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Breach of the WP:INVOLVED policy by Graeme Bartlett

Mr Bartlett has broken the strict policy against administrative actions by admins who are "involved"; the stated reason for this rule is to avoid conflict of interest by editors who have been granted special powers in good faith by the community. The policy, inter alia, states that:

He has breached the rule by pursuing an administrative action and then, within a day, entering exactly the same dispute to barrack for one side and against the other in line with his use of the tools. It is utterly irrelevant whether his admin action or his unwitting disclosure came first. He has attempted to defend his actions by saying, "I am involved in this second discussion, but not in the first one. I will not be closing this second discussion." The discussions are about the same issue, and the second has been directly brought about by his admin action. He appears to be up to his neck in it, and it is now there for everyone to see that he was up to his neck in it while acting as an admin, too. He is welcome to express his views as an editor, of course.

Mr Bartlett gave explicit and implicit undertakings at his RFA to abide by the policies pertaining to admins, and the community took him on trust when they voted to give him admin status. I will show good faith by assuming that he is misunderstanding a basic duty of WP admins (rather than disregarding it). I ask him to respond to the points I have made here. Tony (talk) 14:03, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Tony, as per the above discussion the appropriate forum to press this charge is Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents and not this talk page. Given your own involvement in this dispute, both in the previously closed discussion and in related discussions among involved parties on talk pages predominately favored by only a single side of the debate, I would recommend you read WP:BOOMERANG before continuing to press the issue. --Allen3  14:43, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

No thanks, Allen. I've chosen to ask Mr Bartlett to respond here, the scene of the breach, and the most appropriate place to give him the right of reply. Are you saying that daring to take an admin to task about a flagrant abuse of a fundamental policy is to "shoot oneself in the foot"? I wonder why you are taking this stance? Does it have anything to do with the fact that you yourself are an admin? Do you believe admins should be able to breach policy for their own ends as they wish, with impunity?

You say, ""Given your own involvement in this dispute". As I pointed out above, everyone is welcome to put their view as an involved editor—Mr Bartlett and you included. However, I did not take an administrative action while involved: he did. What exactly is your point? I'm not sure you understand the principle of conflict of interest; and I had hoped the en.WP had moved on from the practice by which admins gang up to support each other's wrongdoing. Tony (talk) 15:16, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the admin Did Not breach any policy as an involved admin. The above WP:RM had already been closed and done, and there was a new WP:RM created. Graeme Bartlett was not involved in the RM that he closed and is very capable of commenting on a completely new RM. Unless of course you feel that the two discussions are the same?--Jojhutton (talk) 15:51, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Here's someone who "Is not a Misplaced Pages admin, but would like to be one someday". I'm sure your support of the admin's wrongdoing will be appreciated; will it be returned at your RFA? Now, listen carefully: the two RMs are over exactly the same matter, yes? Are you trying to say that they are not? If so, exactly what is the difference between them, aside from the fact that one is attempting to reverse the other? You people will argue that red is blue to get your way, it appears. Tony (talk) 16:03, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Well it obviously looks like you have done some checking up on my user page. Good job. So much for the Assume Good Faith crowd. The first RM is closed and done. Once a new RM is opened, its a new thread and new discussion, even if covering the same topic. You may not be happy with the result, but wikipedia policy says that you should respect consensus, and stop trying to Game the System with countless RMs.--Jojhutton (talk) 16:09, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm quite sure that Bartlett is allowed to give his opinion as the closer of the last RM (I have seen this done in many places like AFD and DRV). Also, the proper place for this complaint is WP:ANI (although WP:AN would be a better place). --Enric Naval (talk) 17:21, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Tony, you have not provided any evidence he was involved when closing the RfM. If he's crusaded against en dashes, that would be a COI, but you've not shown that. There's no reason for him to even respond to you here. If you only want a personal explanation, there's his talk page, assuming he's willing. If you want to pursue sanctions, take it to the proper place, ANI. But they'll require evidence, or you'll simply be seen as disruptive. — kwami (talk) 17:22, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

• The admins have nothing but garbled anti-logic to offer. There is no "proper" place in particular, and this page is where the wrongdoing occurred. It is perfectly legitimate to ask, AGAIN, that Bartlett resign his adminship. It defies common sense to ignore the fact that Bartlett had strong feelings on the matter. He has displayed these publicly above, and it matters not one bit whether he revealed them at the time or afterwards. Here again, if you didn't get it, is the policy:

It is surprising how quickly other admins (and one want-to-be) have rallied to his support with non-arguments. This is a strong display of why admins have a very bad reputation on the English WP. Still waiting to hear why the involved rule has not been breached. And here, since you ask yet again, Kwami, is the evidence:

1. Oppose the move and continue to reiterate my earlier close with the consensus. The naming policy clearly states that the names Misplaced Pages uses for articles are those most commonly used. The MOS is subsidiary to the policy. If there are many other articles with ndash, that is not a reason to make this article also match, but a reason to rename those articles to match the common name, rather than trying to make the title look the best. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 6:54 pm, Yesterday (UTC+11)

Tony (talk) 08:35, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with his reasoning (IMO this is a difference of style, not of naming), but all that quote shows is that he was convinced that one side of the dispute better corresponded to WP consensus. That's an imperfect system, but pretty much how things work. — kwami (talk) 10:00, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

• Comment Bottom line Tony, Bartlett was not involved when he closed the previous RM, but he has the right to become involved at a later time if another RM is opened, which it was.--Jojhutton (talk) 11:35, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
  • No, I'm not going to be waylaid by this. He has told us fair and square that he feels strongly biased towards one side. It is spelled out explicitly in his comment. What part of "Oppose the move and continue to reiterate my earlier close with the consensus. The naming policy clearly states that the names Misplaced Pages uses for articles are those most commonly used. The MOS is subsidiary to the policy. If there are many other articles with ndash, that is not a reason to make this article also match, but a reason to rename those articles to match the common name, rather than trying to make the title look the best." is unclear? A lot of people here do not agree with this view, and now Bartlett is seeking to become part of the consensus by !voting on exactly the same issue at the same place within a few days. If it were an even slightly different issue, we would take it into account; but it's not. The WP:UNINVOLVED policy says that administrative actions must not be taken by admins who feel strongly one way or the other. It also says the the community interprets involvement very broadly. It is improper, for example, for an admin to express their personal opinions on the issue when closing. That is why the policy insists that another, uninvolved admin be brought in to make the judgement.

