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Why does this article assert that Carl is far-right?

Just because some sources claim that he is far-right doesn't mean he is far-right. He is a classical liberal. Watch his videos directly and see his political positions for yourselves. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sarsath3 (talk • contribs) 23:39, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

"So to summarize. The gatekeepers think that because the bias is found in 'reliable' sources that it's acceptable and that the copy paste nature of modern media only adds to legitimacy via perceived consensus."-Me on the bias of this article.

The relevance of the label that the media ascribes a person is certainly debatable but likely reasonable. However the length of this section just to say 'He's far-right' is certainly excessive and I support a move for a more concise summary. EatingFudge (talk) 00:47, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Putting scare quotes around "reliable" remains unpersuasive. Most encyclopedias are tertiary sources. Therefore, Misplaced Pages specifically favors WP:SECONDARY, WP:INDY sources. We are not interested in original research, so this isn't the place to publish our own opinions of his videos. For convenience, I will add that much has been written about why "classical liberal" doesn't mean what Benjamin's group seems to think it means, which is only one of many reasons we favor outside sources for these things.

Regardless, Misplaced Pages goes by reliable sources. If you have some specific reason to think these sources are not reliable, discuss it, either here, or at WP:RSN. Vague kvetching isn't productive. Grayfell (talk) 07:13, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

As Grayfell says, Misplaced Pages goes by reliable sources. If sources are unduly biased then they are not reliable, but in this case the sources have been well-established by the Misplaced Pages community as reliable, and the fact that they say some things you don't like about your favourite YouTuber doesn't discredit that. — Bilorv (talk) 09:55, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Strange, according to Misplaced Pages the term ‘’ad hominem signifies a straight attack at the character and ethos of a person, in an attempt to refute its argument.’’ Reading whats now hidden above I see none of this. The closest might be the feminism question but that is only to address the ad hominem dismissal I feel I received. Ironically it seems I have been characterized as an ad hominem agent without any of my refutations or counterarguments being addressed.EatingFudge (talk) 15:56, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Revised (gentler and replied to none)

The quotes are not meant to scare but to accentuate. There is a difference between a news journalist reporting on facts and a tabloid journalist reporting on their own activist opinions. It is a flaw to think individual articles are reliable because its publisher is reliable. Per WP:RSPUSE To learn why this is important click on AmericanPressInstitute or PewResearch.

The links provided to refute Benjamin's claim of "classical liberal" is grossly opinionated. Review of these sentences with this helpful chart demonstrates the departure from facts to opinion.

Rightwingwatch: "joining the right-wing populist and anti-immigrant UK Independence Party (UKIP), demolishing their claims that they are merely “classical liberals.”"

Thebaffler: "“classical liberalism” is more and more filled with the dregs of the alt-right."

Dailydot: "a classical liberal is a conservative that doesn’t want to explicitly identify themselves with the less acceptable aspects of right-wing thought, such as misogyny, racism, homophobia, and fascism."

MerionWest: Actually this was an interesting read, however it does not refute Benjamin's claim.

To anyone who favors outside sources for these things I recommend this summary by Stanford on classical liberalism and its broader context. This knowledge may help one refute ideological journalists such as seen above.

Regarding reliable sources: “Misplaced Pages is an online encyclopedia, written from a neutral point of view and based on reliable sources and objectivity.” –WP:NOTNP “Even considering content published by a single source, some may represent high-quality professional journalism, while other content may be merely opinion pieces, which mainly represent the personal views of the author, and depend on the author's personal reliability as a source.” and “Consider also the weight of the claims you are supporting, which should be evaluated alongside the reliability of the sources cited. Mundane, uncontroversial details have the lowest burden of proof, while information related to biomedicine and living persons have the highest.- WP:RSPUSE

