User talk:Horse Eye's Back/Archives/2020/October

Stripping of citations to Xinhua

I'm concerned about your stripping of citations to Xinhua throughout the encyclopedia, often for very straightforward facts - for which Xinhua is highly reliable. This, for example, was an inappropriate removal: [1]. One of the points raised at the RfC by several editors was that Xinhua often covers African news that is not covered by other major news outlets. The article now has a "citation needed" tag for the date of a ceremony for the completion of construction of a building - the sort of information that Xinhua is perfectly reliable for. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:15, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

This is another example of inappropriately tagging use of Xinhua: [2]. The RfC explicitly stated that Xinhua is reliable for representing the view of Chinese officials - of which Deng Xiaoping was one, if I'm not mistaken. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:17, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411:The Africa point was raised about CGTN not Xinhua, those are two different news organizations. Only one person, MarioGom, even mentioned Africa at all in the Xinhua RfC. Xinhua is only "highly reliable" for statements about what the Chinese government thinks, perhaps you missed that the outcome of the RfC was downgrading it severely. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:20, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

The WP:RSP entry/RfC close does not say that it is solely reliable for the PRC positions. The two parts where it is generally reliable is:

There is consensus that Xinhua is generally reliable for factual reporting except in areas where the government of China may have a reason to use it for propaganda or disinformation. Xinhua is also generally reliable for the views and positions of the Chinese government and its officials.

I think some of your tags/removals have been appropriate, but some things like uncontroversial film credits for an actor/actress, birthplace/birthdate, or educational background aren't demonstrably areas where the government of China may have a reason to use it for propaganda or disinformation. The RSP entry/RfC close does say:

Caution should be exercised in using this source, extremely so in case of extraordinary claims on controversial subjects or biographies of living people

but some of these examples are pretty uncontroversial details. — MarkH₂₁^talk 20:26, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

If they’re Chinese actors/actresses then they’re in an area where the government of China may have a reason to use it for propaganda or disinformation... The entire Chinese film industry is used for propaganda or disinformation. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:29, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

This is an abuse of the RfC result. If you define "propaganda and disinformation" and "politically sensitive" so broadly, you're radically changing the RfC result. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:32, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

We don't make those decisions, its the Chinese government which chooses which issues are politically sensitive and worthy of producing propaganda and disinformation about not you or me. It *is* an extremely broad RfC result, I think its the longest single result on the perennial sources list. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:34, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

If you want to widen the result this dramatically, you really need to go back to WP:RSN and argue explicitly for the position you're arguing here. Go make the case that Xinhua is not reliable for the date on which a ceremony was held, or the name of a movie that an actress played in. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:38, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

That’s an incredibly broad definition. A statement that an uncontroversial actor X appeared in film Y is not something where there is any reported or documented reason for propaganda nor is it one by common sense. These aren't analyses of films or people who have been involved in any controversies with the Chinese government. It's just the cast list.

I really don’t think most editors interpret There is consensus that Xinhua is generally reliable for factual reporting except in areas where the government of China may have a reason to use it for propaganda or disinformation to mean that Xinhua cannot be used for anything whatsoever in China. — MarkH₂₁^talk 20:36, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

How do you know that the purpose of promoting the movie or actor wasn’t to further a propaganda or disinformation campaign? I do take the RfC conclusion as stating that Xinhua can not be used for the vast majority of internal Chinese topics, we’re talking about a party state which inserts propaganda and disinformation into almost every domestic issue. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:44, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

The argument from ignorance How do you know that the purpose of promoting the movie or actor wasn’t to further a propaganda or disinformation campaign? is meaningless and can be applied to anything. How do you know that the purpose of any other source reporting that an actor appeared in some other movie wasn't part of a propaganda/disinformation campaign? There needs to be reasonable evidence/doubt, not just the lack of contrary evidence that they haven't launched a secret disinformation campaign using film credits.

If you still think that the absence of contrary evidence is sufficient to count anything as an area of PRC propaganda/disinformation, then you should probably raise that for clarification on WP:RSN. But that would exclude Xinhua reporting not just for Chinese topics, but basically for all topics. Nobody can prove that the PRC (or anything else) does not have a secret propaganda campaign for any given topic. — MarkH₂₁^talk 20:54, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

It wasn’t meaningless it was rhetorical and if those considerations exist for other media organizations they should be noted. Do you dispute the point that propaganda/disinformation is universal in the Chinese film industry? At best the party state has made our job very difficult, at worst its made it impossible. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:04, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

There is RS-documented propaganda for certain aspects of the Chinese film industry (e.g. censorship, cultural analyses, politically controversial topics like Xinjiang and Tibet), where extreme caution should be exercised concerning the use of Xinhua. However, "film credits" and "birthdate of actor ___" are not documented (nor even suspected) areas of Chinese government propaganda/disinformation.

