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Don't bring politics in to a lamp post

This essays in a nutshell page summarizes the gist of user written essays on Wikipedia. Essays can also be navigated via categories, navigation templates, or Special:Search. For a listing and more information on navigating essays, see Wikipedia:Essay directory. Essays may represent widespread norms or minority viewpoints. Consider these views with discretion. Essays are not Wikipedia policies.

This page in a nutshell: Don't bring political biases of sources into a discussion of sourcing concerns for a non-politically controversial topic

 

This is a lamp post. It is not political, so political biases should not be brought up regarding sourcing on how much electricity it uses each year

Having independent, secondary sources is preferred on Wikipedia. However, in countries where the government is involved in the distribution of news, this can lead to some difficulties. Most know that using sources affected by

Sources????

Let's use the Singapore newspaper The Straits Times (ST) as an example. ST is frequently labelled as "the mouthpiece of the Singapore Government". Under the Newspaper and Printing Presses Act, the distribution of news and licensees of newspapers are under Government control. What most do not realise and engage with is that this act essentially shuts down independent news publications from flourishing. Independent news publications do exist such as Mothership and The Online Citizen. However, all print publications, which have higher editing standards compared to the independent sources above, are controlled by the government. Thus, the highest quality sources are those that are either owned by SPH Media or Mediacorp.

That isn't to say that all newspapers are suck-ups to the Singapore Government. Contrary to popular belief, SPH isn't actually owned by the government at all; it's completely independent on its own. Yes, the government is involved in its distribution but it doesn't own SPH. It has also published several opinion pieces which are speculative against the government.

Scenario

Let's say we have Editor A who wishes to improve an article on a particularly famous traffic cone. Said traffic cone is located in a country where its media is controlled by the government. The traffic cone in question is a culturally famous traffic cone, does not have anything to do with politics, and is only covered in its state media. Thus, Editor A is forced to use news sites with government interference in order to improve the article. After some hard work, they decided to nominate it for GAN. Whilst scrolling through GAN backlog, Editor B takes interest in this traffic cone. Editor B notes the heavy usage of articles where the government is involved and brings it up on the talk page. Editor A enquires Editor B to clarify their concerns, to which Editor B brings up the "political biases" in those sources. Editor A disagrees but Editor B is insistent. A subsequent debate between Editors A and B ensues, of which it spills into several notice boards. It results in no consensus. Anyways, Editor A focuses on a new, non-political article in said country and nominates it for GAN. Editor B comes back, comments on the "political biases" in those sources, Editor A disagrees, a debate ensues again, etc, you get the idea. In this case, Editor A is right: it is not problematic to use sources that have government interference as it is a non-political topic. There is no politics involved in a culturally-famous traffic cone.

When it becomes problematic

There are certainly some scenarios where bringing up the political biases of the sources it uses in relation to the content of its subject is in fact important, as shown below:

• Contentious topics: for example, a retrospective article on Operation Coldstore published by The Straits Times on whether the Operation was truly a justified should not be primarily used.
• Heavy government backing: It should be important to note the extent of it. If the subject uses government-controlled articles and is non-political, then it is perfectly acceptable to use such sources, such as for train stations or a lamp post. However, if the government is heavily pushing for said non-political topic (a shopping mall or a "metaverse" type thing), then the sourcing may come into question

Please use Wikipedia as literally anything other than an encyclopaedia

Humorous Wikipedia essay

This is a humorous essay. It contains humorous advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors and isn't meant to be taken seriously. This page is not an encyclopedia article or one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines.

This page in a nutshell: Please use Wikipedia as literally anything other than an encyclopaedia

Wikipedia is known to be an online encyclopaedia. It's not like it's the 9th most visited website in the world and contributes heavily to knowledge. But who actually cares about that? Pffft that's right, knowledge is overrated! Encyclopaedias is for nerds, dorks, and those who have nothing better to do with their lives. It's a boring and bureaucratic wasteland. To help you with your crusade of making Wikipedia a better place, we've came up with a list of how you can make Wikipedia less boring and more fun!

 

Wikipedia is a bureaucratic and boring wasteland that's patrolled by emotionless editors. With your help, we can make Wikipedia a better place!

Why?

How?

List

The following is a list of ideas on how you can make Wikipedia less of a bureaucratic hellhole that are covered up by those boring editors:

Articles

1. Dictionary: What? Most words do not have enough notability to warrant their own encyclopaedic article mostly comprising of definitions on Wikipedia? Heresay! Fiddlesticks! What if the hoi polloi encounter a formal word in an article? Everything should be wikilinked!
2. Original thought
   1. Original research: It's pretty obvious that Marine Parade MRT station is named after the Marine Parade area, so you might as well add it. Those boring cabal-based editors can't see it!
   2. Personal inventions: what do you mean that my million-dollar idea, the snoggler, can't be added on Wikipedia? No one has invented a container to hold ice cream that is also edible! I'm a genius! I conceptualised it 30 minutes ago and have gotten praise for being a savant!
   3. Personal essays: I want to write an essay on how Kaiser Wilhelm could've secretly won WWI (and is NOT gay)!
   4. Discussion forum:

Community

1. j
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Summary

To summarise, Wikipedia is a boring and mindlessly bureaucratic hellhole. Only YOU can make it a better place! We need to spread a little fun around here