Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Sanctioned Suicide/2

Sanctioned Suicide edit

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • Most recent review

Result pending

This article is poorly written and should not be marked as a "good article".

> Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.

The page's information is overwhelmingly negative, with almost no positives of the site and numerous criticisms throughout:

- "Although the forum frames itself as a "pro-choice" suicide forum, it has been widely described as "pro-suicide"."

- "has generated widespread scrutiny from news outlets and government officials for the encouragement of suicide by members on the site"

- "banned by the domain name registrar Epik, allegedly for the presence of minors on the site"

- "members' discussions have been characterized as condoning, downplaying, or advocating violence against women"

- "The forum has been widely described as pro-suicide"

- "noted that members have responded to attempts to direct people to hotlines or other supports with antagonism and accusations of being "pro-life""

- "including both detailed discussions of suicide methods and encouragement to commit suicide"

- "the first person in the UK convicted in connection to the site"

- "a male minor who was encouraged on the site to take his own life via the meat preservative sodium nitrite"

- "died by suicide after members of Sanctioned Suicide taunted him and suggested he should film his death"

The site URL was also removed from the article.

> Illustrated: ... media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.

The only media (other than the site logo) is a screenshot of the "Suicide Discussion" page, but the search was filtered to only show "method" threads, which is not representative of the site.

> Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.

The page was semi-protected because of edit-warring. Cat or other (talk) 01:02, 28 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Cat or other: I opened the first GAR and continue to agree that the article does not meet the criteria. Psiĥedelisto (talk • contribs) ^{please always ping!} 01:11, 28 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Cat or other, you have not notified involved WikiProjects, as required at WP:GAR. Please do so at once.

You appear to have three criticisms of the article: that positive viewpoints are not in equal proportion to negative ones, that the article is not illustrated adequately, and that the page was semi-protected:

Do reliable sources give equal prominence to the positives and criticisms of the site? From a quick look at the sources available online, it seems that most take a negative approach. Per WP:BALANCE, "An article should not give undue weight to minor aspects of its subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject." If the article was written to portray the site's positive aspects as having equal prominence as the negative ones, that would be a distortion of RS and a WP:FALSEBALANCE.
The GA criteria note that "the presence of media is not a requirement" for GA status; it also does not require that the media be "representative" of the site, but merely "relevant". If you feel that more representative images could be added, please be bold and add them yourself.
I must admit, I don't quite get your last objection. You are saying that because the page is semi-protected to achieve stability, it does not meet the GA criterion requiring stability? Some semi-protected articles are even FAs, like J. K. Rowling. I also don't understand why the removal of the site URL following a Request for Comment is relevant.

The arguments above are not persuading me, and thus I land at Keep. {~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 12:20, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

1. I've read the article on reliable sources, and the sources used are not reliable. Firstly, a number of the sources make unsubstantiated claims which are repeated in the article. Secondly, many of the sources are out of date, with repeated mentions of former owners, and 5-year old sources (the site was founded 6 years ago). There are not many sources about the website, which explains the negative majority. The article details a large investigation into the former owners, which constitutes undue weight.

2. The sole image is neither representative nor relevant. The paragraph beside the image is a site overview, not a focus on methods in the "Suicide Discussion" board. It is not my responsibility to make the article a good article; rather it is the responsibility of those who marked it as such. Cat or other (talk) 14:52, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You have yet to provide any examples of what you are talking about, Cat or other, or to notify involved WikiProjects as I noted above, which is your responsibility. Which sources are unreliable or out of date? Which claims do you feel are unsubstantiated? Why is the investigation undue weight? Why is an image of the forum irrelevant to an article about the forum, and what image would be an appropriate representation of the "Site overview" section? Have you read WP:BALANCE?

I note that you have no experience in writing articles (unless your account is a WP:CLEANSTART), with only this reverted edit in mainspace, so please take your time to familiarise yourself with the appropriate parts of the Manual of Style. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:37, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

> You have yet to provide any examples of what you are talking about

The original post contains ten examples, four of which (6, 7, 9, 10) are objectively unsubstantiated.

> Which sources are unreliable or out of date?

The sources making the aforementioned claims (New York Times, BBC, ABC News).

> Why is the investigation undue weight?

The former owners (as stated in the article) resigned in 2021. The article is about the site, not the owners.

> Why is an image of the forum irrelevant to an article about the forum, and what image would be an appropriate representation of the "Site overview" section?

I have already explained this: "The paragraph beside the image is a site overview, not a focus on methods in the "Suicide Discussion" board."

> I note that you have no experience in writing articles (unless your account is a WP:CLEANSTART), with only this reverted edit in mainspace, so please take your time to familiarise yourself with the appropriate parts of the Manual of Style.

Your attitude is condescending, and this point is unreasonable. Cat or other (talk) 16:19, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I will not be taking the time to reply further until you notify WikiProjects, which WP:GAR instructs that you do when opening a nomination and which you have been requested to do twice now. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 18:47, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see the objects presented as credible. Keep --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:33, 3 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The article contains misinformation. Sanctioned Suicide does not promote suicide. Its members make strenuous efforts to help people solve their problems, and the site has certainly saved many lives, as is clear from the posts of members themselves. It does, however, recognise that some problems do not have solutions, and so it is pro-choice in the sense that it considers that when an adult person has made a rational, non-impulsive decision to die by suicide, that decision should be respected. All other sites that I know that offer advice to suicidal people discourage suicide in all circumstances, and that is not always the most productive way to interact with someone who is potentially suicidal. It certainly doesn't prevent all suicides. Sanctioned Suicide offers a different approach, and fills a gap. I am not suicidal, but I have been active on Sanctioned Suicide for nearly 4 years, trying to support people who are, and I have seen for myself how much good the site does. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2a02:587:8efd:bee:a01d:8890:420e:616b (talk) 12:06, 10 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
- Do you have any reliable sources to support these claims? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 13:51, 10 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]