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view · edit Frequently asked questions Q1: When was consensus established to name the page Persecution of Uyghurs in China? A1: The current title reflects the consensus established in the most recent move discussion (22 January 2024). Two previous widely attended move discussions (30 June 2020 and 1 April 2021) had resulted in this page being titled Uyghur genocide. Please see Logs and discussions below for the full list of move discussions. In these discussions, editors discussed reporting from reliable sources in light of WP:COMMONNAME and WP:CRITERIA, the first two times establishing an affirmative consensus that the title "Uyghur genocide" is an appropriate name for the article. The third debate, immediately following a 12 January 2024 discussion that was closed as "not moved", citing WP:NCENPOV as the naming convention guideline justifying a shift to the new name.

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This article was nominated for deletion on 1 February 2020. The result of the discussion was keep.

This article has previously been nominated to be moved. Please review the prior discussions if you are considering re-nomination. Move logs: Ethnocide of Uyghurs Cultural genocide of the Uyghurs Cultural genocide of Uyghurs Uyghur genocide allegations Uyghur cultural genocide Uyghur genocide Discussions: RM, Ethnocide of Uyghurs → Cultural genocide of the Uyghurs, Moved, 4 February 2020, (discussion) RM, Cultural genocide of the Uyghurs → Cultural genocide of Uyghurs, Moved, 16 February 2020, (discussion) RM, Cultural genocide of Uyghurs → Uyghur genocide, Moved, 30 June 2020, (discussion) RM, Uyghur genocide → Persecution of Uyghurs, Not Moved, 3 February 2021, (discussion) RM, Uyghur genocide → Uyghur cultural genocide, Not Moved, 1 April 2021, (discussion)

Persecution of Uyghurs in China was nominated as a Social sciences and society good article, but it did not meet the good article criteria at the time (February 11, 2021). There are suggestions on the review page for improving the article. If you can improve it, please do; it may then be renominated.

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Persecution of Uyghurs in China article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

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I propose that we insert the following sentence as a lede:

The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). ^[1]

I believe that this is accurate, direct, and in line with WP:Lede (notably MOS:OPEN), though this insertion has been twice reverted by other editors. I am looking to see if there is consensus surrounding this change, and how we should proceed moving forward. Mikehawk10 (talk) 19:01, 21 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This has been discussed extensively above and I don't really see any point in rehashing recent discussions.PailSimon (talk) 01:20, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The lede addressed above was in terms of getting proper sources for the lede that currently exists and debating whether or not to use the term “genocide”. I am proposing a new lede that I believe is more direct than the current one. Mikehawk10 (talk) 04:39, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Right your lede uses the term genocide which is relevant to all the discussions above.PailSimon (talk) 08:53, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment: This was discussed in the section First sentence rewrite above (particlarly the comments in December 2020), where using the reference you give (the introduction of a resolution by US senators) to write such a first sentence was pointed out by Drmies as insufficient. This doesn't preclude giving a direct definition of "Uyghur genocide" if it can be cited to other sources (e.g. published academic journal articles or books). — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:31, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yes. There is NO WAY (sorry to be so emphatic) in which we can accept a judgment by a US Senate committee as somehow unbiased and authoritative enough to allow us to state their conclusion in Wikipedia's voice. They shouldn't even be cited unless ascribed. Drmies (talk) 01:46, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • @PailSimon: I had found 10 non-government sources for the revised lede, and used them when I updated it. If the issue at hand was the U.S. government being the source used to justify the prior lede, why has it been taken down when I inserted 10 independent sources instead? Mikehawk10 (talk) 01:22, 27 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

In considering whether the testimony before a U.S. congressional committee is reliable, remember the Nayirah testimony. I think congressional testimony is a primary source, and therefore WP:OR. And one of the requirements of a WP:RS is that they do fact-checking. If the New York Times ran the Nayirah story verbatim from a congressional committee without fact-checking, I think that would still not be a WP:RS. Al Jazeera is reliable for some purposes, but I wouldn't accept their unverified claims about atrocities against Muslims. And I've seen some unverified accusations against the Chinese on ABC News (Australia). I would take Human Rights Watch seriously -- when they do serious fact-checking. But I'd have to read their source documents. --Nbauman (talk) 23:40, 7 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• • • Since the only people calling it a genocide are those who have understood neither the legal definition of genocide nor the dictionary definition, I don't understand why the title of the article uses the word genocide. Testimony of victims can go to proving that crimes against humanity happened, but without evidence that the intention of those crimes was to wipe out the Uighur race, the definition of genocide is not made out. To argue otherwise is just extremism.

--Bacon Man (talk) 08:35, 23 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@My very best wishes: See this discussion among others.PailSimon (talk) 19:41, 1 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I see this section (I did not see it before). So what? The suggestion by Mikehawk10 is very much reasonable. I do not think this phrase is an assertion of anything made in WP voice. This is just a definition of this page subject, which is something different (i.e. how reliable sources define this subject; when I see "Uyghur genocide" in a newspaper, what the authors mean?). As far as we have such subject/page, we must have the definition. This is not really based on views by US Congress or whatever. I would check more, but I do not see clear links to previous discussions. One should realize that the situation with coverage of the Uyghur genocide in sources has changed significantly after previous discussions. My very best wishes (talk) 21:33, 1 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with you, and the lead has now been re-added as there are clearly 5+ editors who are now in favour. — Czello 21:43, 1 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Add agreement.  // Timothy :: talk  21:49, 1 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly disagree with the assertion that this is not a Wikivoice statement. The first sentence of the lede comes across as an unequivocal statement that there is an ongoing genocide in Xinjiang. The title of this article is already bad enough. Above, PailSimon wrote that, The title is less then ideal however the lead of the article makes it clear that these are accusations. The new lede does not make clear that these are accusations - it states, in Wikivoice, that there is a genocide. We obviously have POV problem here. Both the title and the lede should make clear that there are accusations of genocide. The lede should explicitly state who is making those accusations, and should reflect the contested nature of these accusations. -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:13, 27 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It does not state in wikivoice that there is a genocide it says "The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China.” Horse Eye's Back (talk) 22:00, 27 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That looks to me like a Wikivoice statement that there is an ongoing genocide, and I'm sure that that's how many (probably most) readers will interpret it. -Thucydides411 (talk) 23:29, 27 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

But we don’t and they won’t... Its explicitly *not* "The Uyghur genocide is the genocide perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China.” Horse Eye's Back (talk) 23:34, 27 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, but the article is titled "Uyghur genocide," and it begins with, The Uyghur genocide is .... It's simply not credible to claim that people will not read this as a Wikivoice statement. -Thucydides411 (talk) 09:07, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thats because Uyghur genocide is the WP:COMMONNAME, if you want to change the page’s name we can discuss that but please don’t fib about what we currently say in wikivoice, which is "ongoing series of human rights abuses” not genocide. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:22, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think you're being reasonable here. A reader who comes to a page titled, "Uyghur genocide," which begins, "The Uyghur genocide is ..." is very likely to interpret that as a definitive statement by Wikipedia that there is an ongoing genocide against the Uyghurs. You can claim that "Uyghur genocide" is the common name for issues of human rights in Xinjiang (which I find doubtful - "genocide" is just one of the several charges described in the article, and it's a highly contentious and heavily disputed charge at that), but you can't seriously dispute that readers are very likely to interpret the title and opening line as a statement that there is an ongoing genocide. Given your above statements, I take it that you agree with me that this article should not depict the claims of genocide as established fact. If that's the case, then would you support changes to the lede to make it clear that "genocide" is a claim (and to make it clear that the claim is not being stated in Wikivoice), and to attribute that claim? -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:05, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Again it seems like you want to change the name. The reader will interpret that there is an ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China which is called the Uyghur genocide. Which is exactly what we intend to convey and is established fact. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:17, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You don't see how a statement that begins with "The Uyghur genocide is" could be reasonably interpreted to mean that there's a genocide against the Uyghurs? Even if you think it can be interpreted otherwise, do you agree with me that that sentence can very reasonably be read to mean that there is a genocide? Finally, do you agree that the lede should not present the claim that there is a genocide as a fact? -Thucydides411 (talk) 23:33, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That would be a reasonable interpretation, which is different from saying something in wikivoice. Again it seems like your issue is with the name of the page and you’re just obfuscating because we already have consensus on that point and consensus went against you. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 00:43, 30 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Since, as you admit, a reasonable person reading the lede might well interpret it as a definitive statement that there is a genocide against the Uyghurs, we should alter the lede to make it clear that we are not making a definitive statement. It would be unreasonable to insist on a wording that could be reasonably interpreted as a definitive statement. -Thucydides411 (talk) 11:03, 30 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The lead in question is fine and is in line with established consensus that has been recently reaffirmed. In a recent ANI thread, TimothyBlue and Czello both correctly noted that a consensus had been achieved regarding the first sentence in the lead, with Timothy specifically citing comments made by themselves, me, Oranjelo100, and My very best wishes. It also appears that Horse Eye's Back supports the current lead. While consensus can change, I don't think it is a good use of community time to re-litigate this issue twice in the same month, especially considering how emphatically the previous discussion on this topic ended. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 00:19, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The statement (if any) was made by the title of the page (i.e. Uyghur genocide). So, yes, a reasonable person reading the title "might well interpret it as a definitive statement", sure. But now we simply need to explain in the lead what "Uyghur genocide" is. And yes, I think a consensus was reached. If anyone does not like it, please make an RfC to change the title of the page.My very best wishes (talk) 00:53, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with those objecting to the title. It does not make sense to title the article "Uighur genocide" and then explain immediately that when we say genocide, we mean something that might not be genocide. "Uighur repression" would be a better title. It is true that many respected scholars have said they think that what is happening in Xinjiang is genocide, but then again many have disagreed. Yet almost everyone outside China who has studied the subject agrees that the Uighurs are being repressed. The article then does an excellent job of detailing the various forms of repression.

--Bacon Man (talk) 10:56, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Restarted discussion

Mikehawk10, When you say that the lede is fine, do you mean that you do not think it could be interpreted as a Wikivoice statement that there is a Uyghur genocide? I think any reasonable reader is going to view it as a Wikivoice statement that there is a genocide, so unless you're arguing that we should make such a Wikivoice statement, I don't see how you can view the lede as "fine". -Thucydides411 (talk) 09:11, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You’re beating a dead horse, its not a wikivoice statement... End of story. Stop trying to make an end run around consensus, this is becoming disruptive. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:27, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thucydides411 brings up a reasonable point though. There are others wordings that could improve the presentation and tone of the first sentence, e.g. something along the lines of (underlined differences with the current version):

The Uyghur genocide is the designation of an ongoing series of human rights abuses as a genocide perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China.

