Talk:The Dialectic of Sex

Recent edits

I have recently had to revert a series of edits that had the effect of turning the article into a rant about how wonderful The Dialectic of Sex is. Most of the material I removed was either poorly sourced, or had no apparent source of any kind. Much of it was biased, and some of it was frankly irrelevant to this article.

An example: "The goal is to eradicate sex distinctions that essentially enslave women. To some degree, society has achieved this in the 40 years since her book was published." Fascinating, except that how society has or has not changed in the last 40 years has pretty much nothing to do with The Dialectic of Sex. The apparent implication there is that The Dialectic of Sex is somehow responsible for the last four decades worth of change in gender relations. I hardly think that's the case.

Another example: "An example of its prescience is the possibility of reproduction of children outside of a women's uterus in order to free the woman of the means of reproduction. While this would have sounded grossly far-fetched for its time, components of this are a routine reality today." Again, even if that were true, what does it have to do with this book and why does it belong in the article?

Another example: "The fiercest opponents of women's rights have attempted to quell her exceptional aptitude for psychological analysis, assimilation of historical information, and plain foresight at the age of 26; however, the bestseller quietly remains a significant landmark." That's simply promotional material, praise of the book's author and endorsement of the book's agenda, and of course that's completely inappropriate.

Another example: "It must be noted that upon the publication of this book in 1970, a married woman did not have her own credit rating, and if she got a loan from a bank, she might be required to sign a promissory note that she will not get pregnant and leave her job. Female workers could also be fired if they became pregnant. Child-bearing and child-rearing were much greater barriers to female advancement than they are today, although they persist today." None of that was properly cited, and none of it is appropriate to the article.

Another example: "the majority of Freud's theories have been debunked by most mainstream psychologists and historians over the last 50 years". This is possibly true, but again frankly irrelevant.

I'd like to ask the editor who added that material to please see WP:VERIFY and WP:NPOV. He or she should also try reviewing WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 05:27, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Note: FreeKnowledgeCreator is referring to edits by Beauvy, seen here and here, here and here. The IP is also obviously Beauvy. Additionally note that some of Beauvy's edits to the Simone de Beauvoir article have also been problematic, such as recently removing the "Middle years" heading and therefore regulating all the subsections that were under that heading to an "Early years" heading, and having made an edit that has placed a WikiProject tag on the article's main page (instead of on the talk page where it should be). The only reasons I haven't reverted Beauvy at that article is because Beauvy is a WP:Edit warring, non-civil newbie (relatively new/significantly inexperienced with the way Wikipedia is supposed to work), and editors like that are always difficult to work with because they do not know of or understand Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines and/or disregard them when they learn of them until they become familiar with them and/or it is demanded that they follow them or be blocked from editing Wikipedia. As for Freud's theories, the majority of them have been discredited (which has been heavily discussed on the Sigmund Freud talk page), but, similar to what FreeKnowledgeCreator stated, addressing that in The Dialectic of Sex article is not necessarily relevant. Flyer22 (talk) 16:33, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

I think I may have gone slightly too far in removing everything Beauvy added, but there is no doubt that most of that material was inappropriate - either overly-promotional of the book and its author, or else irrelevant to the article. In all the content Beauvy added, there would be maybe one or two sentences that might be acceptable. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 19:50, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

I would like to weigh in here... I would have removed many parts of the additions, only because that vast majority of the additions have been unsourced, some of it controversial. 107xxx: or Beauvy can you put the citation up with your work, rather than be one have of edit-warring? I think both side should take a breather for a bit. Dinkytown talk 03:16, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

The problem with Beauvy's additions isn't only that most of them are unsourced, or that they are often "controversial" (eg, blatantly in violation of WP:NPOV and aimed at praising Firestone and her work). Many of them are altogether inappropriate to this article. The stuff about Freud being discredited is an example. Even supposing that to be correct, it really has nothing to do with Firestone's book. Beauvy's addition reads, "For example, she believed that Freud's theory of family dynamics was wrought with cultural bias for the reason that he could only observe the dynamics of psychology in its immediate social context. This observation is upheld by many who have debunked Freud's theories over the last 50 years (including both mainstream psychologists and historians)." That makes it sound as though all the criticism of Freud that has been made since The Dialectic of Sex was published has somehow supported Firestone's specific criticisms of Freud, which is nonsense. Freud has been criticized in many different ways by many people since 1970, and very little of that criticism has anything to do with Firestone. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 05:43, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

The articles suffers from gross bias, inaccuracy, and lies by omission all by one user FreeKnowledgeCreator. It is difficult to know where to begin:

1. "Firestone reexamines Freud's ideas from a radical feminist perspective." this is NPOV.

