Talk:Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence/Archive 2

Catholic League press releases
I'm not questioning that they had nasty things to say about the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Of course they did. I'm questioning why we need to include an entire paragraph sourced only to self-published attack material. If this criticism wasn't picked up in reliable sources, we shouldn't be including it; merely having an opinion isn't sufficient to have that opinion included on Wikipedia. –Roscelese (talk &sdot; contribs) 20:38, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The CL presents itself as a civil rights group tracking instances of Anti-Catholicism, and have labeled the SPI as a hate group. I think this should be mentioned as the CL is the largest (only?) group in the US that claims to speak out for the civil rights of Catholics and tracks anti-Catholic hate speech -- which in their view includes the SPI--Dudeman5685 (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Objections regarding the actions of the Catholic Church and simple abuse directed at Catholics are not the same thing. Judging by their reactions to criticism and parody, you would think the Roman Church were a feeble enclave of unjustly persecuted co-religionists, rather than a huge international organisation with wealth and influence.
 * Nuttyskin (talk) 17:27, 10 February 2019 (UTC)

Sister's London Chapter
Hello all, I was planning on writing a section for the London Chapter of the Sisters, if that's all good to do. Recently stumbled across a short documentary on said group, which I think would be particularly useful. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tygerstiled (talk • contribs) 13:10, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Poor quality sources / religious self-published websites
This article currently has quite a few references that come from Catholic self-published websites. These likely do not meet the standards of WP:RS. Especially when controversies are being discussed, we should rely on high quality news sources, ideally Wikipedia perennial sources (WP:RSP), books by well-established publishers, etc. Just because a Catholic website is publishing an opinion, does not mean that this opinion merits inclusion in an encyclopedia article. Note: "Articles should be based on reliable, independent, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy."

Along the same lines, there is the use of a very old letters-to-the-editor reference, in which it is usually not made clear which letter is being referenced, and why the Wikipedia article would rely on a letter to the editor. Letters to the editor are not reliable sources for establishing the basic facts about a subject. At least one use of this source is also grossly misrepresenting it, claiming that the ADL made a certain statement, when in fact what is found in the short letter is just a short statement by one member of a local chapter of the ADL. This usage is very misleading. Hist9600 (talk) 04:23, 31 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Certainly letters to the editor should be referenced individually. The ADL letter, presumably the one in 25 March 1999 letter page, is signed by the Assistant and Associate directors of the Anti-Defamation League San Francisco so is presumably an official statement by the local chapter and thus a bit more legit as a source on the SF ADL's view of the matter (though as we don't have the full context, it and the other letters probably shouldn't be used unless cited by a good secondary source). For the 1999 Easter street party and related controversy, there should now be some good scholarly secondary sources describing it that the editors can use; if not, the incident is probably not  'notable'. Looking at Wilcox 2018 which is a book on the organization written by a scholar (professor of religious studies, UC Riverside) and published by an academic press, it mentions the 1999 event as a comparison to the much smaller 1989 event.   The author covers in more detail the  mass at Most Holy Redeemer in 2007 where two sisters took communion from the archbishop and the critics responded loudly; an event this article doesn't cover at all.  --Erp (talk) 05:37, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Criticism
I've been thinking about how best to restructure the article to weave positive and negative reactions etc into the overall article rather than having a WP:CSECTION, for the reasons noted at that page. And I realized that the current modular structure (and the fact that several subsections of the "criticism" section do, to their credit, at least mention positive as well as negative reactions) means that just dropping the empty top-level "Controversies and criticism" header and incrementing the header level of "Religious parodies" and (most of) the other subsections would be one easy improvement. (It also makes me notice how excessive the prominence being given to Sullivan's criticism is, currently given its own section of the article and formerly even added to the lead, when it'd be better placed into the section next to it that already discusses Hunky Jesus, or possibly (depending on how much weight his view is given in secondary sources) dropped altogether. -sche (talk) 09:58, 31 May 2023 (UTC)


 * Yes, it's best practice to avoid criticism sections, which tend to just pile on negative views about a subject. Better to integrate well-sourced criticisms from reliable, independent sources, into normal sections of the article. And of course, content should follow WP:DUE, so if there are not reliable, independent sources saying something, we should consider whether those specific criticisms need to be included in an encyclopedia article on the subject. Hist9600 (talk) 15:19, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

