6 ms·

Just curious, can you give an example?

by naz 5y ago

sleepysysadmin 5y ago
Here's a pretty good article from US point of view providing many examples: https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/ https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/
- pera 5y ago
  > The global warming and MMR vaccine articles are examples; I hardly need to dive into these pages, since it is quite enough to say that they endorse definite positions that scientific minorities reject. Another example is how Wikipedia treats various topics in alternative medicine—often dismissively, and frequently labeled as “pseudoscience” in Wikipedia’s own voice. [...] Yeah I'm OK with Wikipedia being biased against misinformation.
  - sleepysysadmin 5y ago
    >Yeah I'm OK with Wikipedia being biased against misinformation. Early in the pandemic, a conspiracy theory emerged that the virus had been bio-engineered by China at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. One early source of this theory was former Israeli secret service officer Dany Shoham, who gave an interview to The Washington Times regarding the lab.[28][29] Later, US politicians began propagating the idea, including Senator Tom Cotton, President Donald Trump, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.[29] One scientist from Hong Kong, Li-Meng Yan, fled China and supported the idea. Many authorities debunked the conspiracy theory, including American biologist Richard Ebright, NIAID director Anthony Fauci, prominent scientists, and the US intelligence community.[29][failed verification] The conspiracy theory spread widely on social media, but subsequent scientific investigation showed that the virus originated in bats.[25] So you agree with Wikipedia being biased against the misinformation of the lab leak? You're even fine with them asserting it's a conspiracy theory and shutting down conversation about the possibility?
    - satronaut 5y ago
      the lab leak hasn't been disproven yet. There was a senate investigation that biden killed (https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-to-prove-lab-link-to-covid-report/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t...) Why he cancelled it, who's to say, but it COULD be something to do with this; https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-cut-in-deal-with-a-chinese-giant/ https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-... and the senate minority concluded that it was a lab leak; https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/aug/2/house-gop-report-on-covid-19-origins-wuhan-lab-lea/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/aug/2/house-gop-re...
      - sleepysysadmin 5y ago
        >the lab leak hasn't been disproven yet. I was kind of unclear here intentionally. The source being wild has been disproven. This leaves lab leak as the only viable theory. So while it hasnt been proven, it sure as hell is the current theory. The point I was making is that the political position set by wikipedia proves the bias. If they reported in a neutral fashion they would have NEVER called it a conspiracy theory. They might have said that we lack the evidence of it being a lab leak and wild source is quite likely over lab leak. The bias is proven though and then the person I replied to was alright with them ignoring 'misinformation' but this is tantamount to agreeing with the bias. >There was a senate investigation that biden killed (https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t...) Why he cancelled it, who's to say, but it COULD be something to do with this; https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent- https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-... If you step back, early in the covid lab leak story is that the lead scientists from said wuhan lab published in nature mag the source appears to be bat. Afterall, it is indeed quite related. I believe what this says is that it wasn't an intention leak, they just didn't think they did it. The follow up theory is that it was intention but not by them. Intentional by someone who was actively in a cold war with china... who might that be... oh right...
        satronaut 5y ago
  - KennyBlanken 5y ago
    [flagged]
- orwin 5y ago
  I started to agreed with the beginning of the article, but then this part: """ This article weirdly claims, or implies, a thing that no serious Biblical scholar of any sort would claim, viz., that Jesus was not given the title “Christ” by the original Apostles in the New Testament. The Wikipedia article itself later contradicts that claim, so perhaps the editors of the above paragraph simply meant the two conjoined words “Jesus Christ,” and that Jesus was rarely referred to with those two conjoined words in the New Testament. But this is false, too: the two words are found together in that form throughout the New Testament. """ This is wrong. Or rather, wikipedia is completely right in this case. In fact, the line quoted in the article is fully taken from Encyclopedia Britannica. The line is very clear of what it mean, and while it is true that Jesus (son of Joseph) was probably titled "messiah" (or Christ if you want) after meeting with John the Baptist (from the gospels), "Jesus Christ" as a name probably came later. Some bad translations of the gospel or Paul's letter might say otherwise, but don't found your knowledge on translation. And the historiography tends to agree with Wikipedia/me/anybody who had catechism. Another article ruined. I can't read further after that, if the author is wrong about that, he might also be wrong on things i'm not an expert on, so i won't be able to take anything i read on this seriously. People should just stop talking about history in political articles, they ruin it every time. Or maybe they should everytime, and allow history geeks to classified them easily in the "untrustworthy" category.
  - sleepysysadmin 5y ago