2. Firestone does not "argue that incest should be welcomed." She actually argues that if one breaks down the nuclear family construct, incest taboo will naturally dissipate.

3. There is much too much emphasis on "incest" "penetration" and familial sexuality that is misinterpreted from the book, and take center stage in a book that is actually about "seizing the means of reproduction to build a new dialectic materialism of sex" (i.e., the book is philosophically deeper than "welcoming incest" and "misinterpreting Freud"). All of this material is a gross and upsetting distortion of fact.

4. The citations do not appear, eg, there is no citation for: "Firestone's work has been much criticized for its perceived reductionism, biologism, historical inaccuracy, and general crudity, for example, by Mary O'Brien in her 1981 book The Politics of Reproduction." This book does not state this, and this book is not cited. A quoted page reference is absolutely required for this grossly POV material. I doubt "general crudity" is ever stated.

5. By the middle, the muddied unreadable article has become about Freud. It soapboxes on Freud and Jung. Jung should not even be mentioned because he is unrelated to the thesis. Freud is relevant to the thesis but is not properly explained.

6. The criticism of Mitchell is off-topic in the sense that her book is related to Freud and feminism, not The Dialectic itself as the author implies. This is evidence since her book appears 30 years later. Thus the book is not a direct critique as the article now reads.

6. "Firestone's work has been much criticized"- "much" is added by the author who uses only one reference for criticism.

7. All positive receptions are omitted and all of my contributions on this have been reverted by FreeKnowledgeCreator over the last week.

In general, the article is grotesque as it stands, and has been entirely disrupted. The entire article should be removed until their is some semblance of fact produced.

I am going to learn how to report this disruption for generalized factual inaccuracy especially as FreeKnowledgeCreator will not allow any other contributor to this page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beauvy (talk • contribs) 00:39, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for using the talk page. Unfortunately, your comments are full of incivility and personal attacks. This is not welcome or acceptable behavior on Wikipedia. Please see WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL. To reply to your numbered points, however:

1. "this is NPOV." I don't even know what you think "this is NPOV" means.

2. "Firestone does not 'argue that incest should be welcomed.' She actually argues that if one breaks down the nuclear family construct, incest taboo will naturally dissipate." Please see WP:VERIFY. The statement that Firestone would welcome incest is based on a reliable source.

3. You say that "There is much too much emphasis on 'incest' 'penetration' and familial sexuality that is misinterpreted from the book" . That is your opinion, which I don't share. I don't see any misinterpretation here, and you haven't explained how any of the material is a misinterpretation. I don't care if you or anyone finds the material "upsetting."

4. You obviously don't know what you're talking about. Everything - including the statement that the book has been criticized for its "general crudity" - is properly cited. Perhaps you're confused because Mary O'Brien's 1981 book The Politics of Reproduction isn't directly cited. The statement about what she states is from Jeff Hearn's article "Gender: Biology, nature, and capitalism" in the Cambridge Companion to Marx, and it reads as follows: "Although much criticized on grounds of reductionism, biologism, historical inaccuracy, and general crudity (e.g., O'Brien, 1981), Firestone's approach has been of lasting significance in reviving interest in the control of biological reproduction, fertility, or even sexuality as possible bases of patriarchy." Maybe you don't like that statement, but that's really too bad. There's nothing "POV" about quoting the opinion of a scholarly source: Wikipedia policy in fact encourages this.

5. You say that the article is "muddied" and "unreadable". If you could explain how the article is "muddled" and why it is "unreadable" that would be more useful than simply making assertions. Complaints that the article is poorly written or organized are useless if you are unable to explain how the article could be better written or organized - and you've certainly failed to do this. You're clearly wrong to say that the article is in any way "about Freud." I don't know what you think it means to say the article "soapboxes on Freud and Jung." Jung is relevant here inasmuch as a reliable source that discusses Firestone's work deals with him, showing that it is from Jung that Firestone derives the expression "Electra complex." You say that the article doesn't properly explain Freud, but obviously it's not trying to explain Freud, it's trying to explain Firestone's interpretation of Freud, which is something entirely different.