History
Working a bit on the history. Note the story on how they acquired the original habits seems to have several variations. I also note they were quickly replaced by ones they made themselves. I'm relying on the Wilcox book as it is recent and scholarly. We also seem to have more about the context than about the order's own history. Erp (talk) 06:05, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

Introduction criticisms, web scraping concerns
Balancing Perspectives: The introduction presents an emphasis on the criticisms against the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, using strong language like "anti-Catholic" and "hate-group". These should be presented as views held by specific groups, not as universally accepted facts. Equally, the positive views on the Sisters should be given due attention to maintain a balanced perspective. I have made some changes to reflect this.

Emphasis on Controversy: There's substantial focus on the Sisters' disputes with Christian, particularly Catholic, communities. While these are significant, they might be overemphasized in the introduction. It would be beneficial to underscore their charity work, LGBTQ+ activism, and use of satire. They should not be defined by their opponents, but their critics' opinions should be made known as well.

Citation Review: It's essential to verify that all contentious statements are appropriately cited with credible sources. Particularly when specific critics, like the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, are mentioned, the sources need to be reliable. (For example, direct statements or official publications from the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights could be used as sources for their criticisms.) In other words, the claims or criticisms made by these groups should be backed up by sources that are well-respected, accurate, and unbiased in their reporting.

Also, whenever controversial or potentially inflammatory statements are included in a Wikipedia article, such as calling a group an "anti-Catholic hate-group", it's particularly important that these statements are supported by reliable sources to avoid spreading misinformation or bias.

It's crucial to present a balanced, comprehensive view of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in the introduction. Given the provocative nature of their work, it's unsurprising they attract controversy and criticism. Still, it's vital that any Wikipedia article doesn't inadvertently contribute to misinformation.

At the time of this writing, criticisms of the Catholic Church are given a single sentence at the end of four paragraphs. Given their history, this is an act more charitable than any recorded in the Bible; but given the sensitivity of the topic, the vastness of the idea of "The Catholic Church," and the context of being an Encyclopedia entry, it's also common sense.

Just as we shouldn't start the entry on the Catholic Church heavy with its criticisms and its critics' voices, we shouldn't do so for the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Such an approach could yield an unbalanced understanding of any group and particularly, in this case, would overshadow the Sisters' mission and the essence of their organization.

Every perspective, including those of the Sisters' critics, deserves fair representation in this article. However, leading with such criticism can unintentionally mischaracterize the group. An appropriate balance could be to upfront acknowledge the controversial aspects of the Sisters' activities, then delve into specific criticisms in a distinct 'Criticisms' or 'Controversies' section.

As a neophyte editor, I recognize there might be potential issues with this approach, such as it inadvertently facilitating a pile-on of criticisms. However, it's equally crucial to avoid aggregating these criticisms in the introduction, as it currently stands.

My main concern for this is the potential impact on AI-driven information retrieval systems, like Bing's, which will interpret a front-loaded criticism as a definitive categorization of the group as a 'hate group.' Earlier today, Bing looked at this article and decided definitively that OPI was a hate group, because someone here confidently wrote that as fact and cited a Fox News article, in which it was an opinion stated. This contributes to the spread of misinformation much more quickly than even a year ago, as information here is being scraped and presented to others elsewhere as fact. This is a huge problem.

The community may need to consider these newer challenges, presented by AI algorithms' interpretation of article structures, and adjust editorial practices accordingly for fairness and accuracy. 2600:1700:A2C6:500:E4ED:A46C:8A33:CCEC (talk) 20:04, 27 June 2023 (UTC)
 * IP 2600, thanks for your comment and your concern, but it's probably not an AI issue at all. Wikipedia is a top website worldwide, and not only Bing but also Google often use basic information from the lead in their search result snippets. Unfortunately, there is a newbie POV editor active at this page, and even though their edits are being reverted, Bing, Google, and other crawlers pick up changes to the page rapidly and show them to searchers, at least until their POV edits get seen by some other editor and reverted. This is just normal web-crawling, not an AI issue. That doesn't mitigate the damage you describe, but just wanted to let you know what is happening. You can help, by removing such unsupported statements from the article, as soon as you see them. Thanks again for raising your concerns. Mathglot (talk) 08:21, 28 June 2023 (UTC)