Other alternatives could include who is using the designation (perhaps too wordy?), refer to the Genocide Convention, or use other terms. A discussion about how to refine the first sentence is at least worth having. — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:21, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@MarkH21: The lede should make it clear that "Uyghur genocide" is an allegation, and it should also specify exactly who is making that allegation. Using "Uyghur genocide" in a sentence is probably the easiest way to go about this: The United States Department of State has alleged that the People's Republic of China is committing a Uyghur genocide. Subsequent sentences can explain what the elements of that alleged genocide are. The first paragraph should also contain the Chinese government's response to these allegations. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:42, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Thucydides411: We already have a sentence in the first paragraph that conveys the opinions that critics of the policies have, which reads, "Critics of the policy have described it as the forced assimilation of Xinjiang and have called it an ethnocide or cultural genocide, while some governments, activists, independent NGOs, human rights experts, academics, government officials, and the East Turkistan Government-in-Exile have called it a genocide.". Let's not be unnecessarily reductive here; reducing the designation to mere allegations put forward by the U.S. state department does not reflect how the situation is covered in reliable sources, especially given the wide breadth of the sorts of parties who have called it a genocide (especially with multiple generally reliable perennial sources plainly referring to the situation as a genocide). China's response thus far has been (initially) to publicly lie deny that the camps exist, then to acknowledge they exist but frame them alternatively as happy-dory boarding schools or vocational training camps inspired by counterterror efforts (and to deny that any human rights violations exist in the region). WP:Mandy Rice-Davies Applies here, and Chinese government denials should not be given undue weight. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 18:42, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Mikehawk10: This revision will not have pinged Thucydides411 since it was not on a new line with a new signature. See WP:PINGFIX. — MarkH₂₁^talk 21:45, 17 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Mandy Rice-Davies never applies to any article on Wikipedia. It's not Wikipedia policy. It's an essay, and a very poorly thought-out one at that, which asks us to violate two core policies: WP:NPOV and WP:BLP. You can look at the talk page of the essay to read some of the objections.

This is an article about China, and relying heavily on US government allegations or "reports" by obscure DC think tanks, while ignoring the responses by the Chinese government, would be absurd. The lede currently makes almost no mention of the Chinese government's responses to the allegations, and it fails to even properly frame the allegations as allegations, instead putting the charge of "genocide" in Wikivoice. As MarkH21 shows below, reliable sources overwhelmingly do not treat the allegations of "genocide" as true in this case, but instead attribute those allegations to the parties making them. On Wikipedia, we can't for ourselves decide that the allegations are true, that the responses to the allegations are irrelevant, and then proceed to put the allegations into Wikivoice and omit the responses. -Thucydides411 (talk) 11:32, 18 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Mikehawk10 and Thucydides411: Perhaps we should compile the usage in RSes (something that seems to have been dearly missing in many of the drawn-out discussions on this talk page. Many high-quality RSes (even very recent ones) use genocide when describing events in their own voice (with respect to Uyghurs/Xinjiang) only when it is accompanied by either in-text attribution to a specific entity, quotation marks, the word "allegations of", or something similar. None of the following use unqualified genocide as a description of ongoing events in their own voice, instead using:

I don't doubt the assertion that there are some RSes (e.g. a news.com.au video clip) that use genocide in their own voice to describe events, but it does not appear that it is close to being the dominant trend. It appears that the dominant trend in RSes is to describe the existence of accusations of genocide, with evidence and designations given by the corresponding governments, reports, scholars, and activists.

By the way @Thucydides411: I don't think that your proposed first sentence really defines the topic, particularly since the US Dept of State is not the only entity that has accused China of genocide. Also MOS:BOLDLEAD on title placement is relevant here, if the article title is to be used in the first sentence. — MarkH₂₁^talk 21:45, 17 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@MarkH21: Thank you for taking the time to go through reliable sources. I think it's quite obvious from the above list that we have to represent "genocide" as an allegation, rather than as an established fact, and that we should clearly attribute the allegation to the specific parties making it, as much as possible.

For a comparison of how other disputed allegations of genocide are described on Wikipedia, we can look at the article Black genocide. The lede begins, In the United States, Black genocide is the characterization that the mistreatment of African Americans by both the United States government and White Americans, both in the past and the present, amounts to genocide. Based on that lede, we could write, "Uyghur genocide" is the characterization that human rights abuses committed against Uyghurs in China amount to genocide. The next sentence can specify the most prominent allegations (including that of the US State Department). The sentence after that can relate the response of the Chinese government to the allegations. -Thucydides411 (talk) 11:40, 18 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Thucydides411: The Black genocide article is actually a great example, thanks for finding that. I think that your proposed first sentence is an improvement, and is both simple and precise. I would just add the mention of other ethnic and religious minorities and Xinjiang (currently present in the first sentence) to give more complete context for the nonspecialist reader. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:03, 21 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This would appear to be an end run around renaming the page... This is a page about a series of human rights abuses not about the specific allegation of genocide, “Uyghur genocide” just happens to be the common name. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 01:42, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The page is about the human rights abuses. Just as Horse Eye's Back is noting above, we are referring to this by its common name. The article topic is the human rights abuses, and we have a large section on the page about classification. I do not believe that we should present the rights abuses as mere "allegations" in light of reliable sources, and I believe that the current lead (which was inserted with consensus) is a better lead than the one proposed in the restarted discussion. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 03:30, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that the article topic is limited to mere characterizations of the actions as genocide. Its topic is the well-documented abuses; the second paragraph of the Black genocide article notes that there are conspiracy theories that also take the name and has a whole section dedicated to conspiracy theories that take the name "Black Genocide". I think that supporting a change to the Uyghur genocide lead based upon a comparison to that in Black genocide is a whole lot like comparing apples and oranges. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 03:35, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Defining the term "Uyghur genocide" as the characterization of the human rights abuses as genocide has nothing to do with renaming the page nor changing the scope of this article (the wording does not mean that classification must be the sole thing covered within the article and thereby preclude describing the human rights abuses within the article). It's just about providing a more precise definition per MOS:FIRST.

Sorry if it was unclear – I didn't mean my comment to Thucydides411 as to say that this situation is like Black genocide, just that its first sentence has well-formed wording that can be used here, even if it is a different context. I also mentioned this earlier a few times, but "Uyghur genocide" is a descriptive title here and not literally a common name since few RSes use the exact term. This isn't that relevant to how the first sentence should be worded though.

If there's a clear divide here between which first sentence to use, perhaps we just need an RfC. I was hoping to get a more back-and-forth in improving the suggested first sentence before Deku link added it in. Currently, I think we have:

1. No bolded-title first sentence (the status quo pre-March 2021)
2. The current first sentence (stable since 1 March 2021):
   The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China
   • Note: there is a misspelling in the current version of the first sentence: Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region should not have an "h" even though the common spelling of the ethnic group has an "h".
3. My suggestion so far:
   Uyghur genocide is the characterization that the human rights abuses committed by the Chinese government against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China amount to genocide.
4. A more concise version of my suggestion to avoid first sentence clutter:
   Uyghur genocide is the characterization that the human rights abuses committed by the Chinese government against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang amount to genocide.

Between these, I would probably prefer 4 as the most concise and precise, even disregarding what I understand to be Thucydides411's main complaint regarding WP:WIKIVOICE. — MarkH₂₁^talk 22:49, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Option 4 is good. It defines the subject of the article, conforms to WP:NPOV and WP:V, and is concise. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:27, 24 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I believe Option 4 is the best for the article. Deku link (talk) 17:10, 24 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Those options don’t make any sense to me and again this feels like an end run around the renaming consensus. This page isn’t about a characterization, its about a series of human rights abuses and that will remain true no matter what we change the name to. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:57, 24 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

No, this is respecting the renaming consensus. An article titled "Uyghur genocide" should explain what "Uyghur genocide" means, preferably in the first sentence. If you would like the article to be about something other than "Uyghur genocide", then you're free to propose a new name. As it stands, this is the name the community has chosen. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:58, 24 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The topic of this page is the exact same as it was when it had a different name... And the name before that... And the name before that... Renaming a page does not change the underlying topic. Again just because the renaming didn’t go the way you wanted that does not give you a license to turn around and disrupt the article instead. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 00:26, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Defining the title of the article in the lede is not disrupt[ing] the article. I opposed the name "Uyghur genocide", but if that's the name, the lede should define it. I'm trying to understand your position, but it just doesn't make any sense. You want the article to be called "Uyghur genocide", but you don't think the article is about "Uyghur genocide", and you don't want the lede to define what "Uyghur genocide" means. -Thucydides411 (talk) 07:45, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This is an encyclopedia not a dictionary, we define the subject not the name. Its also a lead not a lede, theres a big difference there. Tell me, do you consider Uyghur genocide to be a formal or widely accepted name for the subject? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:27, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You can't have it both ways. You can't argue that the article should be named "Uyghur genocide", but then argue that the article is not about "Uyghur genocide" and that the lede should not define what "Uyghur genocide" means. Pick one position and stick with it. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:49, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

"Pick one position and stick with it” Ahem... Talk:Id Kah Mosque#No working mosques in Kashgar? Talk:Id Kah Mosque#Xinhua is reliable for Chinese government view, with attribution. My position is consistent, whether its about the topic of this page or about what constitutes due weight. If you’re arguing that changing the name of a wikipedia page fundamentally changes the subject of a wikipedia page I don’t think I can agree with you. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:54, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Also again we are talking about a lead not a lede... They are very different things, sometimes people mix them up accidentally or get autocorrected but you are consistently using lede which indicates a WP:CIR issue. @Mikehawk10: this goes for you too somewhat although I do see you using both. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:03, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What makes lede inappropriate here? Feels very bad faith to call competence into question over a perfectly normal US English word for “leading paragraph.” Deku link (talk) 17:42, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for asking! See Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section, its a common enough and significant enough misunderstanding that a whole section (MOS:NOTLEDE) exists about it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:46, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That section only details that a wikipedia lead or lede should not be in the style of a NEWSPAPER lede. It has nothing to do with using the word lede in a talk page discussion. Throwing accusations of incompetence over this is bizarre. Deku link (talk) 18:09, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Read that lead again... There is no such thing as a wikipedia lede, we only have leads. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:15, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I did read it, and it says abundantly that they are not newspaper style ledes. A lede is also a generic term for the introduction to ANY article (it says so right here, "the first paragraph of a composition") and the article is blatantly stating that the lead or lede not be treated as a newspaper article's lede. It's NOT a policy about the spelling of the word in discussions on the talk page. This is an absolutely silly nitpick and, again, a ridiculous base to make claims of a lack of competence. Deku link (talk) 18:21, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

