Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Organized Labour/Archive 6

Advice on IWA article
Hi I've been doing a fair bit of adding to the International Workers Association page and was wondering whether I could get a perspective from other more experienced Wikipedia editors about where I should be going next to improve it and bump it up to a decent grade. Ta! --Saii (talk) 22:53, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Federation Templates
I've reworked the AFL-CIO and CLC templates. Most of these are pretty mundane changes (alphabetizing, removing merged unions, and regrouping sections) but, since I'm adding these to all the member union articles, feel free to make further improvements.RevelationDirect (talk) 00:29, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Notability vote for Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals
Anyone else want to weigh in on the deletion vote for this article? The 20-year-old who nominated the article for deletion says "local affiliates of much larger, more notable unions and organizations ... are not deserving of their own articles." The real issue was a lack of sources in the stub; that has been remedied. Although I believe the article will be kept, some additional voices would help (as I wrote that stub way back in 2007 and thus have a vested interest in keeping the article). Thank you! - Tim1965 (talk) 02:58, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Added my 2 cents in. This editor's rationale that just about any local union would be ineligible for an article is concerning.  He also nominated the Providence Teachers Union article so I'm wondering if he just go carried away by also nominating this one.RevelationDirect (talk) 04:08, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
 * That concerns me, too. But then, that's also only his opinion and not Wikipedia policy. (Technically, any unreference article has not had its notability established.  But if we went around challenging notability on unreferenced articles, I think Wikipedia would lose a third of its content.) - Tim1965 (talk) 14:04, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

WP 1.0 bot announcement
This message is being sent to each WikiProject that participates in the WP 1.0 assessment system. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the WP 1.0 bot will be upgraded. Your project does not need to take any action, but the appearance of your project's summary table will change. The upgrade will make many new, optional features available to all WikiProjects. Additional information is available at the WP 1.0 project homepage. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 03:44, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

IWW union shop list nominated for deletion
Someone has nominated the list of notable IWW union shops for deletion, and I'm concerned that the decision of whether or not to keep the list will be made by people who are not familiar with the 105 year history of the IWW. I'd appreciate it if some folks with knowledge of the subject could weigh in on one side or the other over here. SmashTheState (talk) 22:26, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
 * 2 Deletes versus 6 Keeps and it gets deleted? And this article survives?  Nice!RevelationDirect (talk) 11:15, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, bad decision. I've asked the person who closed it to take a second look and if they don't change the decision, I'll take it to deletion review. Not sure what the point of having people comment at AfD is if they are completely ignored. Marylanderz (talk) 14:02, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Strike Naming Conventions?
I've been poking around the List of strikes and working on some new articles from the list, and have been struggling with naming them. Here's my issue: I think it makes sense to have a standard naming procedure for strike articles, but the names we have are all around the map. So I think there are two options (excluding those strikes which have a commonly used name name in historical accounts such as the Radical War). I don't care which, but was looking for guidance from participants here before I pick one and use it in naming further new strike articles:
 * Option A: (date) (location) (description), as in 1619 Jamestown Polish craftsmen strike
 * Option B: (location) (description) (date), as in Jamestown Polish craftsmen strike of 1619 Marylanderz (talk) 22:03, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Frankly, I don't think it has been discussed. Aside from Wikipedia:Article titles, I don't think anyone has ever discussed it.  Personally, I like Option B, since there are many "Welsh coal strike" strikes, but only one "Welsh coal strike of 1903" (those are just examples). Some articles avoid the date, because they are fall under the "Common Name" guideline ("Haymarket Riot"; although, someone successfully changed this title to "Haymarket Affair" by arguing that "Affair" was NPOV). - Tim1965 (talk) 02:56, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I also like Option B.
 * I'd also like to see some discussion or guidelines for identifying strikes that are closely identified with related events. For example, everyone (pretty much) is familiar with the Ludlow Massacre, which occurred in Colorado in 1914. What would be the proper name for the strike during which the Ludlow Massacre occurred? If it was called the Colorado United Mine Workers Strike of 1913, that wouldn't link it to the most important event for which the strike is remembered.
 * I wonder if a 4th optional parameter would be too much -- such as, Colorado United Mine Workers Strike of 1913 (Ludlow Massacre) Richard Myers (talk) 06:09, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I was looking at a strike article I worked on and it started out as the Writers Guild of America strike (2007–present) but was renamed the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike after it ended. Hardly a useful precedent!  From the perspective of someone looking for an article, I think the date should come last because somemone typing in 2007 might be looking for the top songs or anything but someone looking up the other name is more likely to be interested.  But, whether that other name should be the name of the union, the name of the employer or the location of the strike really depends on what it's known by as the above comments point out.  So put me down for "B".RevelationDirect (talk) 11:08, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

