The wrong way to edit a BLP

[Giraffe Stapler]

Rosie Stephenson-Goodnight (AKA Rosiestep) is a long-time editor. Since 2007, she has made literally hundreds of thousands of edits. She has held a number of positions in WMF groups. She is currently a community-elected member of the WMF Board of Trustees. So what does an experienced and trusted editor like Rosiestep do when they encounter an unreferenced BLP? Let's have a look at one example.

In August 2020, Rosiestep came across the biography of Israeli historian Dvora Hacohen. Rosiestep added a template to it indicating that it was, well, completely unsourced. So far, so good. But in the very next edit, Rosiestep added a source and removed that template.

The relevant paragraph went from this:

From 1975 to 1992, she was the Scientific Advisor of Educational Television for History and Jewish Studies. From 1986 to 1989, she served as a research fellow at the Ben-Gurion Institute for the Study of Zionism and the State of Israel in Sde Boker, and lecturer in the Department of Jewish History at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She also worked as a researcher at Oxford University, Harvard University, and at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, and taught as a visiting professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey, United States.

to this:

Biography:
From 1975 to 1992, she was the Scientific Advisor of Educational Television for History and Jewish Studies. From 1986 to 1989, she served as a research fellow at the Ben-Gurion Institute for the Study of Zionism and the State of Israel in Sde Boker, and lecturer in the Department of Jewish History at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She also worked as a researcher at Oxford University, Harvard University, and at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, and taught as a visiting professor at Rutgers University (2012) in New Jersey, United States.[1]

The reference Rosiestep added confirms that Dvora Hacohen was indeed listed as a visting scholar at Rutgers. So we went from a completely unsourced biography to one where a single fact is sourced. Hacohen's date of birth, place of borth, parents, education, spouse, child, etc are all still completely unsourced. Rosiestep went on to add a list of works (with a reference) and some categories. Some of those categories, of course, were based on the unsourced information already there.

Now, Rosiestep isn't the only person to have edited this article. I'm singling her out because of her position in the Community and because I know she saw that the biography was completely unreferenced. WP:BLP states:

Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—must be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion.

The word "contentious" here is a problem. It can be argued that there is nothing "contentious" about birth dates or places of birth or parents or really any biographical detail. And this is probably true if you're a Wikipedia editor and not the person whose age, birthplace, or parentage are wrong. But there's a footnote on that sentence, which includes none other than Jimmy Wales saying such things as "zero information is preferred to misleading or false information" and "It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons."

Now, over three years on, there are still only those two sources, but a lot more (unsourced) material has been added. And there seems to be a very slow edit war over whether Hacohen was born in 1936 or 1937. Apparently editors (including admins) are happy to revert an IP's change to the birth date even though the birth date in the article has no source. How can they possibly know which date is right? By the way, the Jewish Women's Archive says she was born in 1946. She keeps getting younger. At least that's a date with a source.

What I think Rosiestep should have done (if she wasn't willing to find sources for everything in the article) was mark it for deletion as a wholly unsourced biography. As Jimbo says, zero information is preferred to misleading or false information". Adding a reference for one simple fact while leaving the rest unsourced was worse than doing nothing at all. It may have mislead other editors into thinking that the information was referenced.

[rnu]

Did she at least get points and a badge for her heroic effort?

[Kraken]

Rosie is co-founder and press contact for WikiProject:Women In Red (T-H-L), which is dedicated to increasing the number of women biographies.

Basic biographical information such as nationality and birthdate should always be sourced, as the very first step in demonstrating a page complies with WP:BLP (T-H-L). Furthermore, contentious is clearly operative to any non-trivial educational/career detail where a subject's claimed notability arises from their achievements in academia (WP:NPROF (T-H-L)).

So it does reflect poorly on any editor, but especially Administrators (such as Rosie) or anyone else being heralded internally or externally as an example of what a model Wikipedia editor looks like, if they are patently negligent or even incompetent in such things.

