Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Loaded words and terms on Wikipedia

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 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was:  Userfy to User:DesertPipeline/Loaded words and terms on Wikipedia. CambridgeBayWeather, Uqaqtuq (talk), Huliva 05:08, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Loaded words and terms on Wikipedia

 * – (View MfD) &#8203;

Appears to be a POV fork of WP:Words to watch. While a POV fork is not necessarily a problem when it involves an essay, in this case the essay is unpopular (see the essay's talk page), and people on the talk page make a good argument that this essay encourages users to violate WP:NPOV. In particular, this idea that we cannot use the word "software piracy" has caused problems on other pages, where I had to revert page moves and mass replacements of the word. I believe this essay should be renamed, userfied, or deleted, although I note the essay author has declined a suggestion to userfy this in the past. – Novem Linguae (talk) 17:04, 22 May 2021 (UTC)


 * Merge and redirect. Some of these terms definitely have relevance on Wikipedia, and leaving a section on why these terms are controversial and why replacements are or aren't used is essential. However, many of these terms are common terms, and as such should be described as such nonetheless. Having a dedicated page feels like a little bit of a stretch, but keeping an info section is an absolute must. Casspedia  ( talk )  17:35, 22 May 2021 (UTC)


 * Redirect to WP:Words to watch or userfy. Too idiosyncratic a selection to be in Wikipedia space. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:03, 22 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep: Merge or userfy perhaps, but there is no case for deletion. SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:25, 23 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I implore anyone viewing this page to think as deeply as they can about this. I am not doing the things I'm doing to cause disruption. I'm not doing them to push a point-of-view. I'm doing them because there is a genuinely serious problem here. We are describing things on Wikipedia in ways that implicitly push a point-of-view. We call copyright, patents, and probably other laws only related by the fact they regard intangible concepts and ideas "a form of intellectual property" – in Wikipedia's voice, as if it's true, as if it's a fact. We call unauthorised copying "piracy", even though nobody's going around in a ship and attacking other ships while they copy something without authorisation. The world's gone mad and nobody seems to get it. Some have accused me of not understanding what the neutral-point-of-view policy is about. If "we shouldn't describe something that is not a fact in Wikipedia's voice" is a misunderstanding, then I do. All this essay is saying is "don't use these words in Wikipedia's voice". Don't say "copyright is a form of intellectual property"; say "copyright is considered a form of intellectual property by many", with citations. Don't say "Software piracy is unauthorised copying and distribution of software"; say "Unauthorised copying and distribution is often called 'software piracy and maybe even explain why and when they started calling it that, if there are sources for that. I am not good at making convincing arguments, or making myself understood. Therefore, I think I'm going to fail. I've always said that it's better to try and not succeed than not try and automatically fail. However, I think my efforts would be more useful trying to fix the cause of this problem, rather than attempting to stop Wikipedia from throwing petrol-soaked logs on the inferno. That doesn't mean that my failure in this relatively small area doesn't discourage me heavily from believing that I can make any positive difference in the wider world, where things much more powerful influence decisions. DesertPipeline (talk) 03:29, 23 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The core essence of NPOV is not to reflect the truth nor what is right, which are evaluations that vary even from person to person. NPOV on Wikipedia is somewhat of a misnomer – we reflect the mainstream view, which does necessarily espouse a particular POV, as you have recognized. Of course, there will always be those who disagree with the mainstream view, and may even find it fundamentally wrong or even harmful. Reflecting the mainstream is the best we can do as an encyclopedia to avoid picking sides on the far, far more arbitrary measures of truth and rightness. — Goszei (talk) 08:17, 23 May 2021 (UTC)


 * Userfy as an essay too disputed for projectspace. Not very long ago I had to remove a POV tag from this -- the precedent set by POV-tagging essays would be, uh, unfortunate, but the fact someone was driven to put it on at all is rather representative of the opinion this essay is held in by many of its readers. There's no case for deletion, but userfication is a fine MfD use case (even if it's a bit of a territory fight with RM), and this is a classic example of a userspace essay. Vaticidalprophet 07:34, 23 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Manual of Style/Words to watch: This essay appears to be solely a mirror of the GNU Project's "words to avoid" list, and as such does not need to exist. JJPublic (talk) 15:29, 24 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Userfy, redirect WP-space shortcuts like WP:LOADED to Manual of Style/Words to watch. It's a single user's opinion, which is fine as a user essay, but the title is essentially an inappropriate fork of "words to watch" that misleadingly suggests there is some sort of policy or community consensus backing it, when in fact there's a consensus against it if anything.  If someone is citing a WP shortcut in an edit summary, editors shouldn't have to "investigate" to see if it's a community policy or not.  (Casual editors are already subjected to a blizzard of acronyms & shortcuts for "you messed up", no need for even more when it's not even clear an actual error happened.)  SnowFire (talk) 17:22, 24 May 2021 (UTC)
 * User:SnowFire: I don't agree that the title is misleading. What makes you say that? DesertPipeline (talk) 03:06, 26 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep - Sometimes crabbed opinion essays can be kept in project space. This is a crabbed opinion essay, but it isn't a harmful opinion essay.  Leave it alone.  Robert McClenon (talk) 02:39, 27 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.