User:Apere199/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
LGBT rights in the United States

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article because I am interested in LGBTQ issues, especially rights that they have worked towards getting. This matters because LGBTQ people are people and deserve equal rights to heterosexual, cis people. My preliminary impression reading it the first time was that it gave a nice general historical overview of rights that the LGBTQ community has gained and how they got there.

Lead section
A good lead section defines the topic and provides a concise overview. A reader who just wants to identify the topic can read the first sentence. A reader who wants a very brief overview of the most important things about it can read the first paragraph. A reader who wants a quick overview can read the whole lead section.


 * Does the lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * The lead section has an introductory sentence that is very concise and alerts the reader that the rest of the article will be a historical overview of the rights of the LGBTQ community.
 * Does the lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * The lead section briefly describes most of the topics discussed later in the article, such as legality of same-sex activities like sodomy, hate crime laws, family law, and political support for rights. However, the lead section does not mention military service, prison, transgender-specific rights, AIDS, conversion therapy, Supreme Court rulings, or rights under different presidents. However, these topics that the lead does not discuss are smaller sections.
 * Does the lead include information that is not present in the article? (It shouldn't.)
 * All of the information included in the lead is discussed further later in the article. There is nothing in the lead that is not present in the article.
 * Is the lead concise or is it overly detailed?
 * The lead is very concise. It gives a good overview of later sections without giving too much information away upfront. Overall, the lead is very well written and thought out.

Content
A good Wikipedia article should cover all the important aspects of a topic, without putting too much weight on one part while neglecting another.


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * The article's content is relevant to the topic. The article is about LGBT rights, and the article does a good job of giving a brief overview of all of the issues typically debated and discussed. There is no section that has too much weight or is neglected. The only other thing that I can think of that might be missing is LGBT rights versus religious freedom, which is not included in the section on Supreme Court rulings.
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * The content is pretty much up to date. It includes information up to and including 2021. It talks about LGBT rights under current President Joe Biden. The article also talks about Supreme Court cases up to and including ones decided in 2020. The only thing missing might be current debates, such as the one in Florida on searching the body for student athletics, but nothing has been decided yet.
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?
 * All the content relates to the topic and fits into the article. There is nothing super important that is missing, but small things can be added such as issues of religious freedom versus LGBT rights and issues that are being debated in 2021.
 * Does the article deal with one of Wikipedia's equity gaps? Does it address topics related to historically underrepresented populations or topics?
 * This page addresses topics related to the LGBTQ community. However, I know that there is underrepresentation within this community of people of color and the lower class, and the article does not address any of these issues.

Tone and Balance
Wikipedia articles should be written from a neutral point of view; if there are substantial differences of interpretation or controversies among published, reliable sources, those views should be described as fairly as possible.


 * Is the article from a neutral point of view?
 * The article is from a neutral point of view. It discusses a historical overview without any outside opinion. It is very objective.
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * There were no instances of bias. There were a lot of statistics and interpretations of cases and policies. However, there was no other discussion of these issues other than facts, which makes the article unbiased.
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Most of the statistical data shows how LGBT individuals are being underrepresented or harmed in some way. I don't think this is an overrepresentation of the issues, however, because it reflects how the LGBT community is actually treated and thought about. The section about prison could use some additional information about how LGBT individuals are treated in prison. There was one sentence that briefly mentioned that it is an issue, but nothing further. The article should discuss what harm is being done to them in prison and at what rate it is happening in the U.S.
 * Are minority or fringe viewpoints accurately described as such?
 * I think the views of the overall LGBT community are accurately described. However, there is no mention of the struggle for women, people of color, or low-income LGBT individuals. There should be more discussion on their struggles within the LGBT frame.
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?
 * There does not seem to be any persuasion. The article is strictly factual information. However, I could see how the people reading the article might be people who already care about or are interested in protecting and maintaining LBGTQ rights.

Sources and References
A Wikipedia article should be based on the best sources available for the topic at hand. When possible, this means academic and peer-reviewed publications or scholarly books.


