it worth repeating here... There are actually two issues being conflated here... 1) the issue of what name to use in any given article or list, and 2) the issue of what gender pronouns to use. I think it would be helpful to separate these two issues. Names do not limit a person's identity. A woman can be named "Bruce" and a man can be named "Caitlyn". We can thus treat a change of name that stems from gender identity the same way we treat a change of name that stems from any other cause (such as a marriage, adoption, or simple desire of the person to use another name) - by following the sources and using the appropriate name in the appropriate historical context. As for gender pronouns... that is a more debatable issue, but one that we have a workable solution for: avoid all pronouns (don't use "he" or "she"... use "Jenner"). Blueboar (talk) 15:47, 28 June 2015 (UTC)
  • True. For example, Reiner Maria Rilke was a (cisgendered) man, despite the obviously feminine middle name. Men being named after a female saint, and women having the names of male saints, is common in some cultures or sub-cultures. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:30, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
• The biggest problem with this, if you ask me, is that MOS:IDENTITY is located in the MoS, which is a mere guideline. I'm not sure why it is located in the MoS at all. In fact, it would make much more sense to spin it off as a policy of its own. RGloucester — ☎ 14:56, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

  I would support spinning IDENTITY off as a policy of its own, but I think it's understandable why it has been covered in the MOS (and I think it's reasonable for it to stay in the MOS in the interim, until such time as it's spun off as a policy of its own). As I wrote a while ago, "does this person profess the Jewish faith?" and "is this person transgender" are content questions which must be answered by reliable sources (and in both cases, the most reliable source for the information is the person themselves, and Wikipedia requires self-identification), while "should this person be referred to as a 'Jewess' or a 'Jewish woman'?" and "should this person be referred to as 'he' or 'she'?" are plausibly viewed as style questions, as can be seen from the fact that reliable sources from 1843 saying Foobar Smith killed "two Jewesses" can be used to support the sentence, in our article on Smith, that he killed two Jewish women — the sources verify the content, and we're just choosing which words to use to convey the content. Likewise, if sources from before Manning transitioned said "Bradley Manning visited France and he speaks French", but then sources from after Manning transitioned discovered and published "Chelsea Manning previously claimed she spoke French, but in fact she does not", Wikipedia wouldn't state "Bradley Manning speaks French^{old source}; Chelsea Manning does not^{new source}" — sufficiently many editors would be able to recognize the mathematical identity of Bradley=Chelsea to recognize that the new source was correcting the old source, not making an unrelated claim about a different person. (But as I noted: A thing that is "just a question of style" is sometimes dismissed as unimportant, with the implication that any answer to the question is "fine"; it should be clear that these questions of style are not unimportant, and some possible answers, such as "refer to that person as a 'Jewess'", may cause great offensive.)
  How would one go about elevating and moving IDENTITY? Start an RFC "Should the guideline currently located at MOS:IDENTITY be moved to Wikipedia:Foobar and adopted as a policy?" ? (WP:PROPOSAL seems to suggest doing that, but then says consensus is rarely accomplished that way, which leaves me unsure.) -sche (talk) 19:23, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

I suppose Blueboar's suggestion could work:

• "Manning visited France, and Manning speaks French"
• "Manning previously claimed speaking French, but in fact doesn't speak the language"
• "Manning claimed to speak French^{old source}; In fact, Manning does not^{new source}

Let's not overcomplicate. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:39, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Indeed. Even "Manning visited France^[1] and speaks French^[2]" will do fine.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  06:48, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

If you want to change "Wikipedia favors" to something like "give precedence to", I have no objection. (I do note, however, that WP:POLICY says "policies, guidelines, and process pages themselves are not part of the encyclopedia proper. Consequently, they do not generally need to conform with the content standards. It is therefore not necessary [...] to phrase Wikipedia procedures or principles in a neutral manner".) -sche (talk) 19:23, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

WP:POLICY is a guideline.

"WP:NPOV is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus" (see quote above) is policy.

Yeah there's no policy reason why a style guide shouldn't display stylistically bad choices – for me that's just a common sense argument. If you want to argue "bad style is better while WP:POLICY allows us", yeah, sure, go ahead. But don't expect me to fall for such argument. –Francis Schonken (talk) 20:39, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

The former

"... In such cases, Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise."

has now been changed to (adding bolding to show difference):

"... In such cases, give precedence to self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise."

I propose to update this further to:

"... In such cases, give precedence to self-designation as explicited in reliable sources that contain up-to-date information on such self-designation." (as contained in the most up-to-date reliable sources).

...same guidance, but with less of a "defy WP:RS" spirit (plus other advantages described above). --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:20, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

OK for this then? --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:00, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Updated the proposed phrasing a bit to make it clearer (an up-to-date source that ignores the self-designation should not be followed in this respect). --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:56, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

I think there would need to be some alternative way of expressing what "but don't look at usage" is trying, perhaps ineffectively, to convey. I like -sche's approach above. It could be something like "...In such cases, give precedence to self-designation as reported in reliable sources. While a specific person's self-expressed gender identity is a question of content, use of pronouns and gendered terms is a question of style on which an article may differ from the sources used. Any person whose gender might be questioned..."--Trystan (talk) 15:55, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, think that'll work. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:35, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

So no-one thinks I'm taking credit for someone else's ideas, I point out that the "give precedence to" snippet which I implemented and which seems to be being described above as my language is actually what Francis proposed; I just implemented it because it had agreement here but no-one had bothered to implement it. :b
I'm wary of changing "even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise", because even if the intention is not to change the effect of the guideline, I think a wording like "as [explicited/reported] in [up-to-date/...] reliable sources" would lead more people to think that the guideline was saying the same thing that many people erroneously think WP:AT says, "[the only criterion is,] count how many reliable sources use each name, and title the article whatever name the largest number of sources use".
I don't mind having the MOS specify / explain "while a specific person's self-expressed gender identity is a question of content, use of pronouns and gendered terms is a question of style on which an article may differ from the sources used", if people agree that that interpretation is correct. It would certainly help explain things to the small percent of commenters who, in most of the trans BLP RMs I've seen so far, question if / suggest that "using other pronouns/names/synonyms violates WP:V!". -sche (talk) 18:12, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, no. "People might misunderstand WP:AT" is a less big problem than "people actively misunderstand core content policy". So retracting my initial support for the mentioning of "content" in the MoS. If this has anything to do with "content" it shouldn't be in the MoS. No beating around the bush.

A person's self-identification needs to be covered by reliable sources, or it shouldn't be in Wikipedia. Core content policy, no ifs and buts. No suggestion this doesn't apply to self-identification. Self-identification reported in a tabloid exclusively? No content for Wikipedia. "Outing" of self-identification by someone's acquaintance on a blog? Not a sufficient reason for Wikipedia to start rewriting before the sourcing is WP:V-proof, etc. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:58, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Tx you all for collaborating on the current updated text. As I see it issues have been resolved, and I suppose there's no problem to remove the {{underdiscussion}} tag that links to this VPP section from the MOS. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:25, 15 July 2015 (UTC)

Exploring possibilities to turn transgender guidance into policy

Re. "How would one go about elevating and moving IDENTITY?" I started a separate subsection. I see a few possibilities:

1. Write a separate page with the guidance as you would like it. Put a {{essay}} or {{proposal}} template on top of it. Announce it on this page, and ask cooperation. Once the people interested in it come to a rough consensus that the text is workable, try RfC to elevate to guideline, or (but that would probably be a next step) policy.
2. Propose it on a policy talk page for insertion in that policy. I'd choose WP:NPOV, with something like "Wikipedia is neutral to the choices people make w.r.t. their identity, religion, and preferences, and reports these without bias as expressed by themselves and recorded in reliable sources ... etc..." Again, try to reach a rough consensus on the talk page on wording, and where in the policy it should go. When that is possible → RfC (with announcement here, on the BLP policy talk page etc.)
3. There are other possibilities (e.g. in a first step see if it can be added to WP:NPOVFAQ or WP:NPOV tutorial and from there to policy), and opportunities (e.g. group forces with the recently concluded initiative at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies#"Homosexual" vs. "Gay" – Wikipedia policy?) --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:39, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Note: I placed a {{update}} template at Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBT studies/Guidelines#Transgender and intersex people, which seems to be lagging much behind. Maybe start to find consensus on updating the project-level guidance first, and see whether it can taken to a higher level of guidance from there? --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:59, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

I am not sure that there is enough support for IDENTITY to promote it... so I think the first step would be a wiki-wide (heavily advertized) RFC, asking whether the community wants IDENTITY to be promoted or left as an essay. Blueboar (talk) 11:10, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

1. WP:IDENTITY is MoS, so currently at guideline level (not essay level).
2. RfC for promotion to a higher level is unlikely to succeed before the text is somewhat tailored to such level. It's about common sense exceptions, easily applied for guidelines (as illustrated by some of the examples mentioned in this discussion), while a policy text should be written so that it is more resilient against exceptions (that means more detail about particular circumstances and/or more axing around overarching principles – these are choices that need to be made for a policy text, and hashing out such choices, checking against BLP, NPOV, and other existing policies, etc are usually better done before a more-or-less consensus text is presented via RfC - attempting to finetune a text by means of an RfC has already proved too often to be WP:SNOW) --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:56, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

You might find WP:PROPOSAL worth reading. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:31, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

and/or Wikipedia:How to contribute to Wikipedia guidance. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:34, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken: The current edition has been updated by -sche to a new section (Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBT studies/Guidelines#How to write about transgender, non-binary, and intersex people), per discussion regarding the use of the term "transgendered" that the user brought up. – Zumoarirodoka ^(talk) 12:32, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes; that's largely a different issue from the one we've been discussing here, but if we were drafting a policy on trans subjects, I guess the language I added to WP:LGBT based on discussion would be appropriate to cover in the same place. Actually, perhaps MOS:IDENTITY's guidance on names and pronouns is not the subject of enough unity to elevate it to a policy at this time, but perhaps the WP:LGBT guidance on using words like "transgendered" is uncontroversial enough and subject to enough style guides' unanimity that it would be appropriate to elevate to guideline status on some MOS subpage? -sche (talk) 18:41, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

General discussion

• For articles where the gender is important, and where the current publicly expressed gender identity would cause unjustified confusion, I think using their publicly expressed gender identity from that historic time frame is the way to go. For articles where that is not important, I'm really not sure. So in this case, because the gender of an athlete in the Olympics is important, I would say continue to use the historic male gender identity in those articles. But if we aren't talking about an athlete, I'm not sure. Say its an article about a company that talks about the CEO. On the one hand, the CEO's public gender identity at the time they were CEO may be interesting to some people. But on the other, it is at least somewhat common for people to say their current gender identity long predates when they started publicly expressing it, and we should try to be respectful of that. It also wouldn't be nearly as confusing as in the athlete example. I don't know how this would be turned into a guideline either. Monty₈₄₅ 02:49, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Well, gender is important for sports, as most disciplines use it to create separate categories - usually for good reason. Learning about transgender people competing in sports with a category different from their self-identified gender will be more and more common, now that it is becoming less of a taboo. It makes sense to register a specific sentence in the guideline, but it should be based on the same criteria of the current MOS:IDENTITY. If the topic is confusing to some people, the guideline could help editors deal with it in a consistent way. Diego (talk) 09:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• For a historical listing on a page of athletic events, the name seems more relevant than the gender. As except for co-ed athletic events (equestrian?), it is assumed that everyone in that particular listing is of the same sex (or identified as such at the time of the competition). I was looking for an example of a prominent cisgender athlete who changed names during their career, and hit upon Muhammad Ali. On the list of heavyweight boxing champions he is listed as Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay) for the year 1964. I think doing this on articles referring to Jenner's athletic career - i.e., Caitlyn Jenner (Bruce Jenner) - with a footnote about the gender change, might work. Funcrunch (talk) 03:00, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  A lot of tables don't have that kind of room. You also have to take context into it. For way more than half of Ali's boxing career he was known as Muhammad Ali, not Cassius Clay. Same with Abdul-Jabbar (Lew Alcindor). In their field they had dual names and it makes sense to choose the more prominent one in their field. Jenner in sports was only known by one name, Bruce Jenner. The sports fields should reflect that. Fyunck(click) (talk) 04:59, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

  I can tell you right now, every table involved in this case has room for it. So that's a red herring. Skyerise (talk) 12:05, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

  They wouldn't in tennis draws... I'm not as familiar with wikipedia track&field nomenclature. Fyunck(click) (talk) 17:17, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

  An interesting precedent. I hadn't thought of that angle. Good idea. --Jayron32 03:05, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  Funcrunch has it right. When the old name is reasonably expected and perhaps needed for context, include it in parentheses. Otherwise, use current name. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 03:18, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Well, I think that might be because of Wikipedia's specific preference/obsession for the "common name" to be used, rather than the accurate name (who cares if the entire world calls it Myanmar, its official name? Common name is Burma!!! No discussion!). In the sports-reference results from 1960, he is Cassius Clay, and his sports-reference profile (based on his 1960 results) he is also Cassius Clay (with Muhammad Ali listed under "other names"). —Мандичка^YO 😜 03:19, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Given how WP:RS are treating Myanmar in the past year or so, it is likely ripe for a rename, but that is neither here not there. MOS:IDENTITY clearly lays out an exception for gender identity, the current discussion is merely how to clarify that guideline for articles outside of the subject article itself. --Jayron32 03:29, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Are we seriously comparing a slave state's top-down impressed archaicising spelling of "Burma", which incidentally is pronounced like the word "Burma", with the individual lives of human beings? Ogress _smash! 13:19, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

• • That's a good compromise, but shouldn't the name by which the subject was known at that time come first? Epic Genius (talk) 17:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
• I think gender should reflect the choice of the subject (or in all cases should strive to be neutral where it interferes with proper continuity), but the name should reflect that which the subject was known by at the time. This also raises a question regarding gender-specific achievements. Ie, if Jenner's record was for male decathalon, would we use female pronouns in these cases? - Floydian ^τ _¢ 03:45, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  The guideline says "yes", if that's the person's preference. That's the aproach most respecting WP:BLP. Confusion about a woman participating in men's category could be handled by noting that Jenner is a transgender person, which IMHO is relevant in that context. Diego (talk) 12:06, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  That Jenner came out as transgendered in 2015 is not relevant to an Olympic competition 30 years prior though. And changing the name from the 1976 events, even to add a parenthetical or footnote introduces anachronisms that, frankly, do the encyclopedia a disservice. If we view Wikipedia as a serious reference, then re-writing history is outside our purview. Resolute 18:37, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  Ah but see trans-awareness is the new white liberal guilt of today. It's more important that we slaughter the English language in an attempt to not possibly offend someone who lived for 60 years as a male, than it is to be factually accurate and list the name and gender they were publicly identified by at that time. Political correctness be damned, until June 1st they were a male named Bruce Jenner. Today that is different, but 3 days ago they identified as a man, so 30 years ago they most certainly were a man named Bruce Jenner. Unfortunately a case like this brings out the advocates with their cause. - Floydian ^τ _¢ 14:37, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