    Johjhutton says, "Bartlett was not involved when he closed the previous RM, but he has the right to become involved at a later time if another RM is opened, which it was." (1) He was' involved, by his statement (unless his views have suddenly changed in a day or two). (2) He does not have the right to become involved a few days later in exactly the same debate he has closed and resolved to favour one side—casting a !vote, no less, to influence the outcome of moves to reverse his action. It is the most blatant conflict of interest I have seen on WP for some time. Tony (talk) 12:29, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

    • So, since Tony is using WP:INVOLVED as a basis for admin misuse, let me actually cut and paste what the guideline actually says, because Tony is just using a small snippet of the guideline to advance his theory that Bartlett misused admin privileges.
      • In general, editors should not act as administrators in cases in which they have been involved. This is because involved administrators may have, or may be seen to have, a conflict of interest in disputes they have been a party to or have strong feelings about.
    • This means that admins should not act as admins if they are involved in an already continuing discussion. It does not say that an admin cannot act as an admin if they have strong feelings only.
      • Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community, to include current or past conflicts with an editor (or editors), and disputes on topics, regardless of the nature, age, or outcome of the dispute.
    • As far as time goes, it says Current and past discussions. It says nothing about future discussion.--Jojhutton (talk) 18:13, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

This is a non-issue, and we should stop wasting our time. I've asked Tony to provide difs showing a COI, and he has failed to do that. Without evidence there is nothing for us to talk about. — kwami (talk) 22:32, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Response: It is a fundamental issue that goes to the heart of the admin policy. Kwami, you keep asking for diffs, but the evidence is just above. I have copied it here twice: Bartlett disclosed strong feelings (that is, "involvement") within a day or two of making an administrative action. Mr Hutton is concerned about past versus present versus future: the policy says nothing about when a disclosure of CoI is made; it cares only that an admin action be made without involvement at the time. The main argument by fellow admins who have rallied around Bartlett seems to appeal to when the disclosure of CoI was made. If, as an admin, I closed an RfC, took admin action to implement what I interpreted as consensus, while admitting there was vocal opposition, and then admitted two days later that I was partisan (!voting as such in a move to reverse it), I would resign as an admin when someone complained.

Kwami and others talk about WP:TITLE gazumping MOS. Let's take a look at WP:TITLE. I see this, first off:

Could Bartlett explain how his actions were in accordance with WP:INVOLVED and the text above in WP:TITLE? His continuing silence, in my view, proves his guilt. The matter will need to be pursued, sooner or later, since the community deserves to know whether the protection against corrupt actions that is afforded by WP:INVOLVED can be simply glossed over by wikilawyering over whether the disclosure of involvement at the time of the action was made before, during, or after the action. Tony (talk) 07:21, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Tony, there's nothing wrong with an admin being convinced by the arguments in a RfM, and therefore having a strong opinion about it from then on. The only problem is if they come in with a COI.

If I may offer my opinion, I think it would probably be a much better use of time to start a discussion at TITLE or MOSFOLLOW on whether they really intend that the stylistic choices of our sources should override the MOS. Such a position could potentially be quite disruptive: either title formatting & style would no longer match the text of the article (as currently here), or if it is further decided that text style needs to conform to title style, much of the MOS would be invalidated. — kwami (talk) 07:39, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Replying to Tony1's issue: My response to you is already included above. I was not involved in the previous move request. In the current move request I have opposed it, and therefore am involved in the second request. I have remained quiet because my response had already been made. I will not be closing the current discussion. For newcomers to this: my talk page also has discussion on the nature of the earlier consensus decision. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 09:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

It's as though you haven't read my last post at all. It will not wash, this timing trick you seem to think holds water. Please read my post again. You have publicly announced in your !vote that you have strong partisan feelings on the issue. Unless your case is that you suddenly changed these views in the course of the intervening two days, you have significantly breached a basic tenet of the admin policy. It is worse still that you show no sign of understanding the concept of conflict of interest. You need to resign now. It is untenable that a WP admin either have such a complete misunderstanding of his/her responsibilities under the policy, or be prepared to blatantly breach them in this way. The matter is going to have to be resolved. Tony (talk) 08:26, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I really don't have any particular investment one way or another in the outcome. I think both ideas are fine, and really don't see why we've all made such a fuss. As such, I don't see why we would want to 'hang up by the yardarm', anyone who is a part of this rather academic debate. How about we just let people apologize, and move on? Being excessively gruff doesn't seem like it will help anyone much either, everyone makes mistakes at times, and this is such a pointless thing to have such strong words about (in my tiny opinion). Ok, well, I'm going to get the boiling oil ready. If its needed, just call. :) -- Avanu (talk) 12:34, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

No, it's a serious breach of policy, he hasn't apologised, and he is still refusing to acknowledge his conflict of interest. "Everyone makes mistakes at times" is fine if there's an acknowledgement (and, BTW, a reversion to the original name). WP:TITLE explicitly says that such a move should not be made. Tony (talk) 13:38, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Tony, you still haven't shown any breech of policy that I can see. Maybe I'm just not looking in the right place. If the move was illegitimate, then of course it should be reverted, not just apologized for. But you aren't getting anywhere here. If you're serious about it, take it to WP:ANI and provide the diffs they need to see things your way. — kwami (talk) 19:09, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

You can drag out the diff if you want: the disclosure is just above. Here it is for the third time: "Oppose the move and continue to reiterate my earlier close with the consensus. The naming policy clearly states that the names Misplaced Pages uses for articles are those most commonly used. The MOS is subsidiary to the policy. If there are many other articles with ndash, that is not a reason to make this article also match, but a reason to rename those articles to match the common name, rather than trying to make the title look the best. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 6:54 pm, 16 March 2011, last Wednesday (4 days ago) (UTC+11)". It's a reverse disclosure that demonstrates beyond doubt that he was conflicted when he carried out the admin action. Do you have a logical problem with this? Tony (talk) 02:05, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Well, I don't know about the other editors here, but really, I would like to ask that if you have an administrative issue with another editor (rather than something directly related to the Mexican&American War) that you take that complaint to the proper forum, and let it drop here. I've seen a lot of passionate arguing already about dashes and hyphens, and I'm not really all that concerned with someone modifying the name. So maybe they did wrong. Take it to the right place to remedy it. A *polite* discussion with that editor, or to the powers-that-be. -- Avanu (talk) 02:41, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Regrettable edit

This edit changes some of the hyphens to dashes; whatever may be justified, this is contrary to MOS:CONSISTENCY: while some may think An overriding principle is that style and formatting choices should be consistent within a Misplaced Pages article, though not necessarily throughout Misplaced Pages as a whole. Consistency within an article promotes clarity and cohesion. is too strong, that is what MOS says.

Perhaps more seriously, it damages the article. Foos' book is subtitled about the "Mexican-American War", not, as Kwami makes it, the "Mexican War" - a significant error in these days of string searches. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:49, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Kwami's revert war also restores from 1846–48 - yet another MOS violation. (What is the standard of professionalism being used here, anyway?) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:56, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

The page move was illegitimate, I'm afraid, made in flagrant breach of WP:INVOLVED—it needs to be moved back to the original en dash, in conformity with the MoS and the practice elsewhere in this and related categories of articles. Tony (talk) 03:13, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Give it up. Nobody but you thinks that the page move was against WP:INVOLVED.--Jojhutton (talk) 03:24, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Sep, you were so quick to revert that I had no time to restore the actual corrections that you made. BTW, you left en dashes in the article (U.S.–Mexican War, multiple instances of Mexican–American War, Texan–Mexican conflict), so it was hardly consistent as you left it.