This seems to support the idea that all the opinions repeated from the same opinion is not in the spirit of Misplaced Pages especially since it appears the majority of sources are of a partisan nature. Per WP:BLPSTYLE Additionally 37 refs for those few sentences is certainly flirting with WP:OVERKILL - EatingFudge (talk) 17:28, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Thebaffler: "“classical liberalism” is more and more filled with the dregs of the alt-right." Dailydot: "a classical liberal is a conservative that doesn’t want to explicitly identify themselves with the less acceptable aspects of right-wing thought, such as misogyny, racism, homophobia, and fascism." Are you kidding me? Sarsath3 (talk) 01:58, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Why do we only present sources' opinions of him that say that he is far right? Plenty of sources believe he is a classical liberal, as does he. Its good that we don'T write those is wikipedia's voice, but since we are relaying third party opinions, perhapse it would make sense to relay other equaly valid opinion on this political figure? Francis1867 (talk) 13:42, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Please present these plenty of sources. — Bilorv (talk) 15:28, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Seems you are correct afterall. Reliable and unreliable sources share how he lables himself, but less reliable sources also lable him far right. Bottom line, the fact that he describes himself accurately would prevent secondary sources from applying their own lable on him, since anywhere else but wikipedia, primary sources have more weight than secondary ones. Perhapse we should simply say what relibale sources say while mentioning what less rialble sources accuse him of: "Carl Benjamin is a right of center (...) sometime called far right by his opponents. Francis1867 (talk) 00:41, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

This is not editorializing. It's simply better phrasing.

Sources use of Cast doubt changed to Critiqued. Critiqued: Evaluate in a detailed and analytical way. Cast doubt: Cause something or someone to be questioned. These two words are substantially different so as to potentialy mislead a reader and exchanging them for simply ‘better phrasing’ is ignorance at best. But thats ok, Watching the interaction I have come up with an even better phrasing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EatingFudge (talk • contribs) 21:21, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

As has already been explained countless times on this talk page, we are not interested in an editor's personal interpretation of a primary source. We are interested in reliable, independent sources. That this primary source is a youtube clip from the Daily Mail only further undermines the significance of this interpretation, per WP:DAILYMAIL. Grayfell (talk) 22:13, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for agreeing with me. Fixed the wording to matched the reliable source.EatingFudge (talk) 22:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Again, see WP:POINT. You clearly already know you have been challenged on this. Discuss first, and stop playing pedantic games. Grayfell (talk) 22:41, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I do realise I have been challenged on using the words of a reputable source. The reason given was better phrasing. So I picked a better word to use for best phrasing based on my reading of secondary sources and knowledge of the English language. Linking to the video hosted by the Daily Mail was only so people can have an unbiased understanding of what happened and was not used for interpretation.

As for WP:POINT I followed the example of others. If you feel that others have made a poor example for me, I may agree with you. Anyway, please enlighten me as to why we cannot use the words of the referenced reputable source, instead of the not editorialising but simply better phrasing word of current use. EatingFudge (talk) 00:36, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The original change to dismissed is not verifiable from any presented reliable source. The next change was to cast doubt, which the source actually did say, but the sentence structure was already a bit close paraphrasing and only differed by a couple of words. Source said: Phillips has cast doubt on the idea of a “men’s day” but has not laughed about male suicide, which she has said is a serious issue. We said: Phillips has critiqued the idea of a "men's day" but has not mocked male suicide, which she believes to be a serious issue. To avoid any possible clopping, I've changed it to Phillips had critiqued the idea of a "men's day" but said that male suicide is a serious issue. Note also that we said that Phillips "believes to be a serious issue", which is rather different to what the source said (she said that ...); we can't possibly discern a figure's true thoughts, only what they say and what their actions indicate. — Bilorv (talk) 00:41, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Ah so its an issue of whether its editorializing or paraphrasing. Well since the introduced word “Critiqued” infers an impartial or maybe positive action while reputable sources say she laughed or mocked. And as you may know, these are negative uses therefore I would say the switch from negative to positive is more than a superficial modification, its editorializing.

