Talk:Carnism/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

You really do need to listen to what other independent editors say

So far the two uninvolved editors who have expressed clear opinions agree that this article is biased. Yest my edits to try and improve make the artiocle more neutral and encyclopedic are being routinely reverted.

Examples are:

Carnism is a prevailing belief system that supports the killing of certain species of animals for meat.[2] The term was coined in 2001 by psychologist Melanie Joy and popularized by her book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows (2009).

Please can someone explain why my , very mild, change of wording which give a true and encyclopedic description of what the neologism 'carnism' is has been reverted to a form that implies that it is a regularly used English word. It is in no published dictionary that I know of.

Carnism is a term was coined in 2001 by vegan psychologist Melanie Joy and popularized by her book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows (2009)[2] to describe the prevailing belief system that supports the killing of certain species of animals for meat.

Similarly this:

"Four Ns"

A series of studies published in 2015 found that the "Four Ns" – "natural, normal, necessary, and nice" – accounted for the majority of American and Australian meat-eaters' stated justifications for consuming meat. These hold that humans are omnivores (natural), that most people eat meat (normal), that vegetarian diets are lacking in nutrients (necessary), and that meat tastes good (nice).[13][36]

Meat-eaters who expressed these views more strongly reported less guilt about their dietary habits, suggesting that they are an effective strategy for resolving cognitive dissonance. People who endorsed such arguments tended to objectify animals, have less moral concern for them and attribute less consciousness to them. They were also more supportive of social inequality and hierarchical ideologies, and less proud of their consumer choices.[13]

Is not an encyclopedic description of the subject but language from a book promoting a particular POV and inventing new, facetious, terminology to trivialise views opposed to veganism.

My version...

The reasons people do eat meat

A series of studies of moral reasoning around the meat eating found four main reasons that people gave for eating meat. These reasons are that humans are omnivores, that most people eat meat, that vegetarian diets are lacking in nutrients, and that meat tastes good.[13][35]

Meat-eaters who expressed these views more strongly reported less guilt about their dietary habits, suggesting that they are an effective strategy for resolving cognitive dissonance. People who endorsed such arguments tended to objectify animals, have less moral concern for them and attribute less consciousness to them. They were also more supportive of social inequality and hierarchical ideologies, and less proud of their consumer choices.[13]

...retained all the facts but was neutral and encyclopedic. By all means improve it but, in the light of RfC comments, wholesale and immediate reverts of my edits is not right. Martin Hogbin (talk) 08:51, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

As the editor arguing hardest for your position, I can see why the edits were reverted.

• The first one makes the sentence rather long and confusing. Further, while others object to politically labelling Joy in the lead, period, I think "vegan" is not as good as "animal rights advocate", since we don't know exactly when she became vegan, and veganism can be a dietary choice unrelated to politics. (Joy was originally a carnist, then a vegetarian for purely health reasons, now an ethical vegan).

If the English is not the best, improve it, do not just revert; that is one of the rules of the game. I have no objection whatever to "animal rights advocate", in fact I agree that it is a better description of Joy. Had my wording been changed to use that term I would have regarded it as constructive and cooperative editing. Martin Hogbin (talk) 12:15, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

That's what it is now, in the body. For the lead, we should find consensus. FourViolas (talk) 13:01, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

There is no consensus for what we have in the lead now. It misrepresents the subject matter. I would be happy with my wording with your changes. What do you say? Martin Hogbin (talk) 13:47, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

My position is above. FourViolas (talk) 14:49, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

• Piazza's terminology, which comes from peer-reviewed data-based studies, is not "facetious" "pro-vegan" language; it's careful, technical, psychological jargon. You can tell because the meat-eaters Bastian Brock and Steve Loughnan (see #Several vegans) use almost identical language. We can't simply assert the 4Ns, we have to say that "they hold that X", because they are each contested in many reliable sources. (We just haven't been including the rebuttals.) For example, the American Dietetic Association (hardly a vegan apparat) rejects the "necessary" argument. FourViolas (talk) 10:51, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Firstly, what was wrong with my version? It contained all the same content but in neutral language. The terminology the "four Ns" is not neutral. Firstly it implies that there is a widespread debate about why we eat meat. This debate is mainly restricted to a few partisan sources. It is a trivialising term which adds nothing to the arguments except to make the opinions of some authors sound more authoritative than they are. Martin Hogbin (talk) 12:15, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Per WP:VNT, we shouldn't try to know better than the editorial board which approved that paper. If an RS objects to "4N", we can add that objection; it's not useful for us to argue connotations without sources. FourViolas (talk) 13:01, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Indeed we have no right to tell the authors how to best make the point that they want to but we are not writing a paper we are writing an encyclopedia and we are the ones who decide on the language and style to be used here. Martin Hogbin (talk) 13:47, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Would you like to play by the rules of the above game by stating a position in a {{cb-position}} template, or supporting an existing one, so we can take your position into account when compromising? FourViolas (talk) 10:55, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

My position has always been clear it is WP:NPOV. That is not something we should compromise on.

I am an editor just like you and I am following the rules of the game. I made some fairly mild edits to improve the neutrality and make the language more encyclopedic in the hope that other editors would work with me to improve the article. Rather than do this they just have been reverted.

We are some way through an RfC