    >Another article ruined. I can't read further after that, if the author is wrong about that, he might also be wrong on things i'm not an expert on, so i won't be able to take anything i read on this seriously. People should just stop talking about history in political articles, they ruin it every time. Or maybe they should everytime, and allow history geeks to classified them easily in the "untrustworthy" category. I'm not the guy, i just linked the blog which had examples. My reading of the blog isn't that he's taking a position but rather pointing out how the wiki page is clearly written by someone who does not believe Jesus ever existed. That Christians wouldn't write the article that way.
mandmandam 5y ago
Their smearing of independent anti-war media is consistent. MPN, The Greyzone, and others have been disallowed as sources for very flimsy reasons: [0]. They backed up one editor at the highest levels, after people wised up that he edited Wikipedia an average of 30 times per day, every day, over 14 years; almost entirely making edits against left wing and anti-war causes: [1] They've also literally destroyed someone's life, lied about it, and then patted themselves on the back for fixing the problem nearly a year too late: [2] With regard to Irish national politics, I can attest that they leave out serious scandal information regarding the top two parties politicians, while leaving out important good stuff and including all sorts of bs about independent and left wing politicians; from what I've seen they do the same everywhere. [0] - https://thegrayzone.com/2020/06/10/wikipedia-formally-censors-the-grayzone-as-regime-change-advocates-monopolize-editing/ https://thegrayzone.com/2020/06/10/wikipedia-formally-censor... [1] - https://www.mintpressnews.com/phillip-cross-the-mystery-wikipedia-editor-targeting-anti-war-sites/250824/ https://www.mintpressnews.com/phillip-cross-the-mystery-wiki... [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2021-10-31/Opinion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...
- circlefavshape 5y ago
  Can you please provide an example from Irish national politics?
- akolbe 5y ago
  For more on the Nathaniel White story and how having his picture used to illustrate the Wikipedia article on a serial killer affected him, according to his lawyer, see https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dgpnq/wikipedia-and-google-identified-wrong-man-as-a-serial-killer-for-years https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dgpnq/wikipedia-and-google-... But yes, it's the endemic failure to tell "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" that is so worrying. The Wikimedia Foundation wants to become the "essential infrastructure of the [global] ecosystem of free knowledge". https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2017#Our_strategic_direction:_Service_and_Equity https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/... Even if one were to agree that such a global infrastructure monopoly is a desirable thing to have, one would have to need one's head examined to want an organisation in charge of this infrastructure that regularly resorts to lying by omission to suit its own self-interest.
no_time 5y ago
compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola with https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Julius_Evola&oldid=468626403 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Julius_Evola&oldi... Don't tell me him being antisemitic is such a paramount piece of information that it needs to appear in literally the first sentence.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  To clarify, you think the old revision is the better one?
  - no_time 5y ago
    Yes. The old lets the reader to decide for him/herself whether he was antisemitic or not. Does not obstruct information about his views yet does not devolve into name calling in the first sentence. I'm not trying to underplay what he is saying, but dismissing him in the first sentence on a supposedly neutral article really rubs me the wrong way.
    - ceejayoz 5y ago
      > The old lets the reader to decide for him/herself whether he was antisemitic or not. I think you've misunderstood the point of an encyclopedia, personally.
    - YXNjaGVyZWdlbgo 5y ago
      There is no question that he was an antisemite if you read the sources provided on the very same page. He was objectively an antisemite there is no room for interpretation or your definition of the word differs from the one of the general public.
      - s1artibartfast 5y ago
        [Deleted]
clavicat 5y ago
Easily. >The Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory is a series of unevidenced claims centered on the false allegation that while Joe Biden was vice president of the United States, he engaged in corrupt activities relating to the employment of his son Hunter Biden by the Ukrainian gas company Burisma.[1] They were spread primarily in an attempt to damage Joe Biden's reputation during the 2020 presidential campaign.[2] United States intelligence community analysis released in March 2021 found that proxies of Russian intelligence promoted and laundered misleading or unsubstantiated narratives about the Bidens "to US media organizations, US officials, and prominent US individuals, including some close to former President Trump and his administration." The article begins by immediately labeling the accusations “unevidenced” and “false” and then suggests that it is a foreign intelligence plot, an allegation which is itself a conspiracy theory. The article then continues to debunk the accusations point by point all in the introduction of the article, placing the refutation prominently at the top so that the only impression the reader is left with is that there is nothing to it. Only in the final sentence does it reluctantly concede that: >The article's veracity was strongly questioned by most mainstream media outlets, analysts and intelligence officials, due to the questionable provenance of the laptop and its contents, and the suspicion it may have been part of a disinformation campaign.[8][9][10] It was later confirmed that at least some of the laptop materials were genuine and Hunter Biden himself said that the laptop could be his.[11]
