Fanlore talk:Plural Point of View

User pages

A User Page is not to be confused with a page about a person in Fanlore - the distinction is explained in detail in our FAQ. Uh, this isn't even a question in the FAQ, let alone a detailed explanation of the distinction. Should this sentence be yanked, or is someone going to address the question Real Soon Now? I have to confess, my first thought was to write up my editor page and then redirect regular pages using my old and new pseudonyms to the editor page. Now that I know these are to be distinct, I won't, but for the life of me, I don't have any idea why. --zvi 19:52, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Zvi, the reason why a redirect would be ill-advised is that on your User page you control the content completely (to the extent that it stays within the ToS) and you control the point of view; furthermore, the PPOV does not apply to your User page - the tone is your choice, as is the content. If a page about you NOT controlled by you exists on the wiki, it would certainly be great that it a/ lists your other names and b/ links to your User page, but it will also be there so that other people can come write things about you that you might not have thought of yourself (or even wanted to include, but which are true/relevant of your fandom history/involvement).

Now, you're right that the missing FAQ is disturbing, and that the distinction nededs to be further explained. We'll get right on that! Thanks for pointing it out. --anatsuno 20:07, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Fact vs. opinion

--Doro 13:27, 11 August 2008 (UTC) We do not strive to establish a "true" account of events, explanation of practices, or definition of terms. We do not believe this exists in fandom.

I think this goes a bit too far. Do you mean to say that factual truth doesn't exist? It's often difficult in fandom to establish what really happened and that's why we need a plural point of view (and I think the PPOV is a really good idea!), but shouldn't we try to get as close to the truth as possible? When there is irrefutable evidence that something happened a certain way (dates, an old tv guide, links, actual copies of a text that is quoted by some people as saying this and by other people as saying that), I don't see why in such a case a differing opinion should have equal weight.

Furthermore, I think there is a contradiction between May indicate the perceived prevalence of a viewpoint within a community and should be given equal weight. All opinions are valid, sure, but not all opinions are equal: There are majority opinions, minority opinions, minority opinions that used to be majority opinions before there was a shift some time in the past; there are opinions held by a single person, opinions that are a majority or minority opinion depending on the fan community, etc. And there are reasons why an opinion is a majority or minority opinion or why it changed.

Without that frame of reference the quality of the information suffers and I would rather have good information than something that says everything is equal and there is no truth.

What do you think?

The PPOV policy refers to "every contribution of interpretation or experience" not facts, so I don't think it's a problem. It will be clearer once we have an example. --Cathy 21:41, 11 August 2008 (EST)

Doro, I see what you mean; and Cathy has it pretty close - I think we need to clarify that "we believe in interpretation rather than 'establishing truth' in situations where factual data is not available". So, for an example, it's a fact that Supernatural started airing in 2005; but it is not a fact that fans write Wincest because they're clinically disturbed (to use an extreme example! *g*). Would a clarification of PPOV such as that help towards sorting out this page/policy? --Hope 06:23, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I think making the distinction between fact and opinion would be very useful, especially with a real example (something like the one you gave here). --Ccupitt 13:49, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

This discussion caught my eye as I was checking recent changes--and it goes directly to something I wondered about in the PPOV statement, which I also love, but there is a difference between fact and interpretation (and opinion!), and that could be noted, with some good examples. I like the limits set ("events, explanation of practices, or definition of terms"), but I'm also wondering if some good examples of how to make qualifications in entries (to avoid the false universalizations we're all prone to making when writing in haste and in more informal spaces where people understand "fandom" means mostly "those of us in this little corner of fandom who mostly but not entirely agree") Robinr 20:53, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Inclusive vs. finite language

Under General Guidelines: Sorry, I'm not sure what is meant by this sentence: Use more inclusive than finite language when sharing your viewpoint Could you provide an example finite and inclusive? --Lian 17:02, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Possible misrepresentation of Wikipedia NPOV policy

I believe that this page misrepresents Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy due to a flawed understanding of how Wikipedia's NPOV policy works. As such, the current writeup of the PPOV policy may be confusing to editors coming from Wikipedia and other wikis with a similar NPOV policy. As of writing, the page currently describes NPOV policies as trying to establish a single or objective account of events.

Fanlore is not a traditional encyclopedia that strives to establish a single account of events (as in "Neutral Point of View").

Wikipedia's neutral point of view (NPOV) policy presupposes that it is possible to write from an objective perspective. We do not strive to establish a "true" account of events, explanation of practices, or definition of terms. We do not believe this exists in fandom.

However, Wikipedia does not aim to establish a single account of events or to establish a 'neutral standpoint' as a correct one. Wikipedia's FAQ page on NPOV disputes that NPOV is about objectivity.

"There's no such thing as objectivity"

Everybody with any philosophical sophistication knows we all have biases. So, how can we take the NPOV policy seriously?