* There is a precedent for using names that the athlete used at the time of their athletic achievements. Ron Atest (Metta World Peace), Mike Stanton (Giancarlo Stanton), Domanick Davis (Domanick Williams), Olivier Saint-Jean (Tariq Abdul Wahad), Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul Jabbar) and Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) did not have their records retroactively changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.69.186.3 (talk) 04:02, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• In my opinion, use female wherever possible except in the cases where it would be likely to lead to confusion or implicates something that is not the case. (Her former marriage, at the least. Possibly her athletic accomplishments and her appearance on the Wheaties boxes as well) In the cases where her female name is likely to lead to confusion or false implications, use Bruce Jenner (Caitlyn Jenner). AddWittyNameHere (talk) 07:42, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• In sentences where female pronouns would cause problems, a common guideline is to use the last name (i.e. "Jenner competed in male categories" rather than "she competed in male categories"). Using the parenthesis is a good idea when the full name is needed - it's the most informative. Diego (talk) 09:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Yes, I was speaking mostly of her full name. Names are more likely to lead to confusion and should have a more standardized solution; for pronouns there are multiple valid ways to work around issues—by replacing the pronoun with the surname, by rearranging the sentence so it makes sense ("became a parent" v. "became a father"). Probably more ways to deal with pronoun-related issues that are neither confusing nor insensitive, but those are the two most obvious. AddWittyNameHere (talk) 17:24, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I strongly encourage all participants in this thread to read all of the Wikipedia:Gender identity essay - and in particular Retroactivity and Common name, which is the topic at hand. It works as a FAQ for MOS:IDENTITY, dealing with the most common objections to it, and reflecting the values that were used to craft the current guideline in defense of BLPs. Would it be a good idea to post it at the lead of this discussion, above Option 1? If there are no objections, I'll post the link there. Diego (talk) 10:14, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• The only problem I have with that is that it makes too many presumptions on the part of the transgendered person. For some transgendered people, the act of "coming out" as one gender may be merely the revelation to the public of a gender which they have had their whole life. However, the experience of transgendered people (like all people) is diverse, and the experience of one person cannot be generalized across all people. Gender can be a fluid concept, and while for one person, the act of "revelation" may be what is happening, other people may genuinely be one gender for some phases of their life, and may genuinely be another gender for other phases of their life. It isn't for us to decide, in any one particular case, what gender means to all people at all times. Sure, for some the act is merely a public revelation of a life-long gender (as noted in the essay), but for others the situation is more complex. We're also considering, in that essay, the implicit notion that people's experience exist only on the binary state of one of two genders; or perhaps on a continuum between those two genders. Human experience cannot be reduced to a single axis on any trait; we need to be careful not to minimize the experience of those who identify as a third gender or the genderqueer. My concern with that essay is that it's advice is not inclusive of the range of human experience, and we should NOT assume that all people who "come out" as trangendered are doing so for the same reason as all others. If a person genuinely identified as a different gender at a different phase of their life, we should not minimize that experience any more than a person who identified as one gender, different from their public persona. Both experiences should be considered "valid" (insofar as it isn't any of my or your or anyone's job to determine validity for others in a situation such as this.) --Jayron32 11:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• I don't see the essay as excluding the genderqueer nor assuming a gender binary; even if many examples deal with the case of transgender persons, the main theme is that of self-identity, whichever that is. It's true that we shouldn't soehorn all experiences into a common category, but that's not what the essay is about, quite the contrary. We do need a standard on how to handle our "default" way to write, so to say, and for transgender people (the topic of this discussion) the most sensible way is well handled by the external guidelines on which our MOS:IDENTITY guideline is based.

Exceptions to the guideline may still be handled case by case. If we find evidence that one particular person doesn't consider themselves to have always been the same gender, the writing for their biography could be handled on the light of the particular expressed self-identification of that person at different times. The problem with Option 1 above is that it encourages doing this even for people who self-identify as always having been the same gender. Diego (talk) 11:23, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I very much appreciate Jayron's commentary about transgender people having different gender identity expressions. And on that point, it is also worth noting that while the term transgender is commonly used in a restrictive sense (for cases such as Chelsea Manning or Caitlyn Jenner), it is also an umbrella term for gender variant people. Because the biology of gender (including the causes of transsexualism topic) is still so heavily debated, with so much of the debate being inconclusive, and the complexities of gender variance, I remind myself to be cautious about making gender identity automatically a matter of biology. For many transgender people, they absolutely believe that there is a genetic basis to their gender identity; for other transgender people, they don't.

On another note: What should we do in cases like this edit, where CloudKade11 changed the label of "father" to "mother" regarding Jenner? How do we know that Jenner identifies as a mother? Flyer22 (talk) 11:55, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I think, however, that we miss the basic premise of these discussions when we focus on issues like "biology" and "choice" and "genetics" and "environment" and all the rest. The implicit assumption in the above (well meaning) discussion is the same as the transphobic people use to justify their bigotry: They choose to mistreat someone based on the fact that their identity is not valid based on concepts of biology; that a person "chooses" a certain gender, and that choice therefore means that others get to impart "consequences" based on that choice, etc. The first, and again, well meaning attempt is to refute those notions by saying "no, it really does have a genetic or biological basis" or "it is not something people choose". While well meaning, that misses the point entirely. The point (and excuse the emphasis, but I am doing this for clarity, not to shout or be rude), is that people are afforded dignity for no other reason than they are people. When you find someone mistreating a person because they claim that their biology makes them one gender, and they've (in the mind of the transphobic person) chosen to disobey their biology, and you counter that with "no they haven't, their biology and not their choice makes them who they are, even for transgendered people", you've focused on the wrong issue, and ultimately do a disservice to the proper resolution of the conflict. The response is "people are afforded the same basic level of dignity no matter who they are, and that includes the same rights to self-determination and identity that are afforded to all, irrespective of all considerations". That's the end of the debate. That's the point we need to get across. When we make dignity dependent on why a person is the way they are, that opens the possibility that there will be people who don't qualify for dignity based on your debated definitions. Dignity is not optional. --Jayron32 12:19, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Jayron32 (WP:Pinging you in case you miss this comment), I know that it's common for transphobic people to use biology against transgender people (I've seen it enough times on Wikipedia and elsewhere), and I've heard all of those types of arguments. I brought up the biology matter above because this post by Diego Moya mentions biology. Your "11:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)" post also made me want to address biology and the fact that gender variance is complex; there are some genderqueer people, for example, who will state that they choose to be a gender and that they actively rebel against the gender binary. I simply wanted to add on to your point about not generalizing transgender people; what I meant is that it's not always simple to say what made a person transgender. Some people (including some transgender people) argue a biological basis; other people (including some transgender people) argue that it's not a biological basis, and then there are the ones that argue that it's nature and nurture (a combination of both, not one or the other). That's basically all that I was stating: Gender identity expressions do not always form the same way. Flyer22 (talk) 19:38, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

See this archived discussion at MOS talk page. BTW, when infoboxes can't properly summarize a complex situation, isn't it common practice to simply remove the problematic fact and explain it in prose? Diego (talk) 12:17, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I think the edit should be reverted or removed entirely, and CloudKade11 notified of this discussion, since there's still a huge debate on this. Epic Genius (talk) 17:05, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• If anyone seriously wishes to challenge or change Wikipedia's established position on this, I would strongly suggest starting by studying the history of our articles on Chelsea Manning, Wendy Carlos, and Chaz Bono as well as the extensive discussions about the naming of each on multiple noticeboards. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:11, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• We really need an official FAQ that summarizes the previous conversations about the guideline, otherwise we'll be revisiting it for every new variation of its application. Diego (talk) 12:17, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Well, I think the issue is that if this had been discussed before, it is not self-evident from the way the existing guidance is written at MOS:IDENTITY. The point of the discussion is not to overturn any aspect of that well-crafted guideline, it is to clarify as there is some ambiguity. The point of the discussion is to hammer out how to handle issues which did not come up in the cases like Chaz Bono or Chelsea Manning; neither of them competed in sports where their results were awarded to them under their prior names, a situation which we need to clarify for the current hot topic, but to do so in a way where we don't have to debate it again in the future. It is because this situation has not been clarified for policy's sake that the discussion is necessary. Once this matter is settled, we won't have to deal with this one. That doesn't mean some new, novel problem we hadn't thought up yet won't arise in the future that we hadn't yet considered. The process is not ever going to end; that's not a bad thing. Not because we're rehashing settled policy (which this discussion is not, MOS:IDENTITY is not under challenge), we're dealing with situations we hadn't the foresight to clarify previously. We'll have situations in the future similarly as well. This is just the way it goes. --Jayron32 12:27, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

But we have cases that cover transgender identity in the context of their previous careers, like Linda Wachowski and Danielle Bunten Berry, and which were taken into account when drafting the guideline. Current consensus is to use the latest expressed identity and gender pronouns even for the periods where the public identity was a different one (and even on articles about their careers), handling any potential confusion through careful wording.

If the goal is how to clarify the guideline on how its current wording applies in some particular cases, it cannot override its purpose - the clarification must be compatible with what we already have. Or if this discussion wants to change that existing consensus, it needs to address the arguments that lead to it, not merely ignore them nor assert that they are no longer valid. Diego (talk) 12:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• I'm not doubting whether the discussion happened before. The issue is the current state of the guideline has some ambiguity. Insofar as the ambiguity exists now, a discussion is needed now to resolve the ambiguity now. When this discussion concludes, this ambiguity will be resolved to the community's satisfaction, and the wording of the guideline will be changed to be less ambiguous. --Jayron32 13:46, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. What is ambiguous about that? The people arguing to use male pronouns in Jenner's case are arguing for a radical change in the guideline, not a clarification. If you're referring to what name should be used, then you're right, what name to use is not explicitly spelled out - although we have precedents in similar situations, and there seems to be an evolving agreement towards using both names (one of them in parentheses). Diego (talk) 16:31, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  No, I'm with you on the pronoun issue. The deal is in articles such as the 1976 Summer Olympics; especialy on mere entries in tables, where the pronoun issue wouldn't come up at all, do we use "Caitlyn Jenner" or "Bruce Jenner" or "Caitlyn (Bruce) Jenner" or some other identifier. The ambiguity is minor, and only exists in specific historic examples, where there is not a narrative to follow to explain the situation. --Jayron32 17:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

  Thank you, I understand now better your request for clarification. There seem to be two different aspects to it - whether we should use the previous name, and whether we should use the assigned-at-birth pronouns (sorry for the not PC term). The latter is settled from all the long previous discussions and crafting of the guideline, and would require a very strong new consensus to overturn. The former is open to discussion, and would make for a good adition to the guideline. I think Gaijin42's suggestion below to use the previous name where either gender or the exact name are relevant to the topic (noting that the person as changed names since) may be a viable approach, and compatible with how name changes are handled in other situations. Diego (talk) 18:23, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• I don't believe that there are any examples of athletic records being changed when an athlete change their name. It would be quite confusing for a reader to see "Caitlyn Jenner" under 1976 Olympic Gold Medal winners. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 104.254.93.62 (talk) 13:33, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I tend to agree with what fun crunch pointed out above-(a parenthetical ref to old name if needed)...but I would also like to know if it would be acceptable or correct to say something like;"Competing as Bruce Jenner, Caitlyn won the gold medal"?73.199.138.75 (talk) 14:57, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that is valid by the guideline. Diego (talk) 16:54, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I just think that there's no precedent. Keep in mind that I am solely referring to athletic records, not other aspects of Caitlyn Jenners life. I just think that we should stick to common practice. When Chad Johnson changed his name to Chad Ochocinco, Oregon State didn't update their record books to reflect the change. There are many examples of athletes changing their names, and having their records appear as the name they competed under.104.254.93.62 (talk) 15:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

It seems that we have to distinguish between the biological and the juridical aspects. In a strictly biological sense, gender is a component that can never be changed (the difference in regards to male and female chromosomes). For example, if the medical record is considered, an individual once born a male will always remain a male, no matter what surgical operations the individual has gone through.
Individual's name, however, is a juridical matter. When it comes to that, I think we should use whichever name in force at the particular moment (e.g. Bruce Jenner in 1976, Caitlyn Jenner in 2015). In technical terms, I think that "gender as a subjective experience" is mostly manifested through the choice of name, and by respecting this right we'll afford dignity towards these individuals the best.
In other words, individuals may choose between their "gender identity" (subjective experience), not between their gender (which is an immutable biological component). Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 16:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Please see the arguments laid out at Really a man and Legal name, those concerns have been addressed in the current manual of style. Diego (talk) 16:35, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• In this case, the personal preference of this person seems to be to use male pronouns for their past and to start using female pronouns in the future. Because of that, I think that Wikipedia should likewise use male pronouns for this person's past, and female pronouns for the future. Multiple media outlets got statements from this person about their preferred pronoun usage. It is unusual that in this case we have guidance for our manual of style here.

This is supporting evidence to manage these kinds of things on a case by case basis. Reform the RfC to address cases in which there is no supplementary information. This is a poor test case for examining the issue because there is a large amount of contextual publication on this stylistic issue for this case. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:08, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• Jayron32 would you consider adding a third option similar to Funcrunch's suggestion above? It seems like a good compromise. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 19:51, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

• I'm not considering anything. I have no horse in the race, and just want to see the text clear at MOS:IDENTITY so we can point people in the direction the community wishes. I'm open to any and all well-explained alternatives. My two ideas were only the two I came up with, I am but one person, and not that smart of one; I fully expect people to have better ideas than I. --Jayron32 19:54, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

@Jayron32: I ask because I don't wish to refactor you. Is it okay if I go ahead and add a third option then? EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 20:15, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

So long as there's an explanation of the option in the introductory text so people know, in some useful detail, what they are voting on. --Jayron32 20:20, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Ogress, I don't really like being labelled "transphobic"[5] (I assume you were pertaining to me since you referred to my comment) just because I happen to disagree. By "immutable biological component" I was simply pertaining to the different pair of chromosomes that males and females have, and in strictly medical sense that's what defines the gender. Neither do transgender studies disagree with this, but they emphasize "gender identity" (which I correctly reflected IMO). So what you found "transphobic" is actually supported by the very transgender studies. A quick look into the literature will confirm this. Should there have been misunderstanding, I hope this will help to sort it out.
Oh boy, why won't we just start using Finnish language instead? We've got only one pronoun for 3rd person singular, "hän", both for "she" and "he". ;-) Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 12:33, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

@Jayaguru-Shishya: First, I really think you'd benefit from reading the (not very long) really a man guidelines. It really covers a lot of ground quickly, with citation and after consensus. Also, this is not a pleasant conversation in general: people are saying very hurtful things about actual human beings, some of whom are doubtless editors here and in this very conversation, so I'm not going to dance around the subject. Second, I didn't say you were a transphobe, I said the idea was transphobic. And the idea is, in fact, transphobic and incorrect: gender is not immutable and, in a strictly medical sense, different chromosomes are not what define gender. Gender and sex are different, and even sex is far more complicated than "chromosomes": it includes sexual organs, secondary sex characteristics, hormones and other things. In fact, most people don't have any idea what their chromosomes are; do you know how often infertile couples discover that the reason they cannot have children is that one of them has the "incorrect" chromosomes for their sex and gender? The estimated percentage of intersexuals - persons whose chromosomes do not match their apparent sex - among the general population ranges from one to four percent. That's a lot of people. So let me ask you: if a transgender woman has female genitalia due to SRS, has estrogen and not testosterone in her system as a result, has female secondary characteristics like breasts, how is her sex "male"? It's not. And not a single thing about that has anything to do with her gender anyway. A transgender woman who has a fully male body in every way is still a woman. We don't check genitals in people unless we're about to engage in intercourse with them, and we definitely don't check genitals before deciding what pronouns to use. That's the remit of gender, not sex. Ogress _smash! 13:07, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your answer, Ogress. Sorry, I got mistaken that you were calling me "transphobic", but I am glad to hear you weren't :-) Anyway, I can assure you that I am not. I must admit though, that I never distinguished between the terms "gender" and "sex", but considered those more or less synonymous. It seems I was wrong. I just checked from a Finnish-English-Finnish dictionary, and the term "gender" is defined as follows:[6]

1. Identification as male/masculine, female/feminine or something else, and association with a (social) role or set of behavioral and cultural traits, clothing, etc typically associated with one sex. (Compare gender role, gender identity.)
2. The sociocultural phenomenon of the division of people into various categories such as "male" and "female", with each having associated clothing, roles, stereotypes, etc.

