Wikipedia talk:We shouldn't be able to figure out your opinions

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Is this even remotely true? What on Earth is this essay talking about? We have hundreds of political userboxes (see Wikipedia:Userboxes/Politics/Ideology) ranging from anarchists to Old Whigs. People can, and do, put any old crap on their userpage: "This user seeks to eradicate Trumpism wherever it slithers", "This user knows that tax cuts increase freedom and growth", "This user eats the rich", "This user is an anarcho-capitalist", "This user is interested in the Praxis Marxists in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia"... all proudly displayed at the top of people's userpages. We have people that literally have their opinions in their username -- how, precisely, are we supposed to look through the edits of a user named "Feminist" and not have any idea whether they support feminism or not?

Moreover, it's pretty easy to infer someone's political positions based on broad associations. Can we figure out the political opinions of someone whose last 50 edits were to format the references in Presidency of Ronald Reagan, format tables in Remington Model 887 (citing the owner's manual), and update figures for Charlton Heston filmography... do we get points for this? Is the person doing anything wrong? If we go to their userpage and it says "This user is a proud supporter of gun rights", do we get to own them by linking this essay and saying "ha, of course"? Conversely, if someone spends a week copyediting Fifth International, Rosa Luxemburg, and Commodity fetishism, have they committed the sin of scrutability? Must they also go over and fix the portrait on Ronald Reagan so we don't figure it out? It just seems kind of silly to me. jp×g🗯️ 01:43, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

You are completely ignoring the phrase "based solely on your edits" and what follows it. Therefore, this section is a total waste of our time. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:24, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

@Valjean: Feel free to send me an invoice for the time you spent reading the first paragraph of my comment and skipping the second one. jp×g🗯️ 02:16, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 18 November 2023 (1)

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Withdrawn, substituted by a different request. Where is Matt? (talk) 23:19, 18 November 2023 (UTC) Where is Matt? (talk) 23:19, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

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Wikipedia:We shouldn't be able to figure out your opinions → Wikipedia:We shouldn't be able to figure out your biases – It's all about being neutral. Hence, the more WP:PRECISE word would be "biases". Where is Matt? (talk) 20:07, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose - This page is not just a restatement of WP:NPOV, it is about the concept of being inscrutable. It is the argument that when we are being neutral and unbiased, that our opinions will not be obvious from our edits. The proposed name change changes the purpose of this essay and makes it pointless. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 20:15, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Requested move 18 November 2023

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved (non-admin closure) BegbertBiggs (talk) 01:15, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

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Wikipedia:We shouldn't be able to figure out your opinions → Wikipedia:Your article edit history should not reveal your biases – More professional (don't use the first person "we") and better reflect the content of this essay. Where is Matt? (talk) 23:23, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose - Move rationale is flawed. This page is not just a restatement of WP:NPOV, it is about the concept of being inscrutable. It is the argument that when we are being neutral and unbiased, that our opinions will not be obvious from our edits. It is literally about how we shouldn't be able to figure out opinions from our editing (or it was before your run of edits today). The proposed name change changes the purpose of this essay and makes it pointless.Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 23:36, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

You seem to be hung up on the word "biases". So just to clarify, would you be in favor of a proposed move to WP:Your article edit history should not reveal your opinions? Where is Matt? (talk) 23:43, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

Although that one doesn't have the same problem, I don't see any reason why we would want to change to that. The rationale for the move seems weak. I am unaware of any guideline that suggests "we" should be avoided in titles, and "more professional" appears to be entirely a personal value judgement. If it ain't broke... Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 23:56, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

See WP:TONE. And yes, I know that it applies to articles and not essays. But that doesn't mean that our essays, intended to provide additional insight into policy, should be written using colloquial language. Using the first person "we" is colloquialism.