Tony, whether the move was legitimate is rather beside the point. The move was made based on the conclusion that TITLE took precedence over MOS. There was no decision that the MOS is therefore suspended from the article. As with any article, if one has a problem with the MOS, that should be discussed at the MOS. — kwami (talk) 03:18, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Just ask yourself what normal people think of this

So now you have a title with hyphen, the lead-section ("lead–section"?) with en dash, the reflist with hyphens, and the talkpage notice (yes, up there ^) with hyphen... hello?... WTF people? Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 04:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

It appeared to be part of a crusade to change the MOS through the back door by getting articles changed and then claiming that the MOS needs to be changed to match. Wanting a hyphen in phrases like this is a perfectly legitimate POV, but it should be debated on its own merits at the MOS. — kwami (talk) 07:08, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Kwami puts it perfectly. Mr Anderson, who has been site-banned for a week (again), is making this a WP:POINTY part of his campaign to reduce the style guides to ... well ... nothing. He has, actually, done us a service in raising matters to do with the relationship between the MoS and external sources, and between the MoS and WP:TITLE. But I believe he should give his campaign a rest; it is highly disruptive and we all have better things to do.

Yes, dashes vs hyphens carry important meanings for readers, and are a long-established part of the language. It is yet more important since readers see our text on electronic monitors; often, they are not of the best resolution, and no one sees it as well as on paper in good light. Hyphens can look like dots or smudges in many circumstances. This might be OK for when a hyphen is correct, but when a dash is prescribed by many of the most prestigious authorities in the US, the UK and elswhere, it is professional to use it.

This debate needs to be at MoS talk, not here. Tony (talk) 02:53, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

@Choyoo. Book titles should appear exactly as they were written (barring capital letters that Americans insist on using at the end of words), idem from names of book chapters.

@Kwami. What, no, that's not a backdoor, that's how it's done, see WP:GUIDELINE#Content_changes.

@Tony1. I looked at several dozens of books from reliable publishers, and the immense majority go against your interpretation of the MOS. (note that I looked at the sources before commenting in both RM; although I prefer the hyphen, I don't mind using it... if it's the customary usage in RS). Either the reliable publishers are not listening to those prestigious authorities, or those authorities have little influence in English common usage (which Misplaced Pages uses). --Enric Naval (talk) 12:14, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Enric, are you referring to title case? I think you'll find that it's widespread. Certainly in journal articles and conference proceedings it's like a full-body rash. While I fully support WP's insistence on sentence case, my point is that if we really did go by the balance of external sources in style and formatting, WP would look rather different. Tony (talk) 13:30, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

from 1846–48

Guys, I am not a native English speaker, but, are you sure that this construction is correct? I don't recall seeing this before. Shouldn't it be one of the following?

• in 1846–48
• of 1846–48
• from 1846 to 1848

--Enric Naval (talk) 09:51, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

As a native English speaker I don't see a problem with this. Someone seeing "from 1846–48" would read it as "from 1846 to/through 48", which is perfectly acceptable. Is this really a violation of the MoS? If so can somebody point out where exactly? –CWenger (talk) 15:07, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I've come across several style guides which say s.t. to the effect that an en dash means "from X to Y", so that it's incorrect to use it with words such as 'from', 'between', etc. Others simply state that it's bad style because it's mixing conventions ('from' is a word, but 'to' is punctuation). Either way, they say that "to" should be spelled out if a separate preposition is used for the first number. (I think "in 1846–48" would be OK because 'in' refers to the range, not to 1846.) — kwami (talk) 19:57, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

WP:MOSDASH says that when there's a "from" or other preposition before the range, it's a bump for the reader to then have to move into a typographical symbol. So "from ... to ...", not "from ...–...". It's not a big deal, but I correct this if I'm copy-editing to make it more logical/consistent/smooth for the reader. Tony (talk) 02:46, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

The MOS reflects normal editing practice on this. A normal Engish speaker might not care, but this "from 1846–48" is the kind of construct that my copy editor would also try to stamp out, because it's just wrong, and makes the writer look illiterate to sufficiently literate readers. Dicklyon (talk) 00:29, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Technical Correctness

Since we're still blabbing about the hyphendash conflict, I thought I might mention that technically, Mexicans *are* Americans, so really a more techincally correct title might be "The war between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848". Well, anyway... blah blah. -- Avanu (talk) 13:50, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and because of that some sources call it the "U.S.–Mexican War". But in English, "American" generally means Usonian, not, um, American. — kwami (talk) 18:08, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

The country that gave us W. V. O. Quine (and Misplaced Pages!) would do well to read his (still awesome) views on naming! And perhaps also WP:battleground and get back to the job. Andrewa (talk) 20:02, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

More commonly, U.S.-Mexican War, as here - an element of the Oxford History of the United States. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:43, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

• Comment- Good Grief is this still going on? I think the war has been over for a while now. Time to make friends and have Pow Wow.--Jojhutton (talk) 17:47, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
  • It shouldn't be. But if you check the dates, it took a while to get the last Move Request closed; it would not be surprising if there is some hesitation now. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:07, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
    • Me thinks some may have poisoned the well.--Jojhutton (talk) 19:33, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Is that over? I thought the U.S. was building a wall to keep out the Mexican invaders. :/ (Tho they may have it in the wrong place. ;p)

This argument is sillier than the mass pagemoves over hyphenating ship classes. :/ Captain Canuck 11:05, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Amazing how many sites parrot Misplaced Pages (sorry partly off-topic)

"Mexican troops were trained to fire with their muskets held loosely at hip-level" removed by 99.189.28.19 for 'lacking citation since 2008'

I looked this quote up in Google to see if there were any reliable sources, and mostly I find that a LOT of sites copy Misplaced Pages content verbatim without checking the facts. -- Avanu (talk) 05:48, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

To check facts would cost money, copying it wholesale makes your site appear in search engines for alot of topics unconnected to your core focus draw eyes and clicks to your advertising-based funding. 65.93.12.101 (talk) 06:23, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Silly Argument - versus –

From Avanu (talk) 17:29, 2 April 2011 (UTC) Rather than going on and on and on, why not introduce some additional reliable sources? Everything I have seen above that is being suggested as a "solution" does nothing to actually advance the debate about which type of punctuation is best. Since we are bound by "Reliable Sources" being our guide, and since the sources are clearly in dispute for numerous reasons, either get more sources, toss a coin, or duel it out at dawn. Either way, it is clearly an endless debate that can't be solved by just arguing a lot.