6. (This is in reply to both the points that you numbered "6"). No, Juliet Mitchell's criticism of The Dialectic of Sex in Psychoanalysis and Feminism is not off-topic. It is a discussion of the book the article is about. The fact that The Dialectic of Sex is not the overall topic of Psychoanalysis and Feminism is completely irrelevant. Also, please stop embarrassing yourself by claiming that Mitchell's book was published 30 years after Firestone's. Firestone's book was first published in 1970, and Mitchell's book in 1974. That makes a gap of 4 years between the books, not 30. As for your complaint about "Firestone's book has been much criticized", the citation provided fully backs up the statement to which you object.

7. I removed the material you added because it wasn't properly cited. Again, see WP:VERIFY.

As for "disruption", it's you, Beauvy, who has been doing that. I note that while you have been critical of how I have edited the article, you have had nothing to say in defense of your preferred version of it, which I find to be of poor quality. Much of the material in it is uncited, or irrelevant and inappropriate, or both. PS, templates don't belong on the talk page. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 03:31, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

you cite Mitchell as 2000 in the article, but you claim its 1974 on the talk page. This is one of the many inaccuracies that do not allow discussion on this page to progress. It is because your citations are wrong, that one cannot move forward. Additionally, recalcitrance in considering anyone's opinion on the book, is itself indicative of severe biased and ownership. Your use of subjective words like "obviously" "it's not the way you like it" and "many criticisms" etc, indicate an aggression over this page that clouds your objectivity. No matter how many times you say it is, the material is not properly cited and is inaccurate. You also reference books you do not cite. Regarding the thrust of the book, as I said, it is dialectic materialism and there is so little focus on Electra complex and zero focus on Jung. There is no promotion of incest. Your article does not explain FIRESTONE's views on Freud. It explains yours. You have egregiously misprinted many aspects of the book. If you want my views, you will see my last revision, which is what I am reverting to. I cannot repeat myself incessantly. Dialectic materialism is the focus. You need to move away from incest, penetration, Jung, electra. The fact that you took away on salient sexual aspects of the book indicates a biased experience. No other page, including amazon.com, will summarize the book remotely the way you did. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.211.139.63 (talk) 04:31, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Regarding "personal attacks" there have absolutely been no personal attacks on you on this talk page. I am not sure what is going on, but it is incredibly aggressive behavior. You should allow other users to edit this page and ask for references. You have not allowed a single word of my 3,777 character edit and have actually, personally attacked me on this page. Regarding non neutral POV perhaps you should read the below summary to familiarize yourself. one is no supposed to give undo weight to non prominent critiques, opinions, interpretations. Please also see, WP:VERIFY and WP:NPOV and familiarize yourself with those. Thanks.

From Wikipedia:Neutral point of view: Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.211.139.63 (talk) 04:41, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

FreeKnowledgeCreator you should familiarize yourself with this important article by Susan Faludi, a recognized scholar, which is where I obtained most of the critiques you deleted from this page over the last week. One of the critiques includes the "prescience" of the book, which apparently strikes you as non factual. However, it is scholars and not I have called the book "prescient." The reason is that she predicted in vitro reproduction before it had commenced as a scientific phenomenon. I realize you do not want this to be true, but all the aggression in the world cannot change the fact that this is true. YOu also cannot change the notable fact that she wrote this book at age 25, which is unusual, and noted in almost every critique of the book. Again, no more talking, just read:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/04/15/130415fa_fact_faludi

The article is in dispute and will remain there, until I have time in my schedule to fix the biased inaccuracies and non sequiturs. I would revert to my earlier version, but you will delete it and then make up rules to report me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.211.139.63 (talk) 06:24, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

You commented above, "you cite Mitchell as 2000 in the article, but you claim its 1974 on the talk page. This is one of the many inaccuracies that do not allow discussion on this page to progress." There is no inaccuracy. Mitchell's book was first published in 1974. The edition of the book cited in the article was published in 2000. Do you really require an explanation of why these facts do not contradict each other? I'm afraid most of your other comments are on that same level of ridiculousness. They are barely coherent, and as such it is difficult to respond to them. With all the good will in the world, I can't see any rational argument in what you say, so there's really nothing for me to refute. If you think, by the way, that you aren't violating WP:CIVIL, then you're sorely mistaken. You accuse me above of "gross bias, inaccuracy, and lies" - you only weaken your position by resorting to that kind of language. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 07:39, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Your recent edits

