Talk:United States/Archive 106

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Airing grievances (reversed American exceptionalism)

So, this sentence was removed because apparently it's POV, which I doubt because it's seems like a reliable source, but whatever. However, what really incensed me is that edit. Here, after cleansing the culture section of moderately positive content, the editor decided to write a separate paragraph on slavery and how the Founding Fathers' views on liberty and equality were incompatible with some of them owning slaves and discriminating against women, and being overall awful.

Some users like invoking Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source, despite it being an essay and in now way a guideline, to reject proposals for having consistent guidelines on nation states articles. When I ask why other nations that practiced slavery, and in fact participated in the Transatlantic slave trade long before the United States of America was founded (e.g. the United Kingdom, the country that smuggled slaves to its Thirteen Colonies), don't have these scathing sections on their past evils and long sentences in the lead, describing all the possible problems in the country, they say it comes down to RS. Well, okay. Try finding something about the fact that Britain only finished paying off debts to slave-owning families in 2015 in the United Kingdom article. I imagine if something like that happened in the US, some editors would place that information in the lead and also repeat it in the history, culture, and wealth and poverty sections just to make sure no one misses it.

I feel like a few editors here are so obsessed with the evils of America, that they somehow assume they are unique to the US, completely ignoring all the good things and leading the article to being an unbalanced mess with multiple WP:UNDUE issues. Pizzigs (talk) 23:34, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

If an editor is incapable of seeing edits beyond the simplistic prism of positive - negative, to the point where they become defensive of some idealized vision of the topic and work against what is in current authoritative, reputable sources (academic literature, textbooks, peer-reviewed journals, etc.)—to the detriment of WP:NPOV—then that editor is participating in WP:Advocacy and possibly WP:Disruptive editing.
From WP:NPOV:
Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. (The relative prominence of each viewpoint among Wikipedia editors or the general public is irrelevant and should not be considered.)
Academic and reference sources such as the Oxford encyclopedia of American cultural and intellectual history are for more prominent, reliable, and reputable, and therefore carry a lot more weight and importance, than middle-market newspapers such as USA Today, especially for the section on US culture and society.
If you feel that the article United Kingdom is missing WP:Verifiable information, show up at that article with reliable sources, but don't attempt to use a mercurial, publicly-edited Wikipedia article as a metric or a source for this article.
Editors don't need to have read Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil to edit Wikipedia, but they do need the intellectual maturity to respect what is in reputable sources—even if it's critical, even if they find it negative—because Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED. إيان (talk) 15:44, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
With due respect, what you are doing now is using policies and guidelines (contrary to their intent) to conduct Wikipedia warfare against people to "get" them. You're perfectly aware of WP:UNDUE and WP:BALASP. Therefore, mentioning slavery, and specifically its incompatibility with the Constitution's stated ideals, in the Culture section amounts to undue weight. Slavery is already mentioned in the lead and History sections, and there're multiple standalone articles dedicated specifically to slavery in colonial America/United States, as well as a Constitution of the United States#Criticisms section. Pizzigs (talk) 16:49, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed. Clearly there is a small group of highly motivated, deeply anti-American editors devoted to promoting their POV of this page. This has to stop. --Jatkins (talk - contribs) 18:56, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
Writing objectively about the US and its history, based on current academic sources, is not "anti-American". This kind of misinformed hypersensitive sentiment of nationalism or patriotism is useless in building an NPOV encyclopedia. إيان (talk) 05:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
User:Pizzigs is "incensed" about the following:
"However, many historians have noted that the Declaration's pronouncement of "all men are created equal" did not apply to either women or slaves. The men who wrote the Declaration were mostly slaveowners, perhaps accounting for the fact that slaves were not even mentioned. Thirty-four of the forty-seven men depicted in the 'Declaration of Independence' painting were slaveholders and in 1776, while slavery was condoned (“condemned”? - ed.) in every Western country, including France and Britain, all thirteen colonies still permitted it."
They've already expressed a contempt for too much faith in Wiki essays, but Wikipedia:Let it go might be the first thing to address here. If anyone is getting "incensed" they should take care of themselves.
Beyond that, its true that the offending content needs citation, but beyond that, it serves to put some important facts into context.
The real crux of the issue is revealed in the statement 'after cleansing the culture section of moderately positive content", referring to edits by [[User:]]. This is in the broader context of an ongoing effort by other editors recently to "trim" the article down, which have notably *not* to my knowledge been categorized by anyone as "moderately positive" or in contrast 'negative' - because it doesn't matter. As long as it meets Wiki:Due criteria, judgements of positive or negative are irrelevant.
"I feel like a few editors here are so obsessed with the evils of America, that they somehow assume they are unique to the US, completely ignoring all the good things and leading the article to being an unbalanced mess with multiple Wiki:UNDUE issues."
Can anyone genuinely argue that this article doesn't already have enough content that popularly conceived as "moderately positive" or even 'strongly positive'? I objectively don't think so.
How the articles for other countries do or do not address slavery is irrelevant to the US article. There are multiple reasons, but among the most important is that the US experience with slavery was different and is a defining factor in US culture, history and society and that context is precisely what is necessary to be included in this article. There is no unifying content that connects all of the dispersed references to AA culture, so that where those references do show up they seem disjointed and unexplainedly diffuse. The reasons for the development of an AA culture arguably unlike any other subculture in the world is the context that is missing. The fact that other countries have had slavery over history is not germaine, but the way slavery played out in the US and the impacts it had and continues to have on the US is precisely what needs context. The question that needs answering for the reader, in effect, is "If other countries have had slavery why is the AA cultural legacy in the US so unique among nations?" Put that in context and the article will be doing its job.
The argument has been made that slavery was not unique to the US, and its been made over and over and over again, but nobody is making the claim that slavery was unique to the US. Nobody. And therefore, it is not an argument against putting the contemporary and legacy impact of slavery into context in this article. Its NOT a value judgement. The AA experience is different from the experience of all other Americans because of slavery, and that manifested itself in a lot of ways and continues to manifest itself. That is not a 'positive' or a 'negative' necessarily, it just 'is', and has been substantiated with valid citations. Shoreranger (talk) 19:23, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
The However, many historians have noted that the Declaration's pronouncement ... line could work (as a single sentence at absolute most), but I think a whole paragraph devoted to it is very undue. The line thirty-four of the forty-seven men depicted in the 'Declaration of Independence' painting were slaveholders and in 1776, while slavery was condoned in every Western country, including France and Britain, all thirteen colonies still permitted it seems wrong to me for two reasons – one, no need to list the exact number in an article so focused on WP:SUMSTYLE as this one, and two, the existence of slavery in the U.S. in 1776 is already very much established in the article. DecafPotato (talk) 20:43, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

