Talk:Margaret Sanger/GA2

GA Review

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Nominator: Noleander (talk · contribs) 03:11, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer: Shushugah (talk · contribs) 15:58, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Looking forward to reviewing. Below are some immediate feedback on structuring of prose in the body/layout. I will need some more time to go through the different sources, and given the length/important of this article, I hope you're willing to take longer to review this. Let me know how I can make this reviewing experience a positive one for you, for example pinging you/structuring my feedback in a certain way etc.. ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 15:58, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for helping with this article. Back in 2011 I re-wrote it, and the article was given GA status (GA1), but it gradually degraded (edit warring, etc) and lost the status in 2015. So, here I am a second time.

Agree this review may take longer than normal.

Thanks for offering to make it a positive experience! The ideal reviewer would be sensible, a good listener, have lots of WP experience, and aware of GA criteria (and how they differ from FA criteria :-) And did I mention sensible? Noleander (talk) 16:38, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Lede

Currently the lede is very long. I think it could be shortened to 1-2 paragraphs. The first paragraph says nearly everything that she is most prominently known for, whereas the institutional context or her family influence is better saved for the body of article itself. It should note earlier, that she was a Eugenicist member. It should also note that a lot of her activism, was using court cases to bring publicity, being arrested 8x over her career.

Yes, it is too large, I'll make it shorter. Most FA articles on important people have 3 to 4 paragraphs in lead, so I'd prefer 3 minimum. WP:LEDE indicates "250 to 400 words" is standard for FA articles; MS lead is 421 words now, so I'll try to get it to around 300-350? Noleander (talk) 16:44, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I got it down to 254 words, 3 paragraphs. It still needs some word-smithing, but I think the size is about right now.

Re: "....she was a Eugenicist member" better words for her relationship with eugenics are: adhere/adherent; subscribe/subscriber; endorse/endorser; proponent; support/supporter; advocate/advocate; or propose/proposer. The word "member" suggests there is some official club, or a single official organization. Noleander (talk) 17:36, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Now at 267 words, 3 paragraphs. Noleander (talk) 03:41, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Layout and structure

The actual section ordering and naming is generally reasonable. I would shorten Planned Parenthood era to Planned Parenthood to be consistent. The body text is sometimes misplaced, for example in section about her death is content related to her legacy. I will make specific suggestions below

Regarding the sections in the article (not just "Planned Parenthood Era" section): The article is broken into three parts: (a) first several sections of the article (before "Views") are a chronological story of her life. (b) Within the "Views" section are the four contentious topics that deserve special focus because many readers will want to zoom in on them and get in-depth coverage. Ideally those four topics would be scattered thruout the life story, but that is not practical due to controversial nature of the 4 topics. These topic/issue subsections are not intended to hold any events or personal info. (c) After "Views" is the caboose: miscellaneous/references/legacy.

The "personal life" events (marriage, divorce) are scattered thruout the upper chronological sections, rather than concentrated in a "Personal life" section. (Ditto for all events in her life: they are in the appropriate chronological section). This is the model used in many biographical articles, such as Douglas Macarthur. I'd prefer to keep it that way. Maybe we could try something like Woodrow Wilson, where there is a "Marriage and family" section (in lieu of "personal life" section); that article also (like this MS article) has several chronological sections, followed by a topic/issue section "Race Relations" ... very much like is found in the MS article now. Unless there is a compelling reason, we should probably maintain that pattern. Noleander (talk) 16:27, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Below, you mention renaming some top-level sections (Birth Control Movement etc) ... we should probably get consensus on the overall layout (above) before acting on those. So, I'll not act on those particular suggestions (below) at this point in time. Noleander (talk) 16:30, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ditto for suggestions like "Her brother is unrelated to her death, should be moved to personal life section" ... I'll refrain from responding to that until the overall layout is finalized. Noleander (talk) 16:51, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've been looking at FA-quality biography articles, and there seems to be a clear pattern:

The articles always begin with several chronological sections presenting the complete life story
The final (sub)section within the life story portion is always Death (or similar)
After the life story portion of the article, some (but not all) bios will have one or more "deep dive" sections for topics/issues that are especially significant for the subject of the bio. These topic/issue sections go into detail, but generally do not internally use a chronological or event-based approach
There is always a "Legacy" section at the bottom of the article, and if there are topic/issue sections, "Legacy" follows those.
"Personal Life" sections do not appear in articles of historically important people, but are found in bios of living celebrities.

I think the article's current layout is consistent with this established pattern. That said, I can see some potential improvements: (a) Improve names of individual sections, e.g. add word similar to "era" to the titles of the life story sections; and (b) ~~Perhaps promote subsections under "Views" to be top-level sections?? .. but that seems like it would lead to more confusion.~~ [Edit: cannot sensibly promote the subsections under "View" because readers would (in Table of Contents) perceive them as chapters in the chronological life story] Noleander (talk) 19:59, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Section specific feedback

Early life

Rename this to personal life, so that it can include her relationship with HG Wells here in a more structured manner.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Mention who Grant, Stuart and her third child are in the body itself.
~~Wikilink to Union army (so people know which side)~~ Done

Social activism =

Can rename and shorten section to Activism, there isn't any kind of activism that is not social.

