Template talk:derogatory

Categorization

I agree with Fytcha that using the speedy deletion category seems wrong. A new category seems like the way to go. We could even implement some logic like in {{hot word}} to check whether the date has passed and use that to change the category, but IDK if that's overdoing it. 98.170.164.88 01:26, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

I’m OK with either using the existing category or creating a new one; I thought perhaps there wasn’t a need to create a new category just for such terms. Will need to have a look at {{hot word}} to see what it does. — Sgconlaw (talk) 03:45, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

LDL attestation

@Sgconlaw Thank you for making this template. Per the changes made to the vote for LDLs and what's listed at WT:LDL & WT:ATTEST, there should probably be a parameter for LDLs to make it so it doesn't show the "three quotations required" section. (This was prompted by the template being added to àgwùtọ̀, even though it technically already has what's required for an LDL) AG202 (talk) 15:04, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

@AG202: OK, I added |ldl=1 or |LDL=1. See if the text displayed is accurate. — Sgconlaw (talk) 15:18, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

Text and background colour for boilerplate text

@This, that and the other: I’ve got no particular strong feelings about this, but is it really necessary to distinguish the boilerplate text from any other text? My idea was just to provide something convenient for editors to use on RFD and RFV pages so they wouldn’t have to keep typing the same text out. — Sgconlaw (talk) 04:37, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

@Sgconlaw My rationale was twofold: (a) you have to start reading the text to know whether it is the derogatory boilerplate text or an RFV rationale/explanation written by a user, and that's tedious; and (b) the coloration makes it easier for people closing discussions in the RFV backlog to notice when the earlier closure date applies. I don't have strong feelings either fwiw. This, that and the other (talk) 11:24, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

@This, that and the other: OK. As I said, I'm fine whether we have the additional text colour and background shading or not. — Sgconlaw (talk) 11:41, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

Speedy deletion

My 2c re the back-and-forth edits over whether this should tag entries for speedy deletion: I see 13 mainspace entries using this template; I don't think that's so many it'd be unreasonable to expect someone to review and tag them with a separate speedy-deletion template {{d}} once they've passed the time limit, especially since they should be getting listed on RFV where they can be centrally tracked. Whereas people do use this template to tag old never-RFVed terms for immediate deletion before anyone can see they've been challenged. It's also odd to tag a page like ukrop for speedy deletion by an admin with page-deletion tools; scrolling down the page reveals it shouldn't be deleted, because the Polish section is apparently uncontested, only the English section should be removed (if uncited), which doesn't require admin tools. - -sche (discuss) 15:19, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

@-sche The issue is that, while I can understand the problem with not sending entries to RFV, the language voted does explicitly not say that an entry has to be sent to RFV, and I think that that's part of the fundamental difference with the interpretations being given (though I can see the other reading in terms of applying to entries made before the vote). If every entry is being sent to RFV then that defeats part of the central purpose of the vote in the first place, which was the limit the overflow of entries sent there: "However, this clutters up these fora, and uses up the time and effort of editors in discussing and verifying the entries which could be used more productively." To me, that was clear when I voted for Option 2 and then abstained on Option 1 because I had a feeling that this would happen. I also haven't seen much from other folks who voted in favor of option 1, with most of the opposition to this change from folks who voted against the proposals in the first place (or didn't vote at all in option 1). To quote someone who voted in favor: "I think speedy-deleting junk is a good idea." It seems that speedy deletion was in the understanding in the first place, so the push against speedy deletion feels a bit weird considering that's what was voted for, and the entries can be re-created without prejudice. As for whether or not we should add {{d}}, I'm personally not going to keep track of whether the 14 days have passed and having the template do it automatically is much easier. I will likely change my approach though, and if I add the template to an entry I'll set the date to when the template was added, unless the entry was created since the vote's passing, partially due to some of the rhetoric I've received. (CC: @Fytcha, @Sgconlaw) AG202 (talk) 20:44, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Re: "use this template to tag old never-RFVed terms for immediate deletion": this seems to contradict the policy per #Using the template to only mark freshly created entries. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:20, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

@-sche, AG202: I want to point out again that, in my opinion, the vote's text is not at all clear. Before the vote has even started, I have already aired my concerns about the clarity of the wording on its talk page: Wiktionary_talk:Votes/pl-2022-06/Attestation_criteria_for_derogatory_terms#First_two_bullet_points. This question has been ignored.

After the vote, I again raised my concerns, this time in the beer parlour: Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2022/July#Derogatory_terms_amendment_to_WT:ATTEST_has_passed. In this thread, the vote creator said (diff) that, according to their own understand of their own text, the vote applies retrospectively: any old, uncited derogatory term may be speedily deleted at any time.