You are incorrect to say deletion is the correct course of action however. Since there are clearly multiple ways this person could be notable as an academic, and since sources are easy to find on a very quick online search, then the deletion policy supports a course of action where the biography is reduced to a couple of sourced lines. A "stub".

One of the top Google results for "Dvora Hacochen" is the Harvard University Press listing for To Repair A Broken World, which supports a one line stub as follows.....

Dvora Hacochen is Professor of Modern Jewish History at Bar Ilan University (T-H-L), Israel. She is a recipient of the Ben-Gurion (T-H-L) Prize. In 2022 she was the recipient of a National Jewish Book Award (T-H-L).

That's still a very poor article, both in general and as a BLP. Chiefly because that one reference isn't independent of the subject. But it is good enough that it wouldn't be possible to delete it without going through the seven day Articles for Deletion process. Where it would undoubtedly be kept after improvements. Or even without improvements, just as long as better sources were identified in the process.

For academics, such sources do not even have to be independent, just reliable (so not overtly promotional, such as a book listing). It could be as easy as locating her faculty bio page, if it supports one of the criteria in NPROF. It shouldn't be that way, but this is one way Wikipedia has decided to officially bend its normally quite strong sourcing rules to address the alleged problem of women in academia being ignored by independent media.

The theory goes that it is Wikipedia's place to make these women visible, so independent media will notice them, so Wikipedia can write about them. It's clearly ass backwards, but it is widely accepted as sound by the Wikipedia community. Not controversial. Worthy of donor money being spent on it.

It is unlikely anyone would even put this stub up deletion therefore, given the general reasons above. But specifically also because the press attention Women In Red has already received, has rather made it clear such an act should be viewed as hostile, even misogynistic. An example of Wikipedia's well documented toxicity that repels women editors. And who would want to be seen as being guilty of that, in this day and age.

One could argue that this is why people in Rosie's position don't even bother to even try to look as if they give a fuck about BLP. They're busy people after all. An ironic case perhaps of having built up a certain level of privelage, even protection. Who can say. It's generally very difficult to get straight answers from these people about why they do what they do, because there is nothing in Wikipedia policy to compel them.

You would probably even be CheckUsered simply for asking Rosie about this matter as a newcomer to Wikipedia, especially now it has been raised here. This would seem to be a gross breach of Californian privacy law and very chilling to any investigative reporters looking to find out more about these counter factual systemic flaws of Wikipedia. But unless you have very deep pockets or a rich benefactor, there's not a lot you can do about it.

The media coverage of things like Women In Red is largely soft soap puff pieces. In many instances it is quite clear the media simply repeat whatever they are told, no matter how dubious or contentious. Perhaps because outside of the narrow confines of Wikipedia criticism, there is no controversy. Their goals are broadly supported, and there is little interest in the details. Not even the BLP implications for women who are often entirely unaware they have been granted the honor of Wikipedia recognition.

So yes, it is rather annoying to see things like this from those who should be setting the example. People who have already been recognized for their alleged good works, internally and externally.

These points have of course all been made before on this forum. To little effect. One could argue it is a complete waste of time even raising it these days, given the moment when such things were still even somewhat controversial on Wikipedia, has long receded into history. Even back then, it only interested a handful of journalists. People looking for proof Wikipedia is a sham, seeking a way to bring it to wider attention. People unfairly maligned by its unaccountable community pursuing their warped agendas, and raising donor cash off the back of it all.

There is now wide acceptance in the Wikipedia community that this is all above board, policy compliant. Or at the very least, the good outweighs the bad. Or even just that there are far more serious issues than this that critics should be focused on. You could even say those who do see it for what it is, prefer it not to be brought to light, lest it do more to harm to Wikipedia than the course corrections needed to fix these specific failings. After all, it is one of the few good things Wikipedia claims to be doing, ending sexism.

But I salute your effort in trying. I hope my efforts have been of assistance.

