Wikipedia is a crow jewel and a true boon. It’s also full of errors large and small- I see them all the time. The sources are at the bottom- but even scientific papers for peer review run into the issue that simply having sources cited means jack squat- sources must be reviewed and then their sources and so on. Kids should be taught to review sources and not just trust information unsourced or sourced on its word or the fact it looks legit. They should be taught to check references and how to find information with circular sources where all the supporting sources end up pointing to the same place or to each other. The fact Wikipedia is accurate or not- the fact it is a wonderful resource- doesn’t mean it should be trusted as granted. Such blind faith is how you end up sliding down a slope from reliable and reviewed to full of bunk without anyone noticing.
tl:dr It may be a good source, but it creates laziness in that students don't know how to research things properly and think the first source they find is the best or only one available.
The tl:dr is mostly correct- but the point isn’t that it makes kids lazy- the point is that we need to teach kids to question things and apply critical thinking. That passive consumption of whatever “facts” are given to us through an authorities source or media makes it so that it doesn’t actually matter if the information is true or not because we will believe it’s true either way. “Question everything” is a good motto so long as we remember its intent and not use it as a blanket statement to mean everything is corrupt. Much like criminal trials- the fact we put information on “trial” shouldn’t imply guilt- it is to determine guilt- and that which is suspect is anything that we do not already know to be verifiably true, especially where critical decisions will be based on the facts at hand.
The argument I always heard was "anyone can edit Wikipedia"
But... Did you know that anyone can write a book? You can write complete nonsense and get it published, and then bam, your random musings are now more credible than Wikipedia.
I once even had a professor mark me down because I used an image from Wikipedia...
I would have gotten marked for using Wiki for an image as well. All my professors made it abundantly clear, nothing from wiki. If you want to use wiki, use the sources at the bottom.
Wikipedia is not a neutral source. It is politically biased way to the left, given how on most topics relating to the culture war, they spit the exact same narrative as the masintream online publications and feminist talking heads.
Here's the prime example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_controversy
#GamerGate, a consumer advocacy movement that exposed the corruption in games journalism is summarized by Wikipedia as: "The Gamergate controversy stemmed from a harassment campaign conducted primarily through the use of the hashtag #GamerGate. The controversy centered on issues of sexism and progressivism in video game culture."
No mention of journalist corruption, and the people advocating for exposing and removing corruption were labelled to be a part of a "harassment" campaign. Against the people who were sleeping with the game developers whose games they reported on. Suck my fucking dick Wikipedia.
Or how about some political figures?
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Milo Yiannopoulos - "far-right political commentator, public speaker, and writer".
The guy is a fucking conservative at most, I'd say he's center-right
Here's the thing: it's impossible to take bias out of anything, especially when bias is such a loaded term. There is no such thing a neutral stance because words themselves aren't neutral; you may see calling Milo "far right" as being unfairly biased, while others may see it as not going far enough. And really what it comes down to is the majority, and expert opinion. If a political scientist believes he's a rabid right winger, that carries much more weight than a non-expert saying he's not.
And believe it or not, Wikipedia is pretty damn conservative. The majority of the well-researched, well-sourced articles in English are written by white men about western topics, with the exception of the bafflingly large number of articles about anime. It's also very hard to establish yourself in the Wikipedia editing community as theres only a handful of actual active editors, and one guy has edited over a third of the articles.
I have a source- Wikipedia. The problem with reading, as people often have with my comments- is it involves reading. Sadly- complex concepts aren’t easily expressed in twitter format or movies would be much shorter I imagine. If one reads the entire wiki- there is an entire section titled “Ethics in journalism complaints” which addresses not only the complaints of ethics in journalism, the debunking of such complaints, citations on the debunking, and the complaints that said debunking of complaints is itself bias. It also addresses that regardless of the possibly noble intent of many to make it about bias- the primary focus and cultural impact of gamer gate was in its misogyny. Hence the synopsis of Gamergate is accurate as a concise synopsis can be.