So my suggestion is, either:

1. Get an overwhelming preponderance of reliable sources for one side or the other.

2. Compete in some game of chance or skill to decide this. (plus, it's fun)

3. Shut up (and I say this in the most charitable way possible).

Silly? Yes, of course it is. I would recommend you choose

4. Go to WP:AN and ask for a neutral admin to close this move request, now long overdue.

That should get all of us out of this talk page, although you may want to warn them about Tony's interminable attack on the last closer.

(1) has already been tried. Enric posted "the ímmense majority of sources use hyphen, even in the title, see see google books search. Specific books: books by military history publishers like Osprey_Publishing or university presses like Indiana University Press, University of New Mexico Press, University of Missouri Press, University of South Carolina Press, Texas A&M University Press when citing sources , University of North Caroline Press, Georgetown University Press or publishers of academic divulgative books Blackbirch_Press, Greenwood Press, ABC-CLIO, or publishers of textbooks like Cengage Learning, Infobase Publishing, Prentice-Hall uses dash in title but hyphen in text, Longman, Hackett Publishing.

"The point is there are some books using a dash, but they are in the minority (for example, Cengage Learning has published many books that mention the topic, and almost every one uses hyphens, and the nominator has listed a few books by academic publishers like Prentice-Hall and one university press). And the most notable publishers use hyphens in the immense majority of their books. For every prestigious RS using a dash, you can find literally dozens of equally-prestigious RS using a hyphen."

The three opposes replied that they didn't need no stinking sources, they were right - and that's the problem: lack of an objective standard, since they reject usage. (Finding yet more books with a hyphen would be easy, but would it help?). WP:MOS proceeds by hand-waving and analogy (as it must, not to be the length of a dictionary), and they firmly believe MOS says what they would like - even though more of us don't see it; they also assert that MOS, a guideline, overrules WP:TITLE, the relevant policy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:30, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

The point is that you are both RIGHT. So this debate will never end unless you just agree to disagree and let it go. Whoever is going to win is either going to have to go get a HUGE preponderance of evidence for their side, or simply have this settled another way. Continually arguing when it has been proven a jillion ways to Sunday that it can go either way (and this is over a difference that amounts to a millimeter's worth of line) is just silly. Flip a coin, whatever. Just make a choice and stick with it. -- Avanu (talk) 00:10, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

The fact that any sources use an en dash is fair evidence that this construct is sometimes judged to fall within the scope of a style guide like ours that specifies the traditional use of en dash to join two names. The fact that many others use hyphen mostly just shows that either they don't have such a style guide, or they don't have a picky editor. The test I proposed is this: find a source that does use en dash to join names, but does not use en dash in Mexican-American War. That would be evidence that an editor made a determination that the joined name provision does not apply to this war's name. How many of those can you find, relative to how many with en dash? Dicklyon (talk) 00:34, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

That whole paragraph sounds like a great justification to keep arguing, but really doesn't prove the point one way or the other. Use of a hyphen means they don't have a picky editor or a style guide? Really? What if they used a space? ("Mexican American War") What does that show? Just pick something and move on. A hyphen works, and an en dash works, so why are guys being so obstinate? -- Avanu (talk) 00:46, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Because hyphen actually appears in the keyboard of +90% computers (all non-Mac computers). And it doesn't become a set of weird characters under certain conditions (try linking a section header that contains a dash). Because it's a deviation from the "standard" ASCII set of characters without a very good reason. And the most important reason: if the hyphen is incorrect, then why do the immense majority RS use a hyphen? We appear to be stating that most RS are wrong and that wikipedia is right. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:12, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Enric, I think you answered your own question. Most sources use it simply because it's easy to find on their keyboard, and/or because they work in, or have been heavily influenced by, a typography limited to ASCII. Dicklyon (talk) 23:32, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

If that was the reason, they wouldn't use “curly quotes” either. ― A. di M.​_plé​ 17:41, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Ah, so it's a Mac-resentment issue for you, is it? There are plenty of methods to input an en dash, which is a basic part of English typography. I suppose the easiest is simply to click below the edit box on the en dash button. I can show you how to do this, if you wish. Tony (talk) 14:08, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

No, it's nothing against Mac. And the easiest is to simply type a hyphen. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:14, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

It's "easiest" to use sloppy English, too; but we have higher standards. If you are satisfied with sub-professional typography, that is fine, but please don't force it on WP. Tony (talk) 14:26, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

If most of RS used a dash, then I wouldn't see a problem in using also a dash, just like they do. But most RS use hyphen as I took the bother to document. Osprey Publishing uses hyphen, does it have sub-professional typography? What about Hackett Publishing Company, Cengage Learning. Or how about the university presses of the universities of Missouri, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgetown? Or how about frigging Oxford university Press, looking at the first 5 results of , they use dash in books but also uses hyphen in 10 books . Are they sub-professional typographers only 2/3 of the time?

I keep seeing the same strawman raised again and again:

• If it uses a hyphen then it's lazy typographers/webmasters.
• If it uses a dash, it's professionalism and an example for wikipedia to follow.

--Enric Naval (talk) 17:49, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

And another strawman that will probably be raised next:

• If a publishing house uses always dash then it's professional and an example for wikipedia to follow.
• If they use sometimes hyphen and sometimes dash then the style of those publishing houses is inconsistent and it shouldn't be followed.
• If they use only hyphen, then those publishing houses have their own house styles and wikipedia has to follow its own house style (search "publisher" in this very same talk page, and you will see this strawman in action)

--Enric Naval (talk) 18:24, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

- - - – – – - - -

Avanu (talk) 04:19, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

From http://www.pepperdine-graphic.com/perspectives/excessive-ing-es-prose-to-bits-1.2521380

"Excessive —ing —es prose to bits" or "Excessive dashing dashes prose to bits"

"The dash comes in two forms, the em-dash (—) and the en-dash (–). They have basically the same function, and the choice between them, as well as the spacing guidelines, depends on the publishing house or style guide of the writer. For example, we at the Graphic use the em-dash with a space on either side."

"The grammatical cousin of the dash pair is the hyphen (-), mischievous because of its unstandardized use. The hyphen typically joins compound nouns. It can also string together multiple adjectives before all-too-modifiable nouns. The bottom line is the hyphen is a joiner, a connecter. Like any good business major, it networks, pulling words together."

-- Avanu (talk) 04:38, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

That is the basic rule. The "non-standard" comment about hyphens means largely that there are words and phrases which vary between "black bird", "black-bird", and "blackbird"; there is no general rule about which to use, although there are a number of fairly good generalizations. There are also some special cases in which some or many writers use "black–bird with a dash, but this is largely an early-twentieth century idea which has not caught on.

If anybody wants to edit the article to match the present title, that would be helpful. I hope my next comment will be on the substance. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:37, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Consensus needs to be generated to go into conflict with the style guides

There have been attempts to breach the style guides on the dash issue. That would be fine, but consensus needs to be gathered here first, on the basis that this article should differ from WP's site-wide practice. I ask that those editors seeking to cause disruption in the article cease, and that the matter be sorted out here.

