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