Ironically I write this in a string of comments many wont read who read even part- but the only way to comprehensively cover the entirety of the issue would be to make the synopsis longer- and then- as my comments often prove- you wouldn’t read the whole thing anyway so would miss parts and still walk away feeling it were biased one way or another because that’s what you wanted to get from it and you stopped reading once you got what you wanted.
But as in previous conversations- most recently with @vitklim on tommy boy- a British right wing personality, regardless of what one intends their noble cause to be- if you start diluting your own advocacy on an issue through brining in tangents like gender and race to it- and especially if you stop debating and begin harassing and insulting and ranting- that’s the message that will be taken away. When someone blows up an abortion clinic the takeaway isn’t a level heated discussion with them about the possible valid or at least considerable points of their views- it’s that they are extremists and shouldn’t be listened to. Extremism isn’t a tool or starting point of discussion because it’s forgone that you can’t reason with an extremist- extremism is for self gratification or a tool not to convince bit coerce change out of fear of consequence to disagreement.
So whatever true and noble intentions for anti corruption in gamer gate we’re lost behind the much larger, much louder, much more vocal and prevalent crowd of extremist misogyny. Any valid points about corruption do not need to be preferences with slurs about issues unrelated to corruption- threats of violence, etc. A bill in congress to fund children’s reading that tacks on a clause about how women shouldn’t work in a field and that “that one chick” “should die” won’t be remembered as “the children’s reading bill.”
Do you have any proof of the supposed "mysoginy" you claim? If your only reasoning for assuming this is that the campaign was aimed primarily at female "journalists", it wasn't because they were female, it's because they were corrupt as fuck.
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Again, you are not disproving anything, you are making claims based on the same premise that the narrative spouted in Wikipedia is the only correct one.
It’s public record if you want to go search twitter or any number of sites- or just a google search for Brianna Wu or Zoe Quinn- or any other number of women targeted. The “gamer gate” movement is like any other loosely or barely organized political group- not made up of one type of person- with many people having conflicting ideas over what the movement was about or what the goal even is. This happens with terrorists “freedom fighters” revolutionaries and protest groups all the time- splinter cells with their own ideas all acting under a banner and largely not aware or responsible for what others are doing.
The misogyny isn’t inherent to gamer gate or everyone involved. It’s inherent to those who displayed it and to those who campaigned under the label of gamer gate for misogyny. The majority of membership in many organizations such as the Taliban aren’t combatants. They speak, recruit, perform administrative or support duties. They may run schools or provide medical care or protection and law from criminals. At its roots their movement isn’t motivated by a hate of Americans.
But guess what? If I wrote a Wikipedia article about the summary is going to say they are a group of extremist terrorists. Yeah- some factions or cells denounce terrorism, and they do other stuff too- but speaking of the movement as a whole that’s what it is- a terrorist organization because that’s the primary aspect.
If gamer gate had succeeded in bringing sweeping and solid change as outlined by a mission statement to games journalism- maybe that would be different. But the largest “victories” claimed amongst self identified gaters was the harassment of women. So dude...
Chill. I didn’t call you a misogynist. I didn’t say all people involved were misogynists, and I didn’t say the primary intent of the whole things was misogyny nor that the primary reason was either. I said factually- that the entire movement and period of time surrounding it was plagued by misogyny. That misogynists flocked to the discussion and attacked anyone- especially women- even remotely involved- and that while gamer gate may have raised awareness and had some impact on corruption, it largely failed to achieve any significant and tangible ground.
So as the movement goes- it’s whatever you want it to be. It’s a movement- it didn’t have a uniform and a flag or even a structure. It was a bunch of pissed off people who all had their own reasons to be there. As a cultural phenomenon it was about misogyny. Without the controversy of it- without threats and the leaking of personal info and all that- do you think the greater world and media outside of gamers and the net would really give two shits about a dry scandal over the relationships between game makers and journalists?
Video game news is seldom news unless a sponsor/parent of a media outlet says they need free commercials and news is slow- or there’s some angle of death and social decay. So the part of gamer gate the public largely knows and exists in the concourses of most is a bunch of Trolls picking on women for being women- and that was in media and execution the most successful splinter faction of the entire movement.