You are right. It must be the Finnish language that's causing confusion here on my part: in Finnish the word "sukupuoli" means both "gender" and "sex", and to emphasize the English meaning of "gender" as "gender identity" (number one above), we speak about "sukupuoli-identiteetti". So that explains why I was mistakenly using those two terms as synonyms (even the word "gender" already self-includes the identity aspect".

Did that make any sense? :-) Summa summarum, the distinction I was trying to make between "gender" and "gender identity" is no longer relevant. Thanks for correcting me! Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 14:23, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Jayaguru-Shishya, coming from this, well, if you read the Gender and Sex and gender distinction articles, you will see that it notes that the terms sex and gender are commonly used as synonyms. But, yes, Ogress and I (and a lot of other people) distinguish between them...and for good reason. Flyer22 (talk) 15:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't know but according to Monash University, it's pretty much like Ogress stated above. Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 16:54, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

According to most dictionaries, "gender" and "sex" are synonyms in English too. But because "gender" also means "gender identity" and "gender role," it is best to be extra specific in conversations in which it is relevant. The usage note at the American Heritage Dictionary explains it pretty well. Darkfrog24 (talk) 18:55, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

The bottom line here is that transgender subjects are usually forced to change their name. They deserve to be credited for all their past accomplishments under their new chosen name. It's simple enough to add footnotes explaining this along with a citation for the name change. All proposal to do otherwise essentially strip the subject of their right to be credited by the name by which they are currently designated for their past accomplishments. Crediting some accomplishments under their former name deprives them of direct credit for their accomplishments. Since it is so easy to use footnotes to clarify, those arguing against doing so seem to be expressing a deep-seated discomfort with gender change which has no place here. Skyerise (talk) 17:41, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

It may be un-related but the fight over Jenner's name is going to street signs as well. [7]. In this case changing the name would effect other people's lives from social security into to drivers licenses. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:09, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

TY especially Jayron32 for comments from 11:03, 2 June 2015 and Skyerise for the compelling "They deserve to be credited for all their past accomplishments.." argument. Part of me wonders how this may relate to all the women and occasional man that change their names in marriage or just for reason of some other preference?

A would agree that biography is of more importance than biology in determination of gender as related to the self but, beyond Jenner's claim that in an earlier phase of (bio) life that s/he wore female undergarments on occasion, is there any more evidence that she previously identified as a female or that, in the context of previous situations, that he (at that time) had identified as a man. I am concerned that we may be exerting wp:crystal to view a situation in Jenner's life of which we either are not or cannot be certain. I appreciated Jayron32's comments that different trans people have very different experiences and my immediate leaning particularly with "she"/"he" issues is that this might be applied differently with different people depending on whether or not the person identified with a gender that was suggested by the approximate 2% chromosome variance that typically dictates biological sex.

As far as name usage is concerned I think I would probably favour "Caitlyn (Bruce) Jenner", "Caitlyn (as Bruce) Jenner" or "Bruce (now Caitlyn) Jenner" in the context of previous sports articles and maybe other unless there is an argument otherwise.

When Daley Thompson (British hero) won the first of his Olympic gold medals this happened in a context that he and everyone else understood that the preceding athlete was the ("American hero") by name as "Bruce Jenner". In this context I agree with other editors that a wholesale replacement of the name would be inappropriate. GregKaye 14:14, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Uh, Greg, have you read the article or any of the interviews? Jenner has stated that her female self-identification and gender dysphoria started at a young age. And transgender women who experience gender dysphoria starting at a young age don't ever "identify as a man", they "present as a man", that is, they do their best to pretend to be their "assigned gender" in order to get by in the world. Their gender self-identification is female usually from the time they understand the distinction between male and female. Jenner has confirmed in interviews that this was the case for her. Skyerise (talk) 14:46, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

In a subject that was new to me and I had only got as far as to go through a number of news reports a long with much of the article. I was also intrigued that the Kardiashian syblings repeatedly made reference to Bruce following announcements with use of male pronoun. Reports came across as indicating support but with significant surprise. In this context I appreciate your answer to my open question above.

I am still interested in the possibility that there may be different experiences up to a level of gender dysphoria as you have described. This would fit in with views presented by Jayron32 that: "Gender can be a fluid concept, and while for one person, the act of "revelation" may be what is happening, other people may genuinely be one gender for some phases of their life". At this point I appreciate that Jenner made very some strong statements in the interview but she also said things that only went as far as to say "My brain is much more female than it is male" 4minutes55secs. She also gave approval of the use of the male pronoun at the point of the interview. The important thing for me is that we treat a person as a person and I really don't know if this some of the content here would be anything that Jenner herself would be overly concerned with. Certainly in the future she is entitled to develop and present views in any way she sees fit.

I was concerned that unnecessarily long explanations were being applied (and made quick reply) but don't feel so strongly about this now. GregKaye 14:44, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Clarification on the meaning of this proposal

MOS:IDENTITY says:

An exception to the above is made for terms relating to gender identity. In such cases, Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise. Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. Direct quotations may need to be handled as exceptions (in some cases adjusting the portion used may reduce apparent contradictions, and "[sic]" may be used where necessary).

I believe the definition of "Option 1" is to change this to:

An exception to the above is made for terms relating to gender identity. In such cases, Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise. In an article whose subject is the individual person, any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns, possessive adjectives, and gendered nouns (for example "man/woman", "waiter/waitress", "chairman/chairwoman") that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification. This applies in references to any phase of that person's life, unless the subject has indicated a preference otherwise. Direct quotations may need to be handled as exceptions (in some cases adjusting the portion used may reduce apparent contradictions, and "[sic]" may be used where necessary). However, in articles about events involving early stages of the person's life, the gendered terms that match the gender used by most reliable sources for the appropriate phase should be used, even if no longer current.

The article Christine Jorgensen, an article about a trans woman, refers to Christine Jorgensen as she/her throughout. But an example of what option 1 says is that if there were an article about Christine Jorgensen's mother, (I'm not saying there is one; this is just a random example showing how I understand the definition of this option) the section relating to personal life and children Florence (CJ's mother) gave birth to would refer to CJ as "George" and "he". Any part of the definition of "Option 1" that I'm ignoring?? (I'm not saying I support this change; I'm merely trying to clarify what it means. Georgia guy (talk) 15:07, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

If this is what is being proposed (which is what many Supporters seem to be arguing for), it would be best to start a new proper RfC with a clearer question. The current thread is worded as a slight clarification of the guideline, but the !votes are calling for a radical restriction of its current scope. It's also unclear what is the scope of the proposed change: should it apply to just sports records? should it affect any article which is not the biography? should it apply to all content referring to the early stages of the person's life, even in the biography? People are supporting all those options which are not part of the original question. Diego (talk) 16:41, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

IMO it should only apply to portions where gender is important. competing in gendered sports, prior spouses were not involved in homosexual marriages, They did not retroactively become the mother of a child. etc This is quite a limited set of places where it matters. "Caitlin went to X elementary school" etc is fine because gender is not relevant to the vast majority of elements in a biography. At a minimum quality every place that matters with the parenthetical (presenting s a male, as Bruce, etc) but that can get very cumbersome. Gaijin42 (talk) 17:22, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Any example?? When talking about a trans woman becoming a parent do you think we should say "She became a parent for the first time" or "She fathered her first child"?? Georgia guy (talk) 17:42, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

For that specific example, avoid gender all together and say "Jenner became a parent for the first time". But when talking about a specific interaction especially if it involves another persons actions or POV its more difficult ("Jenner was viewed as a father figure by the Kardashian girls, and tried to emulate their own Father's good traits)" or something along those lines is what I'm talking about. Jenner is entitled to their own gender identity, including retroactively (because they may have considered themselves female the entire time) but they are not entitled to retroactively change the experiences and interactions of others into ones that involved a woman. Such starts to encroach on BLP issues for the others involved. Gaijin42 (talk) 18:10, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah... that example is difficult because Jenner was their father, and now she's a woman. However, I agree that we should avoid unnecessary pronouns or even unnecessary first names. Epic Genius (talk) 21:32, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Exactly. WP:MOS: "If a style or similar debate becomes intractable, see if a rewrite can make the issue moot."  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  16:48, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

Yep; I believe MOS:IDENTITY at one point even spelled out that rather than saying things like "he gave birth" one should go with "he became a parent", although it seems it no longer does (which is fine, it's common sense). -sche (talk) 21:34, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

It should probably continue to say something about this, since common sense is obviously very scarce on this issue right now and probably will be for the forseeable future.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:34, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

(after some digging) The wording in question was removed in diff, citing discussion. The wording had previously been discussed a lot, as in, almost non-stop from Archive 141 through Archive 149. -sche (talk) 20:22, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

@-sche: Clearly not actual consensus to do that. There seem to be five in favor of it, mostly just with "me too" comments (reminiscent of the cascade of activism that's led to the current huge debate), while multiple other editors suggest that context matters, another suggests using the biologically correct pronoun in biological contexts, and other suggest a recommendation to avoid pronouns, etc. Given the enormous amount of previous, heated discussion, it's unlikely that that handful of editors could have actually represented a consensus to delete long-accepted, common-sense advice even if that micro-consensus had been unanimous, which it definitely was not. At very least it needs to retain the advice to avoid confusing uses of pronouns, which is also one of few things this current, much more participatory discussion is converging on.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  12:20, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: re "[only] five in favor": eh, further up this page, changes were made based on me and Trystan saying "meh, I guess" to a proposal by Francis. (I refer to the final change(s) discussed here.)
I'd be fine with re-adding language to the effect of "where possible, say 'he became a parent', not 'he gave birth'", but I agree with one of the main points that led to the previous wording being removed, namely that it's not "logically impossible" that "he gave birth" and we shouldn't use the words "logically impossible" — even prefaced by "seemingly", they unnecessarily invite controversy (indeed, so much of it that they got removed). A rationale of "minimize confusion" might be better, especially if we bear in mind that being confused/jarred is not the exclusive province of people who say they're unfamiliar with "trans-gender stuff" — many people find it jarring if a subject is misgendered.
Having said that, can you think of articles where a MOS guideline to prefer "he became a parent"-type language would have helped avoid or resolve disputes, especially disputes that wouldn't be covered by the excellent, recently-added guideline "to see if a rewrite can make the issue moot"? Given that such language has been stably absent since 2013, it'd probably be helpful to show cases where its absence has been harmful, if one is interested in proposing its restoration. -sche (talk) 21:27, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

@-sche: Agreed. Those are all salient points. Other than the "prove it" line. Common-sense style advice doesn't need internal or external "citations" (if someone runs to MOS and says "We need a rule against replacing commas with asterisks, because it's happening all over the place", that needs proof; it's the "extraordinary claims require extraordinary sourcing" principle). The only reason I ever got involved introducing language like that the first time (I don't recall if I wrote it or just supported it, but I was there) was because I ran into cases of "he gave birth", "she fathered", etc. and the usual activism-for-language-change editwar-wall came up. Long before the recent meatpuppeteering power-grab. Incidentally, I also added the "see if a rewrite can make the issue moot" wording; I'm glad you like it, but it's too new to know if it will have any effect. A large number of the arguments on this page right now are proof positive that the gender-language activism POV will absolutely use "he gave birth", etc., if permitted. This "mission" will not be swayed by general "rewrite to avoid confusion" wording at the top of a guideline page; part of the cause is to write this way on purpose, to make a point and advance the socio-linguistic agenda. Only a concrete guideline, one that other editors feel empowered to act on, will restrain this problem. As I show below, common sense has not prevailed. The relative absence of a class of attested, poor writing is evidence that the guideline against it was in fact working. Since that language's removal, all hell has been breaking loose (correlation not causation) on every detail of how we write about TG subjects. The reasonable thing to do is revert to the common-sense wording on at least that one little, obvious point, until the chaos shakes out and a proper consensus reassessment can happen.

Anyway, while searching mostly produced false positives ("he gave birth the to philosophy that..."), there are "live" cases right now, e.g. Eugenia Falleni: "he gave birth". And an especially egregious example, as if written on purpose to confuse, at Thomas Beatie: "As a man, he gave birth to all three of his children" (if you read the whole thing, it really means "while identifying as a man, but before internal gender-reassignment surgery", mixing in a point about gender identity that does not need to be in that sentence at all, since it was already stated earlier in the section that he was male-self-IDed since age 10. (The entire section is problematic, written in a "gotcha!" story-telling fashion the entire point of which seems to be the delivery of that phrase I quoted). Both of those examples are back-to-back on the same page of search results. No telling how many more there are (I fixed a number that were not about TG people, just sloppy writing). I'm skipping fantasy/sci-fi and mythological cases, since they may be valid in context. At [[Hit & Miss]: "she fathered a son"; this is repeated word-for-word about the same show at Transsexual. One other result I found had already been rewritten by someone else (not sure how much the search results lag behind the live text), demonstrating both that there are additional cases, and that other editors are concerned about it and reverting it. It's important that these are only the most obvious possible searches, the "I can't believe anyone would actually write that" gaffes. There must be hundreds of other cases, e.g. in sports (the "Caitlyn Jenner won the men's gold medal" kind of stuff). Back to "proof": I don't think I should have to go to those articles and make common-sense rewriting edits that open me to another flood of hateful invective from the usual suspects as they revert-war me, to gather "smoking gun" evidence. My own stress level aside, I'm not an undercover agent, and probably provoking conflict to obtain such a result would be a questionable-faith exercise. There's no need to produce a smoking gun from bad-actors for us to just re-add a version of the wording, minus the wording flaws you pointed out. (Sorry this is long; it's a quick brain dump; I'll compress a lot before advancing this on MOS. If I even need to do it personally. Someone else could.)  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:27, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

For a point of reference of (OK its just my opinion) the stupidity of this policy carried not even to its extreme, check out Talk:High jump#Caitlyn Jenner and Talk:Decathlon#Caitlyn Jenner. Trackinfo (talk) 09:16, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

A lot of people in these discussions are making statements like "Jenner was viewed as a father figure" as if that's going to make people's brains explode - it is fine as is. When reading the article, readers may discover that (for example) Caitlyn Jenner lived much of her life as a man. That's fine. It's not like it's going to cause aneurysms. No one is going to be harmed. It's a little unusual but c'mon, there's a lot of transgender people in the world. There's wayyyy too much weight being placed on speech at Wikipedia, as if what we write here at Wikipedia is going to destroy the world. Just respect people's gender and name choices like we already do with most people. There's relatively little fuss given for most other people who don't use their birth names. IMO, there's zero need to avoid pronouns or skip names - that's just going to be weird. And changing C's old name at the athletic's pages is seemingly causing people to lose their minds... guys, chill. Caitlyn Jenner won awards in men's sports. This isn't going to change anything in the sports world. OMG, was K-C a LESBIAN MARRIAGE?!?!? is first, not likely to happen ever, and second, is covered by the information in the article that Caitlyn publicly transitioned at the age of 65. This is like a drama in a teacup because Caitlyn is a woman and hence uses female pronouns. Trans folk exist and it's seriously not difficult, despite this page exploding, to just handle it. Ogress _smash! 10:16, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

From a relativist point of view, "Caitlyn is a woman" is only true for some people. It's true for me, being familiar with TG people and issues, but I can't pretend that everyone in the world agrees with that, and it's not Wikipedia's job to force the world to go along with it. There's a difference between choosing, by consensus as a project, to respect Jenner's gender identity, and trying to extend that baseline consideration to every possible wording alteration people can come up with in relation to a particular group. This one-size-fits-all approach cannot work. Different TG people approach this sort of issue differently, and the facts of particular circumstances even in the same subject's life differ. From a factual standpoint certain things should not be changed, because it distorts history.

