Talk:Islamophobia in the British Conservative Party/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Vanamonde93 (talk · contribs) 23:05, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

I'll take this. Vanamonde (Talk) 23:05, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

Checklist
GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria


 * 1) Is it well written?
 * A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
 * B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
 * 1) Is it verifiable with no original research?
 * A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
 * At the moment, several formatting issues, including; inconsistent use of sfn (it should be used either for all sources, or just sources with multiple page ranges, or nothing); and harv errors
 * B. All in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons&mdash;science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines:
 * C. It contains no original research:
 * Several issues with synthesis.
 * D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
 * 1) Is it broad in its coverage?
 * A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
 * Essentially a list of accusations; see comments below for further detail.
 * B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
 * 1) Is it neutral?
 * It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
 * Largest concern. See below.
 * 1) Is it stable?
 * It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
 * Not really stable; considerable amounts of material keep being added to this.
 * 1) Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
 * A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:
 * B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass or Fail:
 * Failing per comments.
 * A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:
 * B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass or Fail:
 * Failing per comments.
 * Pass or Fail:
 * Failing per comments.

Comments
While I acknowledge the difficulty of the subject matter, I'm afraid this isn't up to GA standards at the moment, and the issues are serious enough that I see no purpose being served in prolonging the review. In addition to the points mentioned above, here are some concerns that should be addressed before the article is nominated again. There are a few other concerns, about prose and formatting; but it isn't worth spending time on them at the moment, because the article requires a substantive rewrite to address the concerns I've raised here. I would recommend reaching out to one of several editors who have written GAs and FAs about British politics for assistance. Vanamonde (Talk) 23:25, 29 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Scope/framing. This is perhaps the most serious issue, because it is going to require rewriting the article. At the moment, the article is a list of accusations and rebuttals. It isn't an article that discusses the phenomenon of Islamophobia in any substance. What you need to do is build the article around sources that discuss the phenomenon of Islamophobia in the conservative party. If such sources don't exist, then the article shouldn't exist, and should instead be titled "accusations of Islamophobia [...]". As an aside, the "1997-present" in the title is weird and unnecessary; if sources say that the phenomenon drew attention after 1997, just say that; the current title implies older Islamophobia that isn't covered here.
 * Original research. A lot of quotes are used that have no clear relevance, and whose relevance isn't established by the current sources. Murray's quote about the uses of the term Islamophobia are not obviously connected to this topic; conservatives speaking about Islamophobia aren't necessarily opposing it's existence in their party (what does the title "opposition" even mean in this context?) Rees-Mogg's quote is from his own opinion piece; by including it, Wikipedia is asserting that that piece constitutes opposition to Islamophobia; which is both original research and a violation of NPOV, because that assertion needs to be made by a secondary source for us to treat it in this manner. Cowling's critique of Rushdie is the worst example; there is certainly no consensus that Rushdie's book is Islamophobic, and in any case Rushdie isn't a Tory leader. The relevance of those quotes needs to be established by independent sources, and if it hasn't, they need to go.
 * Sources. There are a considerable number of academic sources on the topic. While the GA criteria do not require the best possible sources, achieving neutrality in a topic as complex as this is going to be impossible without scholarly sourcing; and the authors need to use those whereever possible. At the moment, it's built entirely on media sources, which aren't unreliable, but which are necessarily going to be dominated by "X said this, Y criticized them, Z defended them" sort of stories.