Talk:Pictures for Sad Children

Campbell is 100% a woman
The conversations on this page are absurd. A marketing company isn't a quality source for someone's pronouns. Right. Pronouns are a pretty basic thing and not open for much debate. MOS:GENDERID

The two citations on the current article are for

1. Kill Screen, which says "she preferred [sic] female pronouns"

2. Her kickstarter post which says "First of all I’m not a "man” I think—"

Regardless of whether or not it's a "joke" (a comment which becomes more and more tasteless over time, see Transgender rights movement), it's the most recent source on her pronouns. Even Fox News respects Caitlyn Jenner's gender and pronouns. The idea that you need like an academic publication or a stone tablet from Campbell herself to "prove" something so basic is not a standard held up on other pages. The venn diagram of all pronouns would include masculine, feminine, other (for simplicity). #2 above eliminates "masculine" and and #1 indicates support for "feminine". There's no contradiction. Feminine pronouns make the most sense until she says otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Anonymous-232 (talk • contribs) 15:33, 18 March 2021 (UTC)
 * This has been covered in prior discussions. The compromise is we remain gender neutral for now until it may become clearer with more reliable sources and less outside interference from people claiming to be Campbell. --  Dane talk  17:52, 12 July 2021 (UTC)

Gender identity: new source
Input, an online magazine owned by Bustle Digital Group, published a profile of the author today. The profile refers to the author as Simone Veil, explicitly describes her as a trans woman, and uses she/her pronouns. I think that's about as explicit as a source can get.

I believe the article is reliable. Bustle, a website owned by Input's parent company, is yellow at RSP. Input itself doesn't seem to have been discussed at RSN (thought its name makes it hard to search for), but it does appear to be a serious journalistic publication with an ethics policy. The author of this particular article, Justin Ling, is a freelance journalist with bylines in Foreign Policy and the Guardian.

I believe that with this new source, it's very clear under MOS:GENDERID that we should be using she/her pronouns (and probably the new name as well, though I'm less sure about that).

Pinging previous commenters for thoughts:, , , , , , , , ,

If I don't get any objections, I'll probably make the change in the next day or two. (But if someone else has time before I do and there's a consensus to do so, feel free to do it.) Gaelan 💬✏️ 21:22, 22 November 2021 (UTC)


 * Oops, fixing ping to . Gaelan 💬✏️ 21:44, 22 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I am opposed to any changes to the article at this time based on this single article -- although the gender matches previous claims, the name does not and Bustle (as noted by ) is yellow and has had prior issues with freelance journalists and reliability. The "interview" was conducted via email and likely unverified given the level of "fakes" or attempts to assume the identity of this writer, most of the information in this article was publicly rehashed information from the internet sources. Furthermore, I doubt the credibility based on "I reached out to Veil again. The main email I had for her: dead. Another email: dead. I kept trying other accounts."  I would only support these changes IF more than one reliable source that isn't potentially questionable confirmed details that matched.  As of now, there's too much inconsistency in this single source and I think the article is better left as is. --  Dane  talk  04:07, 23 November 2021 (UTC)
 * You are misreading that section. The author had known her since 2014.  He was not randomly trying e-mails, he already knew it belonged to her.  This level of scrutiny is irregular. Wickedjacob (talk) 03:20, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I, on the other hand, support Drlemon98's edit to the article. I believe the two-hour Zoom-call interview and the existence of a new website with Veil's art is plenty. I prefer to follow the latest sources on this subject where possible, in order to minimize further harm to the subject. ~ Maplestrip/Mable ( chat ) 08:06, 23 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I concur. Updating the name and pronouns has under any circumstances infinitesimal to no potential to cause harm; not updating them, on the other hand, has significant potential to cause significant harm. ThirdEchelon (talk) 09:46, 23 November 2021 (UTC)
 * While I appreciate and especially do not want an article to cause harm, I do want an article to be accurate. And the single source in a flurry of bad sources with an unverifiable third party presents just that issue.  Most news organizations require two sources for a piece of information; while we are NOT a news organization, we're an encyclopedia, I do think we need to consider the standards we hold the article to -- especially an article such as this with a lot of attempts to interfere with the factual accuracy of what's published by individuals claiming to be related to the source. As such, I remain firmly opposed to the change until another source prevails with hopefully more reliability. --  Dane  talk  21:32, 23 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I second what ThirdEchelon says about the degrees of potential harm caused by changing a name and a few pronouns, vs not making the changes. If no changes are made, I suggest at the very least informing the reader of the questioned status of her name. Readers are going to read the article on the Input (which does not mention her deadname), come here and see nothing regarding the matter, other than one sentence: "John Campbell's gender identity has become unclear" Shenkerism (talk) 01:30, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
 * As the consensus seems to be to changing it (and has already been implemented), I have gone ahead and clarified the former name which was notable per MOS:GENDERID in the lead. --  Dane talk  05:02, 24 November 2021 (UTC)

Notability of Simone Veil?
The argument for keeping Simone Veil's deadname in the article is MOS:GID. This states that a deadname should be included for any person who was notable under a prior name, and inversely should not be included if the subject was not notable under a prior name.

I'm curious as to whether or not Simone Veil herself meets the threshold of notability, because that seems to be what the argument for keeping the deadname in the article hinges on. I believe that the notability of Simone Veil herself should be adequately demonstrated and established before we include a deadname on this article. Otherwise, I believe that it should be excluded.