- Veen 5y ago
  Wikipedia is a teriary source; its "bias" reflects that of the secondary sources on which it based. The article you refer to has 93 references to major news organizations and other sources. Are there reputable sources that argue the Biden-Ukraine theory is true and well-founded?
  - clavicat 5y ago
    That’s the rub, isn’t it? According to WP:RELIABLE, HuffPost is a reputable media source whereas the New York Post is not. Therefore, if the latter claims to be in possession of Hunter’s emails while the former claims that it’s an FSB forgery, the former must be correct. If only it were so easy to determine reputation.
throwawaylinux 5y ago
Here's an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_(2017–2019) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_... In the first paragraph - > The Mueller investigation culminated with the Mueller Report, which concluded that though the Trump campaign welcomed Russian interference and expected to benefit from it, there was insufficient evidence to bring any conspiracy charges against Trump or his associates. This makes it sound like there was something underhanded there, and their source for it was some opinion piece news article rather than the report itself. The fact is that the report conceded that they found no evidence which linked Trump or his campaign of colluding, conspiring with Russia. The alleged hacking or leaking of Clinton and DNC information under the Obama administration by Russians or other hackers was nothing to do with Trump. He "welcomed" it like any politician welcomes bad news for their opponent, but it's a total mischaracterization of the report, which is really a incredibly problematic indictment of the wild conspiracy theories, lies, and misinformation pushed by many politicians and corporations and people around this. And major related articles from this one, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Links_between_Trump_associates_and_Russian_officials https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Links_between_Trump_associates.... When you look at other kinds of misinformation or even unproven allegations made by less favorable sides of politics, the articles often lead with "unsubstantiated claims", "without evidence", etc. This Trump Russia conspiracy theory clearly should be treated the same way, but it is not, wikipedia is still attempting to keep it alive and is trying to salvage the reputations of those who perpetuated it and those who fell for it.
chippy 5y ago
I love how one can see the examples and the (political stances) effect which is being described especially when this question is asked by reading the responses to the answers.
convery 5y ago
I think the clearest example would be the Gamergate page. Whole page being rewritten twice a day, conservative outlets being blacklisted as sources for not supporting the narrative while random blogs were fine, long time editors being banned from editing because they wanted it to be 'neutral', and a lot of users being banned for pointing out that a lot of the claims were not supported by the questionable sources. For a more recent example that was posted on HN a few days ago: the proposed deletion of a page on mass-killings under Communism. Most of the arguments on the discussion page were from power-editors complaining that the page was "making Communism look bad" and that it was used for "anti-revolutionary talking-points". While the deletion is still being voted on, gives you an insight into the culture.
- kiba 5y ago
  Seems to be a non-issue WRT mass-killing under communism with lot of keep votes.
  - matkoniecz 5y ago
    Note that nomination for deletion is not some vote count, especially if people were encouraged elsewhere to come there and blindly vote without any prior contributions.
- matkoniecz 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes_(4th_nomination) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletio... > An administrator or other editor is in the process of closing this discussion. Please do not contribute further to it; the result should be posted shortly. but nothing changed sine 29th November
unicornfinder 5y ago
Not OP and don't have an example to hand, but something I noticed is that with subjects where I understand them well I do tend to notice a bit of a bias, but equally edits are usually accepted too. The problem in my mind is that on subjects where I'm not as well educated I may well not notice the bias because I don't know what may or may not be disputed for a given subject matter. Obviously everything on Wikipedia should be sourced but it's entirely possible to be selective of which sources you use.
- akolbe 5y ago
  Kozierok's First Law: "The apparent accuracy of a Wikipedia article is inversely proportional to the depth of the reader's knowledge of the topic." :)
- manicdee 5y ago
  Welcome to the entire gamut of human endeavour. We don’t live long enough or have brains enough to know everything at once so we delegate information gathering to others.
q1w2 5y ago
I first noticed it with the article on the Orlando gay club shooting. The initial article contained unverified reports that the suspect was himself gay, and that that was his motive for the attack. ...and mods on Wikipedia were deleting any edits that referenced the fact that the suspect's father was a former Taliban official that was admitted under the Obama administration, and was politically active in Florida, attending a number of Hillary Clinton talks despite video evidence. References to the suspect verbally professing his allegiance to ISIS was constantly struck from the article with constant rewrites that the motive was that he himself was gay. It was wild to see the disinformation being pushed by mods.