[Yngvadottir]

Yes, uppermost in Rosiestep's mind seems to have been retaining a biography of a woman academic, and she should have done a lot more. I've now made 3 edits to it and spent rather too much time searching for sources—Worldcat is now almost unusable, like wrestling with a squid, and I can't read Hebrew—and am about to go do what I am supposed to be doing. But the history has some interest.

It was created completely unreferenced in November 2019 by Onceinawhile (T-C-L), who creates a lot of articles but not many biographies. (I checked later work and found they started creating them with a list of sources or a single ref, such as to a faculty page; I had to track down Dr. Hacohen's faculty page.) The original version had her place of birth, her parents (with a link to an article on he.wiki on her great-grandfather), her husband and one of her sons. The latter have articles that were linked, Menachem Hacohen (T-H-L) and Aviad Hacohen (T-H-L); these were created in December 2009 by Number 57 (T-C-L) (with a ref.) and in April 2012 by Mishpats4 (T-C-L) (no ref., their only work unless something has been deleted; it ended with a signature and was moved from their talk page by Scopecreep (T-C-L). So par for the course: the menfolk get articles first, but they're also respectively a rabbi and former Knesset member and a lawyer and professor of law. So she's also at a disadvantage as a mere social science prof.

Following Rosiestep's series of edits in September 2020, the article returned to its slumber. But most of the text turns out to have been the result of a massive rewrite by so far single-purpose account BatShe (T-C-L), in January 2022: cumulative changes with a few intervening edits by others. They fluffed it up and removed most of the personal info. I considered welcoming them, but instead pinged them in my edit summary, since I've been restoring some of that material with references and it's reasonable to wonder whether she has a personal connection to the subject. And then the only substantive change, and the last edit before mine, was an IP last year changing the birth year (and restoring the date to the intro; it had remained in the infobox). So the article illustrates a couple of other common phenomena too. But it turns out to have had a ton more unreferenced personal info when Rosiestep saw it than when I went snooping after seeing this report. Not cool.

BTW Kraken, I disagree that nationality should be cited as a matter of urgency in BLPs. Birthdate, birthplace, spouse, children, and the position that's the basis of the claim of notability would be at the top of my list. Others' mileage may differ; but birthdate and birthdate are all too often unsourced, including on fooking Wikidata. For this bio I at least found Wikidata citing her birth year to something other than just Wikipedia.

That's enough procrastinating, and probably more than enough words.

[Kraken]

BTW Kraken, I disagree that nationality should be cited as a matter of urgency in BLPs.

The widespread laxity over nationality is one of the most obvious signs Wikipedia has no intention of taking WP:BLP seriously, if it would interfere with their day to day activities. It's such an easy thing to do right too. They expend so much time and energy on matters airing from nationality, all the lists, categories, projects, without ever making sure they're not wasting their time on a fool's errand. Without ever checking that what is usually the very first claim in a biography after the name and date of birth, is BLP compliant. They seem to take a perverse comfort in the fact that 99.999% of the time, it won't be wrong. The exact faulty mindset that BLP exists to prevent, for the benefit of the 0.001%.

[Giraffe Stapler]

You are incorrect to say deletion is the correct course of action however. Since there are clearly multiple ways this person could be notable as an academic, and since sources are easy to find on a very quick online search, then the deletion policy supports a course of action where the biography is reduced to a couple of sourced lines. A "stub".

You are right. When I said the correct course of action was to "mark it for deletion", I didn't mean that the article should necessarily have been deleted, but I should have been clearer. Rosiestep could have reduced it to a stub, but that would require finding sources for whatever info that stub contained. If she wasn't willing to do that, marking it for deletion would have given someone else the chance to fix. Or it would have been deleted, which would be better, in my opinion, than having a completely unsourced biography.

To be clear, I think Dvora Hacohen merits an article on Wikipedia. And anyone who has an article on Wikipedia deserves to have an article that is accurate and properly sourced. Jimmy Wales and others often point to things like WP:BLP and pretend that having the rules means people follow the rules. I wrote up this example to show how false that claim is.