But it is not the generic term for the introduction of a wikipedia article, hence why that page does not link to our usage but Lead (disambiguation) does. The MOS authorizes only one spelling and that is lead. I would note that instead of blustering you could just as easily have accepted that you were wrong about lead/lede and moved on, thats what I advise you to do now. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:42, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If you believe that the title "Uyghur genocide" does not accurately reflect the subject of this article, then you should argue for a different title. But this is an article about "Uyghur genocide", and as MOS:NOTLEDE points out, in Wikipedia articles, the first sentence is usually a definition. By arguing that we should not define the term "Uyghur genocide" in the lede, you are effectively arguing that the title does not accurately reflect the subject of the article. Per WP:PRECISE, Usually, titles should unambiguously define the topical scope of the article, but should be no more precise than that. This article is about "Uyghur genocide" - that precisely limits its scope. If you're unhappy with that, then you're free to argue for a different title. But I have the impression that you supported this title, so I don't know what you're complaining about. This is the title, and the lede should define it. As for the spelling of the word "lede", I'm really not interested in getting into a debate over jargon, British vs. American spelling, etc. -Thucydides411 (talk) 15:06, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

At least you’re finally willing to admit that this is about the title and not actually about the lead. There is no debate here, the thing in a wikipedia article is a lead. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:21, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't say anything of the sort. The lede should define the subject of the article. You've insisted that the article should be titled "Uyghur genocide", but now you're bizarrely arguing that the article is not about "Uyghur genocide", and that the lede therefore shouldn't define the term. Nevertheless, you do think the lede should begin, "The Uyghur genocide is ...", which you insist is not a Wikivoice statement that there is a Uyghur genocide, despite the obvious fact that it is a Wikivoice statement, and will be interpreted as such by any English speaker. Nothing about your position makes any sense or has any internal consistency. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:51, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Remarks like this don't move discussion a long and just frustrate everyone involved. We absolutely are talking about the lede currently and the ways in which bold text reference to the title are included in the lede is variable and absolutely can affect wikivoice. Deku link (talk) 00:55, 27 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If we have to pick an option among these, I think that the current lead is best and that option 2 is thus most preferable, though I don't see a need for a spelling change. There are plenty of RS that refer to the region with the spelling of "Uyghur" (and even the Global Times and Xinhua seem to do this at times, though not always). I think it's reasonable to view the coverage in RS as reflecting that there is a valid choice of how to spell the term that refers to the people aside from "Uygur"; since the region is obviously not originally named in a Latin script it leaves a lot of sources to define the spelling of the name for the region themselves. I'd prefer for us to use a consistent spelling of "Uyghur" throughout the article for clarity sake. Given the widespread spelling used by RS, I think using "Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region" is perfectly fine. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 06:49, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The current lede (Option 2) makes an unallowable WP:WIKIVOICE statement that there is a genocide. Uyghur genocide is the characterization of various human rights abuses as genocide. That characterization is heavily disputed, including by the US State Department's own legal advisors, who recommended against designating China's actions as "genocide", but were overruled by the political appointees. Wikipedia can't put that characterization into its own authoritative voice. It's difficult to imagine a more serious breach of WP:NPOV than making unsubstantiated accusations of genocide in Wikivoice, so Option 2 is simply unacceptable and we shouldn't waste any more time considering it. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:57, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Mikehawk10: Regarding the XUAR, there are RSes that use the spelling "Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region" with the "h", yes. But it is neither the common name & article title ("Xinjiang") nor the official English name ("Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region"). It's unusual to use an alternative name that is neither the common name, article title, nor official name, even if for spelling consistency of just one part of that name. — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:28, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It's actual genocide not just designation. Oranjelo100 (talk) 14:41, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If I may suggest an idea: the lead doesn't need to have the bolded title Uyghur genocide in it. It can start with something like "Since 2014, an ongoing series of human rights abuses have been..." See WP:AVOIDBOLD and WP:BOLDITIS. — Goszei (talk) 19:07, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

To add on: formulations like "The Uyghur genocide is the characterization of" run afoul of the principle behind WP:REFERSTO, i.e. the use–mention distinction. The article isn't about a designation, it's about these abuses. — Goszei (talk) 19:13, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I see now that my suggestion was the status quo pre-March 2021. I support a return to that status quo, as the exact formulation of "Uyghur genocide" is not used in very many sources. Therefore, we are operating in a "descriptive title" paradigm rather than a "proper name" paradigm, and so AVOIDBOLD and BOLDITIS apply. — Goszei (talk) 19:34, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Usage in the lede and title was in part supported by some editors claims that it was the common name in certain sources, but many of those sources are simply attributing claims to governmental organizations rather than themselves using the term to categorize the abuses (although other sources now do). Either way, I think this is a good possible alternative to the lede, but we'll need more discussion on this or the options posted by Mike for a new lede. Deku link (talk) 22:39, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

One cannot put "genocide" in the title of an article and then not explain what the word "genocide" refers to. "Uyghur genocide" is a characterization/allegation made by certain parties, most notably the US government. The lede has to somehow explain that. -Thucydides411 (talk) 15:09, 26 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• @Mikehawk10, Horse Eye's Back, Thucydides411, Deku link, and Goszei: The discussion here has led to a few options and died down a bit, but has not come to a resolution with some differing stances. Since the formatting of the first sentence could benefit from broader input anyways, so I started a simple RfC in a new section on this talk page. — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:23, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

As I said above, I agree with those objecting to the title. I would like to elaborate on that in the light of the separate discussion in this section. The article is about much more than (allegations of) genocide against the Uighurs. It is about crimes against humanity and general repression against the Uighurs. An article which was just about "Uighur genocide" and what is meant thereby would focus on the arguments in favor of defining what is happening in the XUAR as genocide, together with the counter arguments. This article doesn't do that. Instead, it discusses the various human rights abuses in Xinjiang, in impressive detail. A more appropriate title for the article would be "Repression of the Uighurs" "Xinjiang repression" or some such as this title is general enough to be accepted by most. Insisting that it be called "Uighur genocide" is more of a campaigner's approach - nothing wrong with campaigning, but it shouldn't be done here.

--Bacon Man (talk) 10:56, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Victims

Currently, the box says "est. >1 million detained". Is this the current number under detention or cumulative total? And what happened to the previously detained? Have they been exterminated? Since we are calling it genocide, is it safe to presume they have been all killed? If not, can we clarify that in the info box? Because its very much open to speculation as opposed to being informative. And where exactly is the source for this? (see info box on Holocaust wiki page)

Deaths

How come there is no information on death toll? there are about 12.8M Uighurs in China. How many have been exterminated? 1 million? The words "mass death" appeared a few times in the main article. Surely, we must have a head count or an estimate of death toll right? If you look at other currently occurring genocides covered by Wikipedia, like Bosnia, Rohingya and Yazidis, we always provide death toll. Why do we have no deaths here? Uighurs (12.8M) by far outnumber the population of Bosniacs (3M), Rohingya (1.5M) and Yazidis (1.5M) combined. surely, the death toll must be in the millions.

If you read the article and also the sources, they called this a "cultural genocide", whatever that might may, and not a physical genocide. Thus there are no deaths. 86.147.5.56 (talk) 22:05, 16 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Refugees

Why are we not disclosing the number of refugees? The current Rohingya genocide only killed 25k ppl and the remaining 700,000+ fled the country. Why did other countries not report their Uighur refugees? Surely, there must be millions of them by now. Are they collaborating with China to kill the Uighurs? If so, we should disclose their collaborators too. Or why isn't the 12.8M Uighurs fleeing? Are they all dead?

Again there are no genuine refugees as they left using their passports. Do you really think that if China is such an authoritarian country as the americans or australians try to make out, people can actually escape? The uyghurs generally go to turkey first, as that is the land of their ancestry, much the same as Jews claiming the Holy Land as where they are from. 86.147.5.56 (talk) 22:05, 16 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Target

Do we have reliable information that Kazakhs, Kyrgyzs, and other Turkic Muslims are systematically targeted? The article claims that these other groups are also targeted because they are all Muslims? So should the article be "Genocide of Muslims in China"? Or is it a particular sector of Islam?

Attack Type - Killing and Infanticide

Is there RS for these? Its not explained in the article itself. How are they killed? Gassed? Gunned down? Hanged? Same with infanticide. Article did not explain. It merely asserts bad stuff happened without saying what is the bad stuff. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.48.246.37 (talk • contribs) 04:46, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The claim for infanticide is related to forced abortions under the one child policy (which it should be noted is done to the Han Chinese population and is against Chinese law as well, which hardly makes it genocidal in implenetation and if occuring is the result of overreaching social workers) ^{[1] [2]}. The claim of infantacide is a POV exaggeration of an unfortunate policy that happens across the entire Chinese collectivist culture regardless of race or religion. Deku link (talk) 05:23, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

a person casually reading the article would not be able to come to the understanding you just described. this is a genocide article, so it is automatically implied by the tone that PRC must be killing all the new borns so that Uighurs become extinct. its not a genocide unless their very existence as a group is in jeopardy. as one of the commenters asserted above - this is not just a cultural genocide, it is a "full blown genocide". so we need to describe how Uighurs are being eliminated from existence. 198.48.246.37 (talk) 06:11, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, and as much as the convention on genocide is brought up, many editors here are ignoring that the largest thing that must be proved is "intent." There are many claims made in the article that cited sources only say are accusations, the sources do not confirm them themselves. There's POV issues all over this article, however, and this has been discussed ad naseaum in some cases. Deku link (talk) 06:34, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict)The claim for infanticide is not a recasting of the allegations regarding forced abortions under the one-child policy (that would certainly be a POV issue). Rather, the sources for reported infanticide that I had provided above seem to be pretty plainly describing allegations of killing newborn children against the will of parents, which is a notable difference from killings of (more often than not female) children that occurred under the one-child policy. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 07:05, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Radio Free Asia is a blatant propaganda outlet directly funded by the state department (its article even says so in a heavily sourced intro, catholic news agency is not a reliable source, the fox news source is not making any new claims and defaulting to other sources, and the New Indian Express uses Asian News International as a content feed, which has been found to fabricate information and is not reliable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Deku link (talk • contribs) 07:19, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

As I've stated before on this talk page, and I'll state again here, there is currently community consensus that Radio Free Asia can be generally considered a reliable source and that there is little reason to think RFA demonstrates some systematic inaccuracy, unreliability, or level of government co-option that precludes its use. While we certainly should attribute it, it ain't a "blatant propaganda outlet".