And actually if we remove the non-reliable source politicshome and use the reputable telegraph (mentioned above) we can have a good idea about what he thought she was laughing at. Voiding the entire sentence. EatingFudge (talk) 01:50, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Both sources you cite say Phillips laughed at Davies, not the idea of a "men's day", if you want to get this specific. I don't understand why you believe PoliticsHome to be unreliable, and the Telegraph source you've given is an opinion column, a bit less reliable. I don't believe I've actually said anything to indicate that I think critiqued is the best word here, because I don't—I think criticised would be best, but we've not yet got consensus for anything but the status quo, and I'm not particularly convinced that writing hundreds of words to argue over the choice of one word is the best use of any of our times. — Bilorv (talk) 09:35, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Your repeated utterence about the existance of a consensus for status quo does not make this false statement true. It is manifestly clear that a few ideologically driven user want to attack and criticise the subject, and are resisting any attemps to correct the page from other editors. These other editors are worn down by constant bad faith argument, ignoring of good points, moving of the goal posts, and then accusation of incivility when this is pointed out. Francis1867 (talk) 00:46, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Do you have any evidence for any of that, Francis? It sounds like unsubstantiated ASPERSIONS to me. Newimpartial (talk) 01:37, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

How to summarize the rape comment

So far, there seems to be only argument and no consensus about whether the rape joke should be quoted in full or summarized. The number of "votes" for each side are about the same. The "keep it as a summary" side seems to have more weight in policy, but only because the purpose of the article isn't to present his quotes in full, only to report on him validated by secondary sources.

However, the side wanting to include the full quote is also correct in their demand for neutrality. In its current form, the summary makes him look worse than what he really said.

A good compromise that allows for both concise-ness and neutrality is to improve the summary, from "he might rape her" to "he might be pressured into raping her".

Numerous sources show that that's what he said. The first source I use here is already being used as the source for the summary. The others I found just to support my argument.

The summary of what he said should be changed accordingly. Amaroq64 (talk) 06:18, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm not interested in whitewashing, nor in yet more tedious discussion, nor in false "compromise". I doubt anyone else is, either. The only difference between these two options is that one is longer. It doesn't add any clarity, but does presume that Benjamin's bloated word choice somehow softens his rape joke. Being "pressured" into raping someone is not somehow an excuse, and makes no real difference.

This is not a contest between two equal "sides", this is about how to succinctly summarizing the topic in accordance with policy. Based on past discussions, I will preemptively mention that nobody here cares that you don't even like Sargon that much, nor that in your opinion the article is a hit-job. Grayfell (talk) 06:36, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

References

1. https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/police-ukip-carl-benjamin-jess-phillips-rape_uk_5cd14f1ce4b04e275d4fb741
2. https://www.buzzfeed.com/markdistefano/jess-phillips-carl-benjamin-new-rape-comments
3. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/carl-benjamin-rape-sargon-of-akkad-youtube-jess-phillips-labour-mp-a8909296.html
4. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/07/police-investigating-ukip-candidate-youtube-carl-benjamin-jess-phillips-comments
5. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/youtube-penalises-ukip-candidate-carl-benjamin-for-rape-joke-bdckhbsk7

Misplaced Pages is not based on votes. It's based on policy. There has been more than enough discussion on this topic over years and all discussions have resulted in consensus amongst experienced editors that the current text is appropriate. This is bludgeoning. We know what he said. No-one is disputing it. That's not the reason why your changes are hugely inappropriate. If you continue repeating the same comments over and over again then you may be reverted per WP:IDHT. I notice you have a history of bludgeoning people over far-right topics. Users here with an ideological mission are not welcome and may be blocked. Go improve an article about a TV show you recently watched if you're interested in actually contributing to our encyclopedia. Or review the academic literature and use high-quality sourcing to make additions to the real Sargon of Akkad. — Bilorv (talk) 08:58, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

I've reviewed the archives. The rape joke has been contentious since it was added, and no consensus was ever reached. You two having unlimited time and energy to gatekeep honest editors from doing anything until they gave up is not a consensus.