Just curious, can you give an example?

by naz 5y ago

Just curious, can you give an example?

Here's a pretty good article from US point of view providing many examples: https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/ https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/

pera 5y ago
> The global warming and MMR vaccine articles are examples; I hardly need to dive into these pages, since it is quite enough to say that they endorse definite positions that scientific minorities reject. Another example is how Wikipedia treats various topics in alternative medicine—often dismissively, and frequently labeled as “pseudoscience” in Wikipedia’s own voice. [...] Yeah I'm OK with Wikipedia being biased against misinformation.
- sleepysysadmin 5y ago
  >Yeah I'm OK with Wikipedia being biased against misinformation. Early in the pandemic, a conspiracy theory emerged that the virus had been bio-engineered by China at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. One early source of this theory was former Israeli secret service officer Dany Shoham, who gave an interview to The Washington Times regarding the lab.[28][29] Later, US politicians began propagating the idea, including Senator Tom Cotton, President Donald Trump, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.[29] One scientist from Hong Kong, Li-Meng Yan, fled China and supported the idea. Many authorities debunked the conspiracy theory, including American biologist Richard Ebright, NIAID director Anthony Fauci, prominent scientists, and the US intelligence community.[29][failed verification] The conspiracy theory spread widely on social media, but subsequent scientific investigation showed that the virus originated in bats.[25] So you agree with Wikipedia being biased against the misinformation of the lab leak? You're even fine with them asserting it's a conspiracy theory and shutting down conversation about the possibility?
  - satronaut 5y ago
    the lab leak hasn't been disproven yet. There was a senate investigation that biden killed (https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-to-prove-lab-link-to-covid-report/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t...) Why he cancelled it, who's to say, but it COULD be something to do with this; https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-cut-in-deal-with-a-chinese-giant/ https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-... and the senate minority concluded that it was a lab leak; https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/aug/2/house-gop-report-on-covid-19-origins-wuhan-lab-lea/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/aug/2/house-gop-re...
    - sleepysysadmin 5y ago
      >the lab leak hasn't been disproven yet. I was kind of unclear here intentionally. The source being wild has been disproven. This leaves lab leak as the only viable theory. So while it hasnt been proven, it sure as hell is the current theory. The point I was making is that the political position set by wikipedia proves the bias. If they reported in a neutral fashion they would have NEVER called it a conspiracy theory. They might have said that we lack the evidence of it being a lab leak and wild source is quite likely over lab leak. The bias is proven though and then the person I replied to was alright with them ignoring 'misinformation' but this is tantamount to agreeing with the bias. >There was a senate investigation that biden killed (https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t https://nypost.com/2021/05/25/biden-team-shut-down-inquiry-t...) Why he cancelled it, who's to say, but it COULD be something to do with this; https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent- https://nypost.com/2021/11/29/joe-biden-expected-10-percent-... If you step back, early in the covid lab leak story is that the lead scientists from said wuhan lab published in nature mag the source appears to be bat. Afterall, it is indeed quite related. I believe what this says is that it wasn't an intention leak, they just didn't think they did it. The follow up theory is that it was intention but not by them. Intentional by someone who was actively in a cold war with china... who might that be... oh right...