Secondly, Catholic News Agency is a reliable source with a good reputation for fact-checking and accurate reporting; I cannot find evidence that it is sloppy with facts and it certainly doesn't pull punches when it runs stories that make the Catholic Church and affiliated entities look bad (1 2 3 4 5); it appears to be reasonably independent from censorship concerns. It's certainly Catholic, but I don't think that we hold a religious affiliation to disqualify reliability (as both Deseret News and Christian Science Monitor are WP:GREL at WP:RSP).

Third, I think it's gotten a bit more NGO recognition beyond the five sources I provided above. I think it's noteworthy enough to include, provided specific details are properly attributed.— Mikehawk10 (talk) 08:00, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You left out an important part of the WP:RSP entry about Radio Free Asia: In particularly geopolitically-charged areas, attribution of its point of view and funding by the U.S. government may be appropriate. You quoted the sentences immediately preceding and following this cautionary statement, but left out this statement.

One of the reasons why this cautionary statement was included was because in the discussion about RFA at WP:RSN, it was shown that RFA has engaged in disinformation about the CoVID-19 death toll in Wuhan over the past year. Compare RFA's wild speculation about 40,000+ ([1]) or even 150,000 deaths ([2]) in Wuhan / Hubei province with the scientific estimate of fewer than 5,000 excess pneumonia deaths ([3]). RFA has repeatedly pushed poorly sourced conspiracy theories about the CoVID-19 death toll in China - theories which have turned out to be false. That's one of the reasons why it is only to be used with caution in geopolitically charged areas.

Just as a comparison, the CoVID-19 death toll was far more accurately reported by Xinhua ([4]). The number reported by Xinhua is fairly close to what scientific estimates ended up finding (only about 15% off). RFA's speculations, by contrast, ranged from about 10 to 30 times the scientific figure. RFA's claims in such a geopolitically charged issue as US government allegations of genocide by China have to be attributed, and we should be careful not to give them too much overall weight in the article. We should consider removing any controversial claim that relies heavily on RFA, unless there is some very good argument for keeping it in. -Thucydides411 (talk) 09:29, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

"it was shown that RFA has engaged in disinformation about the CoVID-19 death toll in Wuhan over the past year” Really? Do you have a WP:RS which says that? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:24, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

My above comment links to RFA articles that engage in completely wild speculation about the death toll in Wuhan and Hubei province, placing it at 40,000 or even 150,000. Those are insane estimates, which are 10 to 30 times the scientific estimate. RFA sourced these crazy figures from social media speculation and random non-experts that it claims to have interviewed, such as "an [sic] Wuhan resident surnamed Zhang" (no qualification given). A number of good scientific studies about the extent of the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Wuhan and the death toll have now been published in scientific journals, yet RFA keeps on publishing wild, unsupported speculation. If that's not disinformation, I don't know what is. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:22, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Thucydides411: You brought this up in the very same RfC that achieved a ommunity consensus that Radio Free Asia is generally reliable. As was stated in that discussion, the urns story has also been discussed by multiple generally reliable outlets. In addition to the Bloomberg News and Time Magazine sources discussed in the RfC, The Washington Post (1 2), The Financial Times, and France 24 have also reported on the urns story as casting doubt upon the true death tolls. Rather than WP:ORing your way into declaring the urns story to be disinformation based upon your own personal extrapolations, I think that the vast majority of reliable sources treat the urns story as credible. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 19:48, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The RfC result specifically called the reliability of RFA into question in "geopolitically charged" topic areas, suggesting in-line attribution of its claims. This was partly based on RFA's CoVID-19 disinformation, which I discussed in the RfC. As for the sources you list above, the first Washington Post article is really terrible, as it engages is some of the same wild, poorly grounded speculation that has since been debunked by scientific studies (which have found fewer than 5000 excess pneumonia deaths in Wuhan, and a matching low SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence of only a few percent). The second Washington Post article doesn't appear to say anything about the death toll in Wuhan or China. The FT article is not nearly as bad, as it does not list the wild numbers that RFA came up with - it just notes that there has been social media speculation. This is an area in which WP:SYSTEMICBIAS may come into play. However, these articles are largely sparked by the original claims by RFA, and RFA has since published even crazier numbers - recently suggesting 150,000 deaths in Hubei province, as I noted above. In these geopolitically charged areas, we should be very cautious with RFA, attributing its claims in-line and avoiding placing too much weight on them. Otherwise, we risk putting dubious, poorly grounded claims - such as those it has pushed about the CoVID-19 death toll in China - into Wikivoice. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:10, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

In what way does there is little reason to think RFA demonstrates some systematic inaccuracy, unreliability, or level of government co-option that precludes its use call the reliability into question? It seems to imply quite the opposite, in my reading. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 06:47, 29 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The part of the RfC close that you're conveniently omitting calls its reliability into question: In particularly geopolitically-charged areas, attribution of its point of view and funding by the U.S. government may be appropriate. RFA's disinformation about the CoVID-19 death toll in China is one of the factors that caused this cautionary note to be put into the RfC result. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:12, 29 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What you think is disinformation is not relevant to this discussion. Either provide a WP:RS which supports these assertions or strike them. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:52, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You're not concerned that RFA has pushed death tolls that are 10 to 30 times larger than the scientifically established figure? I'm not arguing for putting anything in an article in Wikivoice. I'm saying that we should be cautious about making controversial statements about China in Wikivoice, based on a source that we know has pushed disinformation about CoVID-19 in China over the past year. Not treating such a source with caution would be extremely reckless. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:14, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Whether I’m concerned or not is irrelevant. Either provide a WP:RS which supports these assertions or strike them. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:56, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Concerns about the reliability of sources and specifically misinformation pushed by those sources don’t require direct citation to reliable sources on a talk page. Outside of articles contributors are allowed to put two and two together to figure out ways in which a source could be unreliable or biased. If a medium article claimed that the moon has a secret Rabbit Colony at its core, you wouldn’t need to cite a reliable source to point out how that’s inaccurate. Deku link (talk) 08:19, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You can’t call it misinformation or disinformation unless a WP:RS does. An editor can’t raise concerns about reliability unsupported by WP:RS, it always has to be supported. Also just FYI we can’t use Medium for anything beyond limited about self, its generally unreliable per Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:13, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

you absolutely CAN call it misinformation in talk pages and discussions of the reliability of sources without citing WP:RS. WP:RS applies to information included in articles and not discussions about the weight applied to sources and a level of scrutiny given to them. If we had to cite WP:RS for every single claim rather than point out the obvious (ie RFA blatantly inflating COVID death rates), we’d be gridlocked from calling a spade a spade on talk pages. There is a consistent behavior to biblethump on WP:RS where it’s not needed. Deku link (talk) 19:02, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It actually is relevant, because we're deciding how much weight to give to this source and how to present its claims. You're misusing WP:RS. I've provided actual scientific studies of mortality and seroprevalence in Wuhan, which show that fewer than 5000 people died in the city of CoVID-19. RFA recently speculated that 30 times that number - 150,000 people - may have died of CoVID-19 in Hubei province. WP:RS does not say that editors cannot compare different sources on a talk page and realize that one of them is making wild claims that are contradicted by scientific studies. I don't need to show a reliable source that says that 150,000 is way more than 5,000 before saying on the talk page that these two numbers are completely inconsistent. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:03, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

To respond to a few more portions the top-level comment here, there are sources throughout the article that describe the oppression as being targeted at "Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims" quite a bit. Some sources enumerate these to include Kazakhs and Kyrgyzs as well. If you're arguing that there must surely be millions of Uyghur refugees by now, I don't think that takes into account how hard it is to get out of China and how expansive the Chinese surveillance state is, though in any case it's certainly WP:OR for us to speculate on that in the text of the article without reliable sourcing. (The talk page here isn't a forum, so I don't feel the need to expand upon that much more.) Additionally, the sources listed Xinjiang internment camps page might provide us more guidance if we would like to update the number detained (the page has a few estimates separately listed, which is generally good practice when there are multiple estimates floating at the same time). Regarding deaths and abuses writ large, one source to read would be a peer-reviewed paper in the Journal of Genocide Research describes what is going on as comprising political re-education involving coercive Sinicization, deaths in the camps through malnutrition, unsanitary conditions, withheld medical care, and violence (beatings); rape of male and female prisoners; and, since the end of 2018, transfers of the most recalcitrant prisoners – usually young, religious males – to high-security prisons in Xinjiang or inner China. Other camp "graduates" have been sent into securitized forced labour. Those who remain outside the camps have been terrified into religious and cultural self-censorship through the threat of internment (emphasis added). No matter how someone wants to spin it, beating people to death is indeed a way of killing them. The source, however, does not provide an estimate for the size/scope of killings writ large, so we would require another source as an estimator. I believe the lack of its inclusion there is because there really isn't a consensus estimator out there, as far as I can tell. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 07:05, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

While I can understand a good estimate of death toll is hard to come by, but a genocide is more than just killing a few random ppl or a few prisoners getting beaten to death or raped in camp (ie. Abu Ghraib). The words mass death did appear in the article itself. But no details or explanation is provided. Mass killing, if deliberately targeted, is the definition of genocide, but the article does not clearly claim that China is intentionally targeting Uighurs for mass killing. Thus, either a) we remove any claims or rumors of mass killing or b) we clearly state the accusation of mass killing (or mass death) and provide extensive detail from the source. Mass killing is an extremely serious accusation, we should not just leave it as "There have been multiple reports that mass deaths have occurred inside the camps." as it currently is stated in the article. Mass deaths need to be speficially highlighted to give its due weight on the issue. Most casual reader will attribute mass death or mass killing as the very definition of genocide. Currently, this leaves the issue incredibly misleading. 198.48.246.37 (talk) 08:53, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

"Mass killing, if deliberately targeted, is the definition of genocide” no it isn’t, as our sources clearly explain. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:22, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