Hi FreeKnowledgeCreator, I have included new material with references to reputably sourced books and articles that cannot simply be deleted. Please familiarize yourself with the rules of Wikipedia in removing reputably sourced content. I could use help cleaning up the section on infantilization of women by lumping them with children. This is discussed throughout several chapters but I did not have time to write cogently on it. Perhaps you could contribute. Much thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beauvy (talk • contribs) 08:20, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

Hi, I noticed you removed all of my material again calling it WP:coatrack. This does not appear to qualify as coatrack since I do not mention anything that was not in the book, and all citations are relevant. In fact, you have 3 paragraphs touting Freud and Jung, and mentioning Beauvoir in a negative light which is WP:coatrack. The book has nothing to do with Beauvoir or Jung, and only has to do with Freud inasmuch as she refutes his Oedipus complex and his inability to step outside of social reality of his time to provide a more extensive analysis of the family dynamic.

Ultimately, her book is also not about incest and sexuality. It is about dialectic materialism of sex, where sex refers to "biological" sex, rather than intercourse. Results of this new dialectic may include elements of sexuality. But your extensive reference of sexuality including penetration, Elektra complex, and incest undermines the true nature of the book. Few scholarly interpretations (Millet, Faludi, and even your own reference) focus on intercourse as frequently as does your version of the article. I ask that you revise, or summarize into one sentence so as not to detract from the crux of the work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beauvy (talk • contribs) 08:31, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

You say that I should, familiarize myself "with the rules of Wikipedia in removing reputably sourced content." I am familiar with the rules. You, however, apparently are not. You have removed significant amounts of reliably sourced material, apparently for no better reason than that you personally disagree with it. That's not acceptable, and you need to stop doing it. You also need to stop adding unsourced and irrelevant content, such as the following: "At the time The Dialectic of Sex as published, laws were different from those of today. For example, married woman did not have her own credit rating. Also, if a married woman received a loan from a bank, she could be required to sign a promissory note that she will not get pregnant and leave her job since at this time in history, there were no laws preventing against firing female workers who became pregnant. Thus, to understand the impetus behind the book, one would have to read in the context of the fact that child-bearing and child-rearing were much greater barriers to female advancement than they are today, although they do persist today." All of that text is unacceptable, first because it is uncited, and second, because it's not even relevant to the topic of the article, Firestone's book. You really need to re-read WP:COATRACK (or just read it, if you haven't yet). FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:02, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

you're wrong. you are the only one arguing on the talk page - nobody else is. social context is important. you can edit it but you cannot delete my entire content. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.211.139.63 (talk) 21:13, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

I REPEAT:

Ultimately, her book is also not about incest and sexuality. It is about dialectic materialism of sex, where sex refers to "biological" sex, rather than intercourse. Results of this new dialectic may include elements of sexuality. But your extensive reference of sexuality including penetration, Elektra complex, and incest undermines the true nature of the book. Few scholarly interpretations (Millet, Faludi, and even your own reference) focus on intercourse as frequently as does your version of the article. I ask that you revise, or summarize into one sentence so as not to detract from the crux of the work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beauvy (talk • contribs) 08:31, 3 November 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Beauvy (talk • contribs)

Thanks for your comments but I do think you need to re-acquaint yourself with the rules of removing reliably sourced content, and [[WP:coatrack[[. I have kept the all of your references that have been confirmed. I think it's relevant to keep the Mitchell references. Other references are either not appropriately cited or page numbers are incorrect. You also used severely biased terminology. You are free to remove my Social Context section but many other book reviews on WP include this. Social material is allowed if it is DIRECTLY related to the thrust of the book. Social context of the times is related since women had no yet "seized the means of reproduction" because they could not even obtain a loan. This is in the words of reviewers, not me. You do the same thing by spending many sentences talking about Freud Jung, Elektra, penetration, incest etc, which is more irrelevant than the social context in which the book was written. Please see other book entries on similar topics so you can understand. Also, perhaps you could reacquaint yourself with the dialectic of sex. Most of the inflammatory statements you have written are copied from blogs because I have googled them.