Only two days later, the same person said (diff) that they had intended the vote to only apply to entries that have been tagged with the usual request template.

Another two days later, the same person speedily deleted multiple easily citable derogatory term ([1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], ...) without ever sending them to the appropriate request forum and a mere one to two days after them being tagged with {{derogatory}}.

As of now, the majority of the entries deleted pursuant to WT:DEROGATORY have been undeleted and cited.

From my point of view, the following statements about the vote are true:

• The vote's text is poorly written, causing a lot of confusion and diverging interpretations even among native speakers of English (diff, diff).
• The vote's creator seems to have changed their interpretation of their own vote's text twice within 4 days.
• The primary effects of the vote have been: 1) The majority of the thus speedily deleted terms have been deleted contrary to their citeabilty and have therefore already been cited and undeleted. 2) Citers have unnecessarily been forced to add citations to terms that are obviously attestable.

The first bullet point makes me question the vote's legitimacy in the first place. How did the voters understand the text? Would it have passed had the currently surfacing ramifications been clear at the time of the vote?

Lastly, I want to add that the message left by @-sche in this edit summary as well as the second half of this comment left by @PseudoSkull strongly resonate with me. I don't understand what the point is of insisting (or: forcing by threat of incorrectly deleting entries) that somebody else add trivially findable citations. As Dan Polansky said here: Recall that attested does not mean having attesting quotations in the entry.

I really hope we can come together and somehow solve these issues; this whole topic has been very tiring to me (which can probably be seen on my delayed response times and my messages on Chuck's talk page). — Fytcha〈 T | L | C 〉 23:59, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

I would point to my later edit summaries for that entry and comments that I’ve made in general about how it’s on the onus of the creators/folks who focus on offensive terms to find the cites. From discussions with others who voted in the affirmative, my understanding was that any new offensive term entry would need to be created with three citations, otherwise they’d be immediately tagged. That’s the clearest part of the vote for me. If they’re trivially easy to cite, then cite them in advance. Also see @Theknightwho’s comments about Dan Polansky’s point about how if that attestation point is taken literally, then RFV would have no place in Wiktionary. The fact as well that very few people who actually voted in favor of this are commenting against it shows to me that it’s really only a big deal for a few select folks, most of which either didn’t vote or voted against. There was a consensus for at least some change with the prior frustration, and I’d like to see it actually put into place for some time without constant calls for revotes from those folks. AG202 (talk) 00:43, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

What is particularly frustrating about these absurd interpretations of attestation is that it disguises the fact that the new vote does allow for the kind of nuance that everyone wants. WT:ATTEST gives two routes for a term to pass CFI: either a term must have three attestations or the term must be in clear widespread use. The new policy is directly pegged to that, so any complaints about it amount to being complaints about our CFI criteria in general.

To put my lawyer's hat on: this is the sort of policy that the golden rule was designed for. The literal interpretation taken by Dan (that attestations must merely exist) would make the "clear widespread use" option completely redundant, because any term in clear widespread use will inherently have more than three attestations in existence. That can't be what was intended when the policy was written, though, as if that were true, the policy wouldn't have been written with two options. As such, we can conclude that there must be some terms which have three attestations, but which are not in clear widespread use (which is, of course, extremely obvious). This raises the obvious question of verification: it's as much use to claim they exist as it is to point to the existence of a teapot orbiting Mars. Prove it. Whether that's on the page, the citations tab or in the discussion, verification inherently entails some form of information being put on Wiktionary (even if it's just links).

However, we can also conclude that there are terms that are widely used, which therefore means we can disregard the three attestations requirement as unnecessary.

The conclusion to draw from this is that we should be using good faith here. Don't tag terms that are obviously widely used, and don't try to come up with loopholes to save complete rubbish. Theknightwho (talk) 01:31, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

You only need the "golden rule" because the text of the vote is lacking. Fix the text via subsequent vote and the problem is solved, and no "interpretive" discussion is required. I indicated some fixes at #Using the template to only mark freshly created entries. Is the "golden rule" part of American legal culture or is it specifically British? Since, WP says "The golden rule in English law...". Is this project British or American? Above, I see a lot of interpretive liberty applied, reading into the text things that just are not there. Is the literal interpretation really absurd? Cannot an editor remove {{derogatory}} with the comment "easily attested in Google Books" and be done with it? Or can editor place {{b.g.c.}} to the entry as evidence and be done with it? The voted text does not clarify that. Is it absurd that people consider terms easily attested in Google Books as not requiring actual attesting quotations in the entry? Not to me. So what seems absurd to one party is not to another party, and that limits the usefulness of the "golden rule". Hence, a reasonable dose of literalism is advisable during policy design, or else people do not know what they are voting on, and what they actually voted on. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:17, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

It's not lacking - I simply showed that you're interpreting the new policy in a way that is fundamentally incompatible with the way WT:ATTEST itself has been drafted. It's also extremely generous to call your position a literal interpretation, when more accurately it's one that takes the utterly unreasoanble assumption that we don't need to verify anything - an approach we don't take anywhere else. Being brutally honest: you are opportunistically looking for holes, while bullheadedly ignoring that any holes you do find apply to WT:ATTEST as a whole. It is nonsense, and helps no-one.