A deliberate, organized attempt to physically destroy an ethnic, religious or national group is, however, what is meant by "genocide". The IP is correct that random killings or abuse do not constitute genocide. And IP is correct that mass killing is almost always what is meant by "genocide". The underlying issue here is that this article was originally written about alleged human rights abuses generally, but was later renamed "Uyghur genocide". As most of the material in the article is unrelated - or at best tangentially related - to the accusation of "genocide", readers are likely to be confused. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:23, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don’t think thats true... The alleged human rights abuses generally are covered at Human Rights in China, Xinjiang, Xinjiang conflict, Xinjiang internment camps, etc. This page is for a specific set of abuses. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:56, 15 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Looking back through the early history of the article, I see that it was originally about "ethnocide", which was defined as cultural destruction (i.e., not genocide). The article has since been loaded up with all sorts of accusations, both related to the original focus of the article (on allegations of cultural destruction and Sinicization) and related to the new focus of the article (on allegations of genocide), as well as accusations unrelated to either ethnocide or genocide. The article is a mess. Even the first sentence is extremely confusing: The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China. So is the "Uyghur genocide" a genocide, or is it just more generally a "series of human rights abuses"? You've been arguing that the first sentence is not a Wikivoice statement that there is a genocide. So the "Uyghur genocide" is not a genocide? Or it's an allegation that there's a genocide? What is this article about? -Thucydides411 (talk) 13:29, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Articles evolve as the issues they cover do, thats just natural. Whether or not its a genocide Uyghur genocide is the common name, this article is about the the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese government against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China and that remains true regardless of what the title is. If there wasn’t a scholarly consensus to call it a genocide (or its subcategory ethnic genocide) then we wouldn't do so. If you have sources which say the scholarly consensus is to call it something else I imagine you would have shared them during your crusade to get the name changed. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:13, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There is no scholarly consensus to call it a "genocide". The allegation of "genocide" is extremely controversial and contested in this case. In the move discussion, you'll recall, it was repeatedly demonstrated that reliable sources refer to "genocide" as an unproven allegation made by specific parties (e.g., the US government, an obscure DC think tank). -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:36, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

As has been demonstrated multiple times on this page thus far, multiple reliable sources (including those listed as WP:RSP perennially reliable) have described the situation as a genocide without qualification. A short (non-exhaustive) list of some of these sources include:

• News.com.au, which reports that The Chinese Embassy in Canberra has aired a bizarre nine-minute propaganda film riddled with misinformation in an attempt to downplay the acts of genocide being committed against the Uyghur population in Xinjiang.
• Australia's ABC News refers to a discussion on human rights abuses in Xinjiang as discussion on the issue of Uyghur genocide in China.
• Axios (RSP Entry) has affitmatively referred to the abuses as cultural and demographic genocide or simply demographic genocide(1 2 3 4 56 7 8 9, etc.), and has assigned responsibility to the Chinese government in its straight news reporting. More recently, Axios has begun to refer to the situation simply as China's Uyghur genocide.
• The New Yorker (RSP Entry) notes in an investigative reporting piece that "In 1944, as Lemkin, a Jew, witnessed the horrors of Nazism, it occurred to him that the vocabulary of modern law was missing a word, so he coined one: "genocide." Over the years, the term has taken on a specific legal definition, but Lemkin had a broad understanding of it. "Genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings," he noted. "It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups." Such a plan is unfolding now in Xinjiang. As in the cases that inspired Lemkin, it is happening under a shield of state sovereignty."
• Vox (RSP entry) also goes into this in-depth with a well-written data journalism piece that affirms conclusions regarding the ongoing genocide.

With regards to China's widespread and blanket denials and tactics to defend itself, additional reliable sources seem to treat them as utter rubbish that includes disinformation A short (non-exhaustive) list includes:

• Global News reports that China‘s ambassador to Canada says reports of genocide and forced labour of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang province are the "lie of the century," despite international bodies like the United Nations deeming the reports of such activities "numerous and credible."
• The Globe and Mail reports that China has repeatedly described Adrian Zenz's findings as "lies" even in cases where it has confirmed that his findings are truthful.
• National Public Radio has reported that The United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union have all leveled sanctions on China due to their treatment of Uyghurs, which includes detention camps, forced labor, sterilizations and abortions, which a 2020 State Department report has called genocide. China denies the allegations, despite personal testimonies, extensive reporting and, indeed, satellite footage of Uyghur detention camps in China.
• The New York Times (RSP entry) reports that Chinese officials and state media outlets have pushed the government’s narrative about its policies in Xinjiang in part by spreading alternative narratives — including disinformation — on American social networks like Twitter and Facebook

I don't think that there is much more to say here; multiple reliable sources report about the genocide not only as an "allegation" or "accusation", but as a genocide. Framing it as mere accusations is not appropriate for this article. And, given reporting on China's denials, it's likely that mentioning the denials prominently in the lead without comment on the veracity thereof would constitute undue weight. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 20:24, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

We've been over this over and over again. MarkH21 has shown again and again that the vast majority of sources describe "genocide" as an allegation. Even most of your above sources avoid putting the accusation into their own voice. The few sources that you're able to scrounge up that do put this WP:EXCEPTIONAL claim into their own voice are generally either opinion pieces, or incidental text like video captions. To go through your sources one-by-one:

• News.com.au: This is a video caption, not even a news article. If this is the type of source you're using to back up the truly exceptional claim of "genocide", you're digging pretty deep.
• Australia's ABC News: Nowhere does this source say that there is a genocide. It says that the guests discussed the "issue of Uyghur genocide", because that's what the guests discussed. ABC is not claiming, in its own voice, that that characterization is correct. Throughout the article, it repeatedly attributes that characterization to Vicky Xu.
• Axios: This is the only website here that's actually calling this a "genocide" in its own voice. We can't make such an extreme claim, that nearly all news agencies describe as an allegation, based on the writings of one reporter for a relatively minor news website.
• The New Yorker: This is not a news article. This is an opinion piece in the Magazine (as opposed to the separate News) section of the New Yorker. It's written in a highly personal, narrative style, and the author acknowledges that the view they're expressing of what constitutes genocide is more "broad" than the actual legal definition.
• Vox: This article consistently attributes the allegation of genocide to the specific people making the allegation. This might also be a good time to remind people that titles are not reliable sources.
• Global News: This source does not claim that there is a genocide. It describes and attributes the accusation.

I could go on, but it gets tiring debunking your false claims about sources. If there were a consensus among news sources that there is a genocide, you would have no trouble finding numerous news articles that unambiguously stated things like, "China is carrying out a genocide against the Uyghur people." Instead, you're citing opinion pieces, news articles that describe "genocide" as an allegation, video captions, etc. You're trying to put an extraordinary claim in Wikivoice - a claim that is enormously grave and impactful. You had better have rock-solid sourcing for a claim as serious as "genocide". You don't, and repeatedly trying to put this claim in Wikivoice is just WP:POVPUSHING. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:33, 29 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If you'd like to ignore the peer-reviewed journal and law review articles in your analysis then feel free to go ahead, but I don't think that such an analysis would be sufficient or leave you on solid grounds to accuse me of POVPUSHING. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 21:17, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

At a fraction of the length, this article has only 10 less references cited than the page on The Holocaust. It seems like the article is being edited with every new shred of press on the subject that can possibly stick in any way, and the number of in-line citations on each claim is (in my opinion) cluttering the article. Not an actual wikipolicy, but I do think we're reaching WP:OVERKILL levels Deku link (talk) 22:51, 21 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Completely agree with this. One form of citations that could be omitted are references to news articles solely used for quotes from other readily available sources. For example, the paragraph in Uyghur_genocide#Genocide_or_crimes_against_humanity on the Newlines Institute report has about 8 citations to news articles that are all based on the already referenced report. Unless these citations are used to add any further information or context that is not directly found in the report itself, I believe there is no need to have these news articles cited and a single reference to the primary source would be sufficient for that paragraph. D'Lemelo (talk) 11:27, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sympathetic to the desire to avoid citation overkill, but the Newlines report is a good example of why we need more than we normally might. Its reliability has been disputed on this talk page, and the strongest case for its reliability is WP:USEBYOTHERS so it is natural for editors to make sure use by others is clear by multiple RS citations, to pre-empt bad faith questioning of reliability. If these disputes ever settle down, we can trim citations then; for now, I think safer to leave them. However, I do think that there are too many citations of opinion pieces. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:27, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect the reason we have so many sources for this article is of a natural result from so much scepticism about the genocide's existence. Given that there are a lot of people questioning the very name of this article (to the point where there is a prohibition on renaming it for a year), every claim needs to be rigorously sourced in order to justify its existence. Not to mention that it being a current event means there is a continual stream of new information. It probably is overkill, however -- although I'd be cautious in removing too much, as we're likely to get sceptics claiming there isn't enough evidence for certain claims. — Czello 14:01, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I think when all the sources cited on a claim are just referencing each other or a specific report already referenced, it looks more like a self-fulfilling ouroboros of accusations than a credible claim. Deku link (talk) 16:18, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There definitely are isolated cased of citation overkill, but comparing it to The Holocaust is comparing apples and oranges... One of these is a mature page and one is a young page... One is for a historical event and one is for an ongoing event... One has yet to have significant sections broken out into their own pages, the other already has... Lets focus on individual sections, comparing total citation count is a non-starter. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:22, 22 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Vast majority of the citations here, at least with respect to the elements of a genocide itself, comes from Zenz and RFA. Everyone else is just circular referencing to each other. HRW, Newlines, BBC, etc. all referenced back to Zenz and RFA. 198.48.229.13 (talk) 05:26, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Zenz is cited 39 times in Newlines report, RFA about 21 time. But it has 316 footnotes so it is completely inacccurate to say that they are the main sources for its report. Ditto the HRW report, in which Zenz is cited 20 times and RFA 17 times in a report with 235 footnotes, many of which cite multiple sources. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:27, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't do a complete check, but a large number of Newline reference either a) reference directly to Zenz b) reference to "Victims", of which Zenz contributed most of that source or c) to another source like Buzzfeed, CSIS, FT, etc, which then cites Zenz in their article, d) references to Chinese gov't pages, which by itself is not incriminating, but was given an incriminating interpretation by Zenz. Of course there are also other references that r not related to the allegations - such as the legal definition of genocide, etc. And there are interviews, of which the accuser is the primary source itself. But in respect of core evidence of genocide, a lot of it really does go back to Zenz and RFA. 198.48.229.13 (talk) 10:43, 25 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

IP, that does not seem to be true, do you have any WP:RS which say that? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:42, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The Holocaust did not have many citations, nor a diversity of sources until after the Nuremberg Trials. --Ooligan (talk) 07:17, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I remember the pre-Nuremberg version of the Wikipedia article was basically a stub. — Czello 07:25, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

? — Mikehawk10 (talk) 20:55, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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Between the following no-bolded-title and bolded-title first sentences, which should be used at the beginning of the lead? 23:23, 30 April 2021 (UTC)

No bolded-title first sentence (the status quo pre-March 2021):

1. Starting with the current second sentence: Since 2014, the Chinese government, under the direction of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the administration of CCP general secretary Xi Jinping, has pursued policies leading to more than one million Muslims (the majority of them Uyghurs) being held in secretive internment camps without any legal process in what has become the largest-scale and most systematic detention of ethnic and religious minorities since the Holocaust.

