User talk:Jtveg

Established styles
Hey there and welcome to Wikipedia! We usually try to just continue with whatever style an article is currently using, in this case MOS:ERA: "Do not change the established era style in an article unless there are reasons specific to its content". Thanks :) – Þjarkur (talk) 12:21, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

Welcome
Welcome to Wikipedia. Your contributions are welcome here, but please don't arbitrarily change date naming conventions from "AD/BC" to "CE/BCE" format. We have a guideline for this: WP:ERA. Since both conventions are common in English, the Wikipedia community has decided that both conventions can be used in articles and that articles shouldn't be unnecessarily switched from one to the other. Please respect this community consensus. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:25, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

How is the community consensus arrived at?

It sounds to me like an arbitrary decision by a few in charge being claimed to be "community consensus"


 * Honestly, I can't point you to the exact place where this consensus was first formed. It was debated in various subpages of WP:MOS back in 2004 and 2005 and the issue came up again and again for a couple of years. It was certainly not decided by "a few in charge" (even though the number of people who chose to participate in such discussions back in 2004 would necessarily have been smaller than what you'd get now.) The basic rule has been in the guideline for as long as I can remember. It's just one of those things where we learned over the years that it's no use trying to mandate one form or other because our contributors and the literature out there are split in their preferences, and every now and again somebody who strongly prefers one or the other form (like you) comes along and wants to bring everything in line with their ideas. So the large majority of experienced Wikipedians has come to accept it as a firm principle that it's simply better to not re-open those debates all the time but just leave things the way they are, for the sake of everybody's peace of mind. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:06, 21 May 2019 (UTC)