Keep the status quo in the text, consistent with the MoS guideline There was no consensus to change the typography of the article title, and there is definitely no consensus to change the article text. To do so, it should be demonstrated that this article has special conditions that make it "common sense" to go against site-wide practice as articulated in the style guides. Tony (talk) 14:58, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

• I agree. Noetica 04:01, 13 April 2011 (UTC). (See my fuller reasons for the en dash, below.)

Change the typography to a hyphen, consistently; it's what the overwhelming majority of sources do, and we disagree on what MOS says on this issue.

• For example, see CWenger's !vote in the second move request. Neither reason is article-specific. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:28, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Change the typography for article-specific reasons (please state them with your signature).

Time to stop repeated discussions and stay with established consensus (please provide outstanding rationale)

• There have been two recent and protracted discussions that have both clearly demonstrated consensus for the article name to have a hyphen and not an en-dash. It makes no sense to use one name in the article title and another in the text body. This position is based upon Manual of Style, which states "an overriding principle is that style and formatting choices should be consistent within a Misplaced Pages article". --Allen3  16:16, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

• One more time, guys: the immense majority of sources use a hyphen for this name, policy WP:COMMONAME says to follow the common usage in RS, MOS:CONSISTENCY says that it's not necessary to have inter-article consistency across the project. Those are undeniable facts that are not going to stop existing just because you don't like them. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:12, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't think WP:COMMONAME is applicable here; we're arguing about the typographic style, not about what to call it. The relevant guideline is the MOS section on dashes. Dicklyon (talk) 22:48, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

• WP:COMMONNAME is about the raw form of name that is chosen as the title for an article. It says nothing about punctuation. If it were intended to have any bearing on punctuation, at least one of its many examples should include something to show that intention. Not one does. WP:MOS makes recommendations on punctuation; WP:TITLE does not. The form "Mexican–American" accords with WP:MOS, with other articles under the category {{Mexican–American War}}, and with the name of that category itself. If editors wanted wholesale systematic change, they should not have mounted a trivial campaign for piecemeal change: to this single article's title. I and CWenger made a clear invitation for them to work systematically and collegially, and so avoid all this wrangling. They refused that invitation to work together. We now see consequences of that refusal. Noetica 23:08, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
• MOS:CONSISTENCY says exactly this: "An overriding principle is that style and formatting choices should be consistent within a Misplaced Pages article, though not necessarily throughout Misplaced Pages as a whole. Consistency within an article promotes clarity and cohesion." If the title is considered part of the article, then the appearance of the name throughout the article ought to have been fully discussed in the two RMs. It was not. If the title is not considered part of the article, then there is no case from MOS:CONSISTENCY for bringing the form in the article into line with the form in the title. In either case, other elements of WP:MOS (guidelines for systematic punctuation) do apply. If there is a conflict of Misplaced Pages principles, that needs to be resolved. But – you guessed it! – this is not the forum for such a broad discussion of policies and guidelines. Nothing can be settled here about them. Noetica 23:48, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

That assumes that two names only differing in punctuation are the same name. This is not the case. "Finnegan's Wake" is a song. Finnegans Wake is a book. ― A. di M.​_plé​ 00:46, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. We use typographic style to suggest that one is a book title and the other some other kind of title. Similar, the hyphen suggests that "Mexican-American War" would be a war about Mexican Americans, while the en dash in "Mexican–American War" suggests that it's a war between Mexico and America. The typographical style doesn't tell us everything, but our MOS suggests that we use to help where it can. Dicklyon (talk) 01:06, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I think Dicklyon has probably given the best defense of using the dash of anyone that I have seen. -- Avanu (talk) 03:13, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Unless we send a little copy of Dicklyon out with this article each time it is accessed, no reader will understand what we mean by the dash - because in fact this is the war which is both Mexican and American, as the Swedish-Polish War (not Swede–Pole War) is both Swedish and Polish. We already cause most readers to stumble a bit by not calling it the Mexican War; we puzzle them again by a dash they've never seen. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:39, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

No offence, Avanu; and with all respect to Dicklyon: that is the bleeding obvious reason for having the war and the article named with an en dash. The point has been made repeatedly. It is also the point behind the punctuation provisions at WP:MOS. It is also the point that two admins who closed RMs here have missed in the discussion, against their duty to attend to it. It is also the point that eludes a group of editors opposing regularity in naming articles, with their imperfect understanding of punctuation and their unwillingness to follow arguments and learn. Noetica 04:01, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that this hypothetical situation is a real problem that actually happens in the real world. Some days ago I asked for a RS saying that this confusion is a significant problem, I ask for such RS again. If there is some war where the confusion is frequent, then it would be sensible to use a dash for that name. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:28, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Hypothetical or not, the reason given above is the most substantial and useful argument I have seen anyone make on either side about why to choose a dash versus a hyphen. Most of the rest of the arguing has just pretty much been "because some source used it". An actual reason based on logic!!, wow, it's won me over to the dash side. -- Avanu (talk) 12:09, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

The actual argument is "because most sources use it, including the most prestigious and reliable ones" ..... Apparently, none of those publishers has any idea of how to use punctuation, and they all use imprecise and ambiguous names..... --Enric Naval (talk) 12:37, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

The lazy sub-professional typographers at Oxford University Press, Osprey Publishing and Hackett Publishing Company and Cengage Learning, not to mention all those university presses that fill their unprofessionally-typed books with imprecisions and ambiguities. We don't want to imitate that sort of people here at wikipedia. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:34, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Another way of answering A di M: It does not necessarily make that simple assumption at all. And anyway, aren't "JF Kennedy" "J F Kennedy", "J.F. Kennedy", and "J. F. Kennedy" forms or presentations of the same name, but punctuated differently? We would normally speak of them that way. Same for spelling. People might ask me: "How do spell your name, with a 'cs' or a 'cz'?" They are less likely to ask me: "Is your name the one with 'cs', or the name that is exactly similar except that it has 'cz' instead?" These are complex ontological and linguistic matters; no definitive answer will be reached on the talkpage for a North American war. Noetica 01:21, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

By the way, I was talking about the apostrophe before the ess which is there in the title of the song but not that of the book, not about the quotation marks/italics surrounding the titles (which are not part of the titles themselves anyway). ― A. di M.​_plé​ 11:08, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

• CWenger asked a good question at my talkpage: was my recent edit here was a violation of MOS:CONSISTENCY? I reproduce the answer I gave there, because it is relevant to our present deliberations:

Good to see you here, CWenger. No, it was not a violation. For one thing, some material on the page (in the categories at the bottom, and elsewhere) had the en dash form and could not be changed, and some had the hyphen form. So consistency could not be achieved in any case. Therefore, when in doubt, edit according to clear MOS guidelines. The prevailing and irremediable inconsistency comes about because of editors' refusal to accept a peace proposal that you tentatively suggested and I took up and presented, in the second RM at Talk:Mexican-American War I'm not kidding: this is all more serious than it looks, because of the wide implications for policies and guidelines, and the potential to generate precedents for disorder if they are ignored.

