User:TommyLax/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Homosexuality and Quakerism

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I have chosen this article as I found it within a list of C-class articles, as was a suggested starting point from the training page. Since it is C-class, I can infer that there would be room for improvement within the page. Equally, it is an area of sexuality studies that I have absolute no knowledge of. With my lack of understanding of the topic I feel it will allow me to evaluate the source from an uninformed perspective; similarly to a general wikipedia user who wishes to educate themselves on this for the first time.

Evaluate the article
As someone who has never given much thought to the relationship between Quakerism and sexuality, I find the article to be generally informative - though I do see opportunities where the page may be improved.

The leading section is adequately concise. It presents the key idea immediately, which is that some Quaker communities seem to support homosexuality, while other communities adapt a more traditionalistic christian approach which denounces homosexuality. Key concepts in the lead section are well linked, these include: homosexuality, quakerism and key countries where they are most prominent. It also provides statistics on where Quakers are most common and cites reports which show this. A negative from this initial section is the presence of unsubstantiated claims such as '...many quakers are supportive of homosexual relationships, while views are divided among U.S meetings'. The page gives no links here to any evidence which illustrates this support. Moreover, the lead section would possibly benefit from outlining topics of discussion throughout the page - however given that it is a C-class article, the page is not massively extensive.

The article starts by explaining the Quaker "Friends policy and decision-making" which establishes key ideas about how the religion operates. While there is not many sources used in this area, it does occasionally link to other pages. In one instance it references "London Yearly Meeting's publication of Towards a Quaker View of Sex", though this report is not linked - this is another example of the need in this page for more evidence. The page does not dedicate to a section which looks at the history of the Quaker/homosexuality relationship. Instead it claims that "Until the 1960s the topic of homosexuality was untouched among Quakers". This again is an unsupported claim and is difficult to believe that the religion did not discuss homosexuality at all until this time, it also does not reference the first mention of homosexuality in regards to Quakerism. The article then proceeds to look at country specific contexts. Discussion of US/UK contexts are extensive and generally well supported however some countries have less information.

While all points are not supported, the evidence provided is usually from an effective source. Many of the references are taking from Quaker sources. This could be seen as bias, but as the page is centralised around Quaker perspectives of homosexuality - this 'opinion' sources are welcomed to understand the relationship.

The page only includes one image. It shows Quaker support of homosexuality, though it is only concerning British contexts and the image itself is small and hidden towards the end of the article.

The information is up-to-date as it was last edited a week prior to my evaluation.