Grayfell is right about one thing. This isn't a compromise between equal sides. The people who demanded neutrality were right and you are wrong. You two and one or two other editors over the years have been blocking numerous attempts to improve it on the technicality that the full quote would be too long. My compromise of improving the summary (backed up by sources) and your responses to it shows that it was never about keeping the article succinct.

Grayfell's wording that a more accurate summary "softens his rape joke" and you (Bilorv) having "Feminist" on your profile suggests that you two have an ideological interest in keeping slanted wording in this article.

Calling me out on my bias doesn't mean my argument is false. It also doesn't mean I'm going to go away and let you get away with your bias. Amaroq64 (talk) 11:03, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

My compromise of fixing the summary solved your sole policy reason (succinct-ness, wikipedia is not a quote farm) for resisting the improvement in neutrality. You have no further argument. Now you aren't even willing to respond in defense of your position anymore. Only attacking my bias and asserting a consensus that isn't there, and then disappearing and hoping I'll go away. Which is of course why I've had to post my argument more than once.

Review of this talk page and the archives shows people with your position behaving with bludgeoning behavior. Your side has gatekeeped many other neutral editors, with unyielding ruthlessness, until you won and they went away.

But we don't have to take my word for it. I can show you that this phrasing has been reported on by reliable sources and that I am not giving undue weight to a fringe position. Three of the five sources I used up there are regarded as reliable according to consensus (with the rest questionable, but not necessarily unreliable). Here is the reporting from just the reliable sources on this phrasing.

In a YouTube video uploaded to his channel last month he compounded his previous comment saying, “with enough pressure I might cave”, before adding “But, let's be honest, nobody's got that much beer.“

Carl Benjamin, Ukip’s candidate for South West England, sent a tweet to the MP for Birmingham Yardley in 2016 saying “I wouldn’t even rape you.” He added to the comments in a recent video saying: “With enough pressure, I might cave.”

Mr Benjamin, 39, has twice referred to the Birmingham Yardley MP. In a tweet in 2016 he said that he “wouldn’t even rape” her. In a YouTube video uploaded to his channel last month he said that “with enough pressure I might cave”. He has refused to apologise, arguing that “any subject can be the subject of a joke.”

References

1. Owoseje, Toyin (11 May 2019). "Ukip candidate who repeatedly joked about raping Labour MP has YouTube account stripped of ability to earn money". The Independent.
2. Syal, Rajeev (7 May 2019). "Police investigate Ukip candidate over Jess Phillips rape comments". The Guardian.
3. Behrmann, Anna (11 May 2019). "YouTube penalises Ukip candidate Carl Benjamin for rape 'joke'". The Times.

Since you no longer have an argument from policy, can't demonstrate consensus, and are no longer able or willing to defend your position, I've edited the summaries of the rape joke and added these sources. This edit improves clarity and neutrality and doesn't contradict succinct-ness. The only reason left to you is that you don't believe Sargon's evil should be "whitewashed" or explained away. But that is your belief and not neutral reporting with due weight based on reliable sources. Amaroq64 (talk) 06:31, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

This has all been said before. I do not owe you a discussion, and neither does anyone else, and we certainly don't owe you one on your own favorable terms. The argument has already been made many times by many editors. Your unwillingness to accept previous discussions is not a license to disrupt Misplaced Pages.

As I've said many times on this talk page, Misplaced Pages editors are not expected to pretend to be emotionless robots. Benjamin's shtick is to say intentionally inflammatory things and then declaring his own conclusions to be rational. This produces Youtube content that some people seem to enjoy, presumably because they get to also pretend to be rational, but it's not how Misplaced Pages works.