Noetica 05:03, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Noetica: there is a wider, systemic issue concerning the role of centralised style guidance at the en.WP. Taking to its logical end the argument that " "most" of my sources use X, so that's enough for me to override the consensus of the MoS built up over years" will destroy the stylistic cohesion of the project. This cohesion is reasonably flexible, but does require WP to make a call about many issues of style and formatting that goes against some external practice. How could it be otherwise? There is considerable variation in English, and most writing is sub-professional out there. Who wants to emulate it? Now, either you agree with the professional aims of the project, or you take the matter to the style guides themselves and ask the community, or you create chaos to try to deride them. Which is it to be? Tony (talk) 14:15, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

“Professional” what? Last time I checked Misplaced Pages contributors were unpaid volunteers, and no-one earns their living by it. (Whatever the hell this has to do with this, BTW?) ― A. di M.​_plé

​ 17:19, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

This is being discussed on WT:MOS; there's been a thread there for months. "Either or or you are creating chaos." This doesn't need to be derided; it's already risible. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:16, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

• I have talked to several fluent and literate speakers of American about this; their reaction has been consistently: "Misplaced Pages spells Mexican-American War how?? Why?" The only profession I know of that succeeds by bewildering literate readers of its product is shock comedy, one of the things Misplaced Pages is not. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:32, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Comment regarding the preceding section

The preceding section has been subject to a lame edit war about whether a subheader should make reference to horse carcasses, as far as I can tell. I have been asked to look at this on my talk page. I've warned one editor two editors not to edit-war, but the warning really applies to all of you. Folks, if you want to make comments about horse carcasses or something, please add them as a new comment and do not overwrite anything written by others. And above all do not edit-war on a frigging talk page. Or I may block you all for sheer lameness. Regards,  Sandstein  19:23, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Let's go to arbitration mediation

I moved over the past week and a half, and came back to Misplaced Pages disappointed to see that there has been absolutely no progress on the Mexican~American War naming issue. Again, I personally am not really sure if a hyphen or en dash is correct, but I do know that using both interchangeably, particularly in the same article, looks unprofessional. I don't see any way this issue is resolved without some authoritative figure/body making a decision. Therefore I suggest arbitration as the only way forward. –CWenger (talk) 04:19, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Arbitration is centrally for resolving behavioural issues, not content issues. Tony (talk) 04:49, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Then what? –CWenger (talk) 04:56, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Mediation perhaps? –CWenger (talk) 04:59, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

IMO, refusing to accept consensus is a behavioural issue. But I'm not sure that arbitrators would see that way unless it's very clear situation. --Enric Naval (talk) 08:35, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

"Refusing to accept consensus" does seem mighty widespread here. Maybe that means there's not a consensus? Dicklyon (talk) 17:54, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

There are two closed Requests for Move in this very same talk page. You even commented in the second one some 16 hours before it was closed as "no consensus to revert the move". --Enric Naval (talk) 21:09, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Both relative to content and behavior, this is one of the lamest pursuits on the Wiki.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 17:43, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes; and it's already listed. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:10, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Given the comments in AN, maybe we should move it to the top of the list or something. --Enric Naval (talk) 04:26, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

That would be presentism. ;-> Several LAME discussions have been even sillier and more disruptive - hard though it may be to believe. This (after all) is an issue internal to Misplaced Pages; there are no chat groups of True Dash nationalists ready to conduct anon vandalism to change the English language. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 13:39, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

WP:MEDIATION would be more appropriate; WP:MEDCOM will actually have an authority figure, and may therefore be more likely to persuade people to co-operate. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:10, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

It is worth a shot, but I can see this getting denied because one of the prerequisites is: "Except in extraordinary cases, earlier steps in the content dispute resolution process, such as requests for comment, or informal mediation, have been utilised without success". Not sure if they would consider this an "extraordinary case". Is anybody willing to put in the effort to request mediation? –CWenger (talk) 06:46, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I only see this problem in mediation. If Tony1 and Noetica agreed to mediation, and the mediator concluded that using a hyphen was better, would they accept the result and allow other editors to replace dashes with hyphens, rename articles, etc? I mean, look at how they reacted when the RMs were closed with results they disagreed with.... No point in starting a mediation and investing time on it, if there is so much evidence that some of the participants will only accept the result if it goes their way..... --Enric Naval (talk) 11:21, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Then we go to arbitration, and let them defend this record; but I believe Tony will be more sensible. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 13:39, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I think everybody involved is acting in good faith and would abide by the decision. And anyway, if they don't, doesn't the mediation committee have the power to enforce its rulings with topic bans and blocks and such? –CWenger (talk) 17:28, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

No, mediators do not have power to block and ban and such; yes, they are probably a good idea for this issue. Dicklyon (talk) 18:20, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

more pushing by Enric_Naval

I reverted some changes of hyphen to en dash within the article, and a move a related linked page that User:Enric_Naval moved from en dash to hyphen. I think we don't have consensus for that, and if consistency is what he's after, there's an easier way back to that. Dicklyon (talk) 20:14, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

The title was changed after one move request, and a second move request was closed as "no consensus to move" (no consensus to move back to the dashed title). --Enric Naval (talk) 22:05, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I missed some of that. So why not move it back to the stable version, and not propagate all the hyphen changes? Dicklyon (talk) 00:18, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Exactly, and the impropriety referred to below concerns a breach of both WP:TITLE and WP:INVOLVED, not to mention WP:MOSDASH. Tony (talk) 13:24, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Edit-warring notice

There have been TWO move request over the title of this article, next guy who edit-wars to reinsert the damned dash will be dragged directly to WP:AN3 for violatiing MOS:STABILITY. --Enric Naval (talk) 21:01, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

The article was stable with en dash in Mexican–American war since the middle of 2008; just because someone got it improperly moved doesn't mean you have license to go changing that everywhere. Dicklyon (talk) 00:25, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

There were two Requests for Move closed by to different admins, the second closed while a thread in An was active. If you suspect any impropriety then raise the issue at WP:AN or WP:ANI. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:46, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Enric here. How can you say it was "improperly moved"? Maybe the dash→hyphen move was a fluke, but the move back was proposed and there was no consensus for it. We all see things on Misplaced Pages we don't agree with; you can't simply call them improper/invalid/illegal when they have consensus. –CWenger (talk) 01:05, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

If you're saying "damned dash", it sounds like you might need a short break. This issue isn't worth losing sleep over. It's just a punctuation mark. -- Avanu (talk) 00:48, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

(Damn! Well, I'll be damned!) --Enric Naval (talk) 00:57, 14 April 2011 (UTC))

I say dashed dash, in an effort to preserve a sense of proportion. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:54, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Category rename to fit the page renaming

The related Category:Mexican-American War has been nominated for deletion, merging, or renaming. You are encouraged to join the discussion on the Categories for discussion page.