I was reading this article last night, and when I came back to read more today I seen a neutrality issue has been added to it. I assumed the issue was the article has a celebratory version of US history, as has been the case with various books I’ve read, so it’s surprising to see it’s the opposite being argued here. I felt compelled to comment because of this. Bit of background, I’m Irish, and my parents marched in the 1960s civil rights marches in Northern Ireland which were directly inspired by those partaken by minorities in the US. At that time catholics were heavily discriminated against (“Negroes of Northern Ireland” was a phrase associated with the movement), and given this somewhat shared history I’ve been heavily interested in US history. There are a number of issues I see in this article but I will limit it to three: first, Pilgrims seeking “religious freedom”. My question, freedom for who? Here is a quote from historian Kenneth Davis in the article “America's dark and not-very-distant history of hating Catholics“: “We want to show this patriotic view that we were this melting pot of religious freedom. Nonsense. People wanted their own religious freedom, not freedom for others.”. I’d have had a death sentence hanging over me. They were an extremist, persecuting sect intolerant of the beliefs of others. Second issue: “Consent of the governed”, “Self governed”. Unless you were among the white male elites, you consented to nothing as you were not part of any form of governing as highlighted in this article: The "consent of the governed" meant propertied white men only. Third issue: the “melting pot”, “diversity”, “welcoming to immigrants”. Yes, if you were white (prior to 1965). Due to immigration and citizenship restrictions, in 1965 the US population was almost 90% white, and most of the remaining 10% were descendants of slaves. Here is an article titled “The Immigration Act of 1965 and the Creation of a Modern, Diverse America": “Since Congress restricted citizenship to white persons in 1790, the immigration system has been a cornerstone of American Apartheid.” So that’s three issues that this article, the way it is currently written, completely distorts history. I’d like to see those issues I’ve highlighted addressed in the article so we can get closer to an accurate version of events. Thank you. J Sullivan77 (talk) 20:31, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Regarding point 1, when the Pilgrims arrived in New England, there was no one there except for the Native Americans. Their idea of fleeing to the New World for religious freedom (from the rest of Europe, for what it's worth) predates even a concept of "(the United States of) America" as we know it today. DecafPotato (talk) 23:09, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
The culture section is also primarily about the country today. @DecafPotato: @J Sullivan77:. For instance, Canada's culture section is much more a product of Pierre Trudeau (1968-1979/1980-1984) than John A. Macdonald.(1867-1874/1878-1891). It would be similarly undue to have Canadian Indian residential school system's mentioned in that section. KlayCax (talk) 00:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Sullivan, indeed there are problems of bias in this article. It is known that Wikipedia has a racial bias. See Racial bias on Wikipedia. Also read our Samuel P. Huntington article and his latest book Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity, and especially what he has to say about the Catholic/Protestant problem. This is not the sort of historian that we should be using to make statements in Wikipedia's words. Sectionworker (talk) 00:36, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
I didn't realize the discredited Huntington was being used as reliable source material here. Yikes. Shoreranger (talk) 14:14, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Hello. I’m the same user as above (J Sullivan 77); couldn’t remember my password so had to register a new account with the same name but just added an initial. Another issue, a fourth if you will, and it relates directly to this heading here, Jefferson’s line “all men are created equal”. We know he wasn’t referring to Natives as he labeled them “savages” in the Declaration. A Native community leader responded to this racist section of the Declaration and the dehumanizing label on his brethren (a legacy of which would continue throughout the next century and be echoed by politicians), with “Any holiday that would refer to my people in such a repugnant, racist manner is certainly not worth celebrating. July Fourth is a day we celebrate our resiliency, our culture, our languages, our children and we mourn the millions — literally millions — of indigenous people who have died as a consequence of American imperialism.”. As a pioneer of scientific racism we also know Jefferson wasn’t referring to blacks as he wrote “blacks are inferior to whites in the endowments of body and mind”, and on blacks becoming mixed with whites he wrote “the improvement of blacks in body and mind, in the first instance of their mixture with the whites, has been observed by everyone, and proves that their inferiority is not the effect merely of their condition of life”. That just leaves whites (as being equal) who he was referring to. His views of other races being lesser than whites would also be reflected in the period with white only governance and white only citizenship. This legacy of white superiority and domination left other races marginalized, with Leland T. Saito, Associate Professor of Sociology and American Studies & Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, writing, "Throughout the history of the United States race has been used by Whites for legitimizing and creating difference and social, economic and political exclusion.” (quote from: Leland T. Saito (1998). "Race and Politics: Asian Americans, Latinos, and Whites in a Los Angeles Suburb". p. 154. University of Illinois Press). It’s essential to record history with a full scope, and not pluck out a line that is most comfortable (especially to white eyes). The truth often isn’t comfortable (which applies with my own Irish history), but it is the truth nonetheless that we must report on. Again, this article propagates a distortion of reality, a distortion of the foundation of America, and the legacy of that foundation which so many unfortunate millions then had to endure. Similar to the aforementioned issues in my prior comment, I’d like to see this issue properly looked at, and rectified in the article. Thank you. JB Sullivan77 (talk) 20:38, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that this article could do a lot more to clarify the social hierarchies that permeate U.S. history. Exceptional claims require exceptional sources, and Samuel P. Huntington's American exceptionalism should not be in this article. I have tried to remove it, but Pizzigs re-added it in their edit war.  — Freoh 15:13, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Can you explain why Huntington should be removed as a source? TFD (talk) 17:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
He is most notable for his controversial opinions, and Wikipedia prioritizes facts over opinions. If this article were significantly shorter, it might make sense to balance his perspective with others, but this article is too long, and this seems like a natural place to start cutting.  — Freoh 20:33, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
I realize it's not the best source. But, surely. Individualism et al. are pretty indisputable aspects of American culture?
If there's a better source with a similar statement - then that should be added in its place. KlayCax (talk) 05:46, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
That's the point. Huntington's views on the post-Cold War world order are controversial. That doesn't diminish his stature of a widely cited academic. I added another source a week ago, but let me be clear: what is stated in that paragraph of the culture section is no way related to those views of Huntington that are considered controversial. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Other authors characterize the American Creed differently from Huntington,[1] and this article should focus on agreed-upon facts rather than Huntington's opinions.  — Freoh 02:42, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Re: Huntington. A distinction must be made between opinions and facts in a source. Inclusion of the first is determined by weight, while the second is determined by rs. In this case, in "American Creed" (pp. 66 ff.), Huntington writes about the American Creed as it is understood by social scientists. He refers for example to Gunnar Myrdal, who coined the term, Daniel Bell, and Seymour Martin Lipset. As a professor of political science, Huntington is qualified to summarize what social scientists have found about U.S. political history. It's only when he starts expressing his own opinions (which is not the case here), that we have to assess how accepted those opinions are. In any case, there is nothing controversial about what Huntington wrote about the American Creed. It's generally accepted that the U.S. was founded on specific principles that had consensus support and continue to be accepted by most Americans.
Notice that the argument is whether or not in practice America met the principle's in its creed, not whether or not the creed existed. Bourbon France for example did not have to explain how slavery and religious discrimination fit with the belief in freedom and equality because they were not part of their creed. The U.S. creed has become so broadly accepted that many people see it as self-evident.
TFD (talk) 13:20, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
The Puritan concept of freedom of religion was based on the view that the individual had a direct relationship with God rather than an indirect one through a priesthood and was therefore free to choose how he or she worshipped. But there were limitations. Catholicism was not accepted because it required allegiance to a foreign ruler (the Pope), while heresy (such as unitarianism) and atheism were seen as an affront to God. While modern liberalism rejects these limits, it does so by arguing from principles that the Puritans established. TFD (talk) 13:37, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Geronimus, Arline T.; Thompson, J. Phillip (September 2004). "TO DENIGRATE, IGNORE, OR DISRUPT: Racial Inequality in Health and the Impact of a Policy-induced Breakdown of African American Communities". Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race. 1 (02). doi:10.1017/S1742058X04042031. ISSN 1742-058X.

KlayCax's unexplained "trimming"

KlayCax, under the pretense of "trimming" you selectively removed important, cited information about race, social inequality, wealth inequality, homosexuality, and same-sex marriage in the section United States#Culture and society. This smacks of POV pushing and masking these edits with the edit summary: Copied wording from Great American Novel. Further trimming is WP:disruptive editing. Please explain yourself. إيان (talk) 14:19, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. I have restored some of the relevant material, some of it long-standing.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 14:33, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
Hi, @إيان: @C.J. Griffin:.
race, social inequality, wealth inequality
Mention of those topics surrounding the United States were not removed in the edit. They were removed from the culture section. Since it just reinstated what is already said. The fact that there's social/wealth inequality is already present in the Income and Poverty section. I wouldn't be against reinstating the citations themselves. But the vast majority should be reinstated there.
Homosexuality and same-sex marriage
Cutting out:

A late 2022 Grinnell College poll found that 74% of Americans agreed that same-sex marriage should be a guaranteed right while 13% disagreed. Approval of same-sex marriage is higher in younger generations; among 18-34 year olds, 76% are in favor of legal recognition and 7% oppose. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage bans were unconstitutional.

While leaving in the article:

LGBT rights are among the most advanced in the world, with public opinion and jurisprudence on the issue changing significantly since the late 1980s. LGBT rights are among the most advanced in the world, with public opinion and jurisprudence on the issue changing significantly since the late 1980s.

Seems entirely justifiable to me. Both connotate the same concept; one just does it in a whole lot less words.
This smacks of POV pushing
There's a lot of American policy I disagree with. That being said - as @E-960: and other editors have mentioned - this article is quickly becoming WP: Undue. Compare the wording for Japan, Brazil, Canada, and other countries to the present U.S. article. No one here is denying that the United States has not committed atrocities/doesn't have problems.
But absolutely none of these things were downplayed in the edit. In fact, the majority of the removal was increased American support for same-sex marriage/homosexuality. KlayCax (talk) 06:15, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Bruh, the section is called Culture and society. Those are well-sourced, long-standing statements about dominant features of US society you unilaterally decided to remove. You also surreptitiously attempted to mask your edit with the summary Copied wording from Great American Novel. Further trimming and now that you've been called out on it, you're equivocating and obfuscating and refusing to acknowledge your wrongdoing and apologize for it.
You need to get beyond this idea that an article is somehow a moral judgment or condemnation of its topic. It's simply intended to be an NPOV reflection of what is recorded in current, authoritative WP:Reliable sources. The content of other articles is not a valid argument because WP:Wikipedia is not a reliable source. If you have issue with that content, take it up on those pages. إيان (talk) 18:45, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed. I don't understand why there is all this insistance that NPOV information is somehow moral judgement and/or condemnation all of a sudden. Shoreranger (talk) 19:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
There's general agreement that this article is too long and needs significant trimming. This article should cover only the absolute broadest strokes, with very little in terms of detail. That's what WP:SUMMARY style is for. My only complaint with KlayCax's edit is that they didn't remove enough. I'd like to take a hacksaw to this article, but every detail is really important to one person or another, and everyone wants their own "most important issue" to be as prominent in the article as possible. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 00:41, 4 April 2023 (UTC)
Yes, me to. @Thebiguglyalien:. I get that — as you said — that every detail is really important to one person or another. But it appears that any substantial cuts will have to be painstakingly go through months-long RFC's. Essentially any removal or trimming is immediately challenged. It's unfortunate. KlayCax (talk) 10:52, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax is at it again, unilaterally making massive changes to the article, and in so doing making all kinds of wild WP:OR WP:POV claims and not bothering to cite WP:reliable sources, from here to here. This time they're not selectively removing cited information they don't like under the pretense of "trimming," but rather adding what they like without bothering to cite sources or seek consensus. إيان (talk) 04:28, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