So yes, it is very much broken. This version of essay (prior to my edits today) reads like it was written by a 3rd grader. I have applied some WP:TNT to it with 14 edits, and the essay's title is very much part of the WP:TNT that the essay needs. Where is Matt? (talk) 00:49, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Twice now you've made a comment about it being written by a 2nd or 3rd grader. I'd ask you not to do that again, see WP:NPA. In reply to your comment, though - WP:TONE doesn't need to apply to non-policy essays. It's okay for something to be written in an informal manner, and plenty of essays are. We don't need to make everything dry and sanitised. — Czello ^(music) 10:01, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

This is not a discussion about the content of the essay. This is a discussion about the title for the essay. In my opinion, my proposed title better reflects the contents of the essay (which was poorly written before I edited it -- and no, criticism of the writing style absolutely does 'NOT constitute a personal attack). Where is Matt? (talk) 15:03, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

When you say things like "it reads like it was written by a 3rd grader", yes that's a personal attack. It's an insult on the person who wrote it. There are ways for you to convey your views on the tone without comments like that. — Czello ^(music) 16:27, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

If it makes you feel better, I'll apologize for writing that I think that the essay "reads like it was written by a 3rd grader", and replace it with "I think this essay is very poorly written". Where is Matt? (talk) 16:31, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Agree with Czello (and, for the record, also their edits to the article today). I'll add a couple of points. "We" in the article title is not first person, and certainly not colloquial. It is referring to we, the community. I wonder what other famous documents I can think of that start off with something like "We, the community". Perhaps some synonym of "community". And this tone question gets to the nub of the issue here. I don't think you have understood this article before you sought to change it. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:56, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose. Not only are the changes unnecessary, but the change of tone would lead to harassment and stalking of otherwise good-faith editors. There seems to be some unspoken assumption that the perfect editor exists, one who has no biases. No, we all have them, but that doesn't necessarily mean that if the biases occasionally peak forth from hiding they are evidence of a bad editor with an "agenda". We should just try to keep them out of our editing, and we trust other editors to civilly alert us when we fail. I have written an essay about this, especially related to NPOV: NPOV means neutral editing, not neutral content.

Where is Matt?, maybe you should write your own essay, rather than trying to change the meaning of this one. This could encourage some editors to mercilessly analyze and monitor every single edit by another editor, and this will end up causing good-faith editors to be dragged to ANI and other drama boards, making it impossible for normal people to edit here. This would create a hostile environment. We don't need that. The original wording was fine and got the message across just fine.

That doesn't mean that one cannot make improvements in grammar and presentation. Just stop treating this as your own website. Make small edits that don't change the direction of the original essay. Create your own if you want to do that. You should learn from what just happened at Wikipedia:Disambiguation dos and don'ts. You marched in there and made a lot of edits, even edit warring over them, and all of them have been reverted. Again, don't treat this place like your own playground. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me)

Not sure how you think I changed the meaning of the essay. If you'd like to give specific examples, we can discuss (in a different section of this talk page). I'd like to believe that all my edits constituted an improvement, but if you have a different opinion, we can discuss. Where is Matt? (talk) 03:56, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Not sure I at all understand the demand for it being "professional". If it were egregiously unprofessional or offensive I could understand, but I don't see an issue with the current title. I don't believe essay titles need to be sanitised or made completely dry - take WP:REICHSTAG as an example. Given that this is an essay and not a policy, WP:TONE doesn't apply. Additionally, "biases" and "opinions" aren't necessarily the same thing. A bias might imply an unfair perspective on something, rather than a general opinion. I also agree that sending someone this article under the proposed title might unintentionally be perceived as unduly harsh - we're not always accusing someone of being biased. — Czello ^(music) 10:00, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Suggestion for userfication

User Czello edits of this essay are consistent with WP:OWN. My suggestion to them would be to WP:USERFY this essay if they want to more control over the essay's content. Where is Matt? (talk) 15:34, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

It's important to understand that just because a user started an essay, does not mean that it is not subject to the rigors of community scrutiny once placed in the Wikipedia namespace domain. Where is Matt? (talk) 15:36, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

On the contrary, I'm not opposed to people editing the essay - indeed, I left most of your edits in. I undid some because 1) I felt thy missed the point, with reasoning I gave in the edit summary (often times not AGF), and 2) I felt they weren't improvements as they needlessly sanitised the article. I'm afraid I don't accept it's a case of WP:OWN as it's still acceptable for an article's creator to undo edits provided it's justified.

As Valjean suggested above, I think you may have somewhat misinterpreted the meaning of the essay in some instances. It's not just about malicious biases from users seeking to spread propaganda, it can also be unintentional opinions slipping through into their editing. Indeed, I feel you removed a few references to this in your edits, while I still feel it's important to AGF. The things I restored were an attempt to make sure we're not accusing people of being malicious.