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * The authors cite hundreds of secondary sources that were used to create this article. Not all of them are super reliable, however. The authors use blog-like sources, like HuffPost (owned by Buzzfeed). However, most of the sources used are reliable. Other sources include Supreme Court opinions, surveys, academic journals, and newspapers such as the New York Times.
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Most of the sources are good. They come from academic journals or credible news sources or government sources. However, there are other sources, like academic books, that could have been used to provide additional information or further support claims.
 * Are the sources current?
 * The sources are current. The oldest sources are from 2015 and some of them are from 2021. All of the sources are from within the last decade, so the information is relevant and current.
 * Are the sources written by a diverse spectrum of authors? Do they include historically marginalized individuals where possible?
 * The sources are written by a diverse spectrum of authors. Skimming through the footnotes of over 500 sources, I did not see any repeat authors. The article utilizes some authors who are LGBTQ themselves, like Jaime Grant. However, most of these authors are still white and do not share the same experiences that people of color, for example, might have. A majority of the authors are white researchers who are just interested in the subject.
 * Are there better sources available, such as peer-reviewed articles in place of news coverage or random websites? (You may need to do some digging to answer this.)
 * There were a lot of newspaper sources used, including the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, and Washington Post. The information gathered from these news sources, such as information on how gaining citizenship is disproportionality difficult for LGBTQ individuals, could be found in academic or scholarly journals or books. A lot of the newspaper citations are for information about states passing legislation, and newspapers are probably good sources for this sort of more recent information.
 * Check a few links. Do they work?
 * I clicked on about 10 of the links and all of them took me to the original source.

Organization and writing quality
The writing should be clear and professional, the content should be organized sensibly into sections.


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * The writing is very concise and easy to read. It is also organized well into sections that have a clear topic. The article was very easy to read.
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * I found no grammatical or spelling errors. The article had an excellent command of spelling and grammar.
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?
 * The article is well organized. The sections are all related to the main topic of LGBT rights, and the order in which they are listed is useful because each section gives background information for the next.

Images and Media

 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * The article has several images. The first is a map of areas that the article covers--the United States. There are several colorized maps that show when each state legalized things like same-sex intercourse and marriage or when states made things illegal like hate crimes. Throughout other sections of the article, there are photos of people protesting for rights. The photos highlight specific signs that were used. There is also a helpful chart that shows data regarding public opinion toward the LGBT community. It helps organize the data into an easy-to-read graphic. There is also a graph that summarizes which rights exist currently and which ones don't. This is a good summary of the entire article in a visual format.
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * The images are well captioned. The photos of people organizing tell where and when the picture was taken as well as the reason for the event captured. For example, one photo says that it was taken in San Diego at a march in response to Trump wanting to define gender at birth. The graphs are also well captioned with links to the sources used, and descriptions of what each thing means so that the reader can easily interpret the information.
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * All of the images that were not self-created are from public domains and include links to the original sources.
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?
 * All of the smaller images are placed to the right of the text, so they are easy to spot.

Talk page discussion
The article's talk page — and any discussions among other Wikipedia editors that have been taking place there — can be a useful window into the state of an article, and might help you focus on important aspects that you didn't think of.


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * On the talk page, there is a conversation about using the term sodomy without quotation marks, even though it is referred to as sodomy in laws. There is also discussion about updating information about a policy passed by Florida Commission on Human Relations that makes discrimination illegal in Florida. There is also discussion about whether or not all-gender restrooms are actually a right at this point. Finally, someone said that the article should be more inclusive by using LGBTQ+ instead of LGBT.
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * This article is of interest to several WikiProjects: WikiProject LGBT studies, WikiProject United States, WikiProject Human Rights, WikiProject Politics, and WikiProject United States/Government. It was created during Wiki Loves Pride in 2015. It was also part of several Wiki Education Foundation course assignments in 2019 and 2020.
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?
 * This article does not go into a lot of detail about any of the rights its mentions and just provides a brief historical overview. In class, we go into much more detail about specific issues. In addition, in class there has been more of a focus on those within the movement that might be underrepresented, but there is none of that in this article. We have also been looking at how specific groups of people view LGBT individuals, such as religious groups. The article focuses on Americans as a whole.

Overall impressions

 * What is the article's overall status?
 * The article's status overall is very good. The article is easy to read as a background for LGBT rights and history. Everything mentioned is relevant and recent and there are no biases.
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * The article uses graphs strategically in sections where there are a lot of data and it might be hard to read in paragraph form. The article also talks about recent goals the LGBTQ movement has achieved, so the information is up to date and relevant to now. It was organized very well and was easy to follow.
 * How can the article be improved?
 * There are a few places where I would have liked more detail. The prison section did not have a lot of information about how LGBT people in prison are being affected. In addition, I think they could have talked about more Supreme Court cases, like Masterpiece Cakeshop. More recent, bigger cases were not mentioned, but are important to analyze. Other than including more information in some places, I thought the article was well written and informative.
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?
 * Overall, I would say the article is poorly developed because there is a lot more information that is relevant to the issues discussed that were just not mentioned. For example, there was no mention of how religious freedom conflicts with LGBT rights. This is a huge issue that is relevant in the Supreme Court still. Because the article was so broad, it also felt like there could have been more details added to help give more context or examples.