So, let's tone it down and draw back: kindness?

Hey, listen, we may have differences and feel passionately about the role of this or that style guide or policy, and the role of various typographical symbols. But one thing we must agree on, I believe, is to show some kindness towards each other, or at the very least, a non-personal approach. Let us by all means strongly debate the issues, but it would help if we studiously avoided even mentioning usernames. I have been guilty of this, too. The tone and standard of discussion will rise, I can assure you.

User:Sandstein is right to be concerned about the drama. So let's fix the drama ourselves, or an unsatisfactory solution will be imposed on all of us. I suggest the matter be slowed down, more measured, with emotion taken out if possible. (I have a RL workload that leaves little time for WP right now, I'm afraid.). Tony (talk) 15:46, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

A common sense argument for the hyphen

I know we have been over every inch of this topic several times, but I want to present a new, common sense argument that I came up with (originally on my talk page). MOS:ENDASH makes an exception for elements that lack lexical independence, e.g. Sino-Japanese trade. Presumably this would apply to Franco-. Is it likely that two terms as similar as Franco-German border and French-German border would use different punctuation? I think the idea behind the "hyphen for elements that lack lexical independence" rule is that the disjointedness of the two elements is evident. With nouns, like France-Germany border, it could possibly be mistaken for the border of a single country (France-Germany). With adjectives, like French-German border, it fits best into the former category, i.e. there is minimal possibility for confusion with only a hyphen. I think this explains why the vast majority of reliable sources use Mexican-American War, and why we should follow them in our WP:MOS. Even if it is not explicitly stated in style guides I think we should be able to figure out what is going on and follow common usage. –CWenger (talk) 22:48, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand what's behind the opposition to the en dash. The ambiguity of the hyphenated construct is very clear, even commented upon in reliable sources like this book that says "...'The Mexican-American War' has fallen in estimation because of the contemporaneous usage of 'Mexican American' to refer to an ethnic group." He resorted to calling it the "U.S.-Mexican War", but the conventional approach to avoiding the ambiguity would be just to use the right punctuation instead of the hyphen. Dicklyon (talk) 23:24, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

My opposition to the en dash is simply because it is so rarely used. I don't think the possibility of confusing Mexican-American War with one fought between Mexican Americans is very realistic, and besides, there is no requirement that names of wars be accurate, e.g. War of Northern Aggression. –CWenger (talk) 23:31, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

You must really hate exclamation marks! I just counted, and if you convert all the dashes in Mexican–American to hyphens, there will still be 73 en dashes in the article. And no exclamation marks at all! And how did you come to have an en dash in your signature if you oppose it? And why does your user page say you're a hyphenation expert and a converter of hyphen to dash? I'm having trouble seeing where you're coming from here. Dicklyon (talk) 23:54, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I am actually a huge fan of en dashes but in this instance, common usage doesn't seem to support it, and therefore I go with the hyphen. –CWenger (talk) 00:05, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I misunderstood you. So what about things like ""McCain-Feingold legislation"? It's hard to find a source using an en dash there, yet it's obviously exactly the kind of thing for which en dash is appropriate. And it can't be argued that it's the proper name of a thing. So why do we have an MOS if we're going to copy the majority, which uses a lower common denominator style? OK, I found one, out of about 20 I looked at in books , about the same as in the Mexican–American war. In science, it's much more common to use the en dash as a stylistic way to clarify things named after two people instead of one, like the Bose–Einstein condensate; wikipedia adopted that style, yes? Dicklyon (talk) 00:16, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm, good point, McCain–Feingold is indeed pretty rare (I found this source that uses the dash and this source that uses it sometimes...odd as well). I like the idea of having the MoS to promote consistent typography throughout Misplaced Pages, and in this case we have chosen the en dash to separate two disjointed nouns used as a compound adjective, following the scientific style as you note. It has a major clarifying role in this case, as there could be somebody named McCain-Feingold and it could be solely their legislation. However, I think the MoS should itself, derive from reliable sources. I haven't seen any examples where two adjectives, separately by an en dash, is the most common usage (e.g. French–German border). –CWenger (talk) 00:47, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

You mean things like true–false, male–female, and red–green? Perhaps they're not "most common", but still appropriate? Have you seen examples where the en dash is most common in pairs of names? I doubt it. Dicklyon (talk) 01:10, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

The problem is those could be nouns as well depending on the context. An example with proper adjectives like French–German border, where the en dash is very common, would be extremely conclusive to me.

If you do a Google Books search for "Michelson Morley experiment", about half use an en dash. That tells me it is commonly used in reliable sources and since there is motivation behind it (clarity/precision), it makes sense for Misplaced Pages to adopt it in our MoS. –CWenger (talk) 01:17, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, as I said, it's common (maybe not majority) in science. And we did adopt it. Dicklyon (talk) 01:22, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Here is a French–German. Didn't take long to find. Dicklyon (talk) 01:26, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

This paper has Russian–Georgian and Russian–Western in the PDF, but hyphen in the online HTML version. Dicklyon (talk) 01:32, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

But what I'm looking for is an example when one of those phrases is the most common usage (or at least very popular, on the order of Michelson–Morley experiment). –CWenger (talk) 01:50, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

hum, Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Archive 121#Bad example for WP:ENDASH.233, for Michelson Morley experiment there is 80% hyphen and 20% dash in the first 30 results of google books and google scholar. Oppenheimer-Phillips has 90% hyphen and 10% dash, and still people want to use dash Talk:Oppenheimer–Phillips_process#Requested_move. --Enric Naval (talk) 09:18, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I thought there were a few more dashes for Michelson Morley experiment than 20%. But anyway I support the dash there and in Oppenheimer Phillips process because it has a major clarifying role. I see it as much more significant than the clarifying role suggested in Mexican American War, i.e. not a war of the Mexican American variety and not a war among Mexican Americans. –CWenger (^ • @) 17:22, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Bottom line: Misplaced Pages has chosen a typographical style (en dash for two disjointed nouns in a compound adjective) that may be a minority usage (~30% in professional publishing) because it imparts extra clarity and precision. I have trouble accepting that Misplaced Pages should choose a typographical style (en dash for two disjointed adjectives in a compound adjective) that is an extreme minority usage (~5% in professional publishing) when it imparts very minimal extra clarity and precision. –CWenger (^ • @) 17:28, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

What I had asked for before was any single example of a publication that shows evidence of a policy of using the en dash in the style that our MOS specifies, and yet does not use it for the Mexican–American War. Surely they must exist. I've found the other way: this book set's the "core–periphery" conflict with en dash, and also the war with en dash. So far, that makes en dash in Mexican–American War a majority among books that clearly have a policy of using en dash to represent to, and, between, versus. Dicklyon (talk) 01:22, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's not just inconsistent typesetting; the two instances of Mexican~American on the same page don't seem to be using the same mark (the book's hyphens can be seen a few pages up, with fellow-readers. But if not, it's just another instance of the generalization: of the millions of books published, we can find one using any remotely plausible typographical choices. Where is the significant minority? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:35, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