Plus the fact you say this: Is it absurd that people consider terms easily attested in Google Books as not requiring actual attesting quotations in the entry? Not to me. makes me think you didn't even read what I wrote properly either, given my argument was that that's still allowed. Theknightwho (talk) 13:55, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

To the contrary, given Wiktionary policy is to only include terms that are "attested", it is obvious that "attested" does not mean "having attesting quotations in Wiktionary", or else we would need to delete almost all of Wiktionary content in a short time to ensure the policy is met. Very simple, and not only literal as per WT:ATTEST but also making administrative sense. It follows that the new policy is lacking and non-literal interpretation of it is required so that it makes administrative sense. That interpretation is going to differ from editor to editor; it goes beyond the text of the policy. I have no idea what happens if I remove {{derogatory}} from an entry with edit summary "easily attested in Google Books"; such an easy attestation does not yet mean "in clearly widespread use" so this item from WT:ATTEST does not handle this case. In RFV, when we provide quotations to show a term is attested, we do not say "attested", we say "cited", a real contrast. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:38, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Also, we have policy draft Wiktionary:No personal attacks and non-policy Wiktionary:Assume good faith, apparently relevant to some of the language that I see above. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:09, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Anyway, this whole discussion does not belong under the "Speedy deletion" head where it is located. In #Using the template to only mark freshly created entries, I argue that "speedy", which traditionally means immediate without any tagging or waiting at least 14 days, is never a meaningful interpretation of the policy text. Does anyone still think some entries can be immediately deleted without tagging and waiting 14 days? --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:32, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I am honestly amazed that you don't understand how your argument also punches a hole in the entire RFV process. Genuinely embarrassing. Not to mention the irony of an appeal to assuming good faith, when the foundation of your argument is to do the opposite. Theknightwho (talk) 14:20, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

It is interesting to see how you never engage with the substance of my argument and instead use emotionally charged language in a response; that suggests that you are yourself not fully convinced of the strength of your aguments. If you want to continue this subject, please create a separate thread; this one is for "speedy deletion". To the point: do you believe some entries to which WT:DEROGATORY pertains can be immediately deleted without waiting for 14 days? --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:29, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I gave you a well-reasoned explanation already, which you dismissed without engaging with a single point. It is interesting how you seem to have forgotten that. It's very clear that you are either unwilling to or incapable of acknowledging the fatal flaw in your point, which you have stonewalled repeatedly. Theknightwho (talk) 14:31, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Why don't you create a dedicated thread? I saw no response from you to 'it is obvious that "attested" does not mean "having attesting quotations in Wiktionary", or else we would need to delete almost all of Wiktionary content'. For the point that you feel was without a response, that is covered not by CFI but rather by the procedural text in WT:RFV: "Cite, on the article page, usage of the word in permanently recorded media, conveying meaning, in at least three independent instances spanning at least a year. (Many languages are subject to other requirements; see WT:CFI.)" So no, my interpretation of "attested" does not invalidate RFV. --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:46, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Which is one of the usual attestation requirements for disputed terms, which these qualify as. As such, terms tagged with {{derogatory}} need to be in clear widespread use or to have three citations provided, just as would be the case if posted to RFV.

This is precisely why the new policy used that wording, because it retained the status quo in all respects. Had it said WT:ATTEST or (as it originally did) stated that three citations needed to be provided, then your argument might be more persuasive. However, as things stand, there are two routes to attestation, and the process is well-understood. It's not reasonable to complain that you can't just assert that it's easily attestable for a term that isn't in clear widespread use, as you seem to want to, because you wouldn't be able to do that at RFV either. Theknightwho (talk) 14:54, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I will not continue this subject in this thread, despite the urge to do so, but I am willing to continue in a dedicated thread. I will try to make good on this promise. --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:57, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I have better things to do than explain the obvious over and over. Apologies - unnecessarily rude. Theknightwho (talk) 14:58, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I find my argument also obvious, yet I have tried to avoid attacking other parties; I have not called anyone's argument and interpretation "utterly unreasonable" and the like. --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:03, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Using the template to only mark freshly created entries

By reading the policy multiple times and thinking about it hard, my best interpretation is that {{derogatory}} should be applied to freshly created derogatory entries while RFD or RFV (usually RFV) should be used for old derogatory entries. The policy is this, from WT:CFI#Derogatory terms:

If a term is derogatory to an individual, group of persons, or geographical location, it must meet the usual attestation requirements within:

• two weeks of the term being created, or if this period has passed,
• two weeks of the term being nominated for deletion or verification.