Your proposed edit is a form of whitewashing, because it emphasizing details according to some personal preference, or based on some idea of what they imply. By a strictly "rational" assessment, the quote is no more or less informative with this filler added. It is no more or less offensive, and it is no more or less encyclopedically significant. Adding more of Benjamin's bloated, awkward rambling is is a form of public relations because it introduces false precision. By introducing a detail we imply to readers that the details is important. It is not important, so this is editorializing. Misplaced Pages is not a platform for public relations, and Misplaced Pages is not obligated to present all sides equally. Grayfell (talk) 07:19, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Wait a minute. The article on neutrality says NPOV is non-negotiable; no other policy may come before neutrality, nor may consensus come before neutrality. So you guys never even had a valid justification for preventing those other editors from including the full quote.

The policy is that living and recently dead persons are especially entitled to neutral representation. This is even according to Misplaced Pages's stance on neutrality, where Misplaced Pages does take a side if most of the reporting takes a side. Much of the reporting uses the "pressured" language. "Would rape" absolutely is more offensive than "could be pressured into raping". It seems more like editorializing to not include the "pressured" language. Amaroq64 (talk) 08:47, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Shall we just let you be the arbiter of what counts as "neutral", then? Nomoskedasticity (talk) 09:14, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

No, it shouldn't be me. But it shouldn't be you guys either. I believe this has been an ideological battle ever since the first editor was stopped from making it more neutral. It should be escalated to dispute resolution. Amaroq64 (talk) 23:27, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

"More neutral" doesn't mean "more flattering" and this isn't a compromise just because you insist that it's more neutral. Mercifully, Misplaced Pages has become less tolerant of WP:SEALIONs, so using dispute resolution over the inclusion of the filler-phrase "pressured into" would be correctly seen as disrupting Misplaced Pages to prove a point.

Your personal opinions about how much less offensive it is to be "pressured into raping someone" is irrelevant. It is, at best, filler language used by Benjamin to obfuscate the offensiveness of his attempted jokes, but it doesn't change meaning of his words. He facetiously introduced the idea of raping this woman as some contorted and pedantic attempt at humor. Nobody, other than Benjamin's more pedantic fans, really cares about the precise wording of the "joke". Sources may or may not repeat specific words, but they don't ever indicate that it is important. In context, reliable sources mention it to explain that he stood-by or compounded his original message. Grayfell (talk) 00:40, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

For the record, this section was recently changed from "How to summarize the rape joke" to "How to summarize the rape comment", with the reasoning "Who says it's a joke??"

It's obviously a joke when taken in context. It seems even the talk section is being editorialized to create a slanted view of the subject. But since the reporting didn't explicitly say it's a joke, I guess that's just another point of contention on this page.
Amaroq64 (talk) 23:56, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

On second thought, The Independent and The Times did characterize it in their headlines as a joke. Amaroq64 (talk) 23:59, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

The comments are not noteworthy because they were jokes. They are noteworthy because he was publicly using the idea of rape, of a real person, for his own purposes.

So in context, who cares? Which part of his comments was the joke part, and why would it matter? Was he joking when he said "I wouldn't even rape you"? Who's the target of that joke, and what's the punchline? I'm asking rhetorically, but if you don't have an answer, you should think about it harder. Was the "joke" part the bit about "nobody's got that much beer"? What does that say about him, rape, and his beliefs? If you want us to think that it's just a joke, you don't take these comments seriously. If so, why should we take you seriously on this talk page? Benjamin doesn't get to pick-and-choose when people take him seriously and when they don't, and neither do you.