It's better to just tag the source with {{better source}} (as you have done in some cases) and use WP:INTEXT attribution when it's not an obvious documented propaganda area like Xinjiang. — MarkH₂₁^talk 21:18, 2 October 2020 (UTC) — MarkH₂₁^talk 21:12, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

I see you've removed completely mundane factual information from a whole list of articles, a few of which are about Africa. One of the things that was shown in the RfC, and which many editors commented on, was that Xinhua's reporting is generally factually accurate, and could only be viewed as problematic in certain confined political areas. The dates of a ceremony or the name of a movie that an actress starred in are not contentious topics, and removing that sort of information is not helpful. Another thing that many editors said in the RfC is that Xinhua is important for keeping a worldwide perspective - particularly when writing about Chinese topics. Removing Xinhua from topics related to China will skew the perspective of those articles. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:30, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Weird, none of that acknowledges that you got the CGTN RfC and the Xinhua RfC mixed up... You did didn't you? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:32, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

This is a common concern with both Xinhua and CGTN. China's close connections with Africa means that there's significant coverage of African issues in Chinese media. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:36, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

But it wasn’t a common issue in the RfCs which is what you said. I also dont know if you missed it but we WP:deprecated CGTN completely. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:39, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm stopping malicious propaganda by paid US government agents on China, Communist Party of China, GS of Communist Party of China

202.9.46.101 (talk) 16:33, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Good for you! Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:36, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

October 2020

Please do not remove content or templates from pages on Wikipedia, as you did to Dantès Dailiang, without giving a valid reason for the removal in the edit summary. Your content removal does not appear to be constructive and has been reverted. If you only meant to make a test edit, please use your sandbox for that. Thank you. Telsho (talk) 15:58, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Bullshit, it was unsourced info on a BLP or from a deprecated source and that was explained in the edit summaries. This is an inappropriate use of this warning template. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:02, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

You removed way more than that and you know it. Telsho (talk) 16:05, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Provide specific diffs which support what you just said. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:06, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Sorry for the fly-by, but CCTV (removed here) isn’t formally deprecated at WP:RSP? CGTN used to be CCTV International, but that’s different from CCTV and it’s various language versions (not that I would use CCTV freely as an RS).

On different grounds though, a list of minor media appearances (e.g. interviews) probably isn’t significant enough for inclusion anyways. — MarkH₂₁^talk 16:09, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

@MarkH21: CGTN *is* CCTV, the discussion deprecated the whole CCTV family of which CGTN was the most reliable and most relevant for our purposes part. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:13, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

CGTN is owned by CCTV but it's a separate network. The RfC and its close didn’t even mention CCTV, and the RfC opener mentioned in the Discussion subsection that CCTV was purposefully excluded because it covers several other different stations. I don't think CCTV is reliable either but it's not actually deprecated. — MarkH₂₁^talk 16:20, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

CCTV isn't a network its a broadcaster, perhaps you are confusing it with CCTV-1? CGTN doesn't even have its own headquarters, their head offices are in the CCTV building. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:21, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

What I was saying is that CGTN is a network owned by CCTV (I'll try to avoid ambiguous pronouns here). CCTV also has several other groups and channels outside of CGTN, but the RfC only considered CGTN. — MarkH₂₁^talk 17:26, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

But CGTN is their flagship, its editorial standards far exceed anything else they publish. It seems like theres genuine disagreement over the scope so perhaps we should open a continuation of the CGTN discussion similar to what has been done with the Daily Mail? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:30, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

In the short term I think we can agree that its a moot point as CCTV wouldn’t be BLP safe either way so its no good for Dantès Dailiang. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:32, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't think any sources describe CGTN as CCTV's flagship channels/network, except perhaps as their flagship overseas market network. If CCTV as a whole had a flagship, it would probably be CCTV-1 (e.g. as described in Two Billion Eyes from Ying Zhu).

I also don’t really think there’s any ambiguity in the scope of the RfC. It clearly only states China Global Television Network (cgtn.com), with the RfC opener also specifically mentioning why they excluded CCTV's other stations in the Discussion subsection. It would be easier & simpler to just open a new RfC on the other CCTV properties (there is also room for multiple RfCs since they cover really different things, e.g. CCTV-5 could be more generally reliable on sports than CCTV's news channels for politics).

FWIW all of the minor TV appearances should probably be deleted from Dantès Dailiang. — MarkH₂₁^talk 17:43, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

October 2020 ANI notice

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Uncivil behavior by User:Horse Eye's Back. The discussion is about the topic Incivility. Thank you. Djm-leighpark (talk) 20:43, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Your submission at Articles for creation: Han Chinese nationalism (October 17)

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Snowycats (talk) 01:18, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Please refrain from making unconstructive edits to Wikipedia, as you did at Liao Cheng-ting. Your edits appear to constitute vandalism and have been reverted. If you would like to experiment, please use your sandbox. Repeated vandalism may result in the loss of editing privileges. Thank you.

Stop removing easily verifiable information. "unable to find" is not an excuse, Wikipedia:Competency is required. The 2019 ITTF World Tour Grand Finals even has an article Sinobball (talk) 21:15, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Unacceptable vandalism

Please stop your disruptive editing. If you continue to vandalize Wikipedia, as you did at Liao Cheng-ting, you may be blocked from editing.

@Sinobball: its a WP:BLP, so you need to find a reliable source. Period, end of story. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:48, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

• I don't care if you replace the source. But removing uncontroversial information and not even bothering to format the table correctly is vandalism no matter what. Period. Sinobball (talk) 21:52, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

@Sinobball: Its a WP:BLP, the information has to be removed immediately. The policy reads "Contentious material about living persons (or, in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced — whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable — should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." There is literally no other option. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Technically per WP:BURDEN you are actually the one in breach of WP:BLP at the moment and I’m going to have to ask you to self-revert. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

• 1) Are you telling me the scores of the 2019 ITTF World Tour Grand Finals are contentious? 2) Be honest - how long did you actually spend looking for sources before you wrote " unable to find reliable source for this information" ? 3) Do you not know how to format a table correctly or do you just not care if Wikipedia looks like shit? If the latter, why do you even care what source is used in the article? Sinobball (talk) 22:05, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

@Sinobball: Of course sporting event results are contentious. I googled "2019 ITTF World Tour Grand Finals Liao Cheng-ting” and got to page four without finding any coverage by a reliable source. I would be grateful if you can find one. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:25, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

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