Nope, none of the material I added came from a blog. Do you have any idea how foolish it is, or how much it weakens your position, to make such claims without evidence of any kind? You accuse me of "lies" and then you come up with something like that? Regarding your "social context" section: yes, I can certainly remove it. Like any other editor, I am free to remove additions to articles that consist of nothing but uncited text, and that was all your "social context" section was. Your claims about references not being appropriately cited (which ones?) and page numbers being incorrect (again, which ones?) are baseless. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 03:26, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Incest

Regarding your favorite topic of incest, here are Firestone's views in Dialectic. This is not a "worship of incest," which you have written. You are creating Wikipedia:Disruption

Firestone argues that Freud is right to trace emotional problems – particularly what Firestone describes as a psychosexual preoccupation with power relations – to the repression of sexual feelings that a child once experienced towards his or her parents. However, she argues that Freud was wrong to accept that this was an inevitable repression, such that we cannot address the cause but only try to treat the symptoms.

Firestone argues that in fact we can and must address the root cause, which she identifies as the incest taboos that universally arise where children grow up in biological families. If children were not related to their caregivers there would be no specific need to have concerns about the possibility of sexual relations (assuming proper consent) between members of the child’s household, and so there would be no need to be paranoid about and to repress the sexual elements of a child’s total response to its first love – the mother. Moreover, the use of power to dictate what (sexual) feeling is permissible and to repress whatever is not, results in a sexuality that is inextricably bound up in power. This psychosexuality of power is perpetutated and reinforced as each generation plays out the same game, over and over.

In no revision of the article edited by me is it stated that Firestone "worships incest", so your comments are irrelevant. Anyone can check this simply by looking at the revision history of the article. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 04:20, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

There is no third party here whatsoever. Therefore, cease stating that I have no "consensus" when clearly neither do you, as consensus implies MORE THAN ONE. Also, REMOVE the "de" in Beauvoir; when French surnames have two syllables the prefix is dropped. THIS IS THE THIRD TIME I HAVE EDITED THIS and I am becoming irritated with your insistence on propagating these errors by reverting the entirety of my work.

What you are saying has no relation to reality. Although your edits to this article have usually been reverted by me, other editors have also reverted you. See, for example, the edit by Ishdarian here, and the edit by Jim1138 here. Flyer22 hasn't reverted you here, but she also evidently has a negative view of your editing, to judge from her comments in the "Recent edits" section above. Obviously, I am not the only editor who thinks your edits aren't very good. Your untrue assertions aren't made more valid by putting them in capital letters, which is unwelcome and comes across as shouting. I don't take orders from you, and I am not going to remove the "de" in "de Beauvoir" - she is virtually always referred to as "de Beauvoir" in English. If I have undone most of your edits to this article, that is because the large majority of them have been destructive and incompetent. That is not a statement about you as an individual. It is a statement about what you have done here. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 19:44, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Your recent comments in edit summaries are simply you repeating the same false assertions you have made in the past. For instance, you say here concerning the material on incest, "this is unrelated to dialectic. distally related to firestone herself." No. The material in question reflects Firestone's views as expressed in her book, and it is obviously relevant to the book. The book itself is widely available, and it is quite easy for interested readers to find a copy and verify for themselves what Firestone's views are. Here is a quote from the final chapter, "The Ultimate Revolution: Demands and Speculations": "Thus, without the incest taboo, adults might return within a few generations to a more natural polymorphous sexuality, the concentration on genital sex and orgasmic pleasure giving way to total physical/emotional relationships that included that. Relations with children would include as much genital sex as the child was capable of - probably considerably more than we now believe - but because genital sex would no longer be the central focus of the relationship, lack of orgasm would not present a serious problem." Firestone, in other words, clearly endorses and welcomes both incest and adults having sex with children. Far from being censored or hidden, these facts ought to be made clearer than they are, so that readers can see what kind of book The Dialectic of Sex is. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:18, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Here you say, "I can also say "like Santa Claus" if he held a similar view, but Santa Claus is irrelevant to dialectic." That comment indicates only that you don't understand the point of a section called "reception". The point of the section is to show how people have responded to Firestone's book. Mitchell responded to it, by among other things, noting that Firestone's views are similar to those of de Beauvoir. This is another obviously relevant, and reliably sourced fact. The rationale you gave for removing it is feeble. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:18, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Outline section overhaul

I've largely rewritten the "outline" section of the article here. Several things should be noted about this. One is that, although the new version is longer than the old, it nevertheless removes much material present in the older version. I believe significant portions of that material were undue, and have seen no difficulty in removing them. I have removed the statement that Firestone "welcomes incest", not because I regard it as inaccurate, but because on reflection it doesn't seem to me to be the ideal way of describing her views. While the older version was cobbled together from numerous different sources, the new one uses only a single source, which is Mary Anne Warren's discussion of Firestone's work in her The Nature of Woman. Perhaps for this reason, it may read better than the older version. I'll have more to say in the near future. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 02:54, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Editing disagreements

There appear to be two outstanding disagreements over the content of this article.