This most common objection to the neutrality policy also reflects the most common misunderstanding of the policy. The NPOV policy says nothing about objectivity. In particular, the policy does not say that there is such a thing as objectivity in a philosophical sense—a "view from nowhere" (to use Thomas Nagel's phrase), such that articles written from that viewpoint are consequently objectively true. That is not the policy, and it is not our aim! Rather, to be neutral is to describe debates rather than engage in them. In other words, when discussing a subject, we should report what people have said about it rather than what is so. This is not to say anything philosophically contentious; indeed, philosophers describe debates all the time. Even sophisticated relativists will immediately recognize that "neutrality", in this sense, is perfectly consistent with their philosophy.

Now, is it possible to characterize disputes fairly? This is an empirical issue, not a philosophical one: can we edit articles so that all the major participants will be able to look at the resulting text, and agree that their views are presented accurately and as completely as the context permits? It may not be possible to describe all disputes with perfect objectivity, but it is an aim that thousands of editors strive towards every day.

In addition, per Wikipedia's own policy pages, the goal of NPOV is to describe and explain the sides of a subject without taking sides itself. This goal aligns with Fanlore's PPOV rather than contrasting it. From the PPOV page as of writing:

The plural point of view:
...Does not attempt to legitimize any fannish viewpoint; it does not seek to denigrate or marginalize any fan group

From Wikipedia's "this page in a nutshell" description of PPOV:

Articles must not take sides, but should explain the sides, fairly and without editorial bias. This applies to both what you say and how you say it.

In practice, I find that Fanlore's plural point of view policy is very similar to Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy. The main points of difference I find is that Fanlore has no notability policy for viewpoints (which is appropriate, given that we are dealing with oral history), and uses and encourages inclusive and positive language and writing style.

As such, I think that this page should be edited to more accurately represent Wikipedia's NPOV policy, in order to create a more clear differentiation between NPOV and PPOV. Confusion between the two policies is something that I see a lot of new editors struggle with, myself included when I was first starting out on fanlore, and I believe that the issues in representing Wikipedia's NPOV policy contribute to the issue. Pinky G Rocket (talk) 15:30, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. That reminds me I was trying to collect some notes on the PPOV policy to write a Fanlore page about it and got a few answers about where it came from in this post. I also hadn't looked at the policy page itself in a while: looking at it now, I think another reason for the policy is that plenty of "reliable" sources or non-fans may judge fandom as a whole negatively, and this wiki takes the non-neutral view that fandom as an activity is ok, that different ways of doing fandom are ok, and that is the baseline POV of every wiki page.--aethel (talk) 00:18, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

I agree with the analysis above, and it would still help if this page talks about what's really different between Fanlore and Wikipedia when it comes to NPOV and PPOV, although 'they are pretty similar' might be a good starting point. We might want to focus on "due weight", perhaps. My understanding is that Wikipedia asks editors to present mainstream views prominently, proportional to the mainstream-ness of each viewpoint. (due and undue weight) Fanlore might want you to present popular opinions in fandom at large prominently, but I don't think that applies to mainstream views in general, inside and outside of fandom. Even the first might be debatable - do we want to dedicate 90% of a page to what 90% of the fandom says, or do we prefer diversity rather than that? --Potpotkettle (talk) 09:24, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

PPOV does not adequately address certain topics

I have some additional thoughts regarding PPOV that are separate from the earlier thoughts on NPOV vs. PPOV, so I'm splitting these thoughts into their own section.

As of writing, Fanlore's PPOV policy page does not address certain topics that I believe should have dedicated sections or be expanded upon in specific subpages, similar to Wikipedia's content guidelines pages. These topics include:

• Pages about people, especially living people;
• Topics regarding or related to spiritual beliefs, including organized religion;
• Topics often characterized as pseudoscience, fringe beliefs, and conspiracy theories.

• (edit: added this point 8/6 Pinky G Rocket (talk) 04:09, 7 August 2023 (UTC)) Pages about fan activities that are illegal under many jurisdictions, such as media piracy, and specific events/occurrences involving illegal behavior, such as assault.

All three four of these topic categories have specific, important questions that are not adequately answered by the policy page and existing help pages, such as Help:People pages. These topic categories also need additional care and thought when writing content for them, as they often attract editor disputes and hostile edits. Having dedicated policy rules and guidelines will help editors discuss how to cover these topics and help editors who may not feel comfortable covering these topics. As some examples, here are some PPOV questions that I do not think are adequately answered by the policy page (to be clear, I am not looking for answers to these questions, these are questions folks may ask):

• How do I balance different viewpoints when writing about a person on Fanlore, including negative viewpoints?
• How does Fanlore document fan activity and behavior which is illegal in many jurisdictions, such as media piracy?
• How does Fanlore address and document public accusations of criminal behavior towards fans and people relevant to fandom?
• Fanlore allows original research from editors and has no reliability policy. How does this apply to writing articles about people?
• What should I keep in mind when writing an article about myself or my own work?
• How do I cover viewpoints often characterized as pseudoscientific?

Pinky G Rocket (talk) 01:50, 6 August 2023 (UTC)