A net negative time sink all over. WP:BRINK. Moxy- 05:26, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
@KlayCax: at this point we are going to ask you to propose any changes here first...including copy pasting, change of content or images. Thank you. Moxy- 06:15, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax and Pizzigs are back at it again, as soon as the full lock was lifted. إيان (talk) 16:56, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, go through the edits and summarize your objections if they're any. Pizzigs (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

E-lock

Why did the extended-confirmed lock in the top-right corner disappear? LOOKSQUARE (talk) 14:59, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Because the (Personal attack removed) who put it there in the first place forgot to add the template back. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.204.232.184 (talk) 18:36, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Sectionworker's edits

User:Sectionworker, yesterday you introduced outdated Social Progress Index rankings to the Culture section. I moved it to the Economy section and cited the 2022 report as opposed to the 2020 report you had used. Today you went even further, unilaterally removing mentions of HDI and education from the lead, despite there having been no consensus to do so. Furthermore, you added a sentence to the Education section, citing a 2017 report. As one can guess, all these edits followed a pattern of removing content that presents the country in a moderately positive light and adding content that does the opposite, with no regard for WP:UNDUE issues. Instead of editing Education in the United States where the American system's shortcomings might or might not already be covered, you for some reason assume that every possible criticism should be listed on the main page. Can I ask why? Pizzigs (talk) 18:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Why? Because I want our articles to be accurate. The lead, now that you have reverted my edits, states "The U.S. ranks very highly in international measures of quality of life, income an wealth, economic competitiveness, human rights, innovation, and education;" Please show me the stats that show that the US measures very high in the quality of life and education. Thanks. Sectionworker (talk) 19:34, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
We really need all to look as sources in all matters not direct editors to Wikipedia pages or old stuff. An article of this nature is not the place for guess work or to learn the Wikiways. Talk after talk above just full of Pov's over citing sources.
Moxy- 19:53, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
It seems that you choose to ignore me. Please furnish the stats that I asked for or I will need to remove the education and standard of living mentions from the lead. Sectionworker (talk) 14:41, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
The U.S. education system ranks very high and the country's HDI is literally 'very high' (check the infobox). Pizzigs (talk) 14:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
OK, one at a time. You choose to use the World Population Center while I use the Pew Research Center. Do you see the difference here? We must strive to use only RS in order to make our articles as accurate as possible. Sectionworker (talk) 15:14, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
The 2015 (upd. in 2017) PRC article you cited is too narrow, giving specific data for elementary and middle school students in select subjects, completely ignoring higher education. The WPC article I cited uses rankings from U.S. News & World Report, so I do not get why you would redlink WPC to imply they are unreliable. Pizzigs (talk) 15:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Don't you find it odd that the red linked source finds the top ten to be:

  • The United States
  • The United Kingdom
  • Germany
  • Canada
  • France
  • Switzerland
  • Japan
  • Australia
  • Sweden
  • The Netherlands

While the blue linked Pew finds Norway, Denmark, Sweden, etc. at the top [1] ? And please don't again say that wpr uses a blue link article. If a tabloid uses CNN for a quote, is the tabloid then OK? Sectionworker (talk) 16:17, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you consider these rankings reliable? Pizzigs (talk) 16:35, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
No I do not. I do not see CNN as an expert on global education ratings. PEW is well known and is used repeatedly in many of our Wikipedia articles. CNN, as a ratings expert, is not. See this [2] Sectionworker (talk) 18:55, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
I was unable to find any mention of CNN there. Can you quote a specific paragraph? In any case, there're no up-to-date and reliable education rankings by country, the scope is too broad. The 2017 PRC article you cited features a report that "measures reading ability, math and science literacy and other key skills among 15-year-olds in dozens of developed and developing countries" and "[The study which] tested students in grades four and eight every four years since 1995. In the most recent tests, from 2015, 10 countries (out of 48 total) had statistically higher average fourth-grade math scores than the U.S., while seven countries had higher average science scores. In the eighth-grade tests, seven out of 37 countries had statistically higher average math scores than the U.S., and seven had higher science scores." Too narrow and dated, in my opinion, and suits individual section in Education in the United States better. Pizzigs (talk) 22:48, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
The Programme for International Student Assessment test for 2019 does not show the US in first place, and in fact they are not even in the top 10 for reading or the top 20 for math. [3] [4] Sectionworker (talk) 03:55, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Agree that we should not say that the U.S. ranks very highly in education, especially not in the lead.  — Freoh 15:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
There has been no comment from the objecting editor so I plan to fix the claim that the US ranks first in education and instead use the Pisa information, since they are considered to be the best source. Now I plan to move on to the claim that the US ranks so high in the quality of life stats. According to Numbeo we are number 17. [5] The article is now using the Human Development Index, which does not measure quality of life. Sectionworker (talk) 19:06, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
I think the reports measure different things. One measures perception based on polling, while the other was completed by experts. The U.S. of course remains the top choice for foreign students, so would poll well.
The U.S. ranking on the expert report is fairly high relative to other countries, but is low compared with other Western developed nations. I think the reason for this is that while the U.S. has leading educational institutions, it also has an unevenness of quality in public education. TFD (talk) 20:47, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed. That should be reflected in the article. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
The AP Poll is mentioned here: [6] Sectionworker (talk) 21:30, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
Also, an update on altruism. We are not longer in the top ten. [7] Sectionworker (talk) 13:09, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
Thank you for once again manipulating data and providing an old CAF report where the US ranks 19th out of 144 countries instead of the latest October 2022 report where it ranks third. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
I'm getting really sick of your lack of respect for other editors. I did not mean to manipulate data when I entered the 2021 report. Thank you for finding a later report. Sectionworker (talk) 16:47, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Also, an update on altruism. We are not longer in the top ten. implies that altruism should be removed from the culture section, despite the U.S. being ranked third in the world. If you had searched for the latest report, you would've easily found the 2022 rankings. Instead, you apparently searched for those rankings that back up your claims of altruism no longer being a defining feature of the American culture. Pizzigs (talk) 16:57, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Feel free to rant on and on, bringing in more and more accusations. I've said what I have to say. Sectionworker (talk) 18:50, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

When did the us gain indepdence

It was 1776 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Numberblockfan22323 (talk • contribs) 19:04, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Who is saying that the U.S. didn't gain independence then? KlayCax (talk) 16:48, 23 April 2023 (UTC)
Not sure what this is about, but it declared independence in 1776—there was still the small matter of fighting off the British Empire. The Treaty of Paris wasn't signed until 1783. إيان (talk) 05:23, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
True, but if you win the war, effectively you get to declare your independence date as the date you declared it. In addition, the US was recognized internationally by France, and prevented any meaningful occupation of territory by the British following declaration of independence (really the only exception is NYC, and for a while at the end Charleston), so by most standards independence in this case is concurrent with declaration. Shoreranger (talk) 16:14, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
While British law considers independence to have occurred in 1783, the year usually given in reliable sources is 1776, which is the year used in U.S. law. TFD (talk) 21:08, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

First patent issuance

The line "In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone" in the Economy section: there is no way that is true. Patents existed for a long time before 1876. The first patent laws in the US were passed in the 18th century. This link from the US Patent Office reports Samuel Hopkins to be the recipient of the first US patent. I apologize if I have misinterpreted the line. Willster2400 (talk) 14:45, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

This is a misreading. Perhaps it could be worded better. He received the first telephone patent (in the US), if that makes more sense. Maxx-♥ talk and coffee ☕ 15:44, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
yes it was first in terms of telephones--and there was a lot of litigation. Rjensen (talk) 22:38, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Why the down grade?

The down grading of the quality level and the addition to the opening of problem banners makes the article look like a FOX is involved. 204.237.49.178 (talk) 23:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

FOX = Full of Xenophobia... have not seen this acronym used in a decade or so. Can you give any example? Moxy- 01:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
Or explain what that means... xenophobia against the US or from the US? That said, my quick perusal (and I mean really quick) had me notice several not quite accurate statements. I'm not super interested in engaging this article, but, maybe someone saw a lot more and decided the quality grade needed an adjustment. Happy editing. 142.115.142.4 (talk) 02:46, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
I am assuming it's related to Xenophobia in the United States.... more at Lee, Erika (2021). "America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States by Erika Lee". The Radical Teacher (120). Center for Critical Education, Inc.: 102–104. ISSN 0191-4847. JSTOR 48694889. Retrieved 2023-04-29. Moxy- 03:11, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Government type infobox

GovernmentFederal presidential constitutional republic under a liberal representative democracy

Does having "liberal representative democracy" as it currently does seem redundant to add to this section? I don't see this added to infoboxes of other countries that are liberal democracies Bokmanrocks01 (talk) 13:30, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

GovernmentConstitutional, federal republic under a presidential system
It is redundant as its akin to say "Western-style democracies" ......what readers need to know is what type of "Liberal democracy" . Moxy- 13:51, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
Please see the reference for that. There is an ongoing vital debate particular to the US as to whether it is a republic or a democracy. It is both. soibangla (talk) 14:47, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
A fun read....Volokh, Eugene (2015-05-13). "Is the United States of America a republic or a democracy?'". Washington Post. Moxy- 21:00, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
@Soibangla: My main issue is with this “under a” language. That would suggest that it is NOT a republic in reality, which is not correct. How is it “under” a democracy? What does that mean? Your source does not contain this terminology. 25stargeneral (talk) 03:30, 30 April 2023 (UTC)
GovernmentConstitutional, federal republic and a presidential system
"and a" Would be fine with me. The article needs to be as simple as possible.[8]. Will be a hard change as the article has been overwhelmed with tedious editors.Moxy- 03:40, 30 April 2023 (UTC)
Yes, I understand; "and" is better. Under was not the term I added. soibangla (talk) 03:55, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Complete rewrite?