That is a fair request and your source does persuade me somewhat. I will look and I hope the other hyphen proponents will too. –CWenger (talk) 01:31, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I looked through the first few Mexican-American War books. Unfortunately the noun~noun noun construct is just pretty rare, and I never even saw it in the hyphenated form. However, I did find an example here. This book uses Mexican-American War but on the second-to-last page it uses "54–40", which is a case of MOS:ENDASH #2 that we are dealing with here. –CWenger (talk) 01:50, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

That's an interesting special case, but how to punctuate a latitude in degrees and minutes is hardly a test of the principle in question. Most likely that was done by a typographer who knew to put en dash between numbers. Dicklyon (talk) 18:15, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, it's not an ideal example. But again, the problem is it is such a rarely used construct. I didn't see any cases using a hyphen either. –CWenger (^ • @) 18:32, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

This uses both Mexican-American War (hyphen) and 1841–1845 (dash; as Polk's term). You will have to search; the dates are in the footnote. That would appear to be a solid majority of usage. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:46, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Almost every book I looked at did that. But it's just because using an en dash for ranges is very common. Using them in certain types of compound modifiers is much more rare. –CWenger (^ • @) 03:00, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Well, perhaps the Oxford dashes should stand and fall together; but here's Spanish-American War (hyphen) and Clayton–Bulwer (dash). Since the double surname dash is relatively common, being one of the few cases where the dash actually serves a differentiation of meaning, this may not be surprising. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:27, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

It looks like Clayton~Bulwer is hyphenated to me. Certainly in the main text, the only place that is questionable is in the title but it's hard to tell as there are no other hyphens/dashes in that font and size to compare to. –CWenger (^ • @) 03:39, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

If that's an en dash in the title it's probably just due to yet another en dash convention, which is to use them instead of hyphen when the words are set in all caps. So this is not an example of what I asked for. Dicklyon (talk) 06:38, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

There are other examples, but it has the usual problem: Clayton-Bulwer is usually hyphenated, because there is no Mr. Clayton-Bulwer out there; but Hay–Bunau-Varilla Treaty, where the dash is reinforced by the word being a compound of compounds, works: link. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:05, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

That's something. But it looks like they only do that to show that it is two people, one with a hyphenated name. A few pages later I see "Kissinger-Tack declaration" with a hyphen. –CWenger (^ • @) 04:12, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Yup, it's WP:ENDASH 5. So? That's "the dash in the style that MOS specifies". If you're going to insist on every point MOS specifies, first show me a book that uses all of them. As usual, OUP publishes this system, but doesn;t follow it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:27, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Just saying, the really conclusive evidence would be a book that uses Mexican-American War (hyphenated) but X–Y Treaty (en dashed). That would say the distinction between nouns and adjectives is real. –CWenger (^ • @) 04:40, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

So, we still have no example of a book that uses en dash to connect parallel nouns (like core–periphery or Bose–Einstein), and yet uses a hyphen in Mexican-American War. So there's no evidence that would support making this odd exception to what our MOS specifies. Dicklyon (talk) 06:42, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

More accurately, we have only the slightest scattering of books which use en dashes to connect parallel nouns at all. None of that handful have been found to discuss the Mexican War, let alone call it that politically correct term Mexican-American War. The odd exception is using an en dash to connect parallel nouns in the first place; the extension of that exception to the compound modifer Mexican-American is the invention of sciolists, unsupported by the text of MOS - even after its recent non-consensus edits. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:42, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Ugh, it's very difficult to find. I sampled the 78 results of "mexican-american war" "mexico-us" in google books. :

First of all, turn out that "Mexican American" is usually punctuated with a space, so there is no possibility of confusion due to using hyphen, see "(...) the Anglo-Americans and Mexican Americans who inhabited the southernmost region of Texas along the Mexican-American border. The Mexican-American War (...)" p. 77

Second, look at the preponderant usages:

• space for name of war and dash for "Mexico-US"

• hyphen for both the name of the war and for "U.S.-Mexico X" and "Mexico-US X", including the Oxford Illustrated Encyclopedia.

• dash for both

• dash for the name of the war and hyphen for "mexico-US" (there was another one, but I lost the link)

Looks like both ENDASH#5 and the last example of ENDASH#2 are at odds with the majority of RS, including the highest-quality ones like OUP. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:45, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

PMAnderson, you are factually wrong where say "More accurately, we have only the slightest scattering of books which use en dashes to connect parallel nouns at all. None of that handful have been found to discuss the Mexican War, let alone call it that politically correct term Mexican-American War." Look at this book, which I pointed out before. Dicklyon (talk) 17:10, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Enric Naval, I'm not getting your point. First of all, the "preponderant usages" are not nearly as relevant as those uses that show some relationship to the WP:MOS points that we are discussing. The several "dash for both" examples support our claims that "Mexican–American" is not treated differently in this context from "U.S.–Mexico". You still no examples to suggest that Mexican–American should use a hyphen in the context of style that uses en dash to connect things as described at WP:ENDASH. The fact that some of our MOS provisions are not what have been adopted by others is quite beside the point of this discussion. Dicklyon (talk) 17:10, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

I think that is a WP:CIRCULAR argument. You can't argue: RS are wrong because they contradict something written at wikipedia. And, per MOS:FOLLOW, wikipedia adopts the practices of RS, not the other way around. MOS:FOLLOW doesn't say: follow sources unless they are at disagreement with other points of the MOS in which case you can dismiss all of them as not following the rules of wikipedia. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:22, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Nobody is saying RSs are wrong. But they do have a different adopted style than we have, in many cases, so may not be useful for resolving fine points of the interpretation of our style, which adopts one standard but not widely respected role for en dash. General guidelines like WP:FOLLOW are less relevant when they are superceded by more specific WP:MOS provisions, for example as in WP:LOWERCASE. Dicklyon (talk) 17:39, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

A modest proposal

Since the issue here is primarily an issue for WP:MOS, and since nobody has been able to show a single source that implies that "Mexican–American War" is anywhere treated differently from other joined pairs as "U.S.–Mexico border", and since the hotly protested move to the hyphenated title has introduced conflict and inconsistency into an area that was previously stable, self-consistent, and consistent with WP:ENDASH for several years, I do therefore move that that we repair this mess by moving the article back to the previously stable en dash form. Any reasoned support or objection appreciated. Dicklyon (talk) 17:32, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Very strongly oppose This proposal is bad faith; having lied about whether the first requested move above was consensus, Dicklyon now proposes to ignore it. It would seem simpler to ban those who are only interested in jots and tittles from this article, and let those who edit in American and on American history work it out. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:43, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

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