Bolded-title first sentence without characterization [...] amount to genocide:

The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the government of China against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China.

The Uyghur genocide is the human rights abuses committed by the government of China against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang.

Bolded-title first sentence with characterization [...] amount to genocide:

The Uyghur genocide is the characterization that the ongoing series of human rights abuses perpetrated by the government of China against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China amount to genocide.

Uyghur genocide is the characterization that the human rights abuses committed by the government of China against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang amount to genocide.

23:23, 30 April 2021 (UTC)

Survey (first sentence RfC)

Please use the discussion subsection below for responses and threaded discussion and leave this subsection for one comment or !vote per editor.

• Option 1 or Option 5: In the preceding discussion, Goszei made the salient points that the bolded-title first sentence is a bit awkward and unnecessary per MOS:AVOIDBOLD and WP:BOLDITIS, particularly since Uyghur genocide is a descriptive title rather than the WP:COMMONNAME (very few reliable sources use the exact phrase Uyghur genocide, instead preferring more descriptive or attributed mentions). This also aligns with MOS:FIRST, which says that if the article title is merely descriptive [...] the title does not need to appear verbatim in the main text.
  Regarding options 2-3: in the previous discussion, Thucydides411 expressed WP:NPOV concerns about directly stating that the Uyghur genocide is the human rights abuses as a WP:WIKIVOICE statement about genocide when most reliable sources do not directly give such a description in their own voices. There is some validity to these concerns, particularly since most RSes attribute or qualify (using quotation marks, allegations of, etc.) the term "genocide" for this topic:

There are some RSes (e.g. a news.com.au video clip) that use genocide in their own voice to describe events, but it does not appear that it is close to being the dominant trend. One can also compare it to using the converse "the ongoing series of human rights abuses in Xinjiang is the Uyghur genocide" given the usage of the definite article "the" in options 2-5; such a description may not be justified as a wikivoice statement.

In my judgment, I still find option 5 to be preferable among options 2-5 independent of the NPOV concerns about options 2-3. If a bolded-title first sentence is to be used to define the topic, the use of characterization [...] amount to genocide more precisely defines Uyghur genocide. It is more clumsy to just say that "the ___ genocide is the series of human rights abuses", because the genocide aspect of the name is a crucial aspect. This is the case, even when disregarding from the aforementioned NPOV discussion. Mikehawk10 and Horse Eye's Back also expressed concern in the preceding discussion that defining Uyghur genocide using the words characterization that the human rights abuses [...] amount to genocide would change the scope of the article; this article would still describe both the human rights abuses and its partial classification as genocide with a first sentence that defines the genocide aspect of Uyghur genocide. An article scope including the classification of human rights abuses does not need to exclude the human rights abuses (and this isn't a WP:SPLIT proposal).

Also following MOS:FIRST, the first sentence should be concise (i.e. options 3 & 5 over options 2 & 4). The full name of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) (notwithstanding the fact that its official English name is actually Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region) isn't necessary over the shorter common name of just Xinjiang, the mention of People's Republic of China is redundant with the earlier mention of the government of China, and there's no need for in and around since the article and its references focus on Xinjiang. — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:23, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1. I find 4 and 5 unacceptable because this article is about the abuses themselves, not their characterization (basically an argument from WP:REFERSTO/the use-mention distinction); we should not make it out to be that way in the lead. Regarding 2 and 3: we should respect naming consensus. HOWEVER, respecting that consensus is complicated here because (as explained by the closer of the most recent RM) there is a bifurcation of rationales that arrive at the current title: one based on this title being the WP:COMMONNAME, and one based on this not being the COMMONNAME, yet still the name that best matches the WP:CRITERIA. I subscribe to the latter view – a COMMONNAME would fit better into the lead, but a descriptive title like this should be expressed pursuant to MOS:AVOIDBOLD and WP:BOLDITIS. — Goszei (talk) 23:57, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Option 1 or 5, although I would like to question what exactly the Holocaust claim in sentence 2 adds to the lede in the first place, as I do not know how well sourced it is (it is to my understanding that the exact numbers of internment are still uncertain. Either way, I don't think many of the sentences in this article put into wikivoice deserve to be so given what is actually reported in RS's. Deku link (talk) 06:15, 1 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Option 2 or 3: The subject of this article is not a characterization of anything, it is a series of human rights abuses. We should not be afraid to call it a series of human rights abuses, or to mention the title of the article in bold in the first sentence as is the case for almost every other Wikipedia article. Loki (talk) 07:53, 2 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Option 1, preferably, or 2. The "characterization" options aren't great, because the article is about the actions, not their characterization, as Goszei said. Describing them as human rights abuses in Wikipedia's voice feels a bit weird—human rights are a nebulous, political concept, so stating that something is a human rights abuse should always be an attributed claim, not a fact, IMO. (For the record, this absolutely is a human rights abuse.) If we do go with one of 2 or 3, 2 reads a little more cleanly to me. (Brought here by the FRS bot.) Gaelan 💬✏️ 06:36, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  On further thought, I'd support 4 or 5 over 2 or 3—the NPOV issue outweighs my quibble with the wording. My order of preference is now 1 > 5 > 4 > 2 > 3; 1 is still the best option by far. Per MOS:BOLDLEAD, since the name isn't "formal or widely accepted"—if it was, we wouldn't have any issue calling it a genocide in Wikivoice—we only need to bold the title if it can be accommodated naturally, so that's not a major concern for me. Gaelan 💬✏️ 23:04, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 2 or 3: The article is fundamentally focused on the abuses detailed therein, whose common name is the "Uyghur genocide". Per MOS:BOLDLEAD, when a common name exists for an article's topic, we should display it as early as possible in the first sentence. It is not the case that most unique WP:RS only attribute or qualify the term "genocide."

Option 1 would be preferred if the community believes this article to have a WP:CRITERIA-named title for the purposes of this discussion, rather than a WP:COMMONNAME title. Option 4 and 5 are unacceptable, owing to their apparent shifting of the article's scope and the use-mention distinction mentioned above by Goszei. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mikehawk10 (talk • contribs) 10:49, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 4 or 5: "Uyghur genocide" is an extremely controversial characterization of what's going on in Xinjiang - one which is primarily advanced by the United States State Department, and which is disputed by other parties, including the US State Department's own legal advisors and more than 60 UN member states. Options 2 and 3 make a direct WP:WIKIVOICE claim that there is a genocide against the Uyghurs. I can't think of a more egregious violation of WP:NPOV than to put an unsubstantiated accusation of genocide into Wikivoice. Wikipedia is not the place to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS, and we're not in the business of pushing extreme - and extremely controversial - accusations in Wikipedia's authoritative voice.

Above, some are arguing that "Uyghur genocide" is simply the common name for human rights issues in Xinjiang, and that "The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses ..." is not a Wikivoice statement that there is a genocide. This is simply an absurd argument, on many levels. Firstly, "Uyghur genocide" is a very specific allegation - it is not the common way of referring to any human rights issues in Xinjiang. It is the accusation that those abuses amount to a genocide, a term that has a very specific legal definition and which has a clear meaning in the English language - one that carries extremely strong connotations. Secondly, regardless of what one thinks about the WP:COMMONNAME argument, a statement such as "The Uyghur genocide is the ongoing series of human rights abuses ..." will be viewed by virtually every single reader who comes to this article as a declaration, in Wikipedia's authoritative voice, that there is a genocide. We can argue till the cows come home about whether or not "Uyghur genocide" is a common name, but at the end of the day, we all know that readers will overwhelmingly interpret this as a definitive statement in Wikipedia's voice that there is a genocide.

Anyone arguing for Option 2 or 3 therefore has to show that a Wikivoice statement that there is an ongoing genocide is acceptable. Unless they can successfully do so, Options 2 and 3 are simply unallowable.

Option 1 does not even define the subject of the article. One cannot name an article using an extremely controversial term, and then completely avoid defining that term in the lede. Options 4 and 5 are the only options that actually explain what "Uyghur genocide" means, and which conform to WP:NPOV. Of these two, Option 5 is more concise, and therefore preferable. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:53, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• I have quibbles with all of these options, but broadly speaking Option 1 is the way the opening sentence should be structured: go straight into the facts. Options 2 and 3 are unacceptable because they violate WP:NPOV: they state in Wikipedia's voice that a genocide is happening, a controversial and disputed claim which is not the consensus of reliable sources. Option 4 and option 5 are acceptable, but not ideal, because this article is really about the human rights abuses, not the genocide characterization itself. Between options 4 and 5, I think option 5 is better, because option 4 is overly wordy (there's no need to write out "Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region" instead of just "Xinjiang", for instance). —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:17, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• I don’t love any of these... Like Mx. Granger I too have quibbles. Of the above I would go with 1. Rather than an either or I think a compromise of having the current second sentence first and then combining 2 and 4 to create a new second sentence along the lines of “The ongoing series of human rights abuses against the Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) has been characterized as a genocide.” would allay all of the concerns that have been raised. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:31, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Something along the lines of this suggestion seems reasonable to me. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:51, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1, with adjustments – I think my view is best expressed by Mx. Granger: I'm concerned about applying in wikivoice the contested label of "genocide", something also touched upon in Gaelan's comment, when there isn't unanimity among sources. It's no coincidence that we have an article/list on precisely this issue – most obviously, there's a discrepancy between the dictionary definition of genocide and the 1948 UN (CPPCG) definition. I also agree with comments that the precise subject of the article is the human rights abuses (not their characterisation), and I think option 1 conveys this most clearly. The second and fourth paras. of the current lead provide a suitable introduction to the use of the term genocide in this context, so I think there's no need to open with the term "Uyghur genocide" bolded and in wikivoice. I'm not wholly content with option 1 as it stands as I think it's overly narrow in scope (with its focus on detention as opposed to other human rights violations), but I think it's a better framework to build on than the other presented alternatives. Jr8825 • Talk 20:09, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