Done Noleander (talk) 20:45, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

~~Wiki link Socialist Party of America~~ – linked to Socialist Party of New York instead, as the original text read Women's Committee of the New York Socialist party.
~~Wiki link Comstock law (once per section is not only allowed, but helpful here)~~ Done
The paragraph about Neo-Malthusian should make it more explicit this is connected to Eugenic politics.

I'm looked into that, and it looks like Malthusians are 100% concerned with overpopulation, and do not concern themselves with the fitness of the human race. The Malthusianism article only mentions eugenics once, and that is to say that eugenics was influenced by Malthusianism (as an argument to impose sterilization/birth control) but not the other way around. I learned that neo-malthusiansm only originated around 1920 or 21, and since Sanger's encounter was in 1914-15, the word in this paragraph should be "Malthusianism" not "Neo-Malthusianism". I improved the paragraph so it now reads: "She shared the concern of Malthusians that over-population led to poverty, famine and war.". I agree that the connection between eugenics and malthusianism should be included in the article ... and the Eugenics section already talks about overpopulation as related to eugenics, so if we need any additional emphasis, it should probably be added there. Noleander (talk) 21:07, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Birth control movement

Missing the most important/notable claim, Today, Sanger, along with Emma Goldman and Mary Dennett, is viewed as a founder and leader of the birth control movement.

Not sure that is appropriate. The first 7 top-level sections are intended to be a chronological listing of events in her life. Retrospective statments such as "today she is viewed ..." are better in the Lede or Legacy sections (or maybe the four Topic/Issue/Views sections). But if you feel strongly about it, I have no objection. See also discussion above about overall layout/sections for this article. Noleander (talk) 21:23, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should be renamed to Birth control, as it's not primarily about the movement, but Sanger's activism/views around it. Of course the movement is relevant, and she is an early pioneer of it.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Paragraph about her relationship with HG Wells should be moved to personal/early life section, and her publication should be moved to her works. It comes off odd in a section that's about birth control movements

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

American Birth Control League

What does shifting from radical politics mean? Some sources I read, suggest that it means she stopped defying laws/being provocative, but it's not clear here.

Done "Shift" in that paragraph means transisiting from solo, low-level efforts (e.g. submitting articles to socialist newpapers) to establishing large, well-funded organizations (ABCL). ~~I'll improve~~ I improved the wording to clarify. Noleander (talk) 19:47, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The 3 paragraphs starting from Sanger invested a great deal of effort communicating with the general public. From 1916 onward seem to have nothing to do with American Birth Control League and are better placed in (social) activism section.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:48, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Death

Her brother is unrelated to her death, should be moved to personal life section

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 20:46, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Eugenics

This is probably most controversial and challenging section to summarize in WP:NPOV manner and claims should be weighted/backed accordingly. This line is written in a wikivoice, and yet seems contradicted several lines later: Sanger's approach to eugenics did not have a racist component. Instead we should rely/summarize what different historians say (as does happen a lot here)

I will ask other editors for feedback/extra set of eyes here, as this is an important section where expertise could be invaluable

Thanks for helping on this: Eugenics is the one section that I know is not GA status yet. I've been working on it the past 2 days, and it ~~is still not there~~ is getting there. One thing I would tell reviewers is: that section is unique because it must be written now, in 2025, in a way that will help editors in future decades maintain it and stave-of edit wars. In other words: it should have more citations (sources) and more footnotes (with quotations and insights) than a typical WP article. Thus, a large number of cites & footnotes (and quotations) in the Eugenics section is not a reason to fail GA (provided the cites & footnotes are pertinent and reasonable). The only alternative to large footnotes (that I can see) is a statement in the Talk page about the Eugenic sources & content, perhaps pinned to the top of the Talk page; I've seen that in some articles about contentious subjects. But footnotes have the advantage that readers can see the information (not just editors) thus avoiding criticisms that the article is censored or ignoring sources. Noleander (talk) 16:59, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The next change I was planning on making to the Eugenics section was to remove all Sanger quotes (I think there are 3 remaining) into footnotes; and replacing the quotes with prose equivalent, based on secondary sources. [There are 2 or 3 quotes from scholars in that section that are encyclopedia-worthy; I was not planning on removing them]. But I'll wait on that task until you or other editors weigh in ... don't want to thrash the section. Noleander (talk) 17:05, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

In popular culture

Currently is bullet point list, while the legacy section has prose about her depictions in popular culture. Consider merging the two sections somehow

Agree "In Popular culture" (IPC) is peculiar. Initially, its content was part External Links section, but (I think) it somehow got moved into a dedicated section, and named "In Popular Culture". I don't think the IPC bullet items deserve prose ... rather than make it prose and merging with Legacy, maybe move the IPC bullets back into "External Links"? Noleander (talk) 16:50, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Done. I deleted the "In Popular culture" section and moved its contents (bullets) into External Links section. Let me know if you're not comfortable with that. Noleander (talk) 17:10, 16 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]