CfD: Category:Trade unions of country -> Category:Trade unions in country
Hi everybody! Some days ago I filed a CfD on the naming scheme of Category:Trade unions of country. While I should have better informed you at once, it's been only now that I realized too few people would take notice of this even though the categories were correctly tagged by me. (That in the meantime they've been untagged by someone else is consequence of a dispute not directly related to this. However I'm not going to tag them all again, as you might understand.) My arguments are given at the CfD section, I'd be happy if some of you joined the discussion, whatever position you take on this. Cheers, PanchoS (talk) 20:21, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, my watchlist was just lit up with changes!RevelationDirect (talk) 01:11, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Official List of Canadian Labour Congress affiliates
Whoneedspants and I are working on improving this list article. A source of frustration for us is that the official websites no longer list the affiliates. We have a fairly technical question about whether specific national unions are members as a whole or if their provincial divisions were admitted separately so we're looking for an official listing. Any suggestions?RevelationDirect (talk) 03:48, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Does the CLC have a file a federal income tax form? In the U.S., the AFL-CIO does (it's the Form 990), even though it's a non-profit and labor union. But the Form 990 will list all the AFL-CIO's affiliates.  If the Canada Revenue Agency requires such a filing, you might start there.  You might also check to see what filings the CLC must make with Human Resources and Skills Development Canada. The CLC might be required to file a list of affiliates somehow with them as well. - Tim1965 (talk) 14:49, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

2009 Royal Mail industrial disputes
Just a quick note to say that 2009 Royal Mail industrial disputes is currently a Good Article Nominee. If anyone can help out please feel free to further expand or review the article. Cheers TheRetroGuy (talk) 13:28, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Unwanted categories and interwiki links on the portal page
The selected article section of Portal:Organized Labour transcludes. E.g. today is July, so it becomes Portal:Organized Labour/July//Selected article. All 365 of them are redirect pages. This method has a problem. Not only transcluding the text and image to the portal page, it also transclude the categories and interwiki links of the selected article. As I know, other portals don't use redirect, instead the lead section of each selected article are copied to the portal subpage. I think this portal should follow this practice. --Quest for Truth (talk) 19:58, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
 * There was discussion of this when the portal was up for Feature Portal two(?) years ago. At that time, the argument was that transclusion was better even though most portals didn't use it. Admittedly, there were few commentators on this isse; I was one of them (voting in favor of transclusion). It would take a lot of work to create non-transcluded articles. I don't know that that many members of this WikiProject are active, or that they want to do that kind of work. And frankly, I don't know of anyone good enough in Wiki-code to be able to rejigger the portal so that transclusion could be done away with (even if we did get articles ready). - Tim1965 (talk) 16:19, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

The Burke Group, once again
I have made my arguments, and have reverted this deletion twice. Perhaps another point of view would be beneficial:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:The_Burke_Group#Relationship:_The_Burke_Group.2C_and_Labor_Information_Services

thanks, best wishes, Richard Myers (talk) 16:26, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Free labor
We need a link to a definition of "free labor." Wiktionary doesn't have one. This seems like a short article to me, but it might be longer than I think. Does it apply outside the US? ("Free labour"?  :)  I don't know. The term is used but not defined and is subject to misunderstanding. Thanks. Student7 (talk) 18:59, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

New article needing expansion: Patagonia rebelde
If anyone is interested in Argentine anarcho-syndicalism, I've created a stub for Patagonia rebelde, based on the es.wiki version, which is quite lengthy. If anyone is a Spanish speaker, or good with GoogleTranslate, there's a lot of es.wiki info on this 1921 workers' uprising which was put down by the Argentine Army. MatthewVanitas (talk) 11:36, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Watch for quotes
I've noticed that some edits to articles are taking quotations out of context. The most egregious example occurred recently on the article Richard Trumka. Trumka made an allegedly inflammatory statement during a U.S. coal strike in 1993. An anonymous editor attempted to link this to the tragic shooting death (two months earlier) of a replacement worker by a union member (who was apprehended, tried, and convicted). These edits implied that Trumka was approving the deadly violence. But Trumka had not been asked by the press about the earlier death. He was responding to a future scenario, posed to him by a reporter, as to what might happen if the employers hired replacement workers. (Hiring replacement workers was inflammatory.) In the same quotation, Trumka denounced violence and said his union had spent much effort trying to avoid it. (Interestingly, the same anonymous editor attempted to make it look as if union members refused to allow first aid to be administered to the dead man. This was only half the truth: Once union members realized that someone had been injured—according to an appeals court recitation of the facts, just moments passed—they allowed first aid to be rendered.)

