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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by SineBot (talk | contribs) at 06:37, 6 February 2016 (Dating comment by Denarivs - "response"). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Sourcing

Sources are a mess, I'd appreciate if someone who knew how could clean them up. Thanks. Denarivs (talk) 00:42, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Reaction

May I include this in the article from New Right on the Alt-right?

Proponents are said to use culture jamming and memes to promote their ideas. One leading proponent records parodies of Disney songs (such as I'll Make A Man Out Of You, from Mulan) "with their discussions of white supremacy and generally racist and sexist lyrics". Adherents also refer to themselves as identitarian, and criticize National Review and William F. Buckley for "not openly espousing, among other things, white nationalism, or white identarianism" such as in the video which is titled “The National Review” and is set to the tune of “The Bells of Notre Dame.” Supporters and detractors alike regularly describe the alt-right as young and intellectually diverse,

References

1. "A YouTube account is rewriting Disney tunes to be racist".
2. http://www.radixjournal.com/blog/2016/1/20/what-is-the-altright
3. http://www.buzzfeed.com/rosiegray/how-2015-fueled-the-rise-of-the-freewheeling-white-nationali
4. http://www.weeklystandard.com/article/beyond-pale/724717?nopager=1
5. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/12/03/rush-limbaugh-s-favorite-new-white-power-group.html
6. http://www.toqonline.com/blog/richard-spencer-launches-alternative-right/

These sources do not support that this is regularly describing as intellectually diverse. Neither The Occidental Quarterly nor AlternativeRight.com (Radix) are reliable for statements of fact, nor are they independent of the movement, so labeling them "supporters" is misleading at best. The Buzzfeed source doesn't really say that the movement is diverse, merely that it's "loosely connected", and that several followers' "political projects are a little hard to pin down". Calling that intellectual diversity is absurdly flattering. Otherwise the Buzzfeed article mostly reflects what figures in the movement say about it, and very little about what detractors say. Popehat and the ADF said the alt-right are white supremacists. That has nothing to do with diversity, intellectual or otherwise.

Regardless, there's nothing 'regular' about a single source. It also reads like an attempt at false balance. If sources are in general agreement (which they aren't) then this should just be stated as is. Since they are not, it's not appropriate for the article to divide sources into supporters and detractors just to create the illusion of consensus. This should be removed from both this article, and the New Right one.

As for the age, I don't think anyone is contesting that the alt-right skews young, but these sources are flimsy. I think the Weekly Standard one must be a mistake, as it doesn't appear to be discussing the alt-right at all, and the Daily Beast one only mentions age in relation to the Limbaugh caller, which is nothing worth mentioning. It does, however, repeatedly emphasize that this is a white supremacist movement, not just a "white nationalist" one. Grayfell (talk) 04:57, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

The Weekly Standard source is a typo of some sorts. The correct Weekly Standard source describes the alt-right as "highly heterogeneous", which is a very close synonym for diverse, and is the best source for this point. The claim is backed up by an article in fusion.net which calls the alt-right "a loosely defined coalition" and an article in NRO which describes the alt-right as a "motley group". The claim that the alt-right is younger than mainstream conservatism has a number of sources. Because of this, I'm going to add the sentence back to the first paragraph. Denarivs (talk) 05:55, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

How about holding off until this discussion is resolved. Multiple editors have given concerns about the quality of these sources and the weight of these claims. Even if we accept these sources, which I'm not saying I d0, "ideologically diverse" is not the only way to describe this characteristic. Also, Misplaced Pages's talk pages are obsolete, and not well suited to this style of discussion, so it may be easier to post responses at the bottom of the section, per WP:TPG, otherwise they are likely to be overlooked. Grayfell (talk) 06:32, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

I added the line before seeing your comment but I've since removed it. You can see the sources here and if there's no problem with it I'll add the sentence back some time. Denarivs (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 06:36, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

I'll edit what's been inserted and we'll review it so we can reach a consensus on this. Connor Machiavelli (talk) 05:02, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

I cut the sentence down to "The alt-right is described as young and diverse." Also, The Weekly Standard said "WPC14’s own website declares that “the WPC has become a venue for fostering difficult and critical dialogues around white supremacy, white privilege, diversity, multicultural education and leadership, social & economic justice, and the intersecting systems of privilege and oppression.”" and "The typical garb for WPC14 attendees ranged from hippie (old folks) to hipster (young ’uns), with common elements of rubber soles on every shoe and green-conscious water bottles dangling from every backpack." Connor Machiavelli (talk) 05:12, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

In this case, "diverse" by itself is far, far too vague and "has been described as" is a WP:WEASEL, so that's not going to work. Poor quality sources can be found to support just about anything, so this would need to be either genuinely ubiquitous among reliable sources, (which has not been demonstrated) or it needs to be clearly attributed.

What on Earth does the demographics of the white privilege conference have to do with the alt-right? From that article it's clear that conference is ideologically opposed to the alt-right, and even that connection is WP:SYNTH. I'm still not seeing how that article is related to the alt-right at all. Grayfell (talk) 05:30, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Alright, let's throw out the wPC14 source. Instead of "has been described", let's just have it say "It is young and diverse.", I mean, even from just looking at the websites this movement dominates, such as 4chan's /pol/, you get quite an impression of who the alt-rightists averagely are. Connor Machiavelli (talk) 05:37, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Check out this source. http://www.weeklystandard.com/what-exactly-is-the-alternative-right/article/2000310 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Connor Machiavelli (talk • contribs) 05:40, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Using 4chan to deduce that kind of thing is WP:OR, and those sites aren't independent, neutral, or reliable. That members of the movement consider it ideologically diverse, or that a handful of mainstream conservatives agree, isn't the only problem. "Diverse" is relative. From a neocon perspective like (a writer for) the Weekly Standard, Taki's Mag, Breitbart, and AlternativeRight may all be diverse, but they would still be within a narrow scope if judged by a more liberal source. We also have the ADF and others saying essentially that the movement is just part of the Euphemism treadmill for white supremacy, which is itself just another way of saying white racist. Obviously not everyone agrees that this is simply "diverse", so that word isn't going to work. Whatever is used needs more nuance and context, otherwise it's puffery. Grayfell (talk) 06:32, 6 February 2016 (UTC)