Talk:Public Universal Friend/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: JPxG (talk · contribs) 23:05, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

I'll do my best! jp×g 23:05, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Okay, I am getting around to this now. jp×g 20:04, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Copyright / licensing / media

 * ✅ Earwig's tool finds nothing remotely close to a potential copyvio.
 * ✅ All images on the page are high quality, under free licenses, and clearly illustrate the thing they are being used to illustrate.

Referencing

 * ✅ Everything is referenced quite well. There are no uncited sections, no uncited paragraphs, and there are plenty of inlines for every statement that seems like it could be challenged.
 * ✅ The works cited are largely scholarly works.

Prose

 * ✅ Generally well-written, and broadly follows MoS.


 * I understand that this article is on a contentious subject, and there's been a lot of back-and-forth about a variety of things. While I don't wish to rehash talk page drama, the present consensus seems to have converged on a very awkward situation. Currently, all pronouns whatsoever are eschewed to the greatest extent possible. MOS:GNL is silent on the issue, and there are no GAs I could find about people with non-binary gender identities. The task here, then, is not easy.
 * (reply to [[User:JPxG) FWIW, the guidance on pronouns is not in GNL but in the main MOS page, MOS: (update: while still summarized on the main MOS page, the full guideline is now at MOS:BIO), "Any person whose gender might be questioned should be referred to by the pronouns [...] that reflect that person's latest expressed gender self-identification". Perhaps unusually for a person from this long ago, this person not only expressed a not-binary gender but also specifically rejected pronouns (though personally I was fine with the they/them pronouns the article long used) . There are some other long articles (including one FA) which also avoid pronouns and could be compared in their prose, e.g. James Barry (surgeon) and Albert Cashier, although ironically they're mostly on people who expressed typical, binary, male, he/him genders — those articles avoid pronouns not out of compliance with the MOS (as here) but out of compromise with people who wanted to directly contravene it and use she/her. If any of the sentences are confusing, let me known and I (or others, naturally, this being a wiki) can try and improve it. -sche (talk) 03:13, 26 March 2021 (UTC) updated -sche (talk) 20:07, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Editors continue to delete mention of the subject's given name, even when referring to the pre-transfiguration person. I'd be uncomfortable with this article achieving GA status while there continues to be this kind of instability.--Jburlinson (talk) 10:16, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Problems concerning the subject's name and use of pronouns continue to undermine this article's stability. It must be failed as a GA at this point in time at least.--Jburlinson (talk) 09:59, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I understand the concern, but I don't think occasional IP vandalism / unhelpful edits to one thing, which is immediately reverted by multiple other editors, "destabilizes" an article (indeed, the speed by which so many editors undo the unhelpful IP edits suggests the stable version is clear). Otherwise, vandals could block any GA nom by vandalizing it. Barack Obama is a Featured Article, and has had to be indef semiprotected for almost a decade now, and still a third of the most recent page of its edit history consists of editors reverting or undoing vandalism or unhelpful edits... -sche (talk) 12:43, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Reviewer: Aussie Article Writer (talk)

I am also reviewing this incredibly well written article. I have a few questions as I’m reading:
 * In the 18th and 19th centuries, some writers said that the person was dead for a brief or even extended period (some spinning tales of a dramatic rise from a coffin), while others suggested the whole illness was feigned; accounts by the doctor and other witnesses say that the illness was real, but that no-one noticed the person die
 * In “the person”, ate they referring to Wilkinson, or the other public friends who travelled the countryside? I’m a bit confused.
 * I agree that wording is really awkward, though I think it'd be odd if someone took it as being about someone other than the article subject and who was not previously mentioned as being in danger of dying. (We could have fun adding all kinds of people like that, heh: "George Washington, who was elsewhere at the time, also did not die."😂) I tried to improve it, also clearing up the ambiguity of "no-one noticed the person die", which could be misread as "they didn't even pay attention while the person did indeed die". -sche (talk) 12:21, 12 June 2021 (UTC)


 * making the Friend "the first native-born American to found a religious community
 * Is there some doubt about this fact? If so, shouldn’t we state who asserts this? With just the quotes it seems odd, almost like we aren’t sure but are quoting it from a source we’ve stick in a footnote. If it is clear this is the case, then I would think we just state it as a cited fact from a reputable source.
 * Good point. I included the quotation because one other source says "first American woman", which is a compatible statement (both can be true), but I worried someone down the line who saw the narrower claim might mistakenly assume this article's statement of "first American" was an erroneous Wikipedian over-broadening and "correct" it to "first American woman" (unnecessarily opening a can of misgendering worms), so I wanted to note that the cited source supports "first American". -sche (talk) 12:21, 12 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Could we add a footnote? We can’t add this in the body, but an explanatory footnote is normally used to clarify finer points like this one. Aussie Article Writer (talk) 15:40, 12 June 2021 (UTC)
 * That would work. Indeed, it occurs to me that we could just add the quote to the existing reference footnote. -sche (talk) 06:54, 16 June 2021 (UTC)


 * ''"pride and ambition to distinguish [them]self from the rest of mankind"
 * Whilst we must respect the gender that the subject identified themselves as, I don’t believe it is factual or neutral to change the historical words of someone who lived at the time who commented on the Friend. May I ask what was actually stated? If they used a gendered pronoun then we don’t need to editorialise it. We don’t restrict offensive text where it is necessarily quoted. It is no different to quoting someone who says a swear word… if the article needs the quote, then we include the swear word. We weigh accuracy and neutrality over the offence some may take to the quote.
 * This was one of the subjects of a set of big RfCs last year into earlier this year, the consensus of which, documented at WP:MOSBIO (by yours truly, as it happens! hehe), was to "paraphrase, elide, or use square brackets to replace portions of quotations to avoid deadnaming or misgendering, except in rare cases where exact wording cannot be avoided, as where there is a pun". However, I think we could sidestep the issue by dropping the quote and paraphrasing, like "[...]what William Savery considered pride." or "[...]what William Savery considered pride and ambition to be distinct." What do you think? -sche (talk) 12:21, 12 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Oh! I apologise! That is indeed what it says! I had no idea… thank you for letting me know (I could have walked into a landline later…). I withdraw my statement. However, that change really is better. Thank you! - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 15:40, 12 June 2021 (UTC)


 * The Society of Universal Friends erected a grain mill in Dresden, the first mill in western New York, now marked with a New York state historic marker.
 * could we get a source for the fact it was the first mill?
 * After poking around for modern sources and only finding a few that quoted or paraphrased the statement from us, I find that the source cited for the first half of the sentence (McIntosh) does indeed say this, although it's old, so I don't know if I'd rely on it for a claim of "first". I also didn't find the mill on the list of historical markers, so I'm just going to drop those two statements. I appreciate your thorough oversight of the article! :) -sche (talk) 13:13, 12 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks! - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 15:40, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Passed

 * All concerns raised have been addressed. This is a fine example of a good Wikipedia article. (Actually, I think it is somewhat better than “good”, but that’s what this forum is for!) I am being bold and promoting it to GA status. - Aussie Article Writer (talk) 07:55, 28 June 2021 (UTC)