I would suggest that people with labor articles in their watchlists monitor these kind of changes to ensure that quotes are not taken out of context or only partial facts inserted. (In this case, Trumka's statement has been taken out of context by a large number of conservative and right-wing pundits, bloggers, and others in the past few weeks. This may have prompted the anonymous editor's edits to the article. It's not clear whether the anonymous editor knew the quotation had been taken out of context, or that the quote had not been directed at the death two months earlier.) It behooves contributors to uphold WP:BLP, and to ensure that high-quality articles remain the standard for Wikipedia and this WikiProject. - Tim1965 (talk) 23:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Pulaski Skyway FAR
nominated Pulaski Skyway for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. JJ98 (Talk) 07:31, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Please link to "Anti-union organizations in the United States"
The article Anti-union organizations in the United States has only a very few links from other articles. I expect a lot of folks don't know this article exists. Please consider adding links, where appropriate. thanks, Richard Myers (talk) 09:26, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Category merger/name discussion
There is a CFD discussion under way regarding the redundant categories Category:Trade union leaders and Category:Labor leaders. These categories will be merged, but the proper name for the resulting category is being debated. Cgingold (talk) 22:37, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Organized labour articles have been selected for the Wikipedia 0.8 release
Version 0.8 is a collection of Wikipedia articles selected by the Wikipedia 1.0 team for offline release on USB key, DVD and mobile phone. Articles were selected based on their assessed importance and quality, then article versions (revisionIDs) were chosen for trustworthiness (freedom from vandalism) using an adaptation of the WikiTrust algorithm.

We would like to ask you to review the Organized labour articles and revisionIDs we have chosen. Selected articles are marked with a diamond symbol (&diams;) to the right of each article, and this symbol links to the selected version of each article. If you believe we have included or excluded articles inappropriately, please contact us at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8 with the details. You may wish to look at your WikiProject's articles with cleanup tags and try to improve any that need work; if you do, please give us the new revisionID at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8. We would like to complete this consultation period by midnight UTC on Monday, October 11th.

We have greatly streamlined the process since the Version 0.7 release, so we aim to have the collection ready for distribution by the end of November, 2010. As a result, we are planning to distribute the collection much more widely, while continuing to work with groups such as One Laptop per Child and Wikipedia for Schools to extend the reach of Wikipedia worldwide. Please help us, with your WikiProject's feedback!

For the Wikipedia 1.0 editorial team, SelectionBot 23:26, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Labor history of the United States
Please feel free to weigh in:


 * Talk:Labor_history_of_the_United_States

thanks, Richard Myers (talk) 02:16, 20 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Followup — issue pretty well resolved. Richard Myers (talk) 03:13, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Richard Trumka edits
The article Richard Trumka has attracted some right-wing edits of late. I don't care if the statements attributed to Trumka are true; facts are facts. But so far, the only sources being cited are from right-wing publications which are third-party but hardly neutral. Would someone else weigh in on this with the Gergnotlef about this? I'm afraid of an edit war breaking out. Gergnotlef so far has been willing to add citations to his edits, but the citations are problematic. (So, to my mind, are the edits, which are more about the death of a strikebreaker than they are about Trumka.) - Tim1965 (talk) 16:24, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Gergnotlef has been blocked for 24 hours for abuse of editing privileges. Richard Myers (talk) 05:23, 22 September 2010 (UTC)
 * UPDATE: Gergnotlef and sockpuppet Gergnott have now been permanently blocked. Note that Gerg may be Greg spelled backwards, as Notlef may be Felton spelled backwards. Suggest watching for variations on this reverse spelling in the event of future sockpuppet activity. Richard Myers (talk) 19:50, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Grievance needs work or will be deleted
The article on Grievance was nominated for deletion. The stub is in a sorry state, and has been extensively vandalized in the past. Every hand in the project needs to fix this and find sources. Please help! Bearian (talk) 21:13, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Frankly, I'd like to create the article "Grievance (labor)" to split off the trade union term from this other political stuff (which the libertarians and Tea Baggers are all enamored of) and create a disambiguation page. Let the political theorists lose their article due to lack of cites and NPOV.  The labor-related article will flourish in the meantime. I'm all for keeping the existing article, if people think it's worth fighting over. - Tim1965 (talk) 23:42, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Splitting off and disambig sounds like a good solution to me. (I haven't looked at the article) Richard Myers (talk) 00:29, 22 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Good suggestion. Done.--Goldsztajn (talk) 20:37, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Please Delete Redirect Article
I accidentally created AFSA Local redirect when I meant to create AFSA Local #1 but got blocked because of the symbol. Can an editor delete AFSA Local for me? RevelationDirect (talk) 12:24, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It might be quickest to put the template on the top of the page. Cheers.  Haus Talk 12:39, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Organized labour articles have been selected for the Wikipedia 0.8 release
Version 0.8 is a collection of Wikipedia articles selected by the Wikipedia 1.0 team for offline release on USB key, DVD and mobile phone. Articles were selected based on their assessed importance and quality, then article versions (revisionIDs) were chosen for trustworthiness (freedom from vandalism) using an adaptation of the WikiTrust algorithm.

