User:III.V.MDCCLXX/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Ratlines (World War II)

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
(Briefly explain why you chose it, why it matters, and what your preliminary impression of it was.)

I have always been fascinated by the history and events of World War 2. I love the psychology of understanding how a man could come to such power, and create a society that was so intensely invested and loyal to this one man, that they would commit horrible atrocities such as the extermination of thousands of Jews. But not only is that incredibly interesting, but the fact that some escaped to other continents and people helped them. The catholic church was even supportive of helping aid in the safety routes for escape.

This article matters because it shed light on the fact that when the war ended and the concentration camps were liberated, the entire event was not over. I think its important for people to know that these men and women who made the extermination of thousands of innocent people possible, some of these people were able to walk away free from paying for their crimes. And i also think its important that people realize the hard truth and reality that the ideas of the Fascist were incredibly powerful and many people would die to uphold the honor and integrity of the work and foundational purpose these people followed and believed in.

My initial impression of the article was that it was very fun to read. But i could see a few places where citations were needed, and if people are as curious about this topic as i am, i want more information in a few places. Especially on others character besides Hudal.

Evaluate the article
(Compose a detailed evaluation of the article here, considering each of the key aspects listed above. Consider the guiding questions, and check out the examples of what a useful Wikipedia article evaluation looks like.)

Lead Section:

- Yes, i believe this article has a clear and concise opening sentence(s).

- I don't think the introduction to the topic gives a concise overview of the main topics that will be discussed.

- No it does not include information in the lead that is not present in the article.

- Very pretty short and to the point.

Content:

- Yes i believe the information in the article is all relevant to the topic.

- I believe for the most part the content is up to date. But i think i can add some more recent information.

- There are a few places where citations are needed where there are none, some places have a few but there is a comment saying more are needed, and a few places where there is a comment saying a better citation is needed. Therefore, i believe there needs to be more citations, as well as more elaboration around those areas.

- I don't believe their are any equity gaps.

- No, seeing as this is apart of World War 2 history, i believe it is a pretty high traffic content area.

Tone and Balance:

- I feel like for the most part the article stays pretty neutral. Though it is human nature to be biased, therefore i believe their is always room for improvement on the tone of the article.

- In the section Vatican Ratlines- Spanish foundations; the first sentence seems not very neutral and a smidge biased.

- There is a pretty long section on Hudal's involvement in the ratlines, but i feel like more on other Vatican clergymen's involvement could be helpful.

- I don't believe there is anything that's written in a way that is trying to sway, but some places could use improvement in phrasing or citing.

Sources and References:

- Not all, some need a source, and some need more sources then what is currently provided.

- Every article could always benefit from more expansive citation's and sources. This one is no different, though i believe it does cover a fair amount.

- I would say there is a good mix of older sources and newer sources.

- I would have to believe that all articles could have some better sources and references available. This article uses a lot of the Phayer 2008 source.

- The links i tried worked. but one source link that took you to the references page, the ISBN when typed into Wikipedia book sources did not come up.

Organization and Writing Quality:

- Yes it is concise, clear, and easy to read in almost all sections.

- There are a few places that could improve grammatic phrases.

- I believe it is broken down well.

Images and Media:

- Yes, there are a ton of images with little blurbs that help to enhance the meaning.

- From what i can see, yes.

- Nothing is flagged from what i can see, so my impression is yes.

- Yes

Talk Page Discussions:

- A few people are editing the phrasing that assumes a bias. There are also modifications being made to links. But a majority of the talk page activity seems to have been from the 2006's-2008's. With a few recent edits from 2018 and 2020. The most recent is from 2023 and mentions a distrust of the main source from Phayer, and Loftus/ Goni because Goni is apparently not a profession historian and Loftus is being called by historians as a fraud. And people believe that Phayer uses Loftus as part of his support for his argument. Therefore a majority of the sourcing for this article comes from sources that not everyone agrees is substantial and trustworthy.

- It is rated a C-class and is apart of 7 wikiprojects.

- We have not discussed the topic of ratlines in any mentionable detail in class.

Overall Impressions:

- Its status seems to be fairly good.

- I think the strength is there is pretty good sources available to use. And for the most part, this event was fairly recent when we look at the span of history, so the oral history is more fresh in our minds then say the crusades that were so long ago the idea and way we understand that event has changed with every time the story has gone through.

-Every article can be improved including this one.

- I think there are still pieces of information that still need to be included, and work that's being done on this topic by scholars that has yet to come out that could be useful to this article.