These quibbles distract us from what sources are saying. Sources do not care about "the joke". Grayfell (talk) 01:08, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Jokes are a matter of intent, intent can be infered throught many way, including the explicit words of the primary source. We could simply quote primary source and say "primary source claim he was joking, some secondary sources disagree". By trying to deny the obvious joke, we make wikipedia look very partisan, and do not adopt a neutral tone. 45.44.248.46 (talk) 13:36, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Again, this is a distraction. Reliable sources do not seem to care if it's a joke or not, and certainly don't treat being a joke as a valid excuse. Sources do not care whether or not he was joking, and because they do not care, it would be non-neutral to imply that it is significant. Grayfell (talk) 19:15, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Presenting views of reliable source that would make the allegation less outragious than what is claimed would not be neutral? So we should only present one side of the story because Buzzfeed and other biased sources which can sometimes be reliable have made attack pieces on the men, and delieberately conceal that he said himself from the get go that it was a joke at the expense of the biased way some media organisation present the news? No original research doesn't mean mimicking unsubstantiated opinions from everything which have been considered a reliable source once, it means not making our own inferences! Plenty of reliable sources, including the primary source have exposed the humourous intent of the statements. Your use of the word "valid excuse" imply that your aim is to use wikipedia to condem the men or the words. If it is so, than your intent and the way you go about it infringe NPV. Reliable sources should be judged in general, news article should also be based on case by case basis. Opinions innews articles should not be shared in Misplaced Pages's voice unless they are authoritative. The source are not authoritative on Carl's humorous intent, and if we are frank, everyone know it was a joke. There are just a few people that deny it because they believe that the comments were unacceptable even as a joke. Be it as it may, the fact a joke is offensive, hurtfull or unfunny doesn't make it less of a joke. Francis1867 (talk) 23:43, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Francis1867 I read this thread and many others where you are involved, and I find it quite unfortunate that you spend so much effort derailing the neutrality of the website by quote mining sources. I googled "Carl Benjamin Joke" and here are the top reliable sources I found. Almost everyone opposed to carl acknowledge the joke. 1 2 3 4 5 6 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Francis1867 (talk • contribs) 23:55, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

You might want to look at Help:Signatures

Either you do not understand what I am saying, or you are ignoring what I am saying. It doesn't matter if it's a "joke" because that's not why anyone's talking about it.

The first one refers to a "vile joke" in the headline and the lead-in. It discusses it as "offensive" and how he doubled-down on the comment. Nowhere else does this discuss or imply that this a joke, except to quote Benjamin. It also discusses some gossip about someone else, and mentioned that Benjamin has called the BBC "communists". The source is specifically about a beef Benjamin tried to start with PinkNews. In context, this is nothing.

Since you intentionally searched for sources which use the term "joke", this isn't even a make-believe version of a valid sample, so it's amusing that you accuse me of cherry-picking. I'm not inclined to waste time picking apart the rest of these. Grayfell (talk) 02:04, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

A modest proposal was not meant to say that we ought to eat irish babies, it meant to make light of some political comments at the time. Immagine trying to write a wikipedia in such a way that present this essai as if the author legimatly argued for canibalism. This would not only take a point of view, it would be a complete and utter lie by misrepresentation. The reason why joke is put in scare quotes is because people are trying to downplay that aspect because we know that in human society, there is a difference between what is acceptable to say as a joke and what you can say seriously. The sources which were the most biased wrote more about the topic, which increases the amount of sources that try to downplay the joke aspect of the story. You use the fact that there are more dishonnest source to be dishonnest. We shouldn't do that, we should critically evaluate sources in light of their apparent bias, and only share authoritative opinions in the voice of wikipedia, other opionions, if mentioned should be paraphrased or quoted. I find the way you are wearing down editors to make sure that the article present your personal views quite despicable. The circular reasoning, the fallacies, the willing blindness to obvious truth. Other editors have talked about it. At least the French version of the article is getting a neutral voice in translation. Hopefully english readers will eventually get the same quality as french do. Francis1867 (talk) 01:41, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

A modest proposal was not... no. Stop digging. A Modest Proposal is accepted as satire, and has a clear target and message, and that target wasn't poor people's children. If "I wouldn't even rape you" was satire, the target is still a woman getting raped, or worse, the punchline is that Benjamin would rape her. "Nobody's got that much beer" was not satire, and it's not up to you to decide who the target of the "joke" is, and more importantly, it still doesn't actually matter. Your opinion about which sources are and are not "biased" is also a dead end. You are not qualified to determine which opinions are authoritative. Grayfell (talk) 06:06, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

