Wikipedia talk:Requests for mediation/Reproductive rights

message: Hey there, I'll be work as mediator for this case if you'll have me. You will want to watchlist this page to keep abreast of the discussions.
As always, mediation is voluntary. I do not believe I have any conflict of interest with this case, however if for any reason you feel I would be inappropriate as a mediator for this case, you may choose to decline and wait for a committee member to become available. Declining me as a mediator will not be held against you in any way.
Please note below whether or not you agree with me mediating this case by adding "I agree" or "I disagree". I look forward to working with you. Shell babelfish 18:37, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Thank you for taking the case. --Phyesalis (talk) 19:15, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

text: I agree per AGF.  :-) (Not remembering having met you before, but assuming that all the mediators know what they're doing, as you seem to with the collapsing of the previous conversation above.) --Coppertwig (talk) 03:18, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

text: I agree. Blackworm (talk) 03:23, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Introductions

message: Thank you very much, Shell.  That looks beautiful:  very well-organized.  I think seeing things laid out like that is helping me see some things a little differently.  For example, I'm not sure I had really noticed the word "primarily" before in the sentence "FGC transcends religion as it is primarily a cultural practice."  Perhaps also because some time has passed, this sentence doesn't seem to mean the same thing to me that it did before.  Perhaps this sentence doesn't contradict the idea that FGC is a religious practice for some people.
I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be commenting here.  I'm afraid to mess up the nice layout.  But I need to correct an error:  I wasn't the one who found the journal articles.   Phyesalis added them to the article as references before I was involved with the article: Cook Freedman What I did was I went to a local university and obtained copies of the articles so I could read them. --Coppertwig (talk) 02:50, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest it would be as easy as slapping RR are HR into the article and its counterpart; obviously its not that simple an idea.  I fully support attributing the opinion, as we should do with all opinions. Shell babelfish 16:30, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you, Shell, for joining this discussion and framing this aspect so succinctly.  Attributing the opinion is my suggested solution as well, however there seems to be disagreement on how to do so.  Phyesalis seems to believe that citing the source using an inline footnote is sufficient; Coppertwig and I disagree and believe that such a statement requires us to explicitly state whose opinion it is.  Explicitly attributing the views later than the first sentence is one option, but that seems to give the appearance that we are presenting evidence in support of the first statement (thus, the opinion), whereas if the statement (opinion) itself were attributed neutrally by referencing proponents, further elaboration would only give the appearance of supporting the neutral statement, which IMO is preferred.  I'd be interested in hearing Phyesalis' and your thoughts on these details.  Blackworm (talk) 17:52, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

text: Usually, on Wikipedia, when I hear "attributing a statement" it means to me that we explicitly attribute the statement in the text, not just by providing a reference.  For example, if there was a significant minority who thought the moon was made of cheese, we might say "The Green Cheese group believes that the moon is made of cheese, while the majority of scientists think this is bunk."   (Okay, we'd probably find a better way to write that ;) ) Obviously, we'd use inline references so people can see where we got our information from and read more about it, but its still important to clearly state in the text who belongs to which opinion. Phyesalis, is this something you could agree to as well? Obviously the wording would still have to be worked out, as well as what par t of this belongs in the lead vs elsewhere... Shell babelfish 18:18, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I generally agree with you, but in your example the opinion presented is that of a minority, and one might argue that saying "the moon is made of rock, not cheese" requires no explicit attribution.  I believe Phyesalis makes this argument by presenting sources using terms such as "majority," "international context," and "consensus," which Phyesalis seems to believe is sufficient for the claim to be cited as fact.  This is a pattern common to most if not all aspects of this dispute.  Is that reasoning sound?  Blackworm (talk) 18:36, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think majority or even consensus opinion can be stated as fact when it comes to telling people what to do.  If almost everyone agrees that the moon is rock, a Wikipedia article can just say "The moon is rock."  But if almost everyone agrees that people should stop when they come to a red light, I don't think a Wikipedia article should say "People should stop when they come to a red light." Instead, it could say something like "Stopping at red lights is required in countries around the world."  It's a matter of whether it's a verifiable fact, or a normative statement.  I don't think giving an attribution in a later sentence would be good enough to allow a normative statement to be stated directly in the article as if Wikipedia itself is asserting it to be true. --Coppertwig (talk) 23:11, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

text: Sorry for the delay - new job - completely unexpected offer. I hope you won't mind, but it's going to be a few more days before I can give this adequate time. Please accept my regrets for the inconvenience. --Phyesalis (talk) 20:01, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: No worries, I'm just glad nothing bad happened.  Congrats on the job :) When you get a chance, I think everyone has pretty much gone over their positions on this particular issue, so if you can let us know where you agree and where you disagree, we'll see where we can go from there.  Thanks. Shell babelfish 00:35, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Ah, great to hear from you, Phyesalis.  Congratulations!  I'm not in a hurry – I seem to be rather busy myself these days. --Coppertwig (talk) 01:22, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like we're still waiting here.  Phyesalis, could you give us an estimate of when you think you'll be available again for mediation?  Thanks for your help. Shell babelfish 08:00, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

text: I don't object, but I'm not sure where that leaves us.  Until now I have been mostly patient about editing disputed material, but it seems the dispute now suffers from an absence of proponents on one side.  Would it be inappropriate for me to edit, for the moment, as if no dispute exists, leaving room for the possibility for Phyesalis to return and resume this mediation later?  Blackworm (talk) 23:25, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it would still be a good idea to be very careful in your edits by making sure your following Wikipedia policy, but otherwise, editing doesn't have to stop when one editor becomes unavailable.  Since its been such a long time since the Mediation was asked for, I'd probably ask for an update on the list of things that need to be mediated anyways -- if anything comes up while Phyesalis is gone that they have concerns over, we can add that as something to address during the mediation. Shell   babelfish 23:32, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you.  (Wow, that was fast.)  Blackworm (talk) 23:34, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I already posted a note on Phyesalis' talk page on April 14 that I will soon start editing the articles she asked me not to edit. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 00:00, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comments