I have no problem with Jenner's article saying "Jenner won [insert award info, from when Jenner was publicly identified as male]". We get into problems of multiple kinds when this is "She won [insert same]". We run into even more problems when the article on the medal itself is changed to read: Winner of the [year] medal was Caitlyn Jenner" instead of "Bruce Jenner" text in a piped link to the Caitlyn Jenner article (or "Bruce Jenner (now Caitlyn)", or Caitlyn Jenner (then Bruce)"]. It's a falsehood from the perspective of virtually everyone but TG language reform activists. Even if I were one myself (and my usage in my personal life actually matches that of one, except where I know the TG individual in question does not her/himself agree with the now-customary usage for TG people), that fact would not change and I'd have to come to the same conclusion. A desire to see the English language change, and for the societal pressures and psychology behind particular language usages to change, doesn't mean they already have changed. Wikipedia is written in 2015 English for 2015 people, not in what we [or some subset of we] would hope is some future English for a future audience.

We all understand that you and several others here want "she" and "Caitlyn" in every single place, but this can't reasonably happen; your motivations for this change to be taken that far, and the problems that arise from it, are at odds with Wikipedia's purpose and the needs of the audience. This is turning into one of the most obvious, though not most weighty, WP:NPOV problems on the whole encyclopedia.

Anyway, I agree that the Jenner article should use "she", and consistently refer to the subject under the current name. But there's clearly not a consensus that this should extend to banning constructions like "Competing as a male, and under the name Bruce, Jenner won [insert medal here]" where this seems it best serves the readers, much less to engaging in revisionist denialism on sport -related pages and suggesting that a woman named Caitlyn won men's sports competitions. But of course I'm just some ignorant transphobe mansplainer. I couldn't possibly be a well-informed, SF Bay Area egalitarian with waaay more than average genderqueer friends, who doesn't believe logic has genitals, chromosomes, or a gender identity. Sarcasm aside, I'm of course aware that my own reasoning on this could have imperfections. But at least I'm making an effort. Most of what I'm seeing from the other side is a circular reasoning pattern of proof by assertion. You can't simply keep restating "she has a right" and "the only correct way to view this is...", without actually responding to and refuting the responses and refutations that have already been provided against your assertions. That's not an argument, it's just noise. (I'm addressing the entire "do it the TG language reform way, or else" side of the debate, not your posts especially.)  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  16:44, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

See BBC's article about Renee Richards if it helps [8] ("She was captain of the men's tennis team at Yale University" is similar to "Competing in male categories, and under the name Bruce, Jenner won [insert medal here]", which could be allowed in an article). It mentions Jenner as "Bruce Jenner [Caitlyn Jenner]". We now have the argument about high quality WP:SOURCEs supporting the same rules codified in WP:MOSIDENTITY. Diego (talk) 08:41, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

One lone example in an experimental area of language and cultural change where everyone is trying to figure out what to do, and may have activistic editors (in the "above you in the company's organization chart", real-world sense) telling you what to do, isn't really evidentiary of anything.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:33, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Option 3 cleanup

@Jayron32 and EvergreenFir: and everyone: Option 3 says "(formerly Bruce Jenner)", which is unnecessarily ambiguous. It's unclear whether that's formerly with respect to 1976 or to present. A reader could figure it out, but we should avoid the need to figure it out if we can. The way to do that is with "(then Bruce Jenner)". I think this can be changed without affecting any existing !votes, as it's only a language improvement, not a change of concept. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:09, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

@Mandruss: My first reaction is that this is a great suggestion. While I'd prefer "then known as", I know that's too much. My thought process on that is that some trans folks would say "I've always been FOOBAR_CURRENT_NAME, people just called me FOOBAR_OLD_NAME back then". But I am probably over-thinking it. I would be fine with changing it to "then" instead of "formerly". EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 19:16, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Unless I'm mistaken, "formerly" has the same problem, so "then" is no worse in that respect. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:20, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

I suppose it does. Just been thinking on it in general. Again, no opposition to the change. It's shorter, clearer, and addresses the issues you raised. It's a good idea. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 19:41, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not particularly hung up on details. My support for such a notion is that the general concept is good; I'm not going to let grammar get in the way of doing the right thing. --Jayron32 00:11, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

While there are many trans folks who would say that they were always the gender with which they now identify, I seriously doubt many would say that they were always the name that they have now chosen. Funcrunch (talk) 03:28, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

 Done ―Mandruss ☎ 07:59, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

How sources are referring to the records matter, and what they are stating

Like I noted at Talk:Caitlyn Jenner, I follow MOS:IDENTITY; I think it's important that we follow it. That stated, when it comes to the records Jenner set, an approach to analyze is this article by espnmediazone.com regarding the ESPY Award that Jenner will be receiving. That article refers to Jenner with male pronouns when addressing the athletic records, but notes that "the decision to publicly come out as a transgender woman took a different kind of courage and acceptance of one's self. To celebrate that bravery, ESPN today announced that Jenner will be presented with the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at The 2015 ESPYS Presented by Capital One." Going by this Twitter post by Jenner, she is excited for the event and perhaps does not mind the male pronouns for a past matter. Keep in mind that when some transgender people, including transgender Wikipedia editors, were insisting that Jenner should be using female pronouns, she was using male pronouns. Whereas many transgender people cannot stand to be referred to by gender pronouns that they do not identify with, it may be that Jenner is not as offended by being referred to by the opposite pronouns, unless perhaps there is an ignorant and/or malicious intent behind it. I'm not stating that we should not follow MOS:IDENTITY; I'm simply posting this ESPY Award article for further thought on the records aspect. Flyer22 (talk) 02:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

I would not read too much into Jenner not correcting or addressing the ESPN article on pronoun usage, especially in a short Twitter post. Speaking from experience, correcting pronouns constantly can be very stressful, and sometimes we let misgenderings go by rather than correct them, simply out of exhaustion. Funcrunch (talk) 03:52, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, I was not expecting her to address the matter, especially via Twitter, and blast groups that will be honoring her; I wanted to add on to the discussion about what is or isn't the appropriate way to refer to her past regarding her records, and what she might think of the matter. As has been discussed above, not all transgender people feel that they were the same gender throughout their lives or at every point in their lives. With this edit, Barte stated, "Some thoughts on the matter from the Washington Post and National Review Both reference the Wikipedia entry here, though neither notes the MOS:IDENTITY guidance." If we look at the Washington Post source, it states, "There’s no doubt that it’s insensitive for former Nickelodeon stars, news organizations and just about anyone to refuse to refer to someone by the name he or she prefers — whether that person is Malcolm X, Cary Grant, Muhammad Ali, Chelsea Manning or Jay Z. But Bell’s insensitive declaration raised an interesting point. Did Bruce Jenner or Caitlyn Jenner win those Olympic gold medals and appear on those TV shows? And if Caitlyn Jenner did, must history be rewritten? Is every source that refers to 'Bruce Jenner, record-breaking athlete' — or 'Bruce Jenner, guest star on ‘Silver Spoons' — now in need of a correction? Wikipedia thought so. By Tuesday evening, the ubiquitous crowdsourced encyclopedia was redirecting its 'Bruce Jenner' page to 'Caitlyn Jenner' and using the pronoun 'she.'"

If we look at the National Review source, it states, "GLAAD addresses the challenge this way: DO avoid male pronouns and Caitlyn’s prior name, even when referring to events in her past. For example, 'Prior to her transition, Caitlyn Jenner won the gold medal in the men’s decathlon at the Summer Olympics held in Montreal in 1976.' But GLAAD also defines 'gender identity,' which is the thing at issue here, as 'one’s own internal, deeply held sense of being male or female.' That presents a problem. But the past, being common property, is not GLAAD’s to rewrite — particularly given the Left’s logical inconsistency about what has just taken place. The argument for adjusting the historical record to reflect Jenner’s present sensibilities is (at least in part) that 'Bruce' was really 'Caitlyn' all along; 'Caitlyn' did win the medals, we just didn’t know it then. Yet GLAAD and others liken pronoun changes to name changes: Nobody calls Jay Z 'Shawn Corey Carter,' ergo, they should not call Caitlyn 'Bruce.' But what 'courage' has Jenner demonstrated if his transition is not precisely that he got rid of the person Bruce for the person Caitlyn? He has not simply adopted a new name, a new identifier, but a new 'identity.' Both the identifier and the thing it identifies have changed." Because of all of this, I've changed the title of this section to How sources are referring to the records matter, and what they are stating. Flyer22 (talk) 23:06, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Re "not all transgender people feel that they were the same gender throughout their lives or at every point in their lives" - this is true, but since you're talking about Caitlyn Jenner in particular here, it seems most prudent to stick with the MOS:IDENTITY guidelines of assuming current stated gender applies throughout the person's life unless they themselves state otherwise. Of course, unless she's stated otherwise, it is highly unlikely that Jenner identified with the name Caitlyn specifically at the time of winning her medals (and certainly not from birth), but that is why Options 3 and 4 above suggest including both names. I really don't see why so many people (not you) are resistant to respecting a person by including both their current and past names in such a manner; it isn't "rewriting history". Funcrunch (talk) 01:49, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

DHeyward, considering what you stated in this discussion, including that "Jenner has already said she doesn't mind masculine pronouns in the 'Vanity Fair' article and indeed still says 'Bruce' out of habit.", maybe you have something you want to state in this section? Flyer22 (talk) 19:06, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with ESPN. When they talk about the past historical records and there is no way to disassociate former name and their gender is relevant to history and notability, the least confusing and the most natural agreements should be used. The IOC statement is all in past tense and is simply a matter of fact regarding the Olympic record. It's not their place to confirm Jenner's transition with pronouns that reflect her gender identity when they are not in a position to do so and, as a general policy, risk outing someone that has left their deadname and past. If there is another Olympic Athlete that is not as well known but keeps their mailing address updated privately with the IOC and has told them about their transition but is otherwise private and disconnects from that past, it would be a HUGE mistake for the IOC to respond to requests about that Olympic Athlete with anything other than the historic record. Mixing pronouns that don't match the record would only elicit more questions and may even open those athletes' transition to public scrutiny, the exact opposite of their desire. It's a sure bet that there are news organizations looking for other transgender athletes, public or not, to seek comment. I would have no problem if Jenner petitioned the IOC to change its records, but short of that, they are bound by them. I expect the IOC to keep medical history of athletes as privately as possible including disqualifications as well as transgender athletes that petition to compete as their expressed gender (i.e. a transgender woman athlete that competes as a woman is a "woman" with no asterisk, "formerly known as" or parenthetical explanation of the waiver or even mention of the waiver). I also commented that I think it is wrong to highlight the transition in virtually every article about Jenner. It reeks of placing activism over a lifetime of extraordinary accomplishments. Jenner, the person, won Gold Medals for the 1976 Men's Decathlon. Her transition does not overshadow that nor is it necessary to whisper "transgender" on every page with asterisk, parenthesis, name changes and pronouns. Those that do so are not seeking to minimize harm to Jenner, rather they are seeking to exploit her for her courage to transition so publicly. We should let her be the role model and not decide which event in her life defines her. We simply don't know. ESPN is not wrong and they have undoubtedley consulted with both Jenner, the LGBT community and others to decide how approach this. They will be courageous in their choice and respectful of the people involved and to imply anything else does a huge disservice to our readers. --DHeyward (talk) 20:06, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

To me it is misleading to suggest that Jenner saying she doesn't mind being misgendered - especially at this very early state in her transition - should guide Wikipedia policy. Most trans people expect to be misgendered and misnamed repeatedly by friends and acquaintances for a period of time following transition, and even misgender and misname ourselves as we get used to using our new names and pronouns. But in an encyclopedia which is referred to by news organizations as well as individuals, we should set a higher standard, and not give the impression that an individual trans person's comfort level around pronouns should dictate how we handle gender changes. (Of course, if she specifically said that she was fine being referred to by her previous name and pronouns in Wikipedia articles and news coverage, that would be a different matter.) Funcrunch (talk) 20:11, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

The "expect to get misgendered" and "misgender and misname ourselves" aspects you brought up are very solid points, Funcrunch. I think that the "getting used to" aspect is something we should always keep in mind with regard to transgender people, their families, and the public at large; for example, it can take a significant time for a mother to use the new name and pronouns, if she ever does so or tries to do so consistently. I also keep the "getting used to" aspect in mind when considering our Wikipedia editors and the world at large. As we know, Jenner is a person who went by the name "Bruce Jenner," and by male pronouns, for a very long time; so it's natural that people will make mistakes as far as the name and gender go; it's not always a matter of transphobia. Flyer22 (talk) 01:15, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Not to mention...there are surely still people who don't recognize the name Caitlyn Jenner, at least at first saying or first glance, but do recognize the name Bruce Jenner. Flyer22 (talk) 01:21, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

To limit this whole discussion to what contemporary sources are reporting is WP:Recentism. Most of the primary reporting of Jenner's athletic and celebrity history before 2015 are not being rewritten by the originating source. Newspapers and books don't reprint due to later developments. In Jenner's case, male pronouns are used, Bruce Jenner is the name attributed by those sources. Wikipedia should not be deviating from those sources when reporting historical incidents. To do so is rewriting history, violating WP:SOURCE. That ought to be consistent across all transgender people. We should always link to the main name article where her transition and new name are explained. Painfully, I'm sure some of these prevalent advocates will want to force the parenthetical "now Caitlyn Jenner" into every appearance of the name, we already see that or primarily its inverse occurring, but it will really clutter up the readability of many articles. Jenner's long, public notoriety makes this case more problematic, but it is confusing to any reader in any case where the wrong name and wrong pronouns are used to describe a notable historical event involving a person who transitioned at a later date. Its a consistent violation of WPSOURCE. Trackinfo (talk) 03:36, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Old sources aren't republished, but we do rewrite our articles to keep them current with the most recent knowledge. When scientists discover an new hominid older than all others, we update the article of the previous one - maybe noting that "for X years, it was the oldest hominid known"; when it is revealed that some scientist published papers with fraudulent data, we remove them from the references - we don't accept those as if they were valid before publishing the retraction and only became invalid after that. All that "historical revisionism" argument is frankly an insulting idea; updating articles to reflect that we understand the topic best now, because of the increased knowledge, is what makes us an up-to-date resource, and thus one of the project's best characteristics.

