[WikiEN-l] Sep 11

Thu Jan 15 22:02:06 UTC 2004

Daniel Mayer wrote:

>Tarquin wrote:

>>At any rate, I agree with the removal of the term
>>"terrorist" from the title.

>Why? The term 'terrorist' is almost always in the title of the incident when
>it is referred to in any place I've ever seen a reference (although it is
>very often just called "9/11" or "September 11" in the USA but those titles
>are not specific enough for us). The incident also perfectly fits the
>definition of terrorism. So there is no reason not to use it unless it is
>unreasonably offensive. I would, in fact, argue that *not* having the word
>'terrorist' in the title would be unreasonably offensive (IMO, that would be
>white-washing, or at lest sanitizing, the title).

This assumes that there's a reason for it to be in the title at all.
Why is that?  What else could "September 11, 2001 attack" mean?
Titles are not required to be maximally complete.
Furthermore, the attack on the Pentagon was /not/ obviously terrorism,
since it was an attack on a military target.
(I would argue that it was terrorism, but only given the context of NY.)

>>That is was an attack, at least, is undisputed :)

>Taking out the word "terrorist" in light of the fact that the word is very
>commonly used in the title and fits the definition, goes against our common
>name naming convention and also creates a needlessly vague title. It also
>supports the POV that the incident was not a terrorist act which is absurd
>since it perfectly fits the definition.

Leaving "terrorist" /out/ of the title absolutely does *not* support
any position that the attack wasn't terrorist.  How could it do that?
There is no presumption that titles include all relevant information.
(That's what the article /body/ is for. ^_^)

Our "common name" naming convention also doesn't apply
unless the phrase "September 11 attack" is /not/ commonly used
without the word "terrorist".  (That may be true, but I don't know it.)

>So if something is commonly called something, fits the definition, is not 
>unreasonably offensive, then that term should be used. 

Names are not required to be complete!

>More generally (meaning not directed toward Tarquin):

>Blacklisting terms is a very bad idea and is more PC than NPOV. Let's not
>forget that PC is in fact an extreme form of POV and is *not* akin to NPOV at
>all (which really deals with article *content* and not titles - titles are
>dealt with through our naming conventions).

I remember once trying to convince you of this very thing:
NPOV is primarily about article bodies, not titles,
and titles need to be further determined through arbitrary conventions.
That was a while ago, so I won't pretend that I changed your mind
(or even that your mind changed since that was a different context);
still, I'm glad to see you say this.

>PC = "politically correct" . Political correctness in the United States is a
>political and social movement which aims to use changes in language to
>prevent offending people who leftists think are offended by the use of
>certain terms. PC also aims to help change the way other people think by
>changing the use of certain terms (rather Orwellian if you ask me). This is
>*not* at all NPOV and should *not* be associated with the 'unreasonable
>offensiveness' clause of our common name naming convention (which is largely
>agendaless, unlike PC).

Since this is a digression, I won't go on about what slander the term "PC" is.
Suffice it to say that no social movement called itself that.
All that "politically correct" nonsense is neither here nor there.

>Wikipedia needs to *follow* common usage, not try to change it!

True, but that's really not relevant to this debate,
since both "September 11 attack" and "September 11 terrorist attack"
can be found, in common usage, to refer to this event.
(Also, there is no particular naming convention for this sort of thing.)
Thus our name is free to err on the side of caution.

-- Toby