User:Valjean/Wikipedia sides with facts and RS

Advocacy of fringe opinions not allowed
The history of the blockings of User:Stiabhna is instructive. We do not allow WP:Advocacy of WP:Fringe opinions here, especially dangerous ones like antivax misinformation. See my appeal to Stiabhna: User talk:Stiabhna. Ultimately they restored that content to their user page and were blocked.

Some relevant content from NPOV
WP:NPOV's nutshell:

Giving "equal validity" can create a false balance

 * See: False balance

While it is important to account for all significant viewpoints on any topic, Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity. There are many such beliefs in the world, some popular and some little-known: claims that the Earth is flat, that the Knights Templar possessed the Holy Grail, that the Apollo moon landings were a hoax, and similar ones. Conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, speculative history, or plausible but currently unaccepted theories should not be legitimized through comparison to accepted academic scholarship. We do not take a stand on these issues as encyclopedia writers, for or against; we merely omit this information where including it would unduly legitimize it, and otherwise include and describe these ideas in their proper context concerning established scholarship and the beliefs of the wider world.

Impartial tone
Wikipedia describes disputes. Wikipedia does not engage in disputes. A neutral characterization of disputes requires presenting viewpoints with a consistently impartial tone; otherwise, articles end up as partisan commentaries even while presenting all relevant points of view. Even where a topic is presented in terms of facts rather than opinions, inappropriate tones can be introduced through how facts are selected, presented, or organized. Neutral articles are written with a tone that provides an unbiased, accurate, and proportionate representation of all positions included in the article.

The tone of Wikipedia articles should be impartial, neither endorsing nor rejecting a particular point of view. Try not to quote directly from participants engaged in a heated dispute; instead, summarize and present the arguments in an impartial tone.

My thoughts
BBC Trust: "Including an opposite view may well be appropriate, but [we] must clearly communicate the degree of credibility that the view carries."

Although we do not take sides when describing disagreements between RSs, nor when describing legitimate scientific disputes and uncertain matters, policy dictates that we take sides when we look at sourcing; we always side with RS over unreliable sources, and content from RS has due weight over content from unreliable sources, which has zero due weight.

We also take sides when describing disagreements between RSs and unreliable ones. We do not leave doubt about what is factual and true; we side with facts vs contrary opinions. We always side with truth vs misinformation/disinformation/conspiracy theories/pseudoscience, and readers should understand that fact.

Some forms of pseudoscience, extremism and disinformation are so dangerous that we should have prominent warnings/notifications on their articles.


 * Vaccine hesitancy is dangerous because public health is not a private matter. Private anti-vax decisions literally kill other people, most often children. Wikipedia must not be neutral on this subject, but should warn against it at all vaccine-related articles and when anti-vax views are mentioned in articles. When describing the anti-vax views of people, we should mention that those views are false.
 * COVID-19 misinformation and vaccine hesitancy. One example of how dangerous this is can be seen by how Anthony Fauci's life is complicated by death threats.
 * Homeopathy is not innocent or free from harm. It causes people to avoid legitimate treatment that can save their lives.
 * Big lie is a lie so dangerous that it has led to deaths, threats of violence, insurrection, a destabilization of society, moves favoring civil war, and it threatens free and fair elections.
 * Climate change denialism threatens society, national stability, affects refugees, national borders, and life itself.

When reliable sources contradict unreliable sources, Wikipedia sides with reliable sources.

WikiProject Countering Fringe Theories?
We have WikiProject Skepticism (which, even though I sympathize, I have never joined), but do we have anything like a WikiProject Countering Fringe Theories? I feel we need something along those lines. Currently, we document fringe ideas, pseudoscience, conspiracy theories, misinformation, disinformation, and such like, and that's all good, but we need to actually counteract the effects of such things because RS also do that.

While we don't have literal disclaimers (now that Wikipedia is mature and a dominant voice in the world, I believe we should have them), we should have notifications (BS alerts) where BS is mentioned, sort of like how Facebook and Twitter have been forced to deal with misinformation. We should do the same for the most egregious and dangerous types. It's not enough to just document that BS exists. We don't censor misinformation, but we should "hand out a condom" whenever it's mentioned. I believe we have a duty to do this, and that it can be done in ways that don't violate NPOV. A Wikiproject might be the best place to hammer this out.

I feel that the WP:FTN noticeboard isn't the right place, but is obviously a very relevant tool for dealing with fires that need to be put out. What we need is the creation of policies, additions to existing policies, creation of templates, notifications, and disclaimers.

Sample warnings, templates, notifications, disclaimers, banners....

 * Template:Antivax

This article describes misinformation that casts unwarranted doubt about the safety and importance of vaccines. Public health is not a private matter. Failure to maintain a safe vaccination status can not only endanger yourself, it can literally kill other people, most often children.


 * Template:C19antivax

This article describes COVID-19 misinformation that casts unwarranted doubt about the safety and importance of vaccines and the existence and dangers of COVID-19. Public health is not a private matter. Failure to maintain a safe vaccination status can not only endanger yourself, it can literally kill other people. Although most fatalities are among adults, COVID-19 is among the top ten killers of children.


 * This warning is literally misinformation. Where's the source saying that the people unvaccinated people are literally killing are "most often children?" These attempts to curate The Truth ™ are harming the project and will drive readers away. Mr Ernie (talk) 16:34, 4 February 2022 (UTC)
 * Good catch. That phrase is now removed. I copied it from the one above about vaccines in general. With childhood diseases, failure to vaccinate most often kills children, so the status with general anti-vax activities still stands; their actions most often kill children.
 * Although COVID-19 does kill children, it doesn't happen very often. Most deaths are among adults. COVID-19 is still among the top ten killers of children. -- Valjean (talk) 17:34, 4 February 2022 (UTC)


 * Template:ElectionMisinfo

This article describes misinformation spread by former president Donald Trump about elections and electoral fraud. The 2020 United States presidential election was the most secure presidential election in U.S. history. Read more about Republican false claims of fraud and their attempts to steal the election from Joe Biden who won the election with no evidence of widespread fraud.


 * Template: uw-parity1:

On Wikipedia, coverage of obscure, esoteric, or controversial non-mainstream topics is held to a set of sourcing standards, with which your recent edit to < > did not comply. These standards prescribe that we use a rough parity of sources on all sides of an issue, proportional to how accepted those views are in independent, mainstream, secondary reliable sources. If we use low-quality sources to describe a topic from the viewpoint of its advocates, we also may use low-quality sources to describe its critics. We must always use the highest quality available sources, but the most important aspect is that the topic is covered from a neutral point-of-view. If you have any further questions about this, feel free to ask the Teahouse or on the article's talk page.


 * Existing Template:uw-fringe1:

Welcome to Wikipedia. Unfortunately, content you added to a Wikipedia article appears to be a minority or fringe viewpoint, and appears to have given undue weight to this minority viewpoint, and has been reverted. To maintain a neutral point of view, an idea that is not broadly supported by scholarship in its field must not be given undue weight in an article about a mainstream idea. Feel free to use the article's talk page to discuss this, and take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to this encyclopedia. Thank you.


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