Part of me wonders if this article could benefit from being completely rewritten. The problem is that at this point, everyone has thrown everything and the kitchen sink into the article and it's a nightmare. Maybe completely starting from scratch and following the pattern of our feature articles like Japan is our best bet. -- RockstoneSend me a message! 20:24, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes Derrick your academic rewrite would be much appreciated. ...... wondering if this should be done in draft first. This way any points of contention can be dealt with in the draft space over article space. We have a slew of new editors who will need guidance and explanation of why things are done a certain way. Moxy- 20:29, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Support The article in its current form is biased. I hope User:KlayCax is okay with me posting excerpts from our discussion on their talk page.
  • Compare the Japan treatment of the country's respective atrocities during WWII to the U.S.
Japan's simply states:

Amidst a rise in militarism and overseas colonization, Japan invaded China in 1937 and entered World War II as an Axis power in 1941... On December 7–8, 1941, Japanese forces carried out surprise attacks on Pearl Harbor, as well as on British forces in Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong, among others, beginning World War II in the Pacific. Throughout areas occupied by Japan during the war, numerous abuses were committed against local inhabitants, with many forced into sexual slavery. After Allied victories during the next four years, which culminated in the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, Japan agreed to an unconditional surrender...

The United States article has been recently changed to have all of the worst aspects of U.S. history highlighted.
It's not a perfect estimate. But from my calculations:
United States's has around 400-500 "positive words" (vs. ~2,000 negative)
Japan's is 771 words positive. (vs. 360 words negative)
Canada's is 800 words positive. (vs. 278 words negative.)
  • How the American, Australian, and Canadian treatment of indigenous people is covered. (Considered by most historians to be roughly equitable. Canada's and Australia's minimizes it as a natural part of their respective histories. The United States article goes on a multiparagraph, detailed response to it that outpaces the entire American Revolution and Founding. (2x-3x when you count slavery)
  • There's other problems as well. But these are the ones that immediately jumped out to me. The U.S. article has changed in a radically negative direction since 2016.
  • Another example is the coverage of slavery in the United Kingdom article (just a single paragraph in the history section): "Britain played a leading part in the Atlantic slave trade, mainly between 1662 and 1807 when British or British-colonial slave ships transported nearly 3.3 million slaves from Africa.[1] The slaves were taken to work on plantations in British possessions, principally in the Caribbean but also North America. Slavery coupled with the Caribbean sugar industry had a significant role in strengthening and developing the British economy in the 18th century. However, with pressure from the abolitionism movement, Parliament banned the trade in 1807, banned slavery in the British Empire in 1833, and Britain took a role in the movement to abolish slavery worldwide through the blockade of Africa and pressing other nations to end their trade with a series of treaties." [The paragraph] is almost laudatory, with a huge emphasis on the government's role in ending slavery. And this sentence is straightforward slavery apologia: "Slavery coupled with the Caribbean sugar industry had a significant role in strengthening and developing the British economy in the 18th century." Pizzigs (talk) 21:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
  • The above is the reason we would need this done in draft.....would need to explain that coverage should equate to scholarly publications. Moxy- 21:47, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Whether or not treatment of aboriginals deserves more attention in articles about Canada and Australia is irrelevant.
Your metrics chart compares conditions for aboriginal Canadians and African Americans, which shows that aboriginal Canadians fare worse on most metrics and all metrics when compared to the national average. But a more fair comparison would be with American Indians, who fare far worse than African Americans and aboriginal Americans on all metrics.
Historically American treatment of aboriginal people was far worse than Canada's. Canada for example never went to war against them with its attendant atrocities or had a Trail of Tears.
Furthermore, villianization of Indians by politicians and the entertainment industry has been ubiquitous.
The findings on aboriginal residential schools have become a topic of major concern in Canada recently. Yet the U.S. had its own Indian boarding schools, which took in more than twice the percentage of aboriginal people and were the same or worse.
TFD (talk) 02:31, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
I would have given more credence to your views on the subject if your edit history did not show such an obvious anti-American bias. I spent literally 5 minutes browsing your edits, and that was enough to establish some patterns. Here you attempted to introduce your POV on documented Russian war crimes by adding "alleged" to the tile; on the other hand, when an opportunity arises to add controversial information about American war crimes, you support it with little hesitation. According to you, Russia did not commit war crimes in Ukraine and RT is not propaganda. Russia of course did not occupy the Ukraine, because it was just another republic of the USSR (saying 'the' Ukraine in 2022 is just reprehensible); it seems the Ukrainian war of independence never happened in your reality). And some defense of Vladimir Putin to sum up your editing patterns. Pizzigs (talk) 14:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Stop accusing others of bad faith please, see WP:GF. Oh, and LOL. Commies, commies everywhere!--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:16, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
I've agreed with you below regarding WP:GF. As for the Red Scare, I can link Moscow trials, to show that excesses can occur on both sides (and I don't remember the Hollywood blacklist members being subject to show trials, torture and execution, but it's not a competition I suppose). Pizzigs (talk) 15:27, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Do you want the article to say that excesses in the U.S. were not as bad as those in the USSR under Stalin? Don't you think that even comparing the U.S. to Stalin's USSR is anti-American? TFD (talk) 16:03, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
IOW you are not interested in the strength of arguments but who made them. See argumentum ad hominem for why this is not a good idea. Otherwise, you have misrepresented my edits. In most of your examples, I asked for sources for statements that editors wanted to add which btw I do for any article regardless of topic. Also, when I said Ukraine was part of the USSR, I was merely stating the position of (ironically) the U.S. government, which recognized the USSR in 1933 with its then current borders. Ukraine recognizes this under its Law on the Succession of Ukraine and this position is (ironically) supported by the U.S. government. Anyway, can you explain why a comparison of the status of aboriginal Canadians with African Americans says anything about how the U.S. treats and has treated American Indians? TFD (talk) 15:58, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Please, participate in the writing process. The issue of past evils (slavery/genocide/racial segregation etc.) needs to be covered in an objective, impartial and balanced way, without giving undue weight to specific events at the expense of other events of equal, if not greater, importance. It has been decided to use featured articles such as Japan and the United Kingdom as examples of the quality the United States article should possess. Pizzigs (talk) 17:31, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Racial inequality continues to be a major issue in the U.S., more than in other Western democracies. The Best Countries report 2023 for example rated the U.S. 9.8/100 in racial equality, compared with Canada, which scored 98.6/100. I don't know what rank the U.S. was, but in 2020, it was ranked 10th worst. Meanwhile, the report rated the U.S. as the fourth best country, so you cannot claim it is "anti-American." TFD (talk) 21:47, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Then it should definitely be mentioned, in addition to other categories -> attributes such as religious freedom, low corruption, and well-developed digital infrastructure. Pizzigs (talk) 23:00, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
If you check the archives, I argued in favor of including "it has low levels of perceived corruption," which is still in the article. You can check the archives for the lengthy discussions. What's interesting about the U.S. is how it ends up as one of the best countries in the world: it surpasses most countries in many areas yet falls well below average in others. It's not anti-American to point that out. TFD (talk) 02:08, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed. And that should be reflected in the article. Areas where the U.S. dominates and falls behind the rest of the (developed) world should be mentioned. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
That ranking is weird and questionable to say the least. It lists Serbia, Bosnia–Herzegovina, South Africa, Malaysia, India, Oman, and Lebanon favorably than the U.S. in racial and ethnic equality/equity. Anyone who knows anything about those countries know that's an utterly ludicrous conclusion.
Correct me if I'm wrong here. @TFD: @Pizzigs:. KlayCax (talk) 17:32, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
KlayCax, do you have reliable sources supporting your dismissal of this source as an utterly ludicrous conclusion?  — Freoh 15:33, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
It measures racial equality, by which it means relative outcomes in criminal justice, health care, economics and education. You might be thinking about racist attitudes among the general public, where I image the U.S. would rank better. Do you have any reason to believe that there is greater inequality in these areas in those countries? TFD (talk) 16:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Yes, it certainly seems so, and the source is reliable, which once again confirms that the United States ranks very high in education and remains the top international destination for foreign students. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Do you have any reason to believe that there is greater inequality in these areas in those countries
South Africa has a much higher Gini coefficent on those metrics - both racial and overall. Crime/murder, economics, education, and criminal justice are score (ranging from) similar to far, far worse than the U.S. Much of that index seems to be based on "vibes" than actual data or methodlogy. For example, U.S. somehow ranked similar to European countries until 2016-2017 or so. Whatever one's opinion on the current state of American politics — and, yes, it's a mess — it is ridiculous to rank the U.S. worse than Bosnia or South Africa in racial or overall equality. Both score far, far worse on all of these metrics. KlayCax (talk) 03:03, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
 Question: is there a full source that contradicts information currently in the article? A lot of this seems like original research involving other content.  — Freoh 13:56, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Morgan, Kenneth (2007). Slavery and the British Empire: From Africa to America. Oxford University Press, USA. p. 12. ISBN 978-0-19-156627-1.

