RationalWiki talk:SPOV

this page should be moved to SPOV because it would be Snarky Point Of View instead of sNarky Point Of View because that is just RETARDED! And NPOV stands for neutral point of view. --98.17.61.146 20:03, 26 December 2007 (EST)

Well, you know what JESUS totally said. Thou hypocrite! Remove the log from thy own sense of humour, before pointing out the splinter in thy brother's. --Jeēv☭s^{Your signature gave me epilepsy...} 20:08, 26 December 2007 (EST)

I think what Jesus actually said was, "Suffer not the humorless to live a dull, tormented life, yet let them rejoice in the grammatical misdeeds of others".

OK, it got moved to SPOV; I suggest we keep the redirect since there are lots of links to it, and well, it makes it funnier. human 20:55, 26 December 2007 (EST)

I think I'd like

"Snarky" replaced throughout by Snarkiness, but am too lazy to actually , you know, do it. CЯacke® 21:11, 26 December 2007 (EST)

Huh? That doesn't make any sense - it always says SPOV, not snarky, and in that phrase, "snarky" is grammatically correct. Or am I missing your point? human 21:23, 26 December 2007 (EST)

Was I dreaming?

... or wasn't there a time when SPOV ambiguously referred to both scientific and snarky points of view? Sprocket J Cogswell (talk) 13:25, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

This needs improvement

People are linking to this when strangers ask why an article is written in a specific way. If I wasn't already familiar with the culture of RW, I wouldn't get it, and I guess most other people won't get it either.--ZooGuard (talk) 17:43, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Nobody reading it critically will get it because it was written 5.5 years ago to an audience that already thought it had its in-jokes and culture down pat. It doesn't actually explain what SPOV means and I can't say that SPOV as an editorial policy looks to be so coherent that editors even understand it well enough to implement it consistently. I'm guilty of adding wildly inappropriate material to some of our articles on prominent creationists, conservatives, and apologists, which now makes my cringe. We've had abortive discussions about what the tone of RW should be. Who thinks SPOV enhances RW's reputation? What's next? 18:53, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Just to clarify - by "get it" I meant "understand the contents of this page". My gripe is with the ability of this page to explain RW culture, not RW culture itself. (Which is a separate gripe best discussed elsewhere.)--ZooGuard (talk) 18:56, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Revision needed

As we grow, this page is becoming one of the most important on the wiki, if only because such a large portion of reasons for undoing edits is given as "SPOV". This page does not come close to explaining what SPOV means. The comparisons to Uncyclopedia, Conservapedia and Wikipedia don't make sense, and we shouldn't be defining ourselves against other projects anymore. Just to say "we're snarky" doesn't mean very much. Blue (is useful) 12:06, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Also, see the discussion above.--ZooGuard (talk) 12:29, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that originally we used this to mean both "Scientific point of view" and "Snarky Point of view". Perhaps the time has to come to give more prominence to "Scientific point of view"? In fact (It seems to me) it is more representative of the current ethos anyway.--Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 12:34, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Some people will read it as "be as pedantic, dry and 'objective' as possible".

Perhaps a part of the problem is that currently "SPOV" applies both to style and tone and to "the angle we've chosen to look at things".--ZooGuard (talk) 13:37, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

It was under my impression that the snark in sPOV came from the disdain rationalwiki shows to pseudoscience and dominionist religious thought; as a defense against drifting to neutral pov as new writers come on, a slightly exaggerated aggressive tone is preserved. But it's a fine line between being snarky and coming across as a giant asshole. In my eyes the point should be that rationalWiki IS a source with a viewpoint, it's biased to scientific and other highly studied and validated views, rather than no viewpoint like wikipedia, which chooses not to value individual ideas and instead report them all. ±KnightOfTL;DR^{walls of text while-u-wait} 13:55, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

I've said this before and I'm sure I'll have to say it again but if RW starts removing the fun and snark from its articles it'll have nothing to recommend it over Wikipedia. The advantage of RW is that you can get a good grounding in a topic without being turned off by the appallingly pedantic and turgid articles you get at WP. If you take away the fun you just end up with a less complete version of a Wikipedia article, but with all the pedantry and turgidity. Could this article be improved? Certainly. But to change it to "Scientific POV" would be an absolutely insane idea. rpeh •T•C•E• 14:00, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

What Rpeh said! Scream!! (talk) 15:03, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

We're going to formalize snarky? Really? sterile^{sporadic heavy hitter} 15:05, 11 February 2013 (UTC) Actually, I would say the "point of view" of RW is biased and reality-based. Clearly not everything is snarky, after all. sterile^{sporadic heavy hitter} 15:07, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