Your best argument is that of readability, but it can't take precedence when is weighted against encyclopedic accuracy (describing all the relevant facts) and BLP (respecting a living person's identity while avoiding harm). And better yet, we don't need to confront them - we could reference both names just in the first appearance in the article, or place a footnote at each entry in a table. So that's not a reason either against options 3 and 4. Diego (talk) 08:56, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

P.S. Regarding the argument about "confusing readers" with the use of pronouns, it's worth noting that the BBC had no problems in using the female pronoun when talking about tenist Renee Richards [9] and is not ashamed of writing a sentence like "She was captain of the men's tennis team at Yale University". For what it's worth, it refers to Jenner as "Bruce Jenner [Caitlyn Jenner], who's a very famous athlete". I think we could use some good advice from the BBC editors and get those as best practices. Diego (talk) 14:52, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Of course they are, but Renee Richards played tennis as a transgender where Caitlyn did not win the decathlon as a transgender. Today when talking about Jenner we would say she won the decathlon in 1976. I have no quarrel with that. But what does Yale University have listed as their Team Captain back then? The Olympics website uses Bruce Jenner with nothing else as winning the Decathlon. So we have to look at context. When we talk specifically about Caitlyn Jenner and what she has accomplished, we are going to say she won the Olympics but mention that it was as (Bruce Jenner) in some way. When we are simply talking 1976 Olympics we are going to use Bruce Jenner and usually use he in that context. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:40, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

But that would be an incorrect use of the pronoun given what we know now, that Jenner was a transgender woman, even if she was hiding. A first class publication like the BBC won't make that mistake. Richards also played tennis in the male categories, and she was listed as a captain of the men's team in Yale, but BBC writes "she was captain", not "he was captain". The context has changed because we have more information about that period that was not known then, and dismissing that information as if it doesn't exist would be wrong. Of course it's OK to use the names Bruce Jenner and Richard Raskind for the period where those were the names they were using, but a clarification that we're talking about persons who later changed names is needed. Diego (talk) 08:27, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

To the closer: survey is statistically invalid

I'd like to point out that this whole survey process is pretty much invalid. Transgender people make up an estimated 2 to 5% of the population. [10]. The 2013 study The Wikipedia Gender Gap Revisited measured gender bias in survey completion and estimated that as of 2008, 84% of English Wikipedia editors were male. In the worldwide Wikipedia Editor Survey 2011 of all the Wikipedias, 91% of respondents were male. There are significant differences in the acceptance of trans people between males and females surveyed, with men being significantly less accepting than women of transgender individuals, with white males being the least accepting among males and with the widest gap between white male and white female opinions. [11] Somewhere between 58-63% of males are sports fans, while only 36-41% of woman are fans. [12]

So, 60% of the 84% male editor population is about 50% of Wikipedia editors, while 40% of the 16% female editor population is 6.4%. Even assuming the unlikely high number of 4.6% for the trans editor population, that puts the expected ratio of female+trans to male editors responding at 1 in 6. Basically, there is no possible way that the outcome can be anything but a "male sports fans" opinion, which would be in no way representative of what our readers want and would necessarily be significantly (and likely severely) skewed toward the less accepting male view of transgenderism.

Unless a better way can be found to do this, these results are completely invalid and should be ignored, leaving MOS:IDENTITY as it is, as the previous consensus was arrived at through discussion about transgender individuals who were not athletes, leading to a more balanced and more accepting result. That is, the past consensus more accurately reflects the general opinion of Wikipedia editors as the inherent biases were not exaggerated by the disproportionate attraction of sports fans to the previous discussions, resulting in the slightly less skewed ratio of ~ 1 to 5 female to male response. I could not find statistics on the acceptance of transgenderism among male sports fans, but I suspect that it is much lower than that of the general male population. Skyerise (talk) 21:20, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

100% ridiculous... AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:32, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I thought so too. But as long as the closer stays within wiki "policy", looks at the arguments pro and con, looks at any relevant censoring policies, and checks where consensus seems to be, I think we'll be ok here at this encyclopedia. Any ridiculous bloviating will be ignored by most good closing admins. Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:10, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Even if there is systemic bias on Wikipedia and in its users, WP:CONSENSUS is important as well. I assume this will be closed by an admin (or 2) and I'm sure they'll weigh the comments here against site policy. Remember, this is not a WP:NOTAVOTE. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 22:33, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Yup, and the current MOS:IDENTITY guideline was developed by consensus and has been tested several times previous without any significant change to the guideline. In such a case, it is reasonable to ask two questions: 1) is there a reason why this discussion looks different? and 2) does that reason make it likely that this discussion is more or less representative than the previous ones? Skyerise (talk) 22:54, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

When the MOS:IDENTITY guideline was developed in this regard, POV pushing editors (that minority you statistically itemized above) flocked to the discussion because it was in their interest. We now have a very public conflict where interpretations of this MOS:IDENTITY causes conflicts with WP:SOURCE and offends many other individuals under WP:BLP in the process (I've tried to itemize a few in other discussions). When we are dealing with people of lesser notability, that awkward rewriting of history might be tolerable on a minor scale. Now we have a famous notable figure with a 45 year history representing as one gender but now is transgendering to another. This massive rewriting of history puts wikipedia at odds with the established, known reporting of that 45 year history in a very public way. Advocacy groups wish to use this as an example, but it is not wikipedia's job to alter facts. Trackinfo (talk) 21:08, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

MOS:IDENTITY is not the only guideline that recommends using recent sources over the ones contemporary to the facts, so advocacy is not the only reason to prefer using the most recent name. Self-published name changes and WP:MOS/Medicine-related articles recommend weighting the most recent sources when appropriate, so it's not a concern of rewriting history but of using the most accurate and updated name for the topic. Also MOS:PIPE advises us to "make sure that it is still clear what the link refers to without having to follow the link", so places that link to the Caitlyn Jenner article (or any biography where the subject has changed names) should provide some cue as for why the historic name does not match the one at the linked article. Diego (talk) 19:50, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Almost all articles containing Jenner's name are getting bombarded (like here and here) by activists replacing Jenner's name to prove a WP:POINT (yet another guideline being violated under cover of MOS:IDENTITY) against what the source says. As these are being reverted by other editors on those grounds, there is the residual Note "Jenner changed her name due to gender transition in 2015." that has not been removed. The message is clear that Jenner has since changed identity, without altering the fact that Bruce Jenner is the name recognized for these achievements. Trackinfo (talk) 22:16, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Trackinfo, it sounds as if you haven't actually read the specific clause of MOS:IDENTITY, or you'd know that it specifically states: "Wikipedia favors self-designation, even when usage by reliable sources indicates otherwise" Skyerise (talk) 22:21, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

I asked over at WP:AN for a neutral uninvolved admin to close this when the time comes but have yet to get a reply. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:35, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Wondering...Does anyone ever ask for a biased, fully involved admin to close a discussion? Fyunck(click) (talk) 23:15, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

LOL! Are there any admins among the !voters above? We could ask them to close the discussion... :) </tongue in cheek>. -sche (talk) 03:09, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. That would be appropriate. Skyerise (talk) 22:36, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

We see this fairly often here. A debate comes to an answer that someone does not like and they try their best to explain why consensus is wrong. I am afraid that you will have to accept the outcome of this RFC even if you think the people involved in it are "sports fans". Chillum 22:56, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, Chillum why do you think you are entitled to tell me what I have to accept? I always have the option of just walking away from Wikipedia. Skyerise (talk) 23:00, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

P.S. Your bee and hummingbird photos are great. Skyerise (talk) 23:04, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Maybe something can be worked out of this proposal is passed? Re-wordingwise maybe? I just don't want it to feel like it is all or nothing, some have argued for this to be a case by case basis. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 23:07, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you I am very proud of both of those images. You are of course right, if you find the outcome distasteful you do not have to participate. I do think you are being a bit dismissive of other people's opinions. Chillum 23:07, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Only because many of the opinions are uninformed, put forth by people who haven't actually looked into or considered the hardships and disapproval which are a lifelong problem with trans folk, whether they choose to transition or not. Skyerise (talk) 02:10, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

::::That's not our problem. We are here to build an encyclopedia first and foremost. High quality articles is more important than trans editors being upset over pronoun usage. And let me be blunt. No group of editors has the right to speak for an entire portion of the population. If you don't like it, well no one is forcing you to stay here. Feel free to fork if you wish, but your demands are becoming disruptive.69.143.188.200 (talk) 06:53, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Read the BLP policy. "Writing an encyclopedia" is neither our first nor foremost task around living persons; treating them with respect is. Moreover, exactly how on earth do you expect to write an encyclopedia free from hideous systemic bias if you adopt policies and make statements hideously offensive to a not-insignificant portion of the population? Encyclopedias require editors and good encyclopedias require diverse editors. And what I'm hearing here is a lot of "hey I got into the clubhouse and clearly everyone is just like me so it's fine". Ironholds (talk) 04:41, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

I have absolutely no idea how you came to comprehend wikipedia biographies in that way. Like everything else we are here to build an encyclopedia... it's our number one priority. Now, wikipedia gives us Policies and Guidelines to help us achieve that endeavor, and BLP's certainly have more strict rules to follow so we don't get sued. It's why we must source, source, source BLP's. We treat living persons with respect (as we do to dead persons too) but we also tell the truth if it is backed by sources. I'd like to say we never censor, but I know we do in certain cases, so it's best to say we rarely censor. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:00, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Probably by reading the policies, being around when they were drafted and working in a related field. It's not so we never get sued; are you kidding? The legal protection we have is actually stronger if the Foundation sets no content policies. It's because you should treat article subjects with a certain modicum of human decency and empathy. Again, the idea of "we are here to build an encyclopedia...it's our number one priority" - you cannot complete that priority if you are exclusionary to current and future Wikipedians. That I haven't seen you address. Ironholds (talk) 06:39, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

I read them and don't see it where it says we are not first and foremost an encyclopedia. Most were drafted before 2008 when it says you made your first non-anon edit (I was in 2006), and working in a related field I see as a non-factor here at wikipedia. So no policies and leaving us to edit as we please leaves us stronger legally? I don't buy it. I gives us the tools to stop false info from appearing for living people, or attacking them using bias. Our policies were not all set just to treat subjects with kindness. If we did that our articles might be barren indeed. We certainly need to treat subjects fairly, and with npov, but we are not exclusionary to future or current wikipedians. Everyone can edit here. Of course we have to use a certain "modicum of human decency and empathy" but we don't go overboard the other direction either and suppress pertinent facts because people don't like those facts. I don't know where this is coming from, but if it's really the way you feel I don't think we'll ever see eye to eye, but dialog is always good as it helps to see different viewpoints. Fyunck(click) (talk) 07:08, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

You're right, me being a HCI researcher into Wikipedia's collaborative workflows and a former legal monkey is of absolutely no relevance in discussions around legal liability and what makes people leave Wikipedia. Why did I even mention it? Look: the Foundation is protected from lawsuits by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which absolves entities of liability if they merely acted as a publisher of defamatory content without exercising editorial control over it. When the Foundation passes rules that constrain editorial content, it weakens that protection; not fatally, but an amount. That is why they're less liable, as crazy as it sounds, without rules on defamation. And this wasn't my first account. We're absolutely exclusionary to Wikipedians! Anyone can edit, you say. As long as the people who can edit aren't appalled by a community that's okay with deadnaming trans people. Or...being massively incivil. Or any of the other things we tolerate. Your position is analogous to, to be crass, dumping sewer water in a pond and then claiming "hey, anyone can still swim in it, if you don't want to swim in it any more it's your problem, you could if you wanted to". I'm pretty amazed that you've genuinely claimed, though, that "we have to use a certain modicum of human decency and empathy" but also that offending trans people is A-OK. What does empathy and decency look like to you? Being decent about the things you think are problematic? If so, you should probably google that "empathy" word. Ironholds (talk) 17:23, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

You're amazed because I'm an amazing person. I find there's a HUGE difference between using a "certain modicum of human decency and empathy" and going overboard and suppressing facts. Timmy may not like being called a snot, but if all the sources call him a snot that fact will wend its way into an article about him. "Massively incivil?" Holy mackerel you must have some burr up your saddle to make a ridiculous statement like that about wikipedia articles and wikipedia editors. And perhaps you should research the word "modicum" while you have access to a dictionary. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:22, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

You don't think there are tremendously offensive and rude Wikipedia editors? Huh. You should hang around certain content creators more. And this isn't about suppressing facts; this isn't about someone called Timmy being called a snot; this thread started, in your words, around "pronoun usage". The right of people to be identified in a way that adheres to the very basic, very fundamental elements of who they are as a person. If you want to convince anyone, you should start while explaining why that principle violates the maxim of "Encyclopedia first, and screw everything else!" - and defend that maxim. Not by comparing it to totally inadequate analogies like "someone calling Timmy a snot". The only thing you achieve when you compare gender identity to calling someone a snot is confirming that you don't get the scale of what we're talking about here. Ironholds (talk) 21:04, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

A couple things here. You are were talking about the wikipedia "community," not a few offensive knuckleheads. To be honest, some of the things you are saying here offend me! So you should practice what you preach. And this is about suppressing facts whatever you want to believe. Maybe not your specific viewpoint as I don't follow every single phrasing people write, but several prominent posters here. I'm a pretty courteous person and have no problems addressing people as they wish to their face, but the past is the past as far as I'm concerned and I'll follow the sources rather than rewrite history. My Timmy analogy might have been poor, but it was 100x better than your twisted sewer water analogy. Look, if Bruce wants to change to Caitlyn, that's her choice. If in referring to her we try and make sure we use she/her then that sounds perfectly reasonable to me. A "modicum" of courtesy seems called for here. Plus it can be easily sourced to boot. There are also times that we'll need to use "Caitlyn (formerly Bruce)", "Bruce (now Caitlyn)" and also simply "Bruce Jenner." It will depend on the situation, and the sourcing. The other thing.... I checked here and I never said anything with the term "pronoun usage." Do you have some nasty chip on your shoulder about me because you're confusing me with someone else? If so perhaps you should learn to read more carefully before the fangs come out. Now for me this is getting too personal and astray from the subject at hand which is whether the "survey is statistically invalid." I don't find it so at all and I found the original posting rather offensive to our editors, who for the most part are good people trying to help. Fyunck(click) (talk) 21:42, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what "legal monkey" means, Ironholds, but even if you were only a paralegal or law school student, not an attorney, you should know that a "right of people to be identified in a [preferred] way" cannot possibly exist in the legal system under which WP operates. Short of defamation and a few other extremely narrow exceptions, anyone can use any words they choose to refer to anyone else. You can make an ethical, social-norms, or other sort of claim, but not a legal one. Your legal training also already informed you that truth is an absolute defense to defamation, so even under the most tortured possible misinterpretation of [US] defamation law, using gender-non-neutral language not preferred by a biography subject could never be defamatory if the facts about the subject could render the gender-specific usage factual in any generally understandable sense. But no one with any legal undestanding would take seriously the idea that gender-non-neutral language could ever be the basis of a defamation claim to begin with. Since you must already know these things, given your legal background, it's unclear to me why you would make such an argument.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  16:10, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

Back to the topic at hand which was addressed to the closer about whether this "survey is statistically invalid." As I did a check it appears to me that a bit of canvassing was happening. I can't be sure because there could have been a mention of why these notifications went out, but I can't find it. So no trouble retracting if I'm wrong. I see that user Skyerise sent out bunches of notices to specific editors from June 4 to June 5 telling these individuals about this topic. Many of those are on her User:Skyerise/ATW sandbox page. Perhaps it's an equal mix of both sides of the issue, but if not it's blatant canvassing. Anyone (like an admin) want to confirm this? Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:20, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

I guess I'm a bit late to the party here, but did someone really just say that writing an encyclopedia is secondary to treating subjects with respect? I don't even know how to respond to something so misguided. -R. fiend (talk) 04:46, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

The problem is advocacy, we aren't here to break social barriers which is what some seem to want done here. If you want to make a difference than take your arguments off Wikipedia and do something to change things. As an encyclopedia though, we follow WP:RS. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 00:58, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Comments and sample articles

Admittedly sex-changes, especially so late in life, are tricky. I believe one should follow what the citations/sources say (not what the subject wants). At any give point, Jenner was either Bruce or Caitlyn, and referred to as either male of female accordingly by reliable sources. Cf. the FA article on Augustus, who had several different names over the course of his life and was referred to by historians by those different names; the article reflects this when describing the events of each time period. Other articles, off the top of my head, to possibly consider looking at (transgenders, gender-benders, pseudonyms) are: Wendy Carlos, Brandon Teena, George Eliot, George Sand, Mark Twain. Softlavender (talk) 01:02, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Jennell Jaquays is another example of someone who gained fame under her former name/gender before transitioning. - Floydian ^τ _¢ 13:31, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

• There's economist Deidre McCloskey, transited from Donald at age 53. The article's bibliography lists all works as by "Deidre". This certainly makes sense for reprints that use "Deidre" instead of the original "Donald". For earlier works, it may or may not be the same question as referring to Bruce or Caitlyn in the historical record. Choor monster (talk) 18:38, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Jan Morris is another example, there is very similar discussion on Jan_Morris - Former name discussion Ashleigh Mitchell 21:20, 31 July 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Moondancer (talk • contribs)