Otherwise, it may be speedily deleted after that period.

In the quoted policy, there are two items, and one item has to be selected for each considered term. The text that supports the selection of item is "if this period has passed", which suggests that terms older than two weeks when noticed/planned to be tagged should be deleted via RFD or RFV, while the freshly created items can be deleted via {{derogatory}}.

The phrase "speedily deleted" seems incorrect since deletion via RFD or RFV is not a speedy deletion; the best interpretation of the policy is that the text should be interpreted as if the word "speedily" were not there.

The phrase "meet the usual attestation requirements" has to be interpreted as "has evidence in the mainspace or citations space that the entry is attested" to make sense; this is not the default semantics of that phrase, but one has to modify the phrase during "interpretation" so that the resulting policy makes administrative sense.

The above analysis is based on the semantics of the codified text of the policy. But it also makes sense in reference to the intent of the policy: the problem was that an anon lands in Wiktionary and enters, say, 50 derogatory entries from Urban Dictionary in a day or few days. An editor who notices these entries would normally tag them for RFV, thereby flooding the slowly administered RFV with them, and that seems less than ideal. The solution is to apply {{derogatory}}, which involves fewer process steps: no adding to RFV page, no striking the RFV nomination in the RFV page, no waiting one more week before the discussion can be archived, and no archiving of the closed discussion. From this standpoint, the policy makes sense. We could ideally want to drive everything via RFV, but RFV involves a lot of overhead and is being behind all the time; this is one way how to relieve RFV while at the same time giving the citors some chance, which they get if they monitor Category:Entries tagged as derogatory. Dan Polansky (talk) 08:16, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Removing the template with edit summary "Easily attested in Google Books"

Can I remove the template with edit summary "Easily attested in Google Books" without placing attesting quotations into the entry? Or can I remove it if I place {{g.b.c.}} or {{R:GNV}} (Google Ngram Viewer) into Further reading? The policy text does not make it clear to me whether I can. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:17, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Proposal: change the wording "attestation requirements" to "verification requirements"

Mostly as a result of the discussion on the above discussion, I think this would clear up some of the ambiguity surrounding what it means for a term to be attested. Currently, the policy requires that terms meet the "usual attestation requirements", but this only need to be verified on Wiktionary if we go through the process of RFV. Arguably, these are part and parcel of the process of attestation, but to make things abundantly clear, I propose that we change the wording to "usual verification requirements". This explicitly pegs the policy to RFV (but has the flexibility to incorporate any changes to the verification process that may happen in the future). Tagging @Dan Polansky. Theknightwho (talk) 15:09, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

"usual verification requirements" would not be clear to me. And I don't think that "clearly widespread use" needs to apply to ethnic slurs; if they are so problematic as the supporters claim, let them be properly cited. And "clearly widespread use" should have been removed from CFI long ago and replaced with a procedural policy since it does not match the general meaning of "attested".

WT:DEROGATORY could be changed from "it must meet the usual attestation requirements within:" to "it must have evidence of attestation in the mainspace or in the Citations namespace within:". This would cover LDLs as well. It could also say, somewhere below: "For well-documented languages, the required attesting evidence consists of three attesting citations." --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:18, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

To use your own argument: evidence of attestation does not entail meeting RFV requirements. The risk of repeating current policy in the wording is that that policy might change. Theknightwho (talk) 15:21, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I don't understand "evidence of attestation does not entail meeting RFV requirements". --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:22, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

I can provide evidence that a term meets WT:ATTEST without that evidence meeting the requirements of WT:RFV. Theknightwho (talk) 15:26, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

How would you do that? --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:28, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

A link to an off-wiki webpage with citations, for example. It sounds trite, but linking to the OED, for example. Theknightwho (talk) 15:46, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

That is why I added the 2nd sentence, which in the current proposal reads "Evidence of attestation consists of the applicable number of attesting citations or, for LDLs, a reference to an applicable source; links to places where the citations can be found are insufficient." --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:48, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

To prevent the duplication, the 2nd sentence could say "Evidence of attestation consists of the applicable number of attesting citations or, for LDLs, a reference to an applicable source; links to places where the citations can be found are insufficient." --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:28, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

One could also simplify that and drop "Citations namespace"; let the quotes be directly in the entry for ease of administration. --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:34, 24 August 2022 (UTC)