1. Beauvy thinks that the "de" in "de Beauvoir" should be removed, because (in her words) "when French surnames have two syllables the prefix is dropped." Beauvy has removed the "de" a number of times, most recently here. I have looked through numerous books and articles discussing Simone de Beauvoir in English, and none of them abbreviates her name as "Beauvoir." Each and every one gives "de Beauvoir" as the short form of her name. See, for example, Claude Francis and Fernande Gontier's biography Simone de Beauvoir, Penny Forster and Imogen Sutton's Daughters of de Beauvoir (an anthology with multiple contributors, who often refer to "de Beauvoir", but never simply to "Beauvoir" - in the few cases where they call her anything other than "de Beauvoir" it's "Simone"), Juliet Mitchell's Psychoanalysis and Feminism (which has a chapter dealing with de Beauvoir), Mary Anne Warren's chapter on de Beauvoir in her The Nature of Women, and the article on de Beauvoir in The Oxford Companion to Philosophy. This list of examples could be lengthened, but there is surely no point. These are all books and articles written to a high standard, and there's no reason to doubt their correctness of style. The question is therefore clear: "de Beauvoir" is correct in English, while "Beauvoir" is wrong. I don't believe that this article should use incorrect style simply to satisfy one user. It's important to get the question settled here, as Beauvy's mistaken view that "Beauvoir" is correct could potentially affect other articles as well.

2. Beauvy thinks that the reference to de Beauvoir should be removed from the "reception" section, because, in her words, "I can also say "like Santa Claus" if he held a similar view, but Santa Claus is irrelevant to dialectic." The apparent comparison between de Beauvoir and Santa Claus is misplaced. De Beauvoir was a key influence on Firestone's work, whereas Santa Claus was not. The fact that Firestone's views on any given issue resemble de Beauvoir's is a perfectly relevant piece of information, then. It gives readers context that can help them to understand Firetone's work, and there is no reason why it should be removed.

I realize that these both seem like fairly petty issues. Nonetheless, they do need to be resolved. I shall be placing a request for comment on these issues (I don't know if anyone is following this, but if they are I'm open to suggestions about how the RFC should be worded). FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 05:30, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

RfC: Two questions

Should the "de" in "de Beauvoir" be kept or removed? Is it appropriate to include Mitchell's comparison of Firestone to de Beauvoir in the "reception" section? FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 02:46, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

• Keep both the de in "de Beauvoir", and the reference to de Beauvoir in the reception section, per my elaborate explanation in the section above this one of why there is absolutely nothing wrong with either of them. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 02:50, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
• Use third opinion instead of a RfC. --I dream of horses (T) @ 02:54, 8 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Why? What on Earth would make you think that it's helpful to say something like that without giving a reason? Third opinion, so far as I know, is for situations in which only two users are having a disagreement, which does not describe what happened at this article. As you can see, I was having a disagreement with another editor, but I wasn't the only person who commented negatively on her editing - several other people besides me also thought her edits were problematic. Incidentally, despite my comments above, I no longer care at all about the "de" issue. I still do want to stop people from removing properly cited and relevant information without good reason, however. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 03:52, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Citation style

I've converted the short refs to {{sfn}} because the anchors that were in place weren't working. I hope this is okay. The function and appearance (apart from a slight punctuation difference) haven't changed. SarahSV ^(talk) 17:06, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for that and for your work on the article in general, SlimVirgin. I would have eventually made the formatting change you just made, or something similar, if you had not. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:01, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

You're welcome, and thank you for the work you've put into it. SarahSV ^(talk) 21:08, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Well, it's nice of you to say that, but the article is not in good condition at present. The "This article may need to be rewritten entirely to comply with Wikipedia's quality standards" tag is not there for no reason. The main reason it is there is the summary section, which is sourced to a secondary discussion of the book rather than the book itself. I am currently working on other things, but at some stage I will commit to re-reading the book and using it to rewrite the summary section. This will not be particularly difficult, as the book is quite short. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:11, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

I was thinking of trying to write a summary, but like you I can't do it immediately. If you get to it first, that's fine with me. SarahSV ^(talk) 21:13, 18 December 2017 (UTC)