• Yes. This is another example of why we can't rewrite history, since most sources we cite are not reprints that make such editorial changes.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:29, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Related (?) topic

Comment Can we extend this slightly? I understand that the article Hillary Rodham Clinton (the name she prefers to be known by) has been moved to Hillary Clinton. Her picture is still captioned Hillary Rodham Clinton. Can we set up a guideline to stop this sort of thing happening? 5.150.92.19 (talk) 11:14, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

It's more the other way around. WP goes by the most common name used in reliable English-language sources because this is what most people look for. The preferences of the subject lately aren't the criterion. Otherwise Cat Stevens would be at Yusuf Islam. The TG exception that's been carved out turn this on it is ear. So this question is: 1) Undo that exception, 2) extend it to everyone, 3) leave it as some weird exception that gives TD subject a special right as an article subject here that is enjoyed by no one else. Everyone one of this options will piss of a substantial number of people both on and off Wikipedia. The worst is #2, because it will impact the most readers. As for the HRC photo caption: It takes a while for all content to be cleaned up after a move.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:30, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

I just had a look at the discussion that caused this to happen and it seems that all the arguments are irrelevant. Surely if a person's name is X entering it in Wikipedia as Y fails WP:RS and WP:V. 5.150.92.19 (talk) 11:34, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

If we're going to defy WP:COMMONNAME policy to always use a transgendered subject's preferred name as the title of their article here, then we have to do that for everyone, or it's laughable bias problem. TG people are not magically "First Class citizens" with more rights than everyone else, us second class citizens.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  07:56, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

To clarify: I mean that the TG exceptionalism to COMMONNAME (and WP:MOS) puts us in the BIAS position of logically having to extend it to everyone or undoing it at least partially. I'm not actually advocating extending it to everyone. On a re-read, I realized the sarcasm wasn't clear. Anyway, I've read the requested move at Talk:Hillary Clinton or Talk:Hillary Rodham Clinton or where ever it is now. The arguments are not irrelevant under Article titles policy. And her name is both Hillary Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton; one's just a longer version. Anyway, the 3-party close on the HRC -> HC case was extremely well prepared and reasoned. It's exemplary. The problem isn't with that move, it's with the underlying decisionmaking tree in policy.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:30, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

SMcCandlish I think that it would be fair if we recognise in Wikipedia that, on this issue, we are actively and I personally think legitimately WP:SOAPBOXING on behalf of LGBT issues. Many of these people may face huge prejudice. In effect we are adopting a convention that, in some ways, is akin to Positive action to exert an influence in one direction while society variously exerts an opposing influence. There are a range of WP:NPOV issues that might be mentioned here perhaps including WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS but, in many cases though not to extremes, I personally think that WP:IAR may reasonably apply. GregKaye 11:01, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorta. It's more that one segment of the LGBT camp descended as a pack of WP:ACTIVISTs and changed something. I doubt it will last, but I say up top, just going back to the earlier status quo is going to make a lot of people angry. There may be some compromise somewhere.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:30, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Name vs. Gender

This point may have been raised above, but if so, it is buried in the discussion and I could not find it. I think we need to separate the issue of "change of name" from the issue of "change of gender". There is no reason why a woman can not be named "Bruce". So... let us (for the sake of discussion) totally accept the argument that Jenner was a woman when she won all those Olympic medals... Her name was "Bruce" at the time. Once we accept that a woman can be named "Bruce", all the angst about what to call Jenner becomes irrelevant... We can treat the name change the same way we would treat any other name change... by using her "old" name in historic contexts, and her "new" name in modern contexts. Blueboar (talk) 13:06, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Blueboar I think that both a differentiation of issues as well as a differentiation of article topics would be an advantage. Where possible I think that pronouns should be avoided totally. "Why say either she or he when "Jenner" is would be sufficient in most if not all cases. We are dealing with a person here and one who, while identifying as a female, was seemingly comfortable with the use of the male pronoun in the early June interview." This also raises the issue that different people are reported to experience self identification to a non xy chromosome based sex differently according to perhaps any number of parameters including extent and time of life. I also think that a lot depends on the way the individual person may regard themselves in retrospect.

The role played by the person is also significant and much has already been said in regard to Jenner's marriages and the ways in which these should be covered. GregKaye 10:39, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Saying that "Jenner was a woman when she won all those Olympic medals" in the men's event is very problematic. Does that mean that she was the first woman to ever win a medal in a men's olympic event? Rreagan007 (talk) 02:35, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes, and it's one of multiple reasons we can't do that.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  15:16, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Suggestion

My sympathy goes to whoever has to close this, not only because the subject is controversial, but because it's confusing that there are multiple options, and the levels of support (or opposition) to any one of them don't at all correspond to the levels of opposition (or support) to the others. The only suggestion I can offer that might cut the Gordian knot is: when looking at the commenters who want to use the new name, and the commenters who want to use the old name, consider whether all of them are actually exclusive to the commenters who suggest using both names or not. Using both names isn't my most favoured option, but it would simultaneously "preserve the historic gender" and provide the clarity and attribution of accomplishments to the people (rather than the strings of letters) who earned them, and so potentially satisfy more people and concerns than either the "only use old name" or "only use new name" options would. -sche (talk) 15:34, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

I concur. While such an approach can't satisfy everyone, it will satisfy a lot of them, while doing no harm to reader interests, and give us something to build on instead of war about.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:26, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

What are we waiting for??

Look at the above "MOS:IDENTITY clarification" section of this village pump. What do we have to wait for before it can close?? Georgia guy (talk) 23:43, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

An uninvolved admin willing to make a difficult close and willing to read 34 kB (3813 words, 306kB of wiki text) of text? Has a request for closure been submitted yet? EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 23:48, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

This one should almost certainly be closed by a three-person panel, to make the close "bulletproof". --IJBall (contribs • talk) 07:03, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Agree on the panel... although experience tells me we won't get a bulletproof decision no matter what. This is such an emotional issue (on both sides) that a lot of people will continue to object... no matter what the closers say. Blueboar (talk) 17:13, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Also agree on the panel. Consensus can always change, but it's less likely to do so if it's closed the way the last Talk:Hillary Clinton RM was closed.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  23:48, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Panel is not a bad idea. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 23:51, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

That sounds strangely like "Let's have a panel of three admins, so that we can thwart CCC". We have enough trouble with calcifying practices and decisions. If a panel of three admins makes it harder for people to comply with our policy about accepting change to consensus over time, then we should avoid doing that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:56, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

Why should a panel thwart CCC? If the discussion has shown a change in consensus, the decision by the panel should reflect just that. In fact I prefer such heated discussions be closed by several people, as they will necessarily have to discuss a detailed analysis of all the arguments presented, to reach an agreement between them. A close by a single administrator too often feels like a WP:SUPERVOTE when some of the arguments presented are dismissed without enough comment from the closer. Diego (talk) 10:57, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

My statement is future-facing: If you have a discussion closed by a panel of three admins in August 2015, it makes it harder for people to accept the fact that consensus has changed in January 2016. Trying to 'make the close "bulletproof"' means trying to make it much harder for people to recognize that consensus has changed in the near future. It's hard enough to recognize this even when one admin engages in a SUPERVOTE; it's almost impossible when three admins (or ArbCom) declare the current view to be The One True™ Consensus. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:53, 3 August 2015 (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.

A-Class article assessment

Hello, so I am unsure where best to propose this. For quite some time we have been using WP:1.0 classification scale. Overall, this has been successful however one item has been under used. That would be A-Class article assessment.

For those who do not know, A class articles rank between Good articles (GA) and Featured articles (FA) of which both has a well defined process namely GAC) and (FAC) whereas A class has none. This leads to a considerable amount of confusion among its use and quite often A-class is entirely skipped where articles are promoted to featured from good article or lower. Furthermore there does not even appear to be an A-class title template.

Please take a look at D21 road (Croatia)'s talk page as an example. It is the ONLY A-class article in Category:A-Class Highways articles, and was promoted to A-class by a user for no discernible reason as such as the case with possibly all A-class tagging. Also mind that the promotion was only applied for Wikipedia:WikiProject Highways while as far as WikiProject Croatia is concerned it is still just a GA. This is by no means an original story. I understand two Wikiprojects, namely WikiProject Military History and WikiProject Tropical cyclones has a more structured use for this, but every other wikiproject seemingly does not.

My question to the community is should we abolish A-class article assessment and stick to whats left (Stub, Start, C-class, B-class, GA, FA) which seems to be doing just fine as we are for-going A-class entirely. The reason I ask this of the community is because we are working on a system to triage assessment using Artificial Intelligence. Under use of A-class makes it very difficult to model even for Artificial Intelligence which is very good at identifying stub, start, good article and featured at the moment due to their structured nature.

As a second phase for this we ought to establish more structure for C class and B class as the algorithm is able to predicts one or the other but human assessment does not seem to have a standard. We need to define what it means to be a C class or B class.

-- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 18:08, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

There are three projects that have active A-class assessment programs, and they've all been active a long time: see WP:HWY/ACR, WP:MHR, and WT:TROP. Theoretically, A-class could be used in many ways, but each of those three projects makes close connections between A-class and the WP:FAC process. In what way would it be useful to abolish these three review processes? Btw, 3 wikiprojects (last time I checked) have a B+ review, intended (AFAIK) to prep articles for WP:GAN. - Dank (push to talk) 19:32, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

There are two considerations we ought to make. Firstly do we want a site-wide standard of our assessment metric? We have means to enforce this with AI induced system that recommends humans to re-assess. Secondly A class assessment undermines community consensus in the sense that both GA and FA have site-wide accepted criteria where as A class does not. My question is does the A class assessment bring anything useful? A class articles are more or less featured candidates, just like good articles. I would certainly find B+ more useful than A class or even B class being a process like Good article and Featured article. What makes an article B class and not C is quite unclear to me at the moment. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 19:59, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

A point of fact - the D21 road article underwent an A-class review here. Parsecboy (talk) 19:53, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for the link, it was unclear to me just by looking at the talk page. I will however ask what does A class bring that GA or FAC doesn't? I am not trying to be dense, I just do not see it. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 20:01, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

A-Class is, generally speaking, a more rigorous review than GA (since it involves multiple reviewers rather than a single one, and is usually done within communities of subject-matter editors rather than arbitrary reviewers). The difference between A-Class and FA is more subtle, but primarily has to do with a focus on content versus presentation; FA tends, on the whole, to pay more attention to matters of stylistic compliance. Kirill ^[talk] 20:25, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

But A class ranks above GA. So it is overruling community standard in essence. I would support a better quality standard for GA if you feel it is inadequate. As for Wikiproject Military, perhaps they can perform a "seal of approval" in place of A class which would be an independent classification outside of the "standard" assessment scale. An article can be GA and this special assessment by Wikiproject Military. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 21:58, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

I think we're going round in circles -- the "special assessment by Wikiproject Military" is A-Class Review. As to your previous point, it would be overruling GA if when an article reached A-Class in one project it automatically applied to all projects but it doesn't (although some projects do accept A-Class assessments from other projects, e.g. WP:Ships and WP:Aviation both accept WP:Military History A-Class assessments). Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 02:36, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

This is pretty much a perennial proposal. Personally, I would support abolishing it as redundant to GA, but I do know MILHIST uses it as another stepping stone toward FA. So mostly, I just ignore it. Resolute 19:38, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

As Dank points out above, the current A-Class processes are inherently project-specific reviews, and are no different from any of the other project-specific classes used in individual projects' implementation of the assessment system. I don't have a particularly strong opinion on whether A-Class should be considered one of the "standard" classes, or whether it should be something adopted by individual projects on an opt-in basis, but certainly I can see no reason why we would want to dismantle assessment processes that have been producing valuable results for years merely because other projects haven't implemented something similar. Kirill ^[talk] 19:55, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

See, that does not make it less problematic. In the case of Cold War a single wikiproject decided on behalf of other wikiprojects that this article was to be promoted from good article to a class. I do not believe each had a process to follow or perhaps such separate processes would conflict each other. I am merely proposing we migrate away from it just so we can aim for a Wikipedia wide article quality assessment. I never claimed a-class assessment to be useless.

We can have multi-assessment if you like where the article would officially be a "good article" and wikiproject would have whatever it's own assessment metric it desires. It is just as easy for the AI algorithm to treat A-class as if it were Good Article for its purposes (or outright ignore its existence). However such confusing labeling would be confusing and hence generally unhelpful to the reader. Our readers are familiar with good article and featured article assessments but they do not know what A class even means. Is that better than featured since assessments start with C then B then... Does it go to A?

-- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 20:07, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

The "multi-assessment" scheme you propose is essentially how things work at the moment. There's no requirement that all projects assign the same assessment level to a particular article; there's nothing preventing one project from rating an article as A-Class and another rating it as GA-Class, for example. (Note that, in practice, smaller and less active projects tend to accept the ratings assigned by larger and more active projects at face value, but this is a matter of consensus and agreement between individual projects, rather than actually policy.)

As a more general point, I'm unconvinced that our readers are particularly savvy in terms of even FA and GA ratings, much less any other elements of the assessment scheme. Further, while I'm broadly sympathetic to the idea that some sort of technology-assisted re-assessment can help improve the overall article assessment system, I would not support dismantling existing, functional assessment mechanisms in favor of a future system that remains entirely hypothetical at this point. Kirill ^[talk] 20:22, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

• Both GA and FA creates a small icon on the top right corner of the article where as A-class does not (we just keep GA icon until FA). So it isn't a matter of savyness, it is a matter of familiarity.
• The "future system" you mentioned already is in function (m:Objective Revision Evaluation Service), mind that it is in development so it is not a finished product but even our preliminary BETA results are exciting. What we do is we take some of the existing quality assessments by humans to train machine learning classifiers and attempt to see if we can predict the actual class. Mind that often the human tagging is outdated so you have a start class that wasn't re-assessed in a while.
• So for current version of the Cold War article ores returns GA (%33) and FA (%49), we indeed have a level of uncertainty. Possibly it is time to seriously talk about a FAC for that article though it isn't that close yet. Fact is it is somewhere between GA and FA, leaning towards FA. We exist to serve the communities needs. As for the D21 road (Croatia) ores returns GA (%55) or FA (27%), so perhaps this article has a long way to go before it becomes featured. We offer a method to triage attention to articles pointing the ones closer to promotion for human review. What is astounding to me is that the system to determine GA and FA article quality is so consistent that we get pretty good predictions. Props to the entire community for making that an awesome process.
• If community demands predictions for A-class we will certainly honor that and we will NEVER force any Wikiproject to use our system. We only serve at the pleasure of the wikiproject requesting our service. We also do NOT want to create more work for Wikiprojects. Our predictions for A class has been more incorrect than correct since A class articles look too much like either good articles or featured articles and overall lack site-wide consistency in quality but also because we lack enough samples to train the system. Hence our accuracy cannot increase much for A class.

-- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 21:51, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't see the fact that the predictions aren't consistent as a problem, actually; as has been mentioned, there are only a few projects that heavily use A-Class, and all of those rely on fundamentally non-automated review processes to assign that rating. In fact, I would go so far as to suggest that your tool should simply ignore A-Class entirely, and predict based just on GA and FA ratings. Those of us who work with A-Class can always examine articles that land between those if we're looking for potential A-Class candidates. Kirill ^[talk] 00:43, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

We should in that case eliminate unused A-class from wikiprojects that do not use it then unless and until they develop a process for it. The idea here isn't to replace you, the idea here is to suggest to you that a GA has been improved over time and perhaps it is time to re-asses it. Indeed you can manage it however you like. Mine was merely a suggestion that would achieve the exact same thing while the template displayed GA and a separate template displayed A class (or an extra parameter which would override the appearance while other parameters would be enough for bot process). It would be helpful to have the assessments template to be as simple as possible. I am more concerned with that. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 01:25, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

A-class is the best assessment that we have. It is far more rigorous review than GA. It involves multiple reviewers rather than a single one, and is done within communities of subject-matter editors rather than arbitrary reviewers, which promotes greater consistency. It includes image and source reviews. A-class MilHist articles are close to FA. Often cases they exceed it. I am totally opposed to the abolition of A-class. A-class is far better than FA because there is no limit on the number of articles that can promoted to A-class, which is why most A-class articles can never reach FA. It is a vital part of our mechanism for producing quality articles. If a well-defined process is required, then other projects are free to adopt the MilHist one, which works well. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:10, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

A class is below FA class. I would think it would be better we improved GA itself. Perhaps make GA meet the MilHist A-class standards and demote existing GA to something like an intermediary B+ (which would be reassessed as GA if it qualifies). We have always raised the bar in quality where we demoted even FA articles. My hope here is to reach to a standard scale that everyone can agree. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 22:27, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes, A class is below FA. But there are limits as to how many articles can be nominated for FA. For the purpose of automated assessment, it is equivalent to FA. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:17, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't think increasing the threshold for GA promotion—at least in terms of making it a multi-reviewer process—is viable. GA was originally developed precisely to provide a light-weight, single-reviewer alternative to other review processes; even if we were to raise the bar for GAs, it would simply result in a new process having to be created to fill the need for a light-weight review. Kirill ^[talk] 00:43, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes, hence B+ ranking below GA and above B. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 01:25, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Well I think it's far simpler to leave GA as it is, and leave the A-Class to be used by those projects that choose to employ it. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 03:03, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

• @Kirill Lokshin:, @Ian Rose: thank you for your insightful feedback. I was unaware this Wikiprojecy used subject matter experts (SME) to insure quality and I would certainly not want that to go to waste. However, I think it would be safe to remove if from wikiprojects that have no use for it. Would that be fair? A-class would be an opt-in only where opt-in would have a criteria such as having subject matter experts etc as Wikiproject Military History has. A-Class feels weird to me as it overrides community decision and that should only be granted to wikiprojects that has an actual process that improves quality.
• I am not trying to disrupt an existing and working system. I just want the WP1.0 rating system to follow a certain site-wide standard so we follow a quality standard that does not get any less than a certain level. A-class is an anomaly in that rating system. From the above discussion, it sounds to me like Wikiprojects use A-class in a manner more or less independent of GA, FA ratings. Commons has a few different assessments as well. For instance there is Featured pictures but also Quality images and Valued images where the three are independent of each other with different criteria. The idea here is to segregate the A-class process so that it stands on its own with SME assessment and community cannot overrule said experts with a FA process (and really vice versa for GA). This is kind of what I meant by "Seal of Approval" which would use the A-class process. Being "Featured" would be a community quality level and SME assessment would be independent of it. We would want people to seek both FA and this new standard. Would this be a better direction?

-- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 08:47, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

• Sure, it's just that I've always seen FA as a community-based assessment while A-Class is project-specific (in other words I think what you suggest is already the case), and assumed that A-class was purely opt-in anyway and didn't need removing from Wikiprojects that didn't use it -- but perhaps I've missed something. I guess we need to know the exact nut-and-bolts of what's being proposed because I'm still a bit unclear on it. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 09:10, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

• @Ian Rose:, we are slowly building consensus I think. There is a reason why I posted a link to relevant wikiprojects. Initially I did not understand the point or purpose of A-class however this is more clear to me now. I suppose the current state I have in my mind is to segregate SME driven A class from community driven GA and FA. Perhaps with this an article may have two title templates. Should we discuss this angle? I want to investigate what kind of a change would be more relevant and agreeable for you. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 14:55, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Just popping in to support what the other Milhist coords and others have said above. If you think it would be useful to removed A-Class from other Wikiprojects for your purposes, that's up to them, but Milhist's A-Class review system is tried and true, provides SME input and scrutiny, and at the very least, three sets of eyes to look over not only the military aspects of the article, but also identify areas where the more generic WP standards need to be improved. FA is a very tight bottleneck, I always have half a dozen articles I would like to nominate, but the one at a time rule means I usually get two or three to A-Class before I get one cleared through FA. I agree that our A-Class far exceeds GA, and that is evidenced by the amount of comments newly promoted GAs get when they are nominated for A-Class review. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 14:03, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

• I would also advocate to keep the A-class review rating (at least on Milhist) per Peacemaker.--Tomandjerry211 (alt) (talk) 15:07, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
  • I do not suggest removing it either, but segregating it as A-class involves SMEs where as GA and FA does not. As a reader I would be more interested in looking at articles that are both FA and A-class since that means not only is the articles style and etc are in like with FA criteria but also its content has been verified and improved by SMEs. The two are different. In this system a FA that wasn't promoted to A-class would be nominateable for SME review. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 17:24, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

• Just noting here that an article that is promoted to A-class does not loose it's {{good article}} status, and (for articles I've been involved with) are still assessed as GA-class for projects other than the one doing the review (note that all the national road wikiprojects share WP:HWY/ACR). And A-class is actually quite linked in with the 1.0 assessments - for the HWY/roads projects at least, A-class nominees are already GAs, and are usually put through ACR as preparation before a FAC nomination. A-class fits in between GA and FA. - Evad37 [talk] 17:04, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
  • But that is self contradictory, in WP 1.0 rating you are either a GA or A-class. I am saying it can be both but I feel we really need to segregate the two processes for this to work as intended. In terms of operation it would change very little, we may just add another template perhaps... -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 17:24, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
    • Hi, this is also responding to your reply to me at 14:55, above. An article can only be GA or A for the same project, but it can be both GA and A overall. That is if you put an article through GAN, all project ratings are set to GA and you get the little GA icon at the top of the article, as well as "A good article from Wikipedia" if you have article assessments turned on in your Preferences. If you then take it through say MilHist ACR, the rating for MilHist and associated projects (e.g. Ships or Aviation) will be A, but not any others, so the article as a whole will be both GA and A and at the top you'll still see the GA icon but you'll also see "An A-class article from Wikipedia ... Also a good article". Then if you go through FAC with it, all ratings will change to FA, the icon will change to the FA bronze star, and you'll see "A featured article from Wikipedia" at the top. So I think A-Class, though a project- rather than community-based system, does slot in quite logically -- I even wrote a little thesis on it (complete with diagram!) for the monthly MilHist newsletter a few years ago. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:11, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
      • Or to put it another way, a Good Article (one that has passed a GA review, but not yet an FAC) is not necessarily a GA-class article (an article assessed with |class=GA in a projects banner) - for the projects using an ACR process, a Good Article can be assessed as A-class for that project (but for other projects it would still be GA-class). - Evad37 [talk] 01:04, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
        • Yes, I think so. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:14, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
          • Ergo, in principle neither one of you would object segregating A class out of the WP1.0 scale then? -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 02:11, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
            • What's the point of doing that, though? It would inflate the numbers of GA-class articles in the projetcts' statistics, which wouldn't then show the A-class articles. Note also that the purpose of article assessments is, per WP:COUNCIL/AFAQ, to allow a WikiProject to monitor the quality of and prioritise work on its articles, and to allow Wikipedia 1.0 to prepare static releases. Neither of these purposes require an article to have a single quality rating across all projects – for any assessment level. For WP1.0, the bot takes the best rating as the rating of the article (per WP:1.0/A); and for wikiprojects, see the FAQ "Are these ratings official? Not really; these ratings are meant primarily for the internal use of the project, and usually do not imply any official standing within Wikipedia as a whole" (WP:COUNCIL/AFAQ). - Evad37 [talk] 02:16, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
            • Actually, can you explain what you mean by segregating A class out of the WP1.0 scale – I may be misinterpreting it. - Evad37 [talk] 02:36, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
              • @Evad37: basically it means we will stop treating A-class as something in between GA and FA and instead treat it as an independent metric. Hence WP:COUNCIL/AFAQ would not have an A-class column like it does now and instead would denote A-class as some independent metric determined by SMEs. We can functionally achieve this in certain ways such as using an additional parameter or an additional template where this would be designed to solely handle A class assessments in no way influencing GA/FA assessment and vice versa. This way getting your favorite article FA would be nice but then you would also seek A class from SMEs. We may perhaps call it something different than "A class" if SMEs do not quite like the name. Perhaps something like Quality Article or Informative Article - still achieving the same thing as A class, SME verification of content. Mind that this would also make SME involvement more prominent making the reader more confident of the contents completeness. As for your other point, the only thing official in this site is remarks made by WMF board of directors and their representatives (staff) so I wouldn't worry too much about "official" too much. Legally speaking we are all just informally maintaining this website. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 03:09, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
                • How does making A-class (or whatever its called) a separate measure actually help wikiprojects or editors? A-class is actually used as a step between GA and FA. It is basically a slightly lighter version of FA, in that only editors involved with the wikiproject (so-called subject matter experts, but no actual qualifications are required) are reviewing the article – to effectively the same standard as FA – rather than editors from across Wikipedia. FA is the ultimate goal, where no further edits (other than minor edits, or updates if a situation changes over time) should be required; A-class is a step along the way, very close to the end, but not the actual end.
                  Furthermore, most assessments are intended for editors, and not actually intended for readers – hence why they appear on the talk page, not the actual article (apart from stubs, GAs, and FAs).
                  My point re offical ratings is that each project can have its own assessment, which may not line up with other projects, because they is not a single, official rating. Hence articles can be A-class and GA-class for different projects, or B-class and C-class, or B-plus-class and B-class – there need not be a single quality rating for every article.
                  Finally, the system as it is at the moment does actually work (in my experience) – what problem are you trying to fix? - Evad37 [talk] 04:15, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
                  • I think there is nothing wrong with A-class as we have it right now. At WP:HWY, we have a comprehensive A-class review process that essentially prepares an article for FAC. Therefore I feel it fits in perfectly on the assessment scale between GA and FA. Also, as Evad mentioned, articles are allowed to have assessments for different projects so an article that went through an ACR at one project may still be assessed GA-class for the other projects. Dough4872 12:15, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
                    • WP1.0 was intended to be a single uniform rating system to prepare which articles go on the CD or not. It became more than that over the years. Having a universal quality standard would be very helpful to the project at large. And having A-class in no way conflicts that. If you want to have A-class between GA and FA, fine. I think separating that process would be helpful to editors as I explained in detail above. Have you looked at Category:A-Class articles recently? It is borderline empty and by that I mean of the 1,962 first order subcats hardly any has any content. Why do we need a Category:A-Class Jennifer Lopez articles if the Wikiproject doesn't even track it? How is that remotely helpful to the reader or anyone?
                    • I am not here to fight for this. I merely made a suggestion that would make A-class worthwhile to the rest of us as we the non-SME masses are clueless what A-class means and what it is for. You can see this in my confusion from the start and I am still confused even now. Ultimately all it matters is if you or the wikiproject have a use for it. There indeed is use which wasn't clear from the start. I will simply program around A-class for the time being since hardly anyone uses it aside from two or three wikiprojects which would cause bias issues for the overall system.
                    • Sorry to have taken your time.

                    -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 12:59, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

@とある白い猫/15: I think there may be a slight misunderstanding about the assessment system here. The assessment classes shown at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index were never intended to be an exhaustive set; they are a "default" set that has been implemented by most projects, but they are not the only classes used for assessment, and each project is able to define its own assessment hierarchy while still using the WP1.0 tools. Compare, for example, the assessment tables for MILHIST, MATH, and ALBUMS; each project has its own assessment hierarchy, with unique assessment classes that aren't used by other projects. If your proposal is that projects should no longer be permitted to define their own assessment schemes, and should instead all be forced to use a minimalist central scheme, then I think it's a non-starter; there is significant value that individual projects get from using customized assessments, and I can't see any good rationale for preventing them from doing so.

On the other hand, if you're simply asking whether A-Class can be taken out of the "default" list and treated as a custom assessment level (similarly to the other custom assessment levels implemented by various projects), then that might be feasible. I don't think the projects that use A-Class would care all that much whether the rating shows up in the table at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index (or, for that matter, whether it's used by the tool you're building or simply ignored), so long as the projects' assessment systems continue to function as they do now. Kirill ^[talk] 13:02, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

• I honestly am indifferent if it is listed in Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index or not. It is just an ancient page. As a reader the category structure for A-class is very unhelpful to me. I suggested a fix and it was rejected. At no point did I suggest forcing anyone for any thing. I am open to suggestions if we have an agreement that we have a problem as observed in Category:A-Class articles.
• As for the tool, such cleanup would be helpful for me to observe actual use of A-class, parsing is a bit hard since Wikiprojects such as MilHist has many categories so at a glance I cannot determine actual adoption by wikiprojects. It is entirely possible we run the code specifically for Wikiproject history while ignoring everything else - that is if there is such a demand from MilHist Wikiproject in the future. Wikiproject Medicine benefited from such a triage of effort where articles that has not been assessed for years were brought to community attention (many stub/start classes were promoted to C/B class etc as a result for example).

-- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 13:53, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Remove from default list and make it an obscure assessment class (like Bplus)

I could support taking A-Class out of the default list (i.e. out of Template:WPBannerMeta's standard classes), and making it an obscure assessment class (like Bplus). Projects with an ACR process – WP:HWY (and its subprojects), WP:MILHIST (with WP:Ships and WP:Aviation), and WT:TROP – could retain their existing A-class articles and categories, while the redundant A-class categories for other projects could be deleted. - Evad37 [talk] 21:06, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

That would be awesome. :) -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 23:15, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Agreed with Evad37, at the least. If it's kept it can be treated as an obscure assessment class like B+, and ignored by the "AI" (expert system) processes that the OP is talking about. But I think I support abolishing A-Class entirely. I've been thinking about this for several years, and it's weird and smacks of WP:LOCALCONSENSUS special-exceptionalism to insert between GA and FA some undefined, wikiproject-level "make up criteria as you go along" quasi-process. Getting rid of the class label wouldn't "abolish these ... review processes" for the three projects using them. You don't need a special label for an article to be voluntarily group-reviewed by wikiproject participants on its way to FA. Just call it FA-preparatory review by the wikiproject. The amount of such reviewing that's done is small enough that each project can simply keep track of it in a short list on their wikiproject page or a subpage of it. It doesn't need special categories and templates. If they really want that stuff, they can have a subcategory of their wikiproject's own category for this, and add some flag in their wikiproject talk page banner template for it, that isn't confused with and commingled with the actually standardized article assessment process. (PS: It's OK that B-class isn't handled by a GA- or FA-like process; it at least has site-wide criteria, a checklist of points. A-class is just random.)  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  01:23, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Nothing random about the MilHist ACR system, nor most of the others I've seen. I know that if a MilHist article has an A-Class stamp on it then it's had a more thorough review than a GA. And wearing my other hat as a FAC coordinator, I wish ACR was more prevalent in WP, not less. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 03:28, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

A-Class isn't designed to be random, and I don't think it should be removed. It's not hurting anything as it stands now, and leaving it in place as a default may encourage its greater use down the road. Imzadi 1979 → 07:14, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