A cursory read of the sources using Veil's deadname yield few articles that appear to cover much about Veil herself, rather they're mostly talking about her art and kickstarter project. Does Veil herself have substantial coverage per WP:BASIC? Askasel 💬Talk📜Contributions 16:46, 28 November 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding MOS:GID, but her deadname was obviously considered notable enough to include prior to it becoming a deadname. I think that, as a somewhat well-known author prior to transitioning (whose current name is only known from a single article, as discussed above), this probably falls under

"Where a person's gender may come as a surprise, explain it on first occurrence, without overemphasis. - MOS:GID"

We certainly wouldn't want people to become confused by the fact that almost every source online refers to the author of this book by a completely different name than the Wikipedia article and, say, trying to correct the "mistake". -- MugaSofer (talk) 06:02, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

I also think we include the author's name in the article of pretty much every publication (hardly surprising, as most articles about a book will include it.) Simone Veil isn't notable enough to have her own article, but the fact she wrote this book is surely notable enough to be included in an article on the book. Not doing so specifically because the author is trans seems, if anything, potentially transphobic, and not like a policy we want to adopt. - MugaSofer (talk) 06:14, 29 November 2021 (UTC)


 * For clarity, I'm not contesting the inclusion of Simone Veil's current name in the article. I don't believe that Simone Veil must be notable to be mentioned in the article. What I believe is that Simone Veil's deadname, as parenthesized in the article, is contrary to MOS:GID's guidance on notability: "If a living transgender or non-binary person was not notable under a former name (a deadname), it should not be included in any page (including lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc), even in quotations, even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest separate from (and often greater than) the person's current name."
 * My argument, in essence, is that Simone Veil as a person likely doesn't meet the criteria for notability on Wikipedia and thus her deadname should not be parenthesized on the article even if reliable sourcing for it exists. Rather, we should maintain only the name that the most recent reliable sources report unless we can prove that Simone Veil is notable per Wikipedia's policy.
 * Perhaps of interest is that Simone Veil's notability has been contested before during an AfD of this article. Of course, it wasn't relevant to that discussion as Veil's notability wasn't under question at that time, but I feel that it's important to mention now that Veil's notability is a factor in whether or not the parenthesized deadname is an appropriate addition to the article. Askasel 💬Talk📜Contributions 18:15, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

As far as I see it, her only real notability are creating Pictures for sad children and popularising hourly comics (which I didn’t even know was from her), and I don’t see why someone who knew about PFSC would be confused by not including her deadname in the article.

But then ultimately I think that even if Wikipedia policies require that the deadname should be used, the policies are wrong  No-genius (talk) 16:37, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The authors deadname was used for publishing the series, therefore their name may come as a surprise to readers, which is why the first note is there without overemphasis. --  Dane talk  05:42, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

It will also come as a surprise if you read the article in source [1], because her deadname is not used there once. But I suppose there wasn’t room, and it’s correct to include the unnecessary detail in longer form writing like a Wikipedia article No-genius (talk) 06:45, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy on using deadnames of creators in articles about their works
The article on Pictures For Sad Children has seen a number of edits back and forth on whether it should include the deadname of its creator, and if so, how. Fortunately, the Wikipedia community holds frequent discussions on how articles should best present gender identity. A full list of these discussions is maintained here, but this specific situation has been discussed at the RFC on how MOS:DEADNAME should handle attribution of previously released works. This discussion started in December 2020 and finished in February 2021. (At this point I do wish to apologise for not noting this discussion sooner – I have only recently become aware of it.)

Various editors made their case for all six general approaches presented over a 35,000 word discussion, ranging from using the original name with no reference to the person's current name, and the exact opposite, as well as ways to mention both. The discussion concluded that when discussing works created by trans people who have changed their names, the name that person chooses to go by now should be used as the primary name throughout the article, but also that the article should have a single mention of the originally credited name (that is, the deadname) either as a parenthetical or as a footnote.

Based on this extensive discussion and its conclusions, I will be restoring Simone's deadname to this article. I intend to do it as a footnote in order to make it as unobtrusive as possible, but as concluded by the discussion there are pros and cons to either approach.

To address a point raised by an editor in this article: the conclusion on best practice drew no distinction on an approach based on whether the person in question is notable (as defined by Wikipedia) or not, though I do see some people discussed this point and similar points as part of the RFC.

I appreciate that editors will not always agree with Wikipedia policy. This project is slowly but consistently learning how best to handle issues like balancing clear, accurate information against potential harm to the people it covers, and its approach has often changed. I would not be surprised if this question, or very similar ones, are raised again in the future. When they are, I would encourage editors to make their voices heard. HenryCrun15 (talk) 07:10, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

I object to using a source that doesn’t use a deadname as the reference for a deadname No-genius (talk) 07:28, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
 * From MOS:DEADNAME: A living transgender or non-binary person's former name should be included in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable under it; introduce the name with "born" or "formerly." Using a footnote isn't how it's normally done, but regardless of how it's done, it's appropriate to mention it once in the lede given that the comic achieved notability while using the prior name (New Yorker article, etc). OhNo itsJamie Talk 20:44, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Bar personal objections to the policy, this does settle the matter for me. Askasel 💬Talk📜Contributions 05:12, 18 February 2022 (UTC)

User "ownership" of wikipedia articles
I don't tend to look at my notifications very often, but I've recently noticed that I was pinged regarding my edits to this, for feedback on changes to this article. I do not regard this decision as wise. I think wikipedia works far better if changes are exposed to fresh sets of eyes, instead of notifications to an existing set of users who feel they have some sort of ownership over individual articles. In the latter case specific users can guard jealously the state of an article over long periods of time, reverting edits they do not prefer. The fact is that most users individually cannot claim any real expertise that makes their contributions more valuable, and in fact their participation in past arguments makes them emotionally compromised in judging whether a new edit is an improvement or not. I think people who have been fighting the gender wars on this article for many years at this point need to step back. --Fangz (talk) 16:25, 23 April 2022 (UTC)