American Blackface minstrelsy

"Blackface" is a makeup.
"Minstrelsy" is a style.
"American blackface minstrelsy" is a unique theatrical artform.

Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source by its own standards. Original research is irrelevant. The existing source is sufficient, but here's more supporting information and additional citations.

The Darker Image: American Negro Minstrelsy through the Historian's Lens Author(s): George F. Rehin Source: Journal of American Studies , Dec., 1975, Vol. 9, No. 3 (Dec., 1975), pp. 365-373 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the British Association for American Studies Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27553195

"The minstrel mode was regarded as America's national poetry,8 and to judge from the constant reiteration of its unique American character and contribution to the theatre by historians of all hues and interests, it has continued, until recently, to be a necessary part of American identity."

  • 8) American Vernacular Dance ', Southern Folklore Quarterly, 30 (1966), 227. 8 J. K[innard], Jr., ' Who Are Our National Poets? ', Knickerbocker Magazine, 26 (1845), 331-41. See also Y. S. Nathanson, ' Negro Minstrelsy, Ancient and Modern ', Putnam's Monthly, 5 (1855), 72-9. Both these are conveniently reprinted in Bruce Jackson (ed.), The Negro and his Folklore in Nineteenth-Century Periodicals (Austin, 1967)

"The pre-1940 response of black writers was similar to that of white scholars and critics; both reflected the long-established place of minstrelsy in popular esteem. Its status as ' the only branch of the dramatic art ' originating in America and the role of its melodies as the ' only approach to a national music '" 15

  • 15) Laurence Hutton, Curiosities of the American Stage (London, 1891), pp. 89-144, 99.

Shoreranger (talk) 14:07, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The information may (or may not) be okay, but I think the concerns over putting it specifically in the overview article of the United States raises concerns; I mean one could write several thousands of pages of text about the United States; it is unreasonable that all of it should end up in this one article; instead, seek to put the information in other articles where it may be more appropriate. As an overview article, the topic is too specific for this article, IMHO. In other words, on the matter of whether Wikipedia should cover this information: sure. On the matter of whether this article here titled "United States" should cover this information, no, there really isn't room to cover a topic of this specificity in a general overview article. --Jayron32 16:17, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
I'd agree, if it wasn't the only regularly-identified American theater form labeled as unique. Shoreranger (talk) 17:45, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
I mean, you can find some sources that so label it. A good thing to do is to look for general reference works and how they discuss the United States of a similar length and purposes expected of a Wikipedia article. The preponderance of mainstream source material on the general topic of the United States don't really give it any mention at all. I mean, you can find a reliable source that says such a thing, which means that somewhere at Wikipedia it seems like a valid topic. However, just because it has a source doesn't mean it belongs in this one article. It seems far too niche a topic for a general overview article. There's other US culture which is generally to be expected in an article of this type, I don't see that this one topic is frequently discussed in similar works outside of Wikipedia in an omnibus work about the US in general and as such, there is no evidence it belongs here. All of your sources, while reliable, are fairly specific, specialist, niche sources, which is fine for including the information in Wikipedia articles about such topics, but not in a high-level overview such as this article. --Jayron32 17:57, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Its the uniqueness to US culture that makes it Wikipedia:Due. There are international pop stars from other countries, that's not unique to the US, but there is plenty of space dedicated to them in the article for example, despite lacking in any uniquely US characteristics identified. A uniquely US artform deserves this minor inclusion. Shoreranger (talk) 18:05, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
WP:DUE says, and I quote, "Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." (bold mine) Being noted as unique in a small number of niche publications is not prominent enough to pass the standards laid out there. WP:DUE says nothing about "unique" being a criteria. Only about how much the concept is covered by mainstream reliable sources. This topic is reliably sourced in relation to other topics, but not in the general sense for an overview article about the United States. --Jayron32 18:18, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
"proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources"
There is a trove of published reliable sources covering American theater, theater history, African American studies, sociology, and more that support the text. The quote you provided says nothing about "mainstream" or "niche", only "published" and "reliable". An overview of United States theater should certainly include mention of the *only* uniquely American theater form, as identified in published reliable sources. Shoreranger (talk) 18:29, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Most published reliable sources about The United States don't discuss the topic. There may be published reliable sources about American theater, theater history, African American studies or sociology that cover the topic to include the concept in perhaps one of those (or any of a number of other articles). Just not this one. --Jayron32 18:49, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
"Most published reliable sources about The United States don't discuss the topic."
Does not require that this article avoid it.
Wouldn't that actually be an incentive to include it, in a certain sense. Should not Wikipedia be unique, partly because it may correct such omissions of the past?
Either way, it still does not justify avoiding the topic by Wikipedia standards, which are the only ones that count here. Shoreranger (talk) 19:08, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
The Smithsonian Institute would of course be considered RS. Here is what they have to say: "Describing the African-American influence on American music in all of its glory an d variety is an intimidating—if not impossible—task. African American influences are so fundamental to American music that there would be no American music without them. People of African descent were among the earliest non-indigenous settlers of what would become the United States, and the rich African musical heritage that they carried with them was part of the foundation of a new American musical culture that mixed African traditions with those of Europe and the Americas. Their work songs, dance tunes, and religious music—and the syncopated, swung, remixed, rocked, and rapped music of their descendants—would become the lingua franca of American music, eventually influencing Americans of all racial and ethnic backgrounds. The music of African Americans is one of the most poetic and inescapable examples of the importance of the African American experience to the cultural heritage of all Americans, regardless of race or origin" [9] Sectionworker (talk) 19:37, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
The canvassing you're currently engaged in on talk pages of other articles is quite unethical. Pizzigs (talk) 19:29, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
What evidence do you have to accuse me of Wikipedia:Canvassing? I am strictly following the procedures for RFC as given by Wikipedia, and in good faith. it specifically calls for, and provides templates for, using talk pages. I don't even have the ability to change the text of the template except to include the article and the talk page section. I wonder if you would be so free with your insults were it not for the anonymity of this venue. Shoreranger (talk) 19:35, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Plus, you've violated WP:3RR how many times already? Pizzigs (talk) 19:34, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Oh, so YOU'RE the one I've been told is bad-mouthing me in chats. Have fun. Shoreranger (talk) 19:36, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source is an explanatory essay, not a guideline. Just saying because you tend to invoke it quite frequently. Pizzigs (talk) 20:30, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
I've referred to it once, and never claimed it was a "guideline". Now you are confusing me with User:إيان
Maybe you need to go outside and get some fresh air. You seem frazzled. Making random (false) observations and "just saying" instead of staying on topic.
How's it going in the chat rooms? Just saying... Shoreranger (talk) 20:42, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Putting in 2 cents. Segwaying from a general paragraph on US theater to a specific style (minstrelsy) is bad paragraph structure, so the addition of some minstrelsy sentences is bad writing. The section should also follow WP:SUMMARY, section wording should reflect the lead at Theater in the United States. Fountains of Bryn Mawr (talk) 20:34, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Most of the content in Theater in the United States that relates to this doesn't have any citations. Unless you are referring to the one outlying sentence "At the same time, America had created new dramatic forms in the Tom Shows, the showboat theater and the minstrel show.[1] which would be clunky if the "section wording" were to reflect that. Shoreranger (talk) 20:49, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that minstrel shows are worth mentioning in this article. It is "a distinctively American contribution to theatrical history",[2] which is exactly the kind of thing that this article should cover.  — Freoh 19:41, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

no Disagree As usual, User:Freoh supports the inclusion of highly disputed content because it presents the United States in a negative light. And as usual, the user seems to be unaware that a discussion have taken place where editors objected to incorporating that content into the article. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, "distinctly American". Europe had a rich heritage of theater, but we had a mix of cultures able to come out with our own new art forms while the Europeans were stuck in the past. For the Black population here in America, minstrel shows offered their first opportunity for people of color to go out on their own (The Christy Minstrels). Early gospel groups also toured the country. Then came tap dancing and jazz. I was surprised to learn when I worked on the yodeling article: When the European Tyrolese Minstrels toured the United States for several years in the early 1840s and created an American craze for Alpine yodeling music, four unemployed white actors decided to stage an African-American style spoof of this group's concerts. Calling themselves Dan Emmett's Virginia Minstrels, the performance was wildly popular and most historians mark this production as the beginning of minstrelsy in the U.S. According to jazz historian Gary Giddins:
Though antebellum (minstrel) troupes were white, the form developed in a form of racial collaboration, illustrating the axiom that defines – and continues to define – American music as it developed over the next century and a half: African American innovations metamorphose into American popular culture when white performers learn to mimic black ones.[30]
Also, it would surprise most people to know that Jimmy Rogers, who was known as the Father of Country Music, created his sound by combining Southern blues with Austrian yodeling and songs of the railroad section workers, gandy dancers, that he had heard as a boy and then later when he did railroad work himself. Really, we have plenty to be ashamed of here, as have many if not most countries, but when it comes to music, I rate us number one of the world. Sectionworker (talk) 03:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Do you have reliable sources to back up your view that this information is highly disputed? I support inclusion because it is distinctively American, not because it presents the United States in a negative light. In my opinion, a picture like File:Minstrel PosterBillyVanWare edit.jpg (a featured picture) would be more illustrative than a lot of the images in this article.  — Freoh 14:06, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Meserve, Walter J. An Outline History of American Drama, New York: Feedback/Prospero, 1994.
  2. ^ Bauch, Marc A. (2011). "Gentlemen, Be Seated!" The Rise and Fall of the Minstrel Show. München. p. 4. ISBN 978-3-656-08656-7. OCLC 118945996.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