      - satronaut 5y ago
- KennyBlanken 5y ago
  [flagged]
orwin 5y ago
I started to agreed with the beginning of the article, but then this part: """ This article weirdly claims, or implies, a thing that no serious Biblical scholar of any sort would claim, viz., that Jesus was not given the title “Christ” by the original Apostles in the New Testament. The Wikipedia article itself later contradicts that claim, so perhaps the editors of the above paragraph simply meant the two conjoined words “Jesus Christ,” and that Jesus was rarely referred to with those two conjoined words in the New Testament. But this is false, too: the two words are found together in that form throughout the New Testament. """ This is wrong. Or rather, wikipedia is completely right in this case. In fact, the line quoted in the article is fully taken from Encyclopedia Britannica. The line is very clear of what it mean, and while it is true that Jesus (son of Joseph) was probably titled "messiah" (or Christ if you want) after meeting with John the Baptist (from the gospels), "Jesus Christ" as a name probably came later. Some bad translations of the gospel or Paul's letter might say otherwise, but don't found your knowledge on translation. And the historiography tends to agree with Wikipedia/me/anybody who had catechism. Another article ruined. I can't read further after that, if the author is wrong about that, he might also be wrong on things i'm not an expert on, so i won't be able to take anything i read on this seriously. People should just stop talking about history in political articles, they ruin it every time. Or maybe they should everytime, and allow history geeks to classified them easily in the "untrustworthy" category.
- sleepysysadmin 5y ago
  >Another article ruined. I can't read further after that, if the author is wrong about that, he might also be wrong on things i'm not an expert on, so i won't be able to take anything i read on this seriously. People should just stop talking about history in political articles, they ruin it every time. Or maybe they should everytime, and allow history geeks to classified them easily in the "untrustworthy" category. I'm not the guy, i just linked the blog which had examples. My reading of the blog isn't that he's taking a position but rather pointing out how the wiki page is clearly written by someone who does not believe Jesus ever existed. That Christians wouldn't write the article that way.

mandmandam 5y ago

Their smearing of independent anti-war media is consistent. MPN, The Greyzone, and others have been disallowed as sources for very flimsy reasons: [0]. They backed up one editor at the highest levels, after people wised up that he edited Wikipedia an average of 30 times per day, every day, over 14 years; almost entirely making edits against left wing and anti-war causes: [1] They've also literally destroyed someone's life, lied about it, and then patted themselves on the back for fixing the problem nearly a year too late: [2] With regard to Irish national politics, I can attest that they leave out serious scandal information regarding the top two parties politicians, while leaving out important good stuff and including all sorts of bs about independent and left wing politicians; from what I've seen they do the same everywhere. [0] - https://thegrayzone.com/2020/06/10/wikipedia-formally-censors-the-grayzone-as-regime-change-advocates-monopolize-editing/ https://thegrayzone.com/2020/06/10/wikipedia-formally-censor... [1] - https://www.mintpressnews.com/phillip-cross-the-mystery-wikipedia-editor-targeting-anti-war-sites/250824/ https://www.mintpressnews.com/phillip-cross-the-mystery-wiki... [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2021-10-31/Opinion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...