@vitklim- the world is not black and white- it isn’t heroes and villains. If someone murders a bus of children to save freedom of speech we can say that he had noble intent but did a bad thing. It doesn’t always have to be all or nothing as it is with you. Pointing out that he murdered a bunch of kids and that’s bad doesn’t mean we can’t acknowledge he had noble intent but poor methods to reach his goals. So undoubtedly you won’t read this or will misread this as usual and come back with some point that’s already been rebuffed. It’s a cycle but I suppose so is life.
When you say that, what I don't understand is... Why cite the middle man?
If Wikipedia provides to with a link to the original citation.... go to that link, or copy Wikipedia's citation.
I am a college composition and literature instructor, and I agree with guest #1 completely. Also, what about all of the times that Wikipedia pages had false information?
Don’t consider this hypocrisy- our teachers failed us. Our adults failed us. The very same people we trusted as experts circulated “facts” from these inaccurate books- simply because they were in books- even when they were probably wrong if one took even some effort to verify them. What’s more? Many decided simply that them being wrong was immaterial to the fact that they were accepted as right. The person who says 2+2=4 will be considered a dunce by a society that was taught and believed that 2+2=5.
So we were failed by those before us and I don’t blame them. Many tried to do well, and most meant well. Many just parroted things as they were told. So there is now a generation in front of us and we aren’t perfect. We don’t have all the answers. But we do know that we can do you a much better service than teaching to agree with wrong facts to seem smart by teaching to question and find answers for yourself. If you’re wrong- at least you were wrong for yourself and know your process and can find where it failed to give you true answers for next time as opposed to just being able to point at a text book and say... “but that’s what the book said...” the way we were taught.
Wikipedia is tribal knowledge in print. That has advantages and draw backs. What ends up on the page is simply what is most agreed to be true. Is that better or worse than a book which is a combination usually of the authors views and an editors pen? In general we want to get as close to an original first person account as possible. There’s also the fact that Wikipedia is an ongoing work- it’s not finished. It’s a fine line because sure- books get newer editions printed, but each volume is a finished work. There is no time ever that a Wikipedia page is “finished.”
I see nothing wrong with using Wikipedia to learn. I see nothing wrong using it as a research tool. But using it as a sole or major supporting case in research I can’t support. As opposed to a book we have too many hands in the pie. Too many variables and unless you’re going to ensure their integrity (which is as much or more work as not using it to start,) it’s not the tool for that job. It’s also very convenient which removes much of the actual learning and skill beholding involved in research. People missed mistakes in text books because no one checked them because they were assumed right because they are sourced etc. book- website- news media network, whatever- if we make a single entity the de facto trusted source no one checks, when no one checks we are entirely reliant on what one gospel source says is true. That’s dangerous.
It's a good place to familiarize yourself with a subject you know nothing about, but there are enough problems with it that it shouldn't be used as a definitive source of information.
It's not that it's unreliable, it's just not a primary source, it's a secondary source (at best). Click the links at the bottom if you want the primary source, then just use that in the paper. That's really all they are asking, and it's not that difficult.
But... Did you know that anyone can write a book? You can write complete nonsense and get it published, and then bam, your random musings are now more credible than Wikipedia.
I once even had a professor mark me down because I used an image from Wikipedia...
#GamerGate, a consumer advocacy movement that exposed the corruption in games journalism is summarized by Wikipedia as: "The Gamergate controversy stemmed from a harassment campaign conducted primarily through the use of the hashtag #GamerGate. The controversy centered on issues of sexism and progressivism in video game culture."
No mention of journalist corruption, and the people advocating for exposing and removing corruption were labelled to be a part of a "harassment" campaign. Against the people who were sleeping with the game developers whose games they reported on. Suck my fucking dick Wikipedia.
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Milo Yiannopoulos - "far-right political commentator, public speaker, and writer".
The guy is a fucking conservative at most, I'd say he's center-right
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Again, you are not disproving anything, you are making claims based on the same premise that the narrative spouted in Wikipedia is the only correct one.
If Wikipedia provides to with a link to the original citation.... go to that link, or copy Wikipedia's citation.
Motherfucking kudos for this guest.