No, but we can't keep using "SPOV" as this blanket excuse to keep utter shit in mainspace. Especially when the page a new editor might go to learn more about this "SPOV" thing they keep hearing is mired in in-jokes from where the site was in '07 and '08 — glory days, I know, but the core group from that time, the one that came up with this policy, is mostly gone. This page needs updating is all. Blue (pester) 15:11, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

I don't agree that it's being used that way. A shit article is a shit article whether or not it's snarky. True, there have been examples of bad snark but what happens all too often is that a snarkectomy is performed rather than a snark transplant. In other words, bad snark is bad, but no snark is also bad. A few examples of what you describe as "utter shit" being kept in mainspace solely on snark grounds would be helpful here. rpeh •T•C•E• 15:43, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Let me ask you this. Since few of us are specialists yet we've got side by sides dealing with major creationist tracts, like 101 Evidences and Question Evolution!, do you think it serves us to have first person narratives that include swearing and crummy analysis without citations? I've removed silly "snark" from articles like someone calling a christian apologist an "asshat" or the like. That's just fucking stupid. It seems to me that "snark" is sometimes an excuse for poor mediocre scholarship in service of just getting content into the wiki. Does this make any sense to you? 16:25, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

You know I love you dearly Nutty, but that's a bit of a strawman. Calling someone an asshat isn't what I'd call snark at all - it's just name-calling and I'd agree that it's fucking stupid. rpeh •T•C•E• 17:32, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

We should just define 'snark.' and be done with it. The problem is that the definition as it now stand is 'snide sense of humor' but editors on the internet are fully capable of having extremely poor senses of humor, cite: Encyclopedia Dramatica, Uncyclopeda. Though I don't know how to remedy this problem? Hold lectures or give FAQs about what is/is not funny? Just warily watch mainspace and revert any "X IS A FAG"-style nonsense? We seem to have defined that sPoV invites unfunny people. But what exactly is the 'funny' we are looking for? Until we can define that, this discussion could go on forever. ±KnightOfTL;DR^{yeah, well you fight like a cow!} 19:01, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Snark, when it's done properly, is appropriate & witty use of irony, sarcasm, ridicule & subversive humour, to complement the "analyzing & refuting" bit, not to take its place. Unfortunately, it's often used as an excuse for corny ancient memes, gratuitous mentions of goats, argumentum ad tumbleweed, inane baby talk (teh ghey, buttsecks), off-topic quotecruft, excessive strikethrough comments, & mystery meat links where the reader keeps having to hover over text to actually understand what's being said (& which usually link to worthless pages anyway like bullshit, irony meter, & argumentum ex culo). Maybe we should put together a few basic dos & don'ts. Probably a lot of our help pages could do with being overhauled too, but then again I doubt anyone really uses them much. ωεαşεζøίɗ^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 19:06, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

What Weaseloid said. Not getting rid of snark, but toning down the "Internet-ese" (for lack of a better term) might do some good. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:27, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

In point of fact our definition article comes down strongly on the scientific-rational POV as do our mission statements.--Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 10:03, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

To quote myself from above: "Perhaps a part of the problem is that currently "SPOV" applies both to style and tone and to "the angle we've chosen to look at things"." That section covers "angle", but tone and style are separate from that.

Redirecting this page to that section is a temporary solution, though.--ZooGuard (talk) 11:15, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Revision needed (back to topic)

Blue's original complaint was the same as mine in the previous section - this page does a poor job of explaining RW culture in its current state. When newbies ask why an article is written in a certain way, they are sent to this page, but it doesn't provide an adequate explanation.--ZooGuard (talk) 11:15, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

I don't think anybody is disagreeing with that; the question now is "What, exactly, goes in its place?" rpeh •T•C•E• 11:21, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

This--Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 11:42, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, some basic guidance on snark/SPOV should be added there & then this should redirect. Wèàšèìòìď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 13:17, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

That's a really good article already. I'd either forgotten about it or never seen it at all. Agree with the Weasel about what to do next. rpeh •T•C•E• 13:40, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

I've expanded the relevant bits of that page to include a brief explanation of snark & SPOV, plus the missions. I suggest redirecting this page, (+ snark & any existing redirects) to the relevant section (here). Щєазєюіδ^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 21:06, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Suits me. :-) --Bob^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 21:56, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Done. Wëäŝëïöïď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 13:13, 15 February 2013 (UTC)