We would like to ask you to review the Organized labour articles and revisionIDs we have chosen. Selected articles are marked with a diamond symbol (&diams;) to the right of each article, and this symbol links to the selected version of each article. If you believe we have included or excluded articles inappropriately, please contact us at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8 with the details. You may wish to look at your WikiProject's articles with cleanup tags and try to improve any that need work; if you do, please give us the new revisionID at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8. We would like to complete this consultation period by midnight UTC on Sunday, November 14th.

We have greatly streamlined the process since the Version 0.7 release, so we aim to have the collection ready for distribution by the end of November, 2010. As a result, we are planning to distribute the collection much more widely, while continuing to work with groups such as One Laptop per Child and Wikipedia for Schools to extend the reach of Wikipedia worldwide. Please help us, with your WikiProject's feedback!

If you have already provided feedback, we deeply appreciate it. For the Wikipedia 1.0 editorial team, SelectionBot 16:35, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Adding "Significant strikes" section to an article?
I've noticed that some articles about trade and labor unions like to have a "significant strikes" section. I'm leery of this, primarily because it seems akin go the rules against trivia. That is, if the strike was truly significant, it would be discussed in the "History of..." section of the article. Additionally, almost none of these "significant strikes" is actually referenced (e.g., no reference is cited that says "this was one of the most significant strikes in Union XYZ's history"). Merely adding citations that show there was a strike, that many bad things (e.g., deaths) happened, and/or that it was a long one ("it lasted 7,324 months") are not enough. Many small but bitter strikes can last a long time, and while very important to the people on strike it may not be a big issue for the national or international union the article is about. Deaths on the picket line are also (sadly) not unusual. Even having a Wikipedia article about a strike does not mean it was significant, and yet that is often why such strikes are included in these types of sections. I find that many "Significant Strikes" sections act as ways of getting rid of the "orphan article" status or as advertising for a local union involved in a strike, rather than act as significant strikes in and of themselves.

There are some "pro" rationales for keeping such sections, however. First, like "See Also" sections, these "Significant Strikes" sections help break out truly significant strikes for the reader's attention. Second, not all significant strikes will be mentioned in a trade or labor union's article. Some articles are not developed well yet, and others may be too long to adequately cover all significant strikes. Third, truly significant strikes can be properly cited (although, like many claims in many articles, they may lack a citation currently—but that does not mean they should be deleted from the section, or the section itself deleted).

What do others think? - Tim1965 (talk) 22:18, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

One episode of labor history of Denver in dispute
Folks may want to weigh in on one side or the other of this discussion. Talk:History of Denver

Basically, i am arguing that (1) a paragraph mentioning the aftermath of a free speech fight for union rights in Denver is a part of Denver history, and should be left intact, as it has been for several years, and that (2) labor history belongs under labor history, and not under politics. The person who opposes this view, Rjensen, is very knowledgeable and a good editor, but i have found him to frequently sanitize articles that do not conform to his very conservative labor views. Richard Myers (talk) 19:19, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

The Teston Independent Society of Cricket Ball Makers
One of the smallest trade unions in the UK based at Teston, Kent. Surely deserving of an article? Any editor willing and able to create it? Mjroots (talk) 10:39, 29 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Are there any published sources about it? - Tim1965 (talk) 15:28, 29 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Possibly - the union was de-listed in 2007, so it is highly likely that it got a mention in the press then. Mjroots (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Help eliminate unsourced BLPs!
Wikipedia is currently working hard to eliminate all unsourced biographies of living persons (BLPs). This goal must be accomplished quickly, as unsourced BLPs create significant legal exposore for Wikipedia in several nations. You can see a list of labor-related BLPs here. Many of these are not from North America. There are not many of these unsourced BLPs, but any unsourced BLPs will be removed from the site shortly. This is something easy and quick which you can do that will help all of Wikipedia as well as the Labour Project. Consider chipping in! - Tim1965 (talk) 21:28, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

WP Organized Labour Toolbar
template:WP Organized Labour Toolbar has been nominated for deletion, it is one of your documented templates. 65.94.46.54 (talk) 08:20, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of London Co-operative Mutuality Club Collectors' Association


The article London Co-operative Mutuality Club Collectors' Association has been proposed for deletion&#32; because of the following concern:
 * A search for references found "it exists" name listed in a few books, but nothing else. Fails WP:V and WP:N

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Jeepday (talk) 13:03, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Maryland Association of Correctional & Security Employees


The article Maryland Association of Correctional & Security Employees has been proposed for deletion&#32; because of the following concern:
 * A search for references found no published (gBooks) support for the content of this article. Fails WP:N and WP:V

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Jeepday (talk) 17:47, 24 December 2010 (UTC)