A-Class is not random. It is not obscure. Unlike B-class it is assessed by multiple editors. GA is a very low rating indeed, and there is a genuine need for a higher rating. It is not an FA preparatory review. I have written many articles that could pass an FA review, but I am not allowed to nominate them. Feel free to abolish worthless ratings like C and Start which truly have no site-wide criteria and contribute absolutely nothing to the article quality process, but not A. I want to see it, and I want it officially listed. I do want a special label. Hawkeye7 (talk) 11:39, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Hardly any project uses A class. We cannot force projects to use A class just like how we cannot force them to disuse it. Perhaps this action will promote A-class by highlighting projects that do have a good use for A class. Right now merely finding those is a chore. This undermines the work put into A class IMHO. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 12:14, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I just don't understand this love affair with A class and its supposed superiority to GA. I haven't seen a single A-class article that I'd have passed at GAC. Eric Corbett 21:18, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

I nominated a whole series of A-class articles for GA to create a Good Topic. All sailed through unchanged. The requirements of A-class Review are so much higher. Most would easily pass FAC too, if they could be nominated. It is true that some GA reviewers assume that an article is bound for FAC (which I usually cannot do) and give it a FAC-style review. But pretty much any B class article should pass GA. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:15, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

You're entitled to your opinion, of course. But don't let's pretend that it's fact. Eric Corbett 22:34, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

"Most well-known facts are". For an example of an A-class article, see Clinton Engineer Works. Welcome back btw. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:11, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

I think this can be fixed by simply adding a requirement "must be GA class before A class nomination". Given how superior A class is, this would not be an issue. A class tends to look more like FA or GA than B or C class based on a few examples I looked. Merely a thought though. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 12:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

It's "random" between projects, not within them! Clearly each of three wikiprojects has it's own criteria (which presumably are not "random"). The problem is that the criteria and processes differ project-by-project, such that readers and other editors have no reasonable expectation than these assessment are comparable, or meaningful to anyone but participants in those wikiprojects. The assessment doesn't fit between GA and FA, which are site-wide processes and assessments with a high degree of cross-project reliability and consistency.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  22:54, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

I do have similar reservations about A class but if people want to have a pass between GA and FA, we should not try to prevent this. It is clear to me that some wikiprojects has a very good reason to have an A-class process. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 12:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Some editors don't want to hassle with the GA process. I can understand it; the competence of the reviewers varies significantly. (Example: a newbie tried to review a nomination related to the Nobel Prizes, and his main interest was finding out what kind of food was served at awards celebration.) Given that we do not have a demonstrable problem with this, I don't see any reason to add layers of bureaucracy here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:11, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

As you wish. Mine was merely a suggestion to overcome the conflict between GA and A-class. Also now you made me curious of what food was served during the Nobel Prize awards ceremony. :P -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 17:58, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Not having "A Class" be part of the WP-wide assessment system wouldn't in any way "prevent" wikiprojectings from "hav[ing] a pass between GA and FA".  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  01:21, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

• I think A-class is great. MILHIST's A-list category is very rigorous, if I recall correctly. There's a big gulf between GA and FA that I think needs to be filled by articles that are far above average quality, but not necessarily "featured" material. Let the projects deal with A-class reviewing as they see fit. North of Eden (talk) 01:29, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
  • I do not believe the proposal contradicts this. A class would be an opt-in process for wikiprojects that choose to use it. Most wikiprojects outright ignore the existence of A class entirely even though they had created the category at some point. The projects already decided to avoid it except a few that have a rigorous process for it. This proposal would not affect those projects that already use A class. -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 12:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
    • WikiProjects already ignore A-class. Removing it from the default would not change anything, except requiring a little extra work for those that aren't ignoring it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:11, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
• A concern I raised in a related thread elsewhere: In theory, A Class can be used by a recalcitrant wikiproject to comply with the GA requirements just long enough to get GA, then revert back to their "WP:RIGHTVERSION" and label it A Class (i.e. "better than GA") and keep it that way, even if it later gets stripped of GA class via WP:GAR. So, it's at least potentially a WP:GAMING tool. I doubt anyone at any of the three wikiprojects making regular, programmatic use of A Class would go that route, but A Class is available to anyone, and some "wikiprojects" consist only of a single active editor, or a small WP:FACTION. So the potential for abuse isn't nonexistent.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  01:21, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Okay so what to do? -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 23:44, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

@Evad37: :) -- A Certain White Cat ^chi? 21:47, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

"Non-identified" edits for dealing with situations where revealing identity of admin may be trouble

Coming off the Gamergate situation, it quickly became clear that admins that enforced BLP or similar actions to clear out obvious policy failures would become the targets of off-site harassment or ridicule. The article and related ones were areas that many editors purposely stayed away from due to this problem, fearing the consequences of helping out.

I would like the propose (though do not know the technical feasibility) of a special user or privilege level that could be set for approved users which would allow them to perform such edits without revealing their identity to the public. The edits would be logged obviously and available to groups like WMF, Arbcom and oversighters, but to all other users of WP, it would be attributed to the name of this group, thus hopefully reducing/eliminating off-site criticism simply for maintaining WP's policy. A noticeboard could be used for resolving any issues with it (misuse, etc.) A email list for those with this feature could be used to send requests for help privately (so the requester's ID remains private as well). This would only be a function that should be used on pages that have been deemed necessary via consensus for such prevention (such as the GG page) as to prevent abuse. Entry to the group should be compared to the RFA process , vetted by the community. --MASEM (t) 21:40, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

No, the person taking action needs to be identified (by username, not identified IRL). If they don't want to do that, then they can either not take action or resign the bit. GregJackP Boomer! 22:43, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Masem. People should be able to edit on something horrible like Gamergate without worrying that their entire life is going to be disrupted by offsite harassment. valereee (talk) 21:24, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Keep in mind these people using this bit or whatever would still be fully accountable, though a reasonable process of discovery. (For example, I would assume this would only come into play for pages that have been semi-prot, put under community or ArbCom sanctions, or the like. Using the 30 days/500 edits aspect of Gamergate's current sanction, I would say that any editor that meets that 30/500 days has the right to request whom did the action under this bit via private channels). And perhaps this is a time limited thing, where the hidden nature only lasts for a year or 2. It is meant for the most extreme conditions where there is recognized issue of off-site engagement with any potential disagreement, not for a run-of-the-mill edit war. --MASEM (t) 21:32, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Would the membership of the group be public? Or are you proposing a group of secret users? Whatever, a terrible idea. DuncanHill (talk) 21:34, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I think by necessity the membership (and process of membership) has to be open to all to maintain accountability, but the size of the group large enough (more than 5 or 10) so that it is impossible to simply identify the actor based on the action. And there would have to be a means of challenging any action as well. --MASEM (t) 21:39, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

↑ What DuncanHill said. It's not clear whether you're proposing a secret brotherhood of illuminati with the power to take anonymous admin actions, or the right to give admins blocking popular editors or protecting contentious pages some kind of opt-out of having their actions logged, but either way this is never going to happen. The Wikipedia bureaucracy might be plagued with de facto star chambers, but at least one can see who their members are. If any given editor is concerned about real life consequences in any given on-wiki situation, the solution is to back away and let someone else deal with it, not to reach for the hoods and masks. – iridescent 21:41, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Backing away and letting someone else deal with it is another phrase for accepting that you're powerless against bullies. No, not hoods and masks. But if I were going to try to edit Gamergate Controversy, I'd want to go to the library and set up an alternate account with an IP that couldn't be traced to my home address. That is some scary shit. valereee (talk) 22:09, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I see the admin's concern, but I can't see the community accepting this. There are already too many administrative accountability problems. Is every single admin on the system afraid of the Gamergate types? I remain skeptical. Even if it were true, there must be an alternative approach. One idea would be a role account that ArbCom could authorize temporary use of, to a specific admin, for a limited time and with a very strictly limited scope, and then change the password after that particular bit of work is done so it cannot be used again my anyone without a new authorization. The log of who had used this account when would be available to all incoming Arbs and also a copy kept by WP:OFFICE people. This might be more palatable, because Arbs are elected only for limited terms, and we implicitly trust WP:OFFICE to do the correct thing for WP (and have no choice but to trust it – the Wikimedia Foundation literally owns this project, and we are just volunteer guests here). I doubt the community would buy this either, though.

Basically, if you want to be an admin, don't use your real name or give out personally identifiable info (PII). If you want to be an admin working in areas that generate off-WP controversy and ire, use a VPN to protect your home IP address. It's kind of like being a cop: If you work in law enforcement, you don't have a social networking pages advertising who you are and what cases you're working on. It's also a bit like being a black-hat hacker or a software pirate: Your PII is precious and its revelation has real-world consequences if you allow it to be associated with your e-role.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  22:21, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Demonyms in multiple languages

(I started to put this on the article's talk page, but realized that the question will apply to many articles. I'm not sure that this is the right place to ask this, but I am sure that someone will tell me if it's not.)

Åland, or the Åland Islands, an autonomous region of Finland, is multilingual, "the only monolingually Swedish-speaking region in Finland". Its infobox shows its name in three languages:

Åland Islands

• Landskapet Åland (Swedish)
• Ahvenanmaan maakunta (Finnish)

It displays the demonym in the same three languages, but unlabeled:

• • Ålandic
  • Ålandish
• • Ålänning
  • Åländare
• Ahvenanmaalainen

If you compare the two lists, it's easy (at least for me, probably for anyone) to recognize that they're in the same order— English, Swedish, Finnish— but that won't be true for every multilingual state or autonomous region.

Hmm... Ingushetia is

Republic of Ingushetia

Республика Ингушетия (Russian)
Гӏалгӏай Мохк (Ingush)

but has no listing for demonyms. I'm not sure that there's a reason for that, or that it just hasn't been done. On the same pattern as Åland, that would be

• • Ingush
• Ингуш
• ГIалгIай

Not quite as easy to sort out, being in a different alphabet.

ISTM that the demonyms should be labeled as well. Is there any reason for labeling the native languages of the toponyms but not the demonyms, or is it just "how we've always done it"?

Many national infoboxes don't list native demonyms at all, though the option is certainly there. For some it would get really complicated— South Africa has 11 official languages, and only English appears for the place name and demonym. (And the national motto is in a twelfth, ǀXam, which is extinct.) If someone added native demonyms, the languages would certainly need to be identified! Please {{Ping}} me to discuss. --Thnidu (talk) 21:16, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

These should all be using the {{lang}} template to supply the language, and if it needs to be visibly labelled this can be done with {{lang-xx}} templates, or manually (view wikisource to see the coding differences):

• Ahvenanmaalainen – just language markup with {{lang|fi}}
• Finnish: Ahvenanmaalainen – templated identifier with {{lang-fi}}, which also includes the language markup (and italicizes automatically)
• Finnish: Ahvenanmaalainen – language markup with {{lang|fi}} and manual mimicry of the {{lang-fi}} template without re-linking the language name (assuming {{lang-fi}} was used earlier)
• Ahvenanmaalainen (Finnish) – language markup with {{lang|fi}} and manually-added identifier afterward
• In Finnish, this is Ahvenanmaalainen in both cases – language markup with {{lang|fi}} and encyclopedic prose identifying the language, for use in main article body

I'm skeptical we need a rule about this; it seems like WP:COMMONSENSE that one should use one of the latter four kinds of markup in any case where it's not obvious, and that they should be presented in the same order. PS: The italicization should not be done for non-Latin scripts. If we did need to provide some specific, formalized advice, the list above is basically a copy-pastable set of examples we could use for this purpose at the appropriate MOS page.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  21:33, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

POV flagging for proposed article deletion?

For an article that has been proposed for deletion: what is the proper way to flag and/or report the proposed deletion as being a potential NPOV violation? This article has been previously flagged with the "controversial" and "pbneutral" templates and has been subject to protracted dispute.

Deicas (talk) 07:47, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

For a regular PROD, you can just de-prod the article. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 07:56, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

The article [13] in question is not a PROD; it is an AfD. Am I getting the PROD/AfD distinction right?

Deicas (talk) 09:03, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Ah, so. A deletion proposal cannot in and of itself constitute a NPOV violation - it appears like a fairly legitimate deletion argument to me. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 09:12, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

One can easily be a WP:POINT problem, though. Clearly not the case here; it's a reasonable AfD, seeks to merge possibly redundant articles not engage in some kind of "censorship".  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  21:47, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

New RFA Expectations?

The following discussion 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.

---

Lately, I have noticed that GregJackP has been opposing at RFA's per lack of content creation or improvement to at least GA or FA, but some users believed that this wasn't required for adminship. However, on Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Liz, I noticed the "oppose" column rising as those who voiced their opinions why they oppose for the RFA believed in him. Adminship isn't necessarily about reverting vandalism of voting on AFD, it's about helping the community by building a free source of knowledge, which includes creating and making improvements of articles, especially to letting it pass peer reviews and being promoted to Good and/or Featured articles. We need more admins who have an understanding of article creation and improvement, including WikiProjects, and I have seen RFA's standards getting more rigorous over time. Anyone agree with my opinion?— Preceding unsigned comment added by Racer Omega (talk • contribs)

Support

Oppose

• Oppose Simply because there is no 'admin criteria' policy. Sam Walton (talk) 12:28, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

What I mean that there is no admin criteria policy, as any user may wish to nominate themselves for RFA, and the proposal of this activity in the "What RfA contributors look for and hope to see" section, as said in WP:GRFA. You may need a high edit count, noticeable experience, and activity when nominating yourself for adminship (i.e., these are more like expectations for editors willing to nominate themselves.) Racer-Ωmegα 12:44, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose Any formal requirement that a particular level of content creation be required for adminship. There is generally little or no role for admin actions as such in the development of content at the GA level or above. One can understand and sympathize with the needs of content creators without having done much of it oneself. DES ^(talk) 13:24, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Yes, one can. Many, however, do not. - Sitush (talk) 13:55, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose. I have no idea what you are saying, wanting, or asking here, least of all why in the world this is set up in a poll format. But I'd like to point out that: (1) There are no specific set requirements for adminship, which is why we have a public discussion-style poll rather than simply an application checklist to fill out. (2) People are not following GregJackP's lead or "believing in him" -- everyone is acting on their own internal notion of what they feel makes a qualified admin candidate, or what about each individual candidate qualifies them or disqualifies them, in their own mind, for adminship. I hope this helps clear things up for you. Softlavender (talk) 17:04, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is insane. What I believe are criteria that are important for someone to get the bit doesn't mean that others should feel the same way, nor is their opposition to my position a valid reason to limit the criteria that any editor uses to determine their support or opposition to an RfA. GregJackP Boomer! 04:19, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

I would request a closure of this discussion. I don't think it would be necessary to go on, like I said at the bottom. Racer-Ωmegα 08:20, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Neutral

Discussion

This RFC doesn't seem to be an actionable question. What are you actually asking people to support or oppose? It is a fact that such oppose views were expressed in recent RfAs. It is a fact that some, including me, argued against them. It is a fact the others agreed with them. One RfA where such issues were raised failed on other grounds, one looked very likely to pass last I checked. Lack of content creation does not seem to have had a significant effect on either outcome. What are you asking for? DES ^(talk) 13:19, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• (Edit conflict) Wikipedia is a big project and there are many many parts to running it. Creating articles; cleaning articles from bad text; removing vandalism; managing disputes about article content; managing the software that presents the wiki content, to name a few. There are many facets to this and most users won't be intrinsically familiar with all aspects and will instead have expertise primarily in one area or a few. The administrator tools and functions are principally about maintaining content (by blocking vandals, protecting pages and deleting unsuitable pages for example) and managing disagreements (by assessing consensus and blocking persistently troublesome editors); they are not principally concerned with creating content. Of course, article creation is a very important task, but it's not the only important thing in running the wiki, nor one that the administrator function is designed for. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:25, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Can whoever started this poll please sign the OP? Softlavender (talk) 13:57, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

  Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 14:00, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

• Agreed, sure article creation is important to Wikipedia, but not necessarily required for adminship, so can we close this discussion, because it appears redundant once the discussion was done? Racer-Ωmegα 15:11, 2 August 2015 (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.