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Whether Mentioning Desmond's Parents being Investigated by CPS Violates WP:BLP and WP:PROPORTION
Ping to User:Gråbergs Gråa Sång. Firstly, I would like to apologize for claiming that other fellow was an admin, I was mistaken. Still, he had already checked and edited the content. Instead of just claiming "WP:BLP" and "WP:PROPORTION" and removing relevant, RS material covering one of (if not the) most widely covered aspects of his life in online popular culture, why don't we do the rational thing and debate formally on the merit of removing the material from the article? How exactly do you feel this violates WP:PROPORTION? Thespearthrower (talk) 10:23, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
That has absolutely no relevance to WP:PROPORTION. WP:PROPORTION is as follows:
"While it is important to account for all significant viewpoints on any topic, Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity. There are many such beliefs in the world, some popular and some little-known: claims that the Earth is flat, that the Knights Templar possessed the Holy Grail, that the Apollo Moon landings were a hoax, and similar ones. Conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, speculative history, or plausible but currently unaccepted theories should not be legitimized through comparison to accepted academic scholarship. We do not take a stand on these issues as encyclopedia writers, for or against; we merely omit this information where including it would unduly legitimize it, and otherwise include and describe these ideas in their proper context concerning established scholarship and the beliefs of the wider world."
The length of content added to an article has absolutely nothing to do with WP:PROPORTION, as you can see. Therefore your argument is not relevant or logical. Thespearthrower (talk) 10:34, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Err, no it isn't. WP:PROPORTION says An article should not give undue weight to minor aspects of its subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject. For example, a description of isolated events, quotes, criticisms, or news reports related to one subject may be verifiable and impartial, but still disproportionate to their overall significance to the article topic. This is a concern especially for recent events that may be in the news. You're looking at the section below that. Given that this article has been completely stripped down, having half the text about that one non-incident incident is a huge PROPORTION violation. Alyo(chat·edits)14:56, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah. The source[1] isn't glaringly awful, but spending half of this BLP on this thing-that-according-to-source-wasn't-a-thing goes against the PROPORTION part of WP:NPOV (and IMO WP:MINORS deserves consideration here). I found this bit more interesting to add something to the WP-article about:
"Throughout the past three months, over 200 cases regarding the Napoles family have been opened with ACS alone, sending it all the way up to New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo. But Wendy says that several other agencies also investigated their family by looking at every video, every interview and every photo of Desmond — including those being circulated by different hate groups. “ACS was here unannounced, announced, every single day. They would come at all hours,” Wendy says. “They would come at 3 in the morning even on school nights. They would visit Desmond at his school several times a week and pull him out of class. His grades went down, he thought it was embarrassing, he just started middle school. It’s just been a really horrible experience.”"
As the issue saw no opposition on the BLP noticeboard and does not violate WP:PROPORTION but does allegedly violate WP:BALASP, I will reinstate the edit. You can post it on the NPOV noticeboard and if they decide it needs to be trimmed, I will not reinstate the edit in its current form. Thespearthrower (talk) 19:31, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
And if you are actually interested in this content due to WP:BALASP, why don't we just shorten this relevant, RS-sourced and widely covered in popular media information so that it is less of the overall page?
Are you going to post the information on the NPOV noticeboard or agree to fix the alleged WP:BALASP issue and shorten the text? You didn't take any steps towards mediation in your last post.
Also, that's a ridiculous point to make. I'm dropping my public accusation against you as it violates a rule, however, a reasonable person can surely agree that somebody who was trying to remove content from Wikipedia that they didn't like being shown on the basis of perceived political implications would surely be attempting to hide the content. Thespearthrower (talk) 20:14, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that you are coming in here, making flatly incorrect statements, throwing around wild accusations, and then demanding others offer steps towards mediation with you when you've offered no reasoned counter to policy-based arguments is making it very hard to believe you're operating in good faith. Alyo(chat·edits)20:21, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly, you shouldn't be making mediation with me based on your feelings about my conduct. You're making mediation with me based on reliably sourced, notable, widely covered in pop culture article content. Your personal feelings towards me or my conduct have absolutely zero to do with whether or not the content should be added.