[rnu]

[...]
If she wasn't willing to do that, marking it for deletion would have given someone else the chance to fix. Or it would have been deleted, which would be better, in my opinion, than having a completely unsourced biography.
[...]

But what about WP:BEFORE and "AfD is not article cleanup"?!

[Giraffe Stapler]

Yes, uppermost in Rosiestep's mind seems to have been retaining a biography of a woman academic, and she should have done a lot more. I've now made 3 edits to it and spent rather too much time searching for sources—Worldcat is now almost unusable, like wrestling with a squid, and I can't read Hebrew—and am about to go do what I am supposed to be doing.

Excellent work, as always.

Aviad Hacohen is (or maybe was) the president of the Academic Center for Law and Science (T-H-L). That article is, of course, completely unreferenced. Worse, it's an obvious cut-and-paste copy job from their website at that time. YR on wiki (T-C-L) did the dirty work in 2017 and it has never been noticed.

[rnu]

Yes, uppermost in Rosiestep's mind seems to have been retaining a biography of a woman academic, and she should have done a lot more. I've now made 3 edits to it and spent rather too much time searching for sources—Worldcat is now almost unusable, like wrestling with a squid, and I can't read Hebrew—and am about to go do what I am supposed to be doing.

Excellent work, as always.

Aviad Hacohen is (or maybe was) the president of the Academic Center for Law and Science (T-H-L). That article is, of course, completely unreferenced. Worse, it's an obvious cut-and-paste copy job from their website at that time. YR on wiki (T-C-L) did the dirty work in 2017 and it has never been noticed.

According to their homepage he is still the president. However it is called the "Academic College of Law and Science".

[Giraffe Stapler]

But what about WP:BEFORE and "AfD is not article cleanup"?!

Unsourced BLPs fall under Wikipedia:Proposed deletion of biographies of living people.

I just love it when people argue things in deletion discussions about how sources exist (not in the article, but they exist) or that AfD isn't for article cleanup. They admit that the article is bad, but that's not their problem. Or anyone's problem, really, because it's a volunteer project.

[rnu]

But what about WP:BEFORE and "AfD is not article cleanup"?!

Unsourced BLPs fall under Wikipedia:Proposed deletion of biographies of living people.

I just love it when people argue things in deletion discussions about how sources exist (not in the article, but they exist) or that AfD isn't for article cleanup. They admit that the article is bad, but that's not their problem. Or anyone's problem, really, because it's a volunteer project.

The obvious solution when people raise those "arguments" would be to draftify the article and only allow it back in main space once it is (at a minimum) rule compliant. Of course the number of drafts would skyrocket. And of course it will never happen.

[Yngvadottir]

I just love it when people argue things in deletion discussions about how sources exist (not in the article, but they exist) or that AfD isn't for article cleanup. They admit that the article is bad, but that's not their problem. Or anyone's problem, really, because it's a volunteer project.

The obvious solution when people raise those "arguments" would be to draftify the article and only allow it back in main space once it is (at a minimum) rule compliant. Of course the number of drafts would skyrocket. And of course it will never happen.

Ritchie has rightly been making a stink for many years about people not even adding the sources adduced at AfD.

The problem with draftspace is that it's now almost impossible to get an article accepted via AfC. Not only is the standard higher than at AfD, weaponised draftification and the fact that AfC reviewers are now a cadre with special training to get access to the app or whatever it is, means they tend to be people who suspect any submitted draft has to be promotional in intent. I've saved a couple of drafts by mainspacing them on my own recognisance after improving them (in one case after a loooong discussion at the relevant WikiProject or on the talk page, I forget now which, characterising all the many foreign-language newspaper sources that I'd cited with links, on a retired Norwegian footballer). I've even submitted a few and had them accepted (which I don't like to do not only because there's a big risk of rejection but because I want the original creator to get the credit). Draftification is the kiss of death.

I considered also fixing up the articles on the son and the father, but I can't read Hebrew and neither is as bad as her article was, so I called it quits. That's on me, I don't do as much as I used to.