To expand/clarify my comments above, I oppose 4 and 5 because of the phrasing "the characterisation that...", which I think is unclear because 1) it suggests that the article is about nomenclature/characterisation, 2) it unintentionally conveys a judgement about the accuracy of the term "genocide" by describing it as a "characterisation", and 3) I think it's unwieldy and fails to covey what the human rights abuses are. I oppose 2 and 3 because they state that the events are "genocide" in unattributed wikivoice. This leaves only option 1, which I'm not particularly happy with either, because 1) it focuses solely on internment at the expense of other elements of repression and 2) I think the immediate comparison with the Holocaust is inappropriate editorialisation, given that it's the first sentence. So my !vote is specifically for opening without a bolded repetition of "Uyghur genocide" (per Wikipedia:BOLDITIS) and for the first half of option 1, ideally with slight adjustments to emphasise that this is only one aspect of repression (albeit the most notable/visible aspect). I'll offer some suggestions for the wording in the discussion below. Jr8825 • Talk 15:16, 21 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Mix Options 1 and 4/5, i.e. start with the no-bolded sentence, and then — maybe in the second sentence — follow with a (semi-Wiki voice) assertion, in the vain of "these human rights abuses have been characterized as a genocide". TucanHolmes (talk) 10:13, 5 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 5 - Per WP:NPOV. STSC (talk) 11:28, 5 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Option 1 or 2 - I would avoid 4 and 5 as the characterisation formulation is weaselly. 3 reads awkwardly. Re Thucydides411 :Anyone arguing for Option 2 or 3 therefore has to show that a Wikivoice statement that there is an ongoing genocide is acceptable. Unless they can successfully do so, Options 2 and 3 are simply unallowable., I believe that Mikehawk10 has shown that pretty compellingly above. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:16, 5 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that Mikehawk10 has shown that pretty compellingly above: I responded to Mikehawk10 source-by-source, showing that most of the sources treat "genocide" as an allegation. Moreover, MarkH21 showed above that the news media overwhelmingly describes "genocide" as an allegation, rather than an established fact. Putting such as extreme - and heavily contested - accusation into Wikivoice would be an egregious violation of WP:NPOV. -Thucydides411 (talk) 15:03, 6 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 5, maybe 4 - I think I most prefer 5, but you should probably insert "ongoing series", i.e. Uyghur genocide is the characterization that the ongoing series of human rights abuses committed by the government of China against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang amount to genocide." like in 4, but without it being as overly wordy as 4. There isn't an adequate level of sourcing that would allow us to describe an accusation of genocide as a fact in wikivoice per WP:NPOV, it needs to be described as a characterization; for that reason I strongly oppose 2 and 3. Regarding 1, that doesn't mesh with the current title – wouldn't make sense for someone to have to scroll multiple lines down to see what the actual title of the article is referring to. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 07:41, 6 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 4 or 5 with preference for 5 - As others have stated, it doesn't seem to be WP:NPOV at all in its current state and it seems even the sources and citations characterize it as an allegation not a statement of fact. There isn't a consensus in the sources and option 5 is the briefest and clearest summary of of what appears to be happening. Convocke (talk) 11:48, 6 May 2021 (UTC) — Convocke (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

• Option 1 or 5, prefer 5 2 and 3 absolutely go against WP:NPOV, while 4 is too wordy for a first sentence. BSMRD (talk) 15:39, 6 May 2021 (UTC) — BSMRD (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

• Oppose options 4 and 5, leaning toward option 1: This article is about the human rights abuses themselves so options 4 and 5 make no sense given the article's scope. Regarding the other 3, the current article title already states "genocide", so if said title sticks then options 2 and 3 would be fine given the current title of the article. I am neutral on which would be better. If it is decided that the word "genocide" is not NPOV (The content of the article seems to treat it this way), then the page should probably be moved (I am not sure exactly what would be a good title) and option 1 be implemented. Username6892 01:32, 7 May 2021 (UTC), amended 21:51, 7 May 2021 (UTC) to make clarifications and add support to an option. New additions in italics.[reply]

  I fail to see how they make no sense given the article's scope? There is no difference content-wise between all those options, only in formulation. I also do not understand how you can view options two and three as fine when they clearly violate neutral point of view, as stated many times in edits before your own. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 15:58, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 5 but amended as per Volteer1's suggestion. As for the remaining options, the second and third option, as stated many times before in this RfC, are violations of WP:NPOV and the first one reads like a piece from sensationalist article. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 16:09, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 5 - I don't find any of these options ideal, but a systematic evaluation of sources provided by many editors above shows that most reliable sources attribute the allegation of genocide, which is contested by a variety of governments, organizations and experts. Furthermore, Option 5 is technically accurate, since it notes that this term describes the characterization of a host of various alleged rights abuses as amounting to a genocide overall. Lastly, this option isn't overly long, while option 4 is too wordy. -Darouet (talk) 17:17, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1 per Goszei. 4 and 5 are unacceptable. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 13:49, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 5 - From different sources, it seems like option 5 fits to define the various rights abuses alleged to be happening. BristolTreeHouse (talk) 07:10, 12 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 4/5. "Genocide" is the common name of what is occurring, though it is a POV characterization, per the explanation in User:Thucydides411's comment. I am open to a revised form of Option 1, descibing the actions themselves and clarifying later that "These actions have been characterized as Uyghur genocide, though I agree with other commenters that option 1 as it currently stands is unusual in construction and focus and insufficient to be the lead sentence without revision. - - mathmitch7 ^{(talk/contribs)} 12:35, 12 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 3 or 5 if we absolutely must include "characterisation". Option 1 as is is too wordy for my taste, and its contents can be mentioned not in the defining sentence but somewhat later. The definition must be both informative and at the same time succinct. Which is why I also reject options 2 or 4.

What is most important in this context is scholarly consensus, and, from what I can see, scholars (controversial figures like Zenz and not-so-controversial ones alike) are in at least a rough consensus (from what can be seen from discussions) that we can call it a genocide and not merely crimes against humanity (which is admittedly already a very strong accusation), and personally I find it not unanimous but strong enough to avoid the word "characterisation". As for why the media use wording such as "alleged to be" or "considered" is more to do with potential lawsuits for defamation (from China) and avoiding accusations of Sinophobia or other anti-China bias, which take a toll on the outlet's reputation, rather then their uncertainty as to whether this can be directly attributed to genocide. Which is, in my belief, extensively used by merchants of doubt (Chinese or not) to tone down coverage on China as being unduly harsh when actually this toning down is not warranted by the facts on the ground. Let's call a spade a spade. Any objections and doubts can be mentioned in the body of the article under the appropriate header (e.g. Criticism), and I believe this to be an adequate way to fulfil NPOV and provide balance to reporting.

As an aside, I see too many similarities here with the coverage of Holodomor in the 1930s. Looking at the arguments used, it seems that if Wikipedia had existed in 1933 (and the word "genocide" too), the discussion would end up concluding that we couldn't say it was genocide because Walter Duranty and some Communist sympathisers would rather us believe (and propagate) the official narrative of USSR of the time and not listen to some Ukrainians whom an average American has never heard of (Ukrainians? Is this another Asian tribe?), and not because there is a major scholarly disagreement on the question, where historians are divided 50/50 (as is the case with Holodomor). The latter case can be seen as justification not to call it genocide outright in the first sentence; but I really don't see it here. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:09, 12 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1, 2 or 3 We can call it genocide in Wikivoice. It isn't the controversial or disputed claim that some editors here claim it be. The forced sterilizations of Uyghur women are now resulting in real birth rate decline [5] [6] [7]. This is genocide. CutePeach (talk) 04:54, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Even the US State Department's own experts advised against labeling what's happening in Xinjiang a "genocide". The Economist has flatly rejected the "genocide" label, said that the label is being used simply for rhetorical escalation and to stoke useful outrage, and has accused the US government of diminishing the unique stigma of the term. Reliable sources overwhelmingly describe "genocide" as an allegation or accusation in this case, rather than putting the claim in their own authoritative voice, as MarkH21 has shown above. In other words, your claim that the "genocide" label isn't controversial or disputed simply does not align with reality. -Thucydides411 (talk) 09:36, 18 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The US State Department did not go with those experts in the end [8], so they aren’t relevant here. I read that Economist article and I also the letter from legal experts countering it [9], so that is hardly relevant here either. I saw the above list from MarkH21 but I think the above list from Mikehawk10 is more aligned with reality. What you will need to persuade me to change my vote is a report from a reliable source falsifying the many reports of the PRC’s genocidal activities published in numerous reliable sources over the past few years. CutePeach (talk) 09:05, 20 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion (first sentence RfC)

• Posting comment: This RfC is based on a preceding discussion of the first sentence at Talk:Uyghur genocide#Restarted discussion. — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:23, 30 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• The options are insufficient: This RfC actually concerns two underlying issues: (1) the stylistic issue of whether to bold the article's subject in the lead and (2) the editorial/POV issue of whether China's human rights abuses should be referred to as a genocide in Wikivoice. The current gamut of choices is insufficient because it is missing an option that refers to it as a genocide in Wikivoice but doesn't use bolding.--DaysonZhang (talk) 01:42, 4 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• A possible option that both avoids bolding and uses Wikivoice would be Since 2014, the Chinese government, under the direction of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the administration of CCP general secretary Xi Jinping, has pursued a policy of genocide leading to more than one million Muslims (the majority of them Uyghurs) being held in secretive internment camps without any legal process in what has become the largest-scale and most systematic detention of ethnic and religious minorities since the Holocaust. --DaysonZhang (talk) 01:44, 4 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Doesn’t option 5 need something in front of Uyghur genocide? I don’t think its a proper sentence as currently constructed. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:23, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's preferable to leave "The" out, as its omission specifically highlights the phrase, which is then described in the remainder of the sentence. -Darouet (talk) 17:37, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It corrupts the sentence format, “Uyghur genocide” the phrase isn't the characterization, thats just genocide. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:52, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah I'm not really sure why the "The" was taken out, especially given it's the same sentence structure as in option 4 which does have the determiner. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 18:21, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Horse Eye's Back, Darouet, and Volteer1: The formulation of option 5 without the definite article "The" was based on the first sentence of Black genocide. I don't really have a preference with or without the definite article. Option 3 should probably include ongoing series of like in Option 2 (otherwise it's a singular-plural mismatch), and Option 5 can include that too. — MarkH₂₁^talk 18:49, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Omitting the definite article effectively recognizes that this is a term that needs attribution. If you add the definite article, it lends credence to the idea that Wikipedia is not just reporting allegations of genocide, but endorsing them as certainly true. The same phrasing that omits "the" is used not only at Black genocide but also Maafa. -Darouet (talk) 19:10, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I see, that makes sense actually. Yeah, omitting the definite article is probably a good thing. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 20:38, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Question: How do editors who indicated support for Options 4/5 feel about what TucanHolmes suggested above?