This comparison to Swift might be the least effective argument I have seen on this site, and that is saying something. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 07:11, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Misplaced Pages:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard#Carl Benjamin's rape joke

 You are invited to join the discussion at Misplaced Pages:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard#Carl Benjamin's rape joke. — Bilorv (talk) 11:56, 23 April 2020 (UTC)Template:Z48

Include brouhaha about "I find racist jokes funny"?

So, it looks like Mr. Benjamin caused another minor stir last year with what some have deemed offensive language. Here are some examples of what I mean: It gets a brief mention here: It seems to me lesser than the rape joke controversy, but I think it merits a mention. What do other editors think? Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 18:03, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Those articles (discounting the BBC) all mention the rape comments, which seem to be the bulk of the coverage. I wouldn't be opposed to a brief mention of David Lammy condemning Benjamin for using the word "nigger", as that seems to be a significant story, but I don't think we should list everything Benjamin has said that he has been criticised for. — Bilorv (talk) 20:18, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Minor change to the lead

I came to this page after seeing the thread on BLP. I made this change to the lead of the article. I believe the current lead is generally good, but this part —and a later remark in which Benjamin said he might rape Phillips but for the fact that "nobody's got that much beer"— is inappropriate. This kind of editorial aside is not encyclopedic in tone, and combination of paraphrase and direct quote is awkward. Also, it's just unnecessary. The lead is supposed to introduce and summarize the person's notability, and I think the quote "I wouldn't even rape you" is enough of an introduction for people to understand why these comments became such a big deal. The rest of the incident can be covered in more detail in the body of the article. User:Bilorv reverted me on the grounds that no changes should be made. Does anyone object to the content of my proposal? Red Rock Canyon (talk) 04:12, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

See also #How to summarize the rape comment, above.

What, exactly, is an editorial aside, here? It is what he said per multiple sources. What Benjamin said is certainly not in an encyclopedic tone, but is that want you meant? We have to use an encyclopedic tone to summarize very crude comments, and it's tricky to do that in an appropriate way.

That said, how necessary it is should be decided by source, but you're right, it's not entirely necessary. If the purpose of removing it is to make the lead more encyclopedic, I think this would functionally be downplaying significant comments because of their content. If the purpose is to make a tighter summary that summarizes source in fewer words, we should talk about that, instead. Grayfell (talk) 05:24, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

I don't mean his comments were unencyclopedic. What he said is a major part of his notability and needs to be covered in this article. I mean that the way this sentence is structured is unencyclopedic. The emdash parenthetical is conversational in tone. It reads like an editorial rather than an encyclopedia and should be removed. That's really my only problem with the lead, and my edit is one suggestion for fixing it. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 05:43, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

As for the comments themselves, I guess my preference is that we quote exactly what he said and then explain the impact. Readers will come away from the article better informed if we quote the comments in full than if we try to paraphrase them. But I think that kind of detail belongs in the body, and I can see there's been a long and angry discussion on that topic which I don't really want to get involved in. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 05:48, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Edit: I see there are proposals for a more substantial rewrite of the lead at BLP, so maybe this discussion is pointless. I think Bilorv's proposal there, to just replace the whole thing with Benjamin's widely-condemned comments about rape in relation to Jess Phillips dominated his 2019 European Parliament candidacy. is probably a better solution for the lead. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 05:58, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Ah, I see. Yes, that makes sense. I think that, per Bilorv's revert, this depends on the consensus at BLP/N. Grayfell (talk) 06:23, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Is it okay to use Benjamin's own videos as sources for this article?