circlefavshape 5y ago
Can you please provide an example from Irish national politics?
akolbe 5y ago
For more on the Nathaniel White story and how having his picture used to illustrate the Wikipedia article on a serial killer affected him, according to his lawyer, see https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dgpnq/wikipedia-and-google-identified-wrong-man-as-a-serial-killer-for-years https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dgpnq/wikipedia-and-google-... But yes, it's the endemic failure to tell "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" that is so worrying. The Wikimedia Foundation wants to become the "essential infrastructure of the [global] ecosystem of free knowledge". https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2017#Our_strategic_direction:_Service_and_Equity https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/... Even if one were to agree that such a global infrastructure monopoly is a desirable thing to have, one would have to need one's head examined to want an organisation in charge of this infrastructure that regularly resorts to lying by omission to suit its own self-interest.

no_time 5y ago

compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola with https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Julius_Evola&oldid=468626403 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Julius_Evola&oldi... Don't tell me him being antisemitic is such a paramount piece of information that it needs to appear in literally the first sentence.

ceejayoz 5y ago
To clarify, you think the old revision is the better one?
- no_time 5y ago
  Yes. The old lets the reader to decide for him/herself whether he was antisemitic or not. Does not obstruct information about his views yet does not devolve into name calling in the first sentence. I'm not trying to underplay what he is saying, but dismissing him in the first sentence on a supposedly neutral article really rubs me the wrong way.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    > The old lets the reader to decide for him/herself whether he was antisemitic or not. I think you've misunderstood the point of an encyclopedia, personally.
  - YXNjaGVyZWdlbgo 5y ago
    There is no question that he was an antisemite if you read the sources provided on the very same page. He was objectively an antisemite there is no room for interpretation or your definition of the word differs from the one of the general public.
    - s1artibartfast 5y ago
      [Deleted]

clavicat 5y ago

Easily. >The Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory is a series of unevidenced claims centered on the false allegation that while Joe Biden was vice president of the United States, he engaged in corrupt activities relating to the employment of his son Hunter Biden by the Ukrainian gas company Burisma.[1] They were spread primarily in an attempt to damage Joe Biden's reputation during the 2020 presidential campaign.[2] United States intelligence community analysis released in March 2021 found that proxies of Russian intelligence promoted and laundered misleading or unsubstantiated narratives about the Bidens "to US media organizations, US officials, and prominent US individuals, including some close to former President Trump and his administration." The article begins by immediately labeling the accusations “unevidenced” and “false” and then suggests that it is a foreign intelligence plot, an allegation which is itself a conspiracy theory. The article then continues to debunk the accusations point by point all in the introduction of the article, placing the refutation prominently at the top so that the only impression the reader is left with is that there is nothing to it. Only in the final sentence does it reluctantly concede that: >The article's veracity was strongly questioned by most mainstream media outlets, analysts and intelligence officials, due to the questionable provenance of the laptop and its contents, and the suspicion it may have been part of a disinformation campaign.[8][9][10] It was later confirmed that at least some of the laptop materials were genuine and Hunter Biden himself said that the laptop could be his.[11]

Veen 5y ago
Wikipedia is a teriary source; its "bias" reflects that of the secondary sources on which it based. The article you refer to has 93 references to major news organizations and other sources. Are there reputable sources that argue the Biden-Ukraine theory is true and well-founded?
- clavicat 5y ago
  That’s the rub, isn’t it? According to WP:RELIABLE, HuffPost is a reputable media source whereas the New York Post is not. Therefore, if the latter claims to be in possession of Hunter’s emails while the former claims that it’s an FSB forgery, the former must be correct. If only it were so easy to determine reputation.