On the other hand, I simply disagree with you that the material inherently violates WP:BALASP, perhaps the length of material does (although I would disagree), and so shortening the material is a good compromise. I feel that the content warrants inclusion as despite the investigation not finding evidence this subject is covered by tons of sources online, and seems to be one of the primary reasons people outside of the drag community know who Desmond is. It's a case where even if WP:BALASP is violated (and I feel it is not) WP:Ignore all rules should be followed for the sake of improving the article. (by the way, for other readers, the investigation did not find his family innocent, as investigations typically do not look for innocence, but rather did not find evidence against his family, as they did not believe having him dress in drag at a gay bar as adults threw money at him constituted sexual abuse) Thespearthrower (talk) 22:27, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
You've had replies from 3 editors in this thread so far, and this far no one has agreed with you on this issue. You could drop this, or see if others pop by and comment, or seek further WP:DR. I guess a WP:RFC could work as a next step, but my guess is that it wouldn't go the way you feel it should. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:49, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I will not stop editing until my arguments are defeated through sound logic, or until an overwhelming consensus is reached. 3 vs 1 is no consensus.Until then it is so called editing war. I invite you to respond with a logical and appropriate response to my points, that is the point of this section, after all. Thespearthrower (talk) 08:05, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
GGS is 100% correct that a poorly covered accusation proven wrong and having no further impact on the people involved fails BLP and UNDUE. Masem (t) 20:25, 28 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Even if he's an admin, he doesn't have the privilege to automatically close a discussion without consensus being reached just because he is on a side. You refuse to even respond to my points, and he mistakenly believed that the accusation was proven wrong. Also, investigations are on several pages throughout Wikipedia, even if they come up unfounded. There is no rule on Wikipedia that investigations which go unfounded cannot be added to a page. Material which is reliably sourced, not contentious, and widely covered should be added. This content is: reliably sourced, there is no debate on whether or not this happened, and is widely covered in popular media. Further, saying "WP:BLP violation" does not automatically mean it does in fact violate WP:BLP. You have to explain why the material violates BLP and then respond to counterarguments. again @Gråbergs Gråa SångThespearthrower (talk) 08:22, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
the contentious material is the implication the parents were not parenting well as to require child services, which was proven wrong.It is NOT widely covered, and the parents are clearly not public figures so we should be pointing fingers at them. thus is absolutely material should not be included, primarily under the principle of "do no harm" under BLP. a you have also edit warned on a BLP page, which generally are under a 1RR rule. Masem (t) 09:17, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If I'm understanding correctly, yes, it violates "undue". If I am understanding correctly, this is a weakly sourced statement that the parents were investigated and no evidence of anything was found. I'm not sure why that would need to be in an article about the child. Red Fiona (talk) 16:45, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I don't personally agree with the results of the CPS investigation. I think it's clear this kid is being exploited. However, given that the parents were not convicted... WP:BLPCRIME generally supports not including it. I don't like it, but that's the policy.
But... is there an additional issue here about a minor performing in an adults-only venue, and the well-documented (in primary sources) connection to Alig? Or any of the other controversies? I assume the attempt to use the CPS stuff is in order to include this content. If this is the goal, and there is any consensus to do so, it would have to be in a way that doesn't use Wikipedia's voice to make accusations against the parents. Everyone who's followed this article knows there has been a ton of controversy here, and the response has basically been to blank it all and leave it in the bare bones state it's in. When the article was ridiculously long and full of inappropriate, gushy content, a number of editors in good standing were concerned. Some wanted to include content in the article about this child possibly/probably being exploited, but sourcing has been very difficult as the press has been very careful in covering this kid. Most of the sources suggested were not WP:RS. On the other hand, the gushy content was added by a now-indeffed sockdrawer, who aggressively pushed to whitewash any criticism of the child's parents or other adults exposing him to adult situations. Unless better sources have been found, the article will probably stay as-is. Just giving some of the background on this. - CorbieVreccan☊☼20:31, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that version has policy violations like: "His doing drag has raised criticism from social conservatives for the perceived sexualization of a child, resulting in harassment and death threats" ... Whereas the article, as biased and essay-like as it is, even makes clear that a claim by the mother is the sole source for this. I don't recall her ever producing any evidence of death threats, so that statement can't be made in Wikipedia's voice as fact. (Though we could say that she said it.)
In this case, unfortunately, that Out article is as biased as the Right Wing ones, so is also not usable. It was really disingenuous of Out to claim that the only criticism was due to "homophobia" and "Right Wing attacks", or even the concept of drag, and to then have that falsehood continued on WP by the now-indeffed sockdrawer; much of the concern for this kid has come from our LGBT community itself, and had nothing to do with the kid dressing up and expressing himself, but rather the situations he was being put into, and concern that he seemed starved and possibly on drugs. The mother's implication that the very people (mostly women) who wanted to see the child protected from drugs, murderers (Alig), sexualization and strip clubs were somehow wanting to harm him is DARVO. Anyone can watch the concerning footage and see for themselves which writers are being accurate. But then if they add in other bias, it doesn't matter; we can't use any kind of polemic as a source. *smh* - CorbieVreccan☊☼18:59, 31 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The ship looks to have mostly sailed here, but just for the avoidance of doubt: If the accusations which spawned the investigation were deemed unfounded, it should absolutely not appear in what would otherwise be a two-sentence long BLP. Some of the reasons for this are covered in various forms at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Presumption in favor of privacy. In particular, I think WP:MINORS and WP:NPF are relevant here, as we are talking about a minor who isn't really a public figure (and his parents): In such cases, exercise restraint and include only material relevant to the person's notability, focusing on high-quality secondary sources... Material that may adversely affect a person's reputation should be treated with special care. Endwise (talk) 11:37, 2 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
All the sources on this page seem to be from LGBTQ news sources and use biased language. I am not suggesting that the news sources are incorrect, but perhaps there are neutral sources that could be cited instead, considering that people do and will continue to cite this page. 70.75.136.252 (talk) 16:42, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