The other things I restored were around making the article to formal or, as I say, "sanitised" - but that's been addressed in the move request above by myself and other users.

Nonetheless, I want to reiterate that I don't think all of your edits were wrong and I'm not insisting that the essay cannot have changes made to it. I do think you've improved it in many places - but overhauling it to make it into something it wasn't intended to be (or trying to make it more "professional") I think missed the point. — Czello ^(music) 16:26, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Not clear why you are taking exception to making the essay more professional. If you object to the essay being professionally written, please userfy it. Where is Matt? (talk) 16:34, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm saying it's unnecessary – why does it need to be? There's no requirement, and plenty of essays can be a bit of an easier read than having to make it dry. — Czello ^(music) 16:36, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

"Not necessary to be professional" is the reason you didn't use professional language when you wrote it. I came and made the WP:TONE more professional. You objected to that. If you object to that, you should userfy the essay. Where is Matt? (talk) 16:41, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

That's a bit of a non-sequitor. Why does it need to be more professional? — Czello ^(music) 16:53, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm somewhat surprised that I need to explain it, but if you put it in the Wikipedia namesapce, and you want people whom you don't know to read it, then it needs to be professionally written. If you want to write something for yourself, or for your close friends, you post it on social media and that does not have to be professionally written. If you feel the need to post things in a non-professional tone, Wikipedia gives you your own user namespace with quite a bit of latitude for what you can put there. Hence, if you really want to have this essay written the way you intended for it to be written, using a colloquial tone, you may want to consider userfying this essay. Where is Matt? (talk) 17:34, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

You are missing the point. Essays do not have to be written in a "professional tone". Who made you the sole arbiter for that anyway? Essays are not in the same class as articles. There is room for freedom of expression in tone, language, and topic. If you find yourself disagreeing with an essay, maybe you should consider writing your own essay. It's a fun and educational process.

BTW, we do not allow the changing of the direction of essays here. Editors who disagree with an essay are encouraged to create their own essay. The original purpose of the essay should be respected. Even with articles, the existing formatting and style are dictated by the creator of the article, and later editors are supposed to keep the formats and style used in the original (as long as they do not violate the MOS). This applies even more to essays.

So, instead of endlessly repeating "consider userfying this essay", try creating your own essay as other editors here are not agreeing with you. Stop kicking the dead horse as it's disruptive. For a newbie, you're getting a reputation as a combative and edit-warring editor, and that is not good. Now your actions are on the radar of even more editors. I suggest you back off. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:57, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

“Although many are simplistic, all rules of writing share a worthy goal: clear and vigorous prose. Most writers want to achieve that. And most want to achieve something more, the distinction that is called a style. It’s an elusive goal, but the surest way to approach it is by avoiding the many styles that offer themselves to you. The world brims over with temptations for the writer, modish words, unexamined phrases, borrowed tones, and the habits of thought they all represent. The creation of a style often begins with a negative achievement. Only by rejecting what comes too easily can you clear a space for yourself.”

• Kidder, T. & Todd, R. (2013) Good Prose. Random House.

The chapter that comes from is called The Problem of Style. It would be an instructive read. I would perhaps particularly point you to the heading, "institutionalese". There is no requirement that essays conform to a particular (perhaps stuffy) tone. Neither Wikipedia essays nor anywhere else. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 18:55, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

if you put it in the Wikipedia namesapce, and you want people whom you don't know to read it, then it needs to be professionally written. That is simply not true, and I'm not sure where you've gotten that from. There are essays that have been up for literal decades that don't adhere to that principle. I think the other two users have very well addressed your points, however (and I thank them), so I won't dogpile. — Czello ^(music) 21:31, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

@Where is Matt?: WP:MFD is that way. Steel1943 (talk) 23:22, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

@Where is Matt?: I think you are misunderstanding the types of essays we have in projectspace. Sure, some of them are basically owned by the community (and it is worth trying to argue with people to change them), but some are obviously the opinion of the person/people who wrote them. Note, for example, that we have a WP:MANDY and a WP:NOTMANDY that basically disagree entirely. It would not be a good idea to say something like: "well, one of them must be incorrect, so we should edit that one to agree with the other". They're opinions; we can just leave them be. jp×g🗯️ 07:30, 22 November 2023 (UTC)