A path forward

Taking Thebiguglyalien's advice to rework it one section at a time, we should focus first on the United States#Culture and society section as it seems to be the most hotly-debated section at the moment. I propose that the first step should be to collectively identify and select a handful of recent (last few years), highly reputable tertiary sources to be synthesized and subsumed into a new text in WP:summary style. Once we have our best of the best sources, in Moxy's words, then we can start to compose a text derived strictly from those highly reputable academic sources. Hopefully this approach with harmonize dissonant energies to the benefit of the article. إيان (talk) 05:46, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

One source I propose, one I have cited several times, is:
I'd also like to remind active editors of the wealth of high quality academic sources available to them through the WP:Wikipedia Library. Remember, for summary style we're looking for encyclopedias and textbooks. I'm interested to see what such sources others might recommend. إيان (talk) 05:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
WP:PSTS—Best to write about historical concepts and events using high quality, academic secondary publications while saving tertiary sources as aids for clear and concise expression. (While acknowledging the current political context makes for a protracted task). One section at a time is a very good idea. — Neonorange (talk to Phil) (he, they) 09:31, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
Great suggestion and thanks for the opening to agreement. For starters, the first few lines are problematic. I removed them because of poor sourcing and was reverted. One of them is, "colonial college scholar" J. David Hoeveler and the other is controversial political scientist Samuel P. Huntington. Sectionworker (talk) 13:43, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
As with writing any research paper, let’s focus first on selecting our sources before concerning ourselves with writing text. Using the most recent reputable sources will naturally resolve issues such as those. إيان (talk) 13:53, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
I agree. First, reliable, non-partisan and neutral RS need to be identified. Discrediting authors behind some of the sources already in the article is not a way to begin this process. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
For more specific history articles, absolutely. But for the Culture and society section in a WP:Summary style article such as this, highly reputable tertiary sources are most useful, at least for creating a basic initial framework that’s balanced for WP:due weight. إيان (talk) 13:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
That liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government are professed U.S. ideals doesn't seem very disputable to me.
I don't know of any historian that denies that liberal democracy, property rights, and limited government are fundamental U.S. principles. (Or that equality under the law/social equality aren't part of its professed ideals.) Huntington is a controversial source: but that's not necessarily problematic if we're citing relatively uncontroversial subject matter. KlayCax (talk) 06:37, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
KlayCax, what's your high quality current academic textbook or encyclopedia that supports the above statement, which differs from how the material is actually presented currently in the article:
Americans have traditionally been characterized by a unifying belief in an "American creed" emphasizing liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government.
This statement has grave WP:NPOV issues by giving WP:undue weight to this particular POV at the introduction of the section. It also has issues with WP:balance because experts would disagree on the extent to which liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government are materially applicable to US culture and society, and those expert critical views are not represented. To explicitly state that values such as these are professed would probably be fair, but if it's not given prominence in current, high quality encyclopedias and textbooks, it's WP:undue in this small section of a WP:summary style article. إيان (talk) 15:07, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
democracy and liberty
The data comes from V-DEM institute. (See here.)
property rights
Seems indisputable. Replicated by many reliable sources.
a preference for limited government
Seems indisputable. Replicated by many reliable sources.
As one text book puts it: American values are "the sanctity of personal property, the rule of law, self-determination, the rights of the individual against the power of the state, freedom of speech and religion, freedom of the press, due process rights..."
Another put it like: Although the list of what America stands for varied somewhat from writer to writer, there was agreement that American values include democracy, tolerance, freedom (including free speech), pluralism, individualism, and secularism.
Another says: To review from Chapter 2, predominant American values include personal independence, limited government, meritocracy, and incrementalism
Another says: The United States has one of the most individualistic cultures in the world. Americans are more likely to prioritize themselves over a group and they value independence and autonomy.
Equality/equality under the law
Raymond Arsenault says America has: bedrock... values of fairness and equality under the law.
Edward I. Sidlow states: The ideals and standards that constitute American political culture are embodied in the Declaration of Independence, one of the founding documents of this nation, presently in its entirety in Appendix A. The political values outlined in the Declaration of Independence include natural rights (to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness), equality under the law, government by the consent of the governed, and limited government powers. In some ways, the Declaration of Independence defines Americans' sense of right and wrong. It presents a challenge to anyone who might overwish to overthrow our democratic processes or deny our citizens their natural rights. The rights to liberty, equality, and property are fundamental political values shared by most Americans.
And so on and so forth. KlayCax (talk) 04:07, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
KlayCax, don't seem to have gotten the point. Many scholars and experts have said many things that are true about the US, but it doesn't all necessarily go into this tiny section. The task before us is to isolate a handful of the best tertiary sources upon which to craft a super short summary of US culture and society for this article; otherwise we're putting the cart in front of the horse, which would surely cause WP:due weight issues. You mention anonymous textbooks—are any of these recent, highly reputable sources you'd like to present for our collective consideration? إيان (talk) 16:24, 27 April 2023 (UTC) إيان (talk) 16:24, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Agree that we should not overemphasize the American Creed.  — Freoh 19:54, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Another high quality source for this section, also published by Oxford University Press though:

إيان (talk) 15:26, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

The two RS that you have suggested are five and ten years old. That's fairly recent, and yet when one considers that so much has occurred in the last five years, for example the killing of George Floyd, take a knee, the 2017 Women's March, mass shootings, and others, where would one find the RS that you find acceptable for these cultural events? Sectionworker (talk) 21:01, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
That's a fair concern. I found these:
إيان (talk) 04:29, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 4 May 2023

Because there are some new things about the USA that they missed out on and some other things. [[User:Joe Biden|Joe Biden] (talk) 01:09, 5 May 2023 (UTC)


The U.S. is a country of 50 states covering a vast swath of North America, with Alaska in the northwest and Hawaii extending the nation’s presence into the Pacific Ocean. Major Atlantic Coast cities are New York, a global finance and culture center, and capital Washington, DC. Midwestern metropolis Chicago is known for influential architecture and on the west coast, Los Angeles' Hollywood is famed for filmmaking. ― Google Speaker: Kevin McCarthy (Republican Party) Trending Capital: Washington, D.C. Dialing code: +1 Population: 331.9 million (2021) Attorney general: Merrick Garland Gross domestic product: 23.32 trillion USD (2021) World Bank — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dallesk1ng (talk • contribs)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. -- RockstoneSend me a message! 01:15, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 6 May 2023

Hi, I'm adding USA into a category list of "G7 nations". Thank you! 田中まさこ (talk) 02:41, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

 Not done for now: That category was recently deleted per the deletion discussion here and appears like you have recreated a version identical to the original. I have tagged the category for deletion for this reason, but if it is not deleted then I'll add this page to the category. Tollens (talk) 02:54, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Redundant tag?

 Question: could we remove the {{cleanup rewrite}} tag? Unless I am mistaken, all of the proposed rewrites center around WP:NPOV issues, which are already covered by the (more informative) {{NPOV}} tag, and it seems redundant to include both. I tried to remove the redundant tag, but Pizzigs re-added it [10]. Rockstone35, could you explain what your {{cleanup rewrite}} tag covers that the {{NPOV}} tag does not?  — Freoh 19:51, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Source for 2023 prison population update

It is apparently disputed which country has the highest prison population in this source. When I click on the source and select prison population total and entire world the US comes out on top with a prison population of 1,767,200 and China in second place with a prison population of 1,690,000. Am I the only one seeing this? Now I recall this being flipped a few months back with China ahead of the US, although I don't remember the numbers. As such, I'd say this does not qualify as a reliable source for major articles like this one and Incarceration in the United States. — Preceding unsigned comment added by C.J. Griffin (talk • contribs) 18:29, 7 May 2023 (UTC) EDIT: It looks like the source is accurate, confirmed by Timeshifter's edit to Incarceration in th United States.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 20:23, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Why is transgenderism, abortion and black lives matter treated as exceptionally important things in this article?

This discussion has been closed by Freoh. Please do not modify it.
Hate is disruptive.

The transgender movement in the United States has no basis in reality because it's the freest country in the world. Wanting to use a restroom while not looking like a real female (and still having male genitalia) is not a reason for protest because the person is anatomically male, so why does the article treat it like it's an institutional barrier? Abortion access isn't entirely illegal, as at the state level it is legal in those places. The fight for abortion isn't some issue that is killing millions a year, yet quite the opposite. Black lives matter has done nothing but riot and cause disruption to justify million dollar thefts from retail stores. There isn't any institutional racism at all because it is illegal. A white cop shooting a dangerous and armed suspect who happens to be a black isn't any cause for concern. Really, this article makes it look like that these issues are the biggest problems in America, yet alone there is a debt over 30 trillion dollars and black issues/LGBT/abortion politics are apparently the biggest problems.

Black lives matter is not a legitimate movement, and the transgenderism ideology isn't either as it is legal and there is not federal law against it. Blacks here are lucky that they were brought over from slavery since if it wasn't for whistling dixie, they would still be in the stone age. This article is extremely biased in what issues it presents as a problem and it should be removed. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and not a place to push political bias, right? Or am I mistaken? Black lives and identity politics and abortion shouldn't be on here since it has no historical precedent as most of this is recent (except for the civil rights movement of the 60s). Please tell me why and maybe inform other reasons why this point-of-view pushing exists. Is it on purpose or is it blissful ignorance of what Wikipedia is supposed to be? GrandCoaxial (talk) 20:07, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you have reliable sources to support your suggestions? Sectionworker (talk) 20:35, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
I left a welcome message on your talk page which provides links to information about Wikipedia. Please read the policy of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. What goes into the article is what is found important in reliable sources, which have chosen to give prominence to civil rights issues over the deficit. Whether or not they should do so is not an issue that we can question here. TFD (talk) 20:53, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
I honestly hope you are just a troll because I don't think somebody can be more hypocritical than the guy who calls this article biased saying that BLM, identity politics, and abortion aren't important? Just because there are some things you define as "not a reason for protest" that doesn't disprove the fact that they are still being widely protested and debated around the country. Considering the Roe v. Wade overturning and the multiple protests that have bloomed from that controversial Supreme Court decision as well as multiple legislating bodies passing abortion-banning or -restricting laws, I would definitely define that as important. Black lives matter & police brutality also were very notable topics worldwide since the untimely death of George Floyd in 2020, with protests breaking out in large cities across the U.S. and the world, so I think I'd consider that pretty notable.
To combat your claim that institutional racism doesn't exist because it's illegal: Child labor is illegal in India, yet this article provides researched claims about millions of child laborers still working in the country. In the United States, heroin is illegal, yet the CDC says that over 143,000 people died from heroin overdoses from 1999-2020. Just because something is illegal doesn't mean it doesn't happen. That's why we have prison.
Also please, use some citations the next time you want to promote a very unpopular and critical opinion (especially one that's outwardly biased toward trans people, black people, and women). I am an ally and a friend to many people of whom you described so poorly. phrogge 'sup? edits 05:15, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
Transgenderism is mentioned once, blm protests are linked to once, and abortion 4 times in two areas. All instances are in the context of central political issues since 2010, or while noting that states can have vastly different laws on even hot button issues (like abortion), and they are pretty far down and in the middle of paragraphs. This does not seem to be "treated as exceptionally important" to me. 142.115.142.4 (talk) 02:38, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
The article appear to have changed since GrandCoaxial posted their complaint. Transgenderism is currently a single-word link. BLM is not included at all. They seem to be under-mentioned. CurryCity (talk) 00:06, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 01:24, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

minus Removed the image from this article and replaced it with a free one.  — Freoh 00:11, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Change image of territories?

I think the current infobox image used to depict U.S. territories (File:US insular areas.svg) could be replaced with File:United States (+overseas), administrative divisions - en - colored (zoom).svg, which shows the territories themselves as opposed to just circles on a map indicating their location on a map, and also showing specific states. Thoughts? DecafPotato (talk) 02:34, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

It's notable that the content of these two diagrams are different; specifically that disputed guano islands are listed in the proposed diagram but not the existing. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 03:37, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 28 April 2023

Add the official flag File:Flag_of_the_United_States_(DoS_ECA_Color_Standard).svg Loganp23 (talk) 00:22, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

There has been an edit war over this for a while and now that there is an official source you can not reject it anymore Loganp23 (talk) 00:24, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
 Not done: If there has been or there currently is an edit war over this then all involved editors should stop immediately and instead have consensus discussion on this talk page. Any edit which is likely to be contentious / contested precludes it from being performed via an edit request. Even if there isn't an edit war, changing images within an article is generally considered contentious de facto due to the prominence of their placement, and in this particular case changing the variation of country's flag is even more likely to be challenged. Please establish consensus before creating another request. —Sirdog (talk) 03:57, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
 Question: who opposes this change, and why?  — Freoh 20:15, 30 April 2023 (UTC)
From what I've just read, the colors of the flag currently on the article aren't based in a specific guideline (besides just 'blue'), so I wonder why the DoS color would be opposed. DecafPotato (talk) 03:57, 3 May 2023 (UTC)
DecafPotato and Freoh, to clarify, I am not currently opposed to the flag being changed as I'm not really invested one way or another. I also didn't check to see if an edit war happened or not. Editors are free to perform edit requests that were declined by others if they are comfortable or willing to do so; declines are not formal rejections. I simply declined this one as it is my experience patrolling WP:ER for awhile that any alteration of an image that isn't an overwhelming unambiguous correction - like reverting vandalism - falls under changes that are likely to be controversial from WP:ER. Cheers! —Sirdog (talk) 11:01, 3 May 2023 (UTC)
It was from before the DoS version was added, a few months ago. I added the flag since it was listed on another official website, and it was immediately changed back. This happened a lot more over the next couple days 2605:59C8:1C4:7A10:989A:2C83:4DF2:E8A7 (talk) 01:31, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
 Done because nobody opposed this change.  — Freoh 19:31, 6 May 2023 (UTC)
Pizzigs, could you explain your opposition?  — Freoh 20:18, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

"The country began expanding across North America, spanning the continent by 1848"

Isn't this just a little bit euphemistic/question-begging? I mean I know the lead section needs to be kept short but shouldn't the Mexican war be mentioned more explicitly than this? How about: "The country began expanding across North America, and following their 1848 victory in the Mexican–American War spanning extended across the continentby 1848." (additions in underline, deletions in strike-through) FOARP (talk) 12:39, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I mean, the article later expands on the whole "manifest destiny" thing. The lead is not the place to write the whole article, and picking a single event/war/whatever begs a greater question "why that one war, when my favorite war is more important?" Best to just leave it as a basic summary, so people can read more later. We can't put everything in to the lead. --Jayron32 12:51, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
And if you want to get really technical, the continent was "spanned" two years earlier, when the Oregon Treaty was settled. It was 1846 when the U.S. got its first stretch of Pacific coast. --Jayron32 12:53, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
Hi Jayron, thanks for your response. I take your point, but aren't we mentioning the war obliquely with the 1848 bit anyway? And like you say, the sentence is technically not accurate. I get that the article does discuss the war in the body-text, but the lead section is supposed to summarise that, and I'm not sure it's doing so properly here. FOARP (talk) 13:01, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
The body text mentions a lot of wars. Summarizing them all in a few words in the lead is probably not great. I might merely rewrite the information as something like "During the nineteenth century, the United States political philosophy was informed by the concept of manifest destiny, as the country expanded across the continent in a number of wars, land purchases, and treaties, eventually reaching the Pacific Ocean by the middle of the century." Sometimes being less precise is more useful here. --Jayron32 13:08, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
I think that proposal would be an improvement as a summary and I would agree with adding it in. FOARP (talk) 14:12, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
 Done. --Jayron32 14:19, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

1619 image / cotton gin image

After reading the recent justification for a non-consensual removal of the 1619 image of slaves landing at Jamestown (now in the TP archives despite taking place less than 30 days ago):

If we're going to add another picture related to slavery, it should be in relation to the cotton gin. 1619 had little long-term impact on American slavery. KlayCax (talk) 17:02, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

I added an image of just that It was deleted by the same user without discussion. [diff] In their edit summary, they mention "other images of slavery" in the article. There are none: only a map which shows free states and slave states more than 200 years after slavery in the US began. -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 18:54, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Thank you SashiRolls.
information Note: KlayCax has also recently inserted their comments into the conversation above about WWII images, distorting the conversation and obscuring the clear consensus, and until now refuses to re-organize them. إيان (talk) 21:16, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
SashiRolls, I retrieved the conversation from the archive and placed it below, in case you would like to contribute your perspective. إيان (talk) 21:40, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
While the 1619 image seemed to me like a good one, the argument that slavery primarily served Europe's sweet tooth until the invention of the cotton gin is not wrong. As such, adding a photo of slaves operating a cotton gin seemed like a reasonable compromise. Perhaps @KlayCax: could comment on their reversion of two people who added an image of what they themself had suggested. Let us also be clear: a map of free states and slave states is not an image of slavery. I forget whether wp:ose is uniquely focused on AfD, but the recourse to comparison with articles about Sudan or Singapore (death penalty) is misguided. -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 09:19, 22 March 2023 (UTC)
I'd that this image is quite fair. It shows both American slavery and its relationship to the cotton gin, and I am not opposed to its reintroduction. The Night Watch (talk) 13:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)
If there are no objections, I am going to revert this edit.  — Freoh 00:35, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
I'm writing a new section on it now. @Freoh: @The Night Watch: @SashiRolls:
It'll be up in the next 24-36 hrs. I've been busy with residency. KlayCax (talk) 02:02, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
Actually may be more like 48 hrs. Sorry, something came up and I was busy with other things on here today. (The post is going to be 1,500+ words, likely.) KlayCax (talk) 06:41, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Having seen no objections, I reverted.  — Freoh 14:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
I don't object to the cotton gin image. @Freoh:. As I wrote above: If we're going to add another picture related to slavery, it should be in relation to the cotton gin. 1619 had little long-term impact on American slavery It's the nuclear testing photo/1619 picture that's problematic. KlayCax (talk) 22:30, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
For the other stuff: I'm almost done writing a full response to the other problems related to the article. Residency's kept me pretty busy and there's a lot on my plate right now.
Sorry for the slow response time. KlayCax (talk) 22:31, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

image restored (May 6). For some reason Pizzigs deleted it despite the consensus here. -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 20:28, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Once again, other countries with a history of slavery, in some cases far longer than that of the U.S., do not have such images in their history sections. There's no consensus, and I'm vehemently opposed to these additions. Pizzigs (talk) 09:05, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
One person objecting vehemently and edit-warring is not how Wikipedian consensus works (see WP:1AM).
No mainstream publisher would try to market an illustrated history of the United States with no pictures of slavery or the cotton gin. As for your claim about other countries on en.wp it is simply wrong. See Jamaica, Haiti, and Brazil for example. Unlike the page on Brazil, the image is not being added to show the cruelty of slavery (there the image is of a slave being whipped). What is being illustrated is a major historical invention which changed history. (I live in a region where wool, silk, and hemp were the major textiles until the market was flooded with cheap American cotton.) Of course the boll weevil would later have an inverse effect which led to the beginning of the Great Migration...
If you wish to start a neutrally worded RfC such as "Should the page United States contain any pictures of slavery?" to gather support for your view that this page should contain no images of slavery I suppose you could. -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 10:02, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
I'm not opposed to the inclusion of a cotton gin image per se, provided it has a balanced description (although it is questionable whether it is notable enough to be included in this article); however, it is concerning that the major Atlantic slave-trading nations (Portugal, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, the Netherlands and Denmark) do not have such a disproportionate focus on slavery in their articles compared to the United States that had slavery in the first place because America had been colonized by the Europeans. Pizzigs (talk) 11:55, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Could you please say what you find imbalanced in the caption "William L. Sheppard "First Use of a Cotton Gin" (1790–1800), Harper's weekly, Dec. 18, 1869"? Thank you.
Your argument (that the page on the US should not include information on slavery because pages like those on France do not) is quite unlikely to convince me since I have added information about France's role in the slave trade to the page on en.wp and to pages on fr.wp long before you created the Pizzigs account. I also notice that you have gone beyond 3RR (three reverts) again today on this article. One major difference with many of the countries that you mention is that what remains of the country is not where the slavery took place, and as a result the practice did not fundamentally change the country's culture as in the case of the United States. (cf. Sectionworker's comments on the African-American role in shaping American music below in the section on yet another image you deleted). This is a large part of why the "it's just so unfair!" argument is misguided / irrelevant. -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 15:27, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
With due respect, my point still stands, and I doubt that image passes WP:DUE for this article. Perhaps, it would be better suited for History of the United States or other related subarticles. I've already pointed out that a railroad image is, in my opinion, more relevant for the U.S. history of the 19th century, if you feel there's not enough images already. Regarding your unilateral introduction of a new image to the music section, it was controversial and violated MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE. Regarding your accusations, I believe Freoh has already ventured down that path. Pizzigs (talk) 16:31, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
The cotton gin was invented in the 18th century, as the caption of the image makes clear. There is nothing preventing us from including an image of both the cotton gin in the 18th C. and folks building railroads in the 19th C. Perhaps @Sectionworker: would be willing to help with that, given that her pseudo is directly related to the question? :) -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 19:27, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Yes, I'm okay with that. Pizzigs (talk) 20:57, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
SashiRolls, help with what? And what does "given that her pseudo is directly related to the question" mean? Sectionworker (talk) 17:10, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
I read somewhere on the internets that "section hand" or "section worker" was a more formal name for a gandy dancer, and so thought you probably had some expertise to lend on the question of straightening sections of track that had been pulled out of place by passing trains in the pot-melting heat. Quite an apt metaphor for wiki-editing really. :) But to answer the question more simply and directly, I thought you might have a favorite 19th C. photo (or video) of the railroad to add... -- SashiRolls 🌿 · 🍥 20:27, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
Every time I've tried to add anything about our rich AA heritage I get a response such as "Hard to believe, given your propensity for cherry picking and manipulating data to push a certain anti-American agenda to the article." I'm sick of it and have mostly given up on this article. Another editor and I wrote the Gandy dancer page. It was a lot of fun. There is no fun here. Sectionworker (talk) 21:38, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Foreign relations

The last two sentences are less than accurate. US-Indian relations have little to do with poor relations with China -- there's no cause and effect as inferred. Why no mention of the Uyghurs, the South China Sea, Taiwan? The last sentence seems to suggest that the US (one of several "key allies of Ukraine") is alone in making Russia suffer "badly deteriorated relations." Deteriorating relations were there before the Ukraine War and the annexation of Crimea, and Russia has contributed to them. 173.77.71.234 (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.117.227.17 (talk) 19:58, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

It does not state that Russia has suffered "badly deteriorated relations" in general. It states that Russia has suffered "badly deteriorated relations" with the U.S., which is true. DecafPotato (talk) 21:34, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, and that's another problem: the US isn't a key "ally" of Ukraine but one of many supporters. "Allies" of the US are France, the UK, South Korea, not Ukraine. Most of the entire Western World supports Ukraine and opposes Russia. The current wording fully implies that the US stands practically alone as an "ally" (erroneous term) and bears major responsibility for deteriorating US-Russia relations, though Russia has the key role as an invader. The Kremlin couldn't write it better. If the preceding sentence re India isn't bad enough, both sentences illustrate this article's recent cognitive decline. 63.117.227.17 (talk)

Although I don't agree with your interpretation of the last sentence's implied meaning, the sentence is problematic in other ways. First being WP:OR; neither of the two cited sources describe the US as a key ally. The Carnegie source does go into detail about how US-Russia relations deteriorated after the annexation of Crimea, but does not cover the more recent conflict. The CNBC source merely summarizes US military aid to Ukraine and doesn't directly support the claims. In addition, the sentence in general feels like recentism in the context of the rest of the section. I think the sentence can be safely removed altogether, and if warranted, re-written with proper sourcing and moved to Foreign relations of the United States. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 09:46, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Regional languages

New "information" added to info box is pure disinformation. English is not a regional language at all but the de facto national language. French has a protected status in Louisiana but is unofficial. The other bulleted languages listed are actually official elsewhere. Even the footnote is wrong: 31 states officialize English, not 28. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.77.71.234 (talk) 15:52, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Please sign your username after posts. This page already says that English is the de facto national language. This page does not say that French is an official language in any region of the US, but merely says that it is a regional language. As it has a protected status in Louisiana like you said, I don't see anything wrong with calling it a regional language then. And regional languages can be official elsewhere, like in the case of Turkish, a regional language in Kosovo being the official language in Turkey. The footnote is not wrong as well, it says 28 states only recognize English as an official language, with 31 states in total recognizing English as an official language. 2601:600:9080:A4B0:91D2:667:AE13:349C (talk) 17:58, 6 May 2023

In no way is English a "regional language". It's the main language of all 50 states and most territories, and it cannot be listed as "regional." French being introduced as a "regional language" does not agree with French in the United States--it's a minority language, spoken in a very small area of two states. A "region" in the U.S. is the South or the Midwest. Territorial languages like Samoan are not "regional" either. Spanish, the only true regional language here, is listed well after its place of importance. The accurate wording should be Minority languages, with English deleted, Spanish first, French second, and Native languages including Hawaiian, Alaskan, and Samoan next. You bring up Kosovo, but the two dominant languages are not even listed in the info box as "regional". There is far worse to see in this United States article, but the erroneous "regional languages" (explained nowhere in the text) is one more example of this article's recent decline. 173.77.71.234 (talk)

You know what, I think that's reasonable. Thanks for the proposal. I will make the change when I become extended confirmed if no one objects. OmegaMantis (talk) 16:07, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

"미합중국" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect 미합중국 has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 May 11 § 미합중국 until a consensus is reached. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:57, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 14 May 2023

Please can I edit I get info about this country fast and live here andd was born here Nathaniel Lawrence (talk) 20:39, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. The Night Watch (talk) 20:46, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

"3rd World country with a Gucci belt" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect 3rd World country with a Gucci belt has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 May 19 § 3rd World country with a Gucci belt until a consensus is reached. ––FormalDude (talk) 07:34, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Paragraph 3 on large wars

In the third paragraph, perhaps mention the USA's isolationist policy in WWI and that, while direct conflict between the USA and USSR was avoided in the Cold War, both countries propped up opposing military regimes in other countries, exacerbating several civil wars in Latin America. Thank you. Mckeeinarcata (talk) 21:15, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Both of those points are made later in the article; I don't think they're specifically notable enough to include in the lead section. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 23:06, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for this good work; but "informed" by manifest destiny?

This is good, but, "informed by the concept manifest destiny" should not be used (it's in the second paragraph). Manifest destiny was used to attempt to justify some truly evil actions, and there is no way to show that these were "destined" to occur; people could have made more humane and peaceful choices. Use of "Informed by..." suggests that the writer is a subscriber to the concept of manifest destiny, which is rare. Perhaps "compelled by the concept of manifest destiny" or "they attempted to justify their policies with the concept of manifest destiny" would work. Thank you. Mckeeinarcata (talk) 20:40, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

 Done I agree that "informed by" is a little odd, and I have replaced it with "influenced by", which is factually accurate without implying anything further. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 03:26, 23 May 2023 (UTC)
Thank you. 47.208.146.32 (talk) 20:11, 23 May 2023 (UTC)
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