When it comes to how Benjamin personally describes himself and his political views, I noticed that the cited sources are all from media outlets. On paper, this is fine, but if this article is to have an accurate collection of what Benjamin himself says he believes, wouldn't it be most accurate if we used his own library of videos. They are first-hand sources of what he thinks, and he has quite a large pool of content across his YouTube channels. We should include the information of what other media outlets and groups of people across the political spectrum believe him to be, but when it comes to how he views himself, I believe the article should take that straight from the horse's mouth. ThatOneGuyWithAFork (talk) 03:15, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

This has already been discussed more times than I can count. Misplaced Pages has a strong preference for secondary sources, and also for independent sources (which are not necessarily the same). Per WP:SPSSELF, his own videos can be used for routine, non-controversial details, but other sources are usually preferable. This info is typically limited to very basic biographical detail, such as full name, year of birth, place of schooling, etc. Opinions are not routine information in most cases, and any inclusion of his views without an outside sign of significance would be a form of promotion ("unduly self-serving" as WP:RS describes it).

To put it another way, as has already been discussed, picking-and-choosing which of his many opinion to include should be decided by reliable sources, not by editors. Grayfell (talk) 03:33, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Indeed, secondary sources are needed here to tell us which information to include (out of thousands of hours of footage of Benjamin), what relative importance it has in relation to other facts about him, and how to describe that information. Any short summary selected from hundreds of primary sources would not be a summary from the horse's mouth, but from the summarising editor's personal point of view. — Bilorv (talk) 07:55, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Climate denial and Covid 19 conspiracy theories

Carl has made multiple videos in which he denies the scientific consensus on climate change, attacks and defames climate activists such as Greta Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion, and more recently, hes been spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories about Covid-19. Any reason why this isn't mentioned? 46.97.170.78 (talk) 22:32, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

If you can present quality secondary sources that cover these things, then it would be appropriate to include them in the article. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 22:43, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Why specifically secondary sources? Why not also include primary sources? Sarsath3 (talk) 00:53, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

As DanielRigal says below, we're about the reliable sources. Primary sources are okay, to some degree, per WP:SELFPUB, but we must also keep in mind WP:DUE. The question essentially boils down to, "does anyone care?" With all due respect to Mr. Benjamin, he might say many things, good or bad, which are not newsworthy and not important to include in this article. We use representation in secondary sources as a proxy for the importance and notability of a subject and the weight that should be accorded to it. I hope that's some sort of explanation! Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 02:41, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

(Edit clash with Dumuzid) We would need reliable sources to have covered his involvement in these topics to a degree that justifies us mentioning it, i.e. not just a passing mention. He is nowhere near as newsworthy now as he was at the peak of his fame/infamy so it is quite possible that they just don't care what he thinks about Covid-19 etc. Other, more zeitgeisty, conspiracy theorists are available and is it possible that they have taken the media coverage that Benjamin might have garnered were he still in his heyday. That said, as Dumuzid says, if you do know of any reliable sources that have covered this then you can drop the links here and maybe they can be used. --DanielRigal (talk) 22:51, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Here's the thing. This is not about how he presents himself, this is about something he demonstrably said. Him attacking Greta Thunberg, claiming that "climate alarmists were wrong in the past", and making a video where he talks about covid-19 coming from a chinese lab, aren't a matter of his opinion. These are facts that are reliably verifiable from his own videos. I can understand that him describing himself as a liberal is bullshit, because it's something we would need to take his word for, but when the question is whether or not he said that "climate alarmists were wrong in the past", I'm under the impression that him actually saying those words in a video on his own channel, it an indisputable smoking gun. 46.97.170.78 (talk) 16:13, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 May 2020

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Carl Benjamin has another youtube channel with the name 'The Symposium' at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7xJftLtg3YJGgClZRr7hbg/feed add link 2A02:C7F:DE8C:9800:5172:5BBA:FD12:C0F6 (talk) 16:53, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Okay, thanks... Nomoskedasticity (talk) 17:21, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

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