throwawaylinux 5y ago

Here's an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_(2017–2019) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Counsel_investigation_... In the first paragraph - > The Mueller investigation culminated with the Mueller Report, which concluded that though the Trump campaign welcomed Russian interference and expected to benefit from it, there was insufficient evidence to bring any conspiracy charges against Trump or his associates. This makes it sound like there was something underhanded there, and their source for it was some opinion piece news article rather than the report itself. The fact is that the report conceded that they found no evidence which linked Trump or his campaign of colluding, conspiring with Russia. The alleged hacking or leaking of Clinton and DNC information under the Obama administration by Russians or other hackers was nothing to do with Trump. He "welcomed" it like any politician welcomes bad news for their opponent, but it's a total mischaracterization of the report, which is really a incredibly problematic indictment of the wild conspiracy theories, lies, and misinformation pushed by many politicians and corporations and people around this. And major related articles from this one, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Links_between_Trump_associates_and_Russian_officials https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Links_between_Trump_associates.... When you look at other kinds of misinformation or even unproven allegations made by less favorable sides of politics, the articles often lead with "unsubstantiated claims", "without evidence", etc. This Trump Russia conspiracy theory clearly should be treated the same way, but it is not, wikipedia is still attempting to keep it alive and is trying to salvage the reputations of those who perpetuated it and those who fell for it.

chippy 5y ago

I love how one can see the examples and the (political stances) effect which is being described especially when this question is asked by reading the responses to the answers.

convery 5y ago

I think the clearest example would be the Gamergate page. Whole page being rewritten twice a day, conservative outlets being blacklisted as sources for not supporting the narrative while random blogs were fine, long time editors being banned from editing because they wanted it to be 'neutral', and a lot of users being banned for pointing out that a lot of the claims were not supported by the questionable sources. For a more recent example that was posted on HN a few days ago: the proposed deletion of a page on mass-killings under Communism. Most of the arguments on the discussion page were from power-editors complaining that the page was "making Communism look bad" and that it was used for "anti-revolutionary talking-points". While the deletion is still being voted on, gives you an insight into the culture.

kiba 5y ago
Seems to be a non-issue WRT mass-killing under communism with lot of keep votes.
- matkoniecz 5y ago
  Note that nomination for deletion is not some vote count, especially if people were encouraged elsewhere to come there and blindly vote without any prior contributions.
matkoniecz 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes_(4th_nomination) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletio... > An administrator or other editor is in the process of closing this discussion. Please do not contribute further to it; the result should be posted shortly. but nothing changed sine 29th November

unicornfinder 5y ago

Not OP and don't have an example to hand, but something I noticed is that with subjects where I understand them well I do tend to notice a bit of a bias, but equally edits are usually accepted too. The problem in my mind is that on subjects where I'm not as well educated I may well not notice the bias because I don't know what may or may not be disputed for a given subject matter. Obviously everything on Wikipedia should be sourced but it's entirely possible to be selective of which sources you use.

akolbe 5y ago
Kozierok's First Law: "The apparent accuracy of a Wikipedia article is inversely proportional to the depth of the reader's knowledge of the topic." :)
manicdee 5y ago
Welcome to the entire gamut of human endeavour. We don’t live long enough or have brains enough to know everything at once so we delegate information gathering to others.

q1w2 5y ago

I first noticed it with the article on the Orlando gay club shooting. The initial article contained unverified reports that the suspect was himself gay, and that that was his motive for the attack. ...and mods on Wikipedia were deleting any edits that referenced the fact that the suspect's father was a former Taliban official that was admitted under the Obama administration, and was politically active in Florida, attending a number of Hillary Clinton talks despite video evidence. References to the suspect verbally professing his allegiance to ISIS was constantly struck from the article with constant rewrites that the motive was that he himself was gay. It was wild to see the disinformation being pushed by mods.