Talk:Anne Marie Morris

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: page moved - non controverisal. ukexpat (talk) 19:44, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Anne-Marie Morris → Anne Marie Morris – The subject of the page is called Anne Marie, not Anne-Marie. Redirect from proposed page currently points here - it should be the other way around Sotonchris (talk) 16:04, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Temporary protecting of the page
Might be a good idea to have this page set up as protected for a few days. It's just getting spammed by anon and new account edits about her remarks. Apache287 (talk) 16:51, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

Use of "racist" to describe phrase
The phrase which Morris used has been described by sources (all of the sources I can find) as racist, so that is what I have used in the article. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 18:01, 10 July 2017 (UTC)
 * It's certainly well attested by reliable sources that it is considered a racist phrase and Wikipedia could and should be able to describe it as such, but I think the best option for the lede is to be slightly more informative in putting the actual phrase in (it's pretty self explanatory that it contains a racial epithet, and the wikilinked article gives useful context of what the phrase was intended to mean, the fact it was once considered socially acceptable and the fact other UK politicians have got into trouble over the past couple of decades). Dtellett (talk) 18:46, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=DCfEhieX8F0C&pg=PT264 Some people genuinely are unaware of what it means, so someone competent at Wikipedia could add: The phrase refers to an African American hiding in your woodpile, you have not noticed him but you will when your wife gives birth to a baby with dark skin. Or your wood is being stolen. Or your slave is being smuggled north to Canada... Also African Americans were killed many ways other than lynchings. There are many photographs of mobs around a woodpile burning an African American. 81.158.89.81 (talk) 21:37, 10 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I think Wikipedia adopting the position that the phrase is inherently "racist" is not in the spirit of neutrality. My grandfather regularly used the term and I would say it has only dropped out of common usage in the last couple of decades. You would sometimes hear it used on TV up to the 1990s and nobody had a problem with it then and it used to be common parlance for anyone over 50. I see it is mostly the left-wing press that is describing it as "racist", but in a similar incident with another Tory MP the Telegraph describes it as "out of favor". Personally I think that is a more balanced description, especially when the phrase has a non-racist application. Betty Logan (talk) 20:30, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

The phrase is racist per se, as it includes 'nigger', which offends, though use of it might be quite innocent, as for example by an infant (or grandfather). Rothorpe (talk) 13:14, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

I've replaced the term 'racist' with the more neutral phrase again, in line with Wikipedia's requirement that articles maintain a neutral point of view. The fact that it was widely disputed (and still is) whether the phrase she used was racist is enough to establish that 'racist' is editorializing (as it is in the BBC article that is cited, which of course is not a reliable source for the claim that the phrase used is racist). Cleisthenes2 (talk) 16:32, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
 * So we should ignore what reliable sources say because your grandfather is racist? AusLondonder (talk) 14:21, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I doubt he was any more racist than the typical person of his era. I would also argue that by serving in WW2 he did more than your modern SJW to oppose racist ideology too. The problem here though isn't that some of us are ignoring what reliable sources say, but rather some of us are being selective about what they do say. Some media outlets may well consider the phrase racist, but as I pointed out above The Telegraph regarded it as simply "out of favour". Therefore it is not a universal view that the phrase is racist, so why are we only relying on the sources that do? If a black Labour politician had used the phrase would the media have been all over it in the same way, and would they have been suspended? I suspect not. That sentence could just as easily be worded as "In July 2017, she had the Conservative whip suspended on the grounds of using racist language, following the emergence of a recording of her using the idiom "nigger in the woodpile". That still conveys all the essential facts of the incident without Wikipedia taking a stance on whether the phrase itself. Betty Logan (talk) 19:03, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree with Betty. It's not our concern to say whether the phrase is racist or not. Readers can make their own mind up about that. Our responsibility is to convey information in a neutral tone. Cleisthenes2 (talk) 13:31, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Non-neutral section headings
It appears is determined to insert non-neutral section headings. He keeps inserting the "nigger in the woodpile" idiom into the actual sub-headings and has done this on several occasions now:
 * 1) July 11th
 * 2) July 13th
 * 3) July 27th

First of all the "Controversy" section covers two incidents and "Controversy" is a standard section heading for this type of thing. There is no censorship here because her comments are fully documented in the article itself. Secondly, each incident does not require a separate section. MOS:PARAGRAPHS states short sections and single paragraphs do not generally warrant their own sub-headings. This is is not a large article and the information is easy enough to find. Along with this alteration it is beginning to look like agenda pushing. Betty Logan (talk) 18:21, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * How is stating the words that came out of her mouth in the heading an example of "agenda pushing"? There appears to be a concerted effort by Conservative Party activists to airbrush alleged racist language from this article along with other articles about racist, sexist and homophobic language used by Conservative MPs. Cordyceps-Zombie (talk) 19:31, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Firstly, if I were in a "concerted effort" to airbrush it out of the article I would remove it completely. Secondly, even if that were my motive it does not actually explain why you keep reverting editors—edits I am not involved in and edits that have not attempted to remove reference to the incident—to keep reinserting the idiom into the section headings where it is not needed. And finally, you still have not explained why you misrepresented a source in the article to present a general comment about immigrants—which also encompasses white Europeans—as an attack on ethnicity. It strongly looks to me that the purpose of your edits here are to perform a character assassination. Frankly, I think an examination of your political allegiances require more scrutiny than mine. Betty Logan (talk) 19:51, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

Addition of WP:OR to the article
I have reverted several times Impsfan for adding content which is sourced from lists which mention Morris only in lists or [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php? original research] WP:OR). Can someone else weigh in on this please? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 21:25, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
 * There seems to be nothing especially controversial about the content added. Brexit is the biggest political issue of a generation, so it seems reasonable to include an MP's position if it is covered by respectable news outlets such as the BBC. I would point out that "Morriss supported Brexit" is not very encyclopedic, because the term "Brexit" is basically slang. As for the other additions, if secondary sources are reporting the findings of an investigation into property ownership and a potential conflict of interest it seems reasonable to add this content. I think the claim "Morris has rental income from two flats she owns in London, as well as one house in Surrey" should be removed though because it is sourced to https://www.theyworkforyou.com which is essentially an activist site and probably fails WP:RS. Betty Logan (talk) 16:05, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

I think that is fair comment from Betty. I'll remove the reference to the accommodation ownership sourced from https://www.theyworkforyou.com and use a non-slang version of 'Brexit'. WP:RS. Impsfan (talk) 20:13, 12 April 2018 (UTC)