Mix Options 1 and 4/5, i.e. start with the no-bolded sentence, and then — maybe in the second sentence — follow with a (semi-Wiki voice) assertion, in the vain of "these human rights abuses have been characterized as a genocide".

As an editor who supports number 1, I would support a variation on this as well, and I think there's room for a compromise here so we don't head towards a no consensus split. Many editors voiced support for Options 1 AND Options 4/5, so I am wondering if this is what they are looking for. — Goszei (talk) 18:51, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Goszei: Yeah I think the HEB/TucanHolmes suggestion is also acceptable. It's basically what's currently the very brief second paragraph, so some more reorganization of the first two paragraphs may be needed to avoid redundancy. — MarkH₂₁^talk 18:56, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Can someone actually write out the proposed text in a talk quote box? -Darouet (talk) 19:13, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Depends on what the "mix" actually means. I personally do not think that sensationalist additions like secretive internment camps without any legal process in what has become the largest-scale and most systematic detention of ethnic and religious minorities since the Holocaust. are fitting for a Wikipedia article, especially its lead sentence. Furthermore, the sources for the secretive internment camps without any legal process part are not the greatest either, the Washington Post article doesn't mention anything about the "lack of legal processing". CPCEnjoyer (talk) 19:18, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to point out that the source itself also says It appears to be the largest imprisonment of people on the basis of religion since the Holocaust. (emphasis my own). The source itself is using hedging language but the article states it definitively. The source is also a slideshow. Convocke (talk) 00:00, 9 May 2021 (UTC) — Convocke (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

In light of these two points, I think the entire phrase "secretive internment camps ... since the Holocaust" should be removed from the article lead quickly. Both claims are sensationalist and mis-representations of sources. - - mathmitch7 ^{(talk/contribs)} 12:39, 12 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This option addresses the concern I have for options 4 and 5, though the part about it being characterized as genocide is already mentioned in the 2nd paragraph of the lead. Will the content be duplicated or moved assuming this option is chosen? Username6892 21:51, 7 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The content would be moved. The desired outcome would be for readers to first get an impression of the facts of the situation (mass-internment and documented human rights abuses), at which point they would presumably ask "Why genocide?", which would then be immediately addressed by the second sentence (characterized as genocide, though contentious). This way, we avoid a full Wiki-voice assertion about the genocidal character of these human rights abuses. TucanHolmes (talk) 11:41, 8 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I recently created an article for the Xinjiang cotton industry. It is believed that hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs are forced to work in the cotton industry of Xinjiang. Any help improving the article would be really appreciated. Thank you, Thriley (talk) 15:48, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Amazing, yet another page to have endless proxy edit wars that ultimately just loop back to this article. In all seriousness, I hope it ends up being an informative article. Paragon Deku (talk) 04:15, 6 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I recently created an article for the Xinjiang Victims Database. Any help improving the article would be appreciated. Thank you, Thriley (talk) 20:36, 8 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Please stop making stubs related to this topic, at least flesh out the articles you make a bit before you put them up. BSMRD (talk) 14:28, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The recently renamed Fairfax University of America (likely due to their reputation) is known for their subpar education standards, grade inflation, and being a visa mill - and it seems they have tried to polish their image in their wiki article too by even deleting talkpage comments noting the controversy and replaced it with PR talking points. Nothing that comes from Fairfax "university" or its thinktanks should be treated as reliable. It says a lot that this article needs to stoop that low to a source like Fairfax.--PlanespotterA320 (talk) 12:51, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Given that nothing is sourced solely to them beyond their own public response, in the "Other reactions" section, this doesn't actually give rise to any sort of verifiability problem. Removing them from the article wouldn't change the content, but I will note that their report was covered by at least one national newspaper, so it may not entirely lack notability even if it does lack reliability. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 13:08, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

While I agree that FUA is unreliable and we shouldn't be including info on their report, it is cited by many "reliable sources". Wikipedia deals with potential misinformation reported as fact very poorly, as per policy it can only report what others have already said, meaning we can't say anything about "Newlines" unless a few RS say it first. If potentially faulty info is reported as fact by RS there isn't much we can do, which gives Wikipedia articles a big bias problem when it comes to recent/ongoing events but that's a discussion for another time and place, so the best thing to do is find Reliable Sources calling out the accuracy of the report. BSMRD (talk) 14:44, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the teaching standards of the university have any bearing on the reliability of the research of an institute that seems to be only tenuosly attached to it. The report by the Newlines Institute has been cited by numerous reliable sources. The relevant initiative at the Institute involves leading experts from other universities.[10] and p.7 of its report lists a whole bunch of experts consulted, so I don't think its reliability is either based on or invalidated by whatever connetion it has to Fairfax. At any rate, as everything we say about the report is attributed, all via secondary sources (demonstrating DUE-ness) except the final sentence (which could be removed without hurting the article, or probably sourced via a secondary cite) it doesn't really matter anyway. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:17, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The particular source that is cited in the paper is a paper that was published jointly by both the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights and the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy. The way that WP:RS have described the report have generally been positive and reflect some level of trust in the source:

1. South China Morning Post calls it the first independent legal analysis of the applicability of the Genocide Convention to Chinese authorities' actions against the Uygur people and notes that it was written by a group of experts in international law, war crimes and the Xinjiang region
2. Radio Free Asia (RSP Entry) notes that the report is based on the analysis of more than 50 global experts on human rights and international law who examined evidence from state documents, witness testimony, and open-source research to make their determination.
3. The Week notes that [t]he report was put together by a host of global figures in human rights, war crimes and international law
4. The Independent calls it an independent legal analysis by experts on international law.
5. ABC News (Australia) called it a major new report at the time of its publication.
6. The Guardian calls it a landmark legal report.
7. USA Today calls it an extensive report.

Taken together, it looks like reliable sources recognize that the report is both independent and written by experts on the topic, as well as reliable given that they cite it for facts. Even if we were to consider the source to be self-published owing to questions about the editorial process of the Newlines Institute and/or the Raoul Wallenberge Centre for Human Rights, self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications. There's plenty of evidence for that here, so it would seem to be the case that the source constitutes a WP:RS. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 01:43, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There's clearly an incestuous reliance on the Fairfax report that makes the rounds among numerous generally reliable sources, but as always there is an insistence on bible thumping RSP rather than seeing how putting claims from the report in wikivoice creates issues. Paragon Deku (talk) 02:33, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Paragon Deku: I don't think that bible thumping RSP rather than seeing how putting claims from the report in wikivoice creates issues accurately describes what I'm doing, and to be frank I think this is a wanton mis-characterization of what my comment fundamentally is. I'm making an argument for reliability of this particular source, not Newlines writ large, based upon an analysis of the source's use by reliable sources for facts and the expertise of the source's writers. This is how we're supposed to evaluate sources; the creator of this section wrote that [t]t says a lot that this article needs to stoop that low to a source like Fairfax, and I wanted to push back on the notion that the source itself is not reliable for facts.

Also, what do you mean by [t]here's clearly an incestuous reliance on the Fairfax report? I've read the comment a few times and I can't seem to figure out exactly what this means.— Mikehawk10 (talk) 02:42, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Because there is not much scholarly consensus or research on the situation as of late, an overabundance of RS reports on the situation in Xinjiang are overreliant on the report, which leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy sort of effect where an abundance of reliable sources continue to lean on the fairfax report. This does not inherently make it credible, it just means that there is currently a reliance on it due to a lack of reports of the same caliber. It's in the same way that Radio Free Asia and Adrian Zenz sourced claims (such as forced marriages or the infamous IUD claim) make the rounds through several RS outlets and are repeated endlessly regardless of the provable nature of the original claim. This is what I mean by incestuous. Paragon Deku (talk) 03:01, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand why you are framing the IUD claim as "infamous". The Globe and Mail reports that extensive documentation of the country’s efforts to incarcerate, indoctrinate, sterilize, relocate and transfer to distant factories large numbers of Uyghur people has been uncovered. The Associated Press itself has produced an investigative report that concluded that the state regularly subjects minority women to pregnancy checks, and forces intrauterine devices, sterilization and even abortion on hundreds of thousands according to interviews that it conducted and data it analyzed. Zenz's reports on this topic have repeatedly cited in peer-reviewed journals. Other generally reliable sources seem to have reported the mass forced insertion of IUDs, as well. The AP investigative report continues to be used, and reliable sources are generally reporting the IUD claims in their own voice without attribution. If you have sources that dispute the claims of widespread forced IUD implantation, I'd love to see them. In any case, our articles are supposed to reflect the coverage provided by reliable sources, so I'm not exactly sure where you are quite going with this line of reasoning. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 04:04, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The claims are infamous due to ignoring the overarching presence of pregnancy tests in China due to the one child policy and the fact that Zenz's methodology is notoriously poor and has been heavily criticized by a number of individuals. Paragon Deku (talk) 04:36, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Are there reliable sources that back that up? The vast majority of reliable news sources and academic papers that I have seen (if not all of them) have not described the numbers in this way. So far, I haven't seen reliable sources listed to support that sort of line of reasoning. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 05:38, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I am not wont to encourage original research and this discussion is (admittedly by my own doing) becoming more forum than article oriented, but there is very clearly a good number of people who have called into question Zenz's methodology, namely using the ratio of insertions to removals to magnify his own statistics to seemingly ginormous numbers and also erroneously labeling insertions as per capita when they are clearly not. This has gone on a bit of a tangent that doesn't quite have to do with analysis of the Fairfax report directly so I won't be continuing discussion past that. Paragon Deku (talk) 06:09, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

insistence on bible thumping RSP rather than seeing how putting claims from the report in wikivoice creates issues - except we don't currently put claims from the report in wikivoice; the report's claims are attributed, and sourced via independent secondary sources. BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:04, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment: Fairfax University may not be a “reliable source,” but it’s a reliable source for its own opinion at least and can be used in that context, with attribution. -Darouet (talk) 03:07, 11 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know much about this, but it seems significant enough to warrant an article. So I made a stub. Hopefully someone can make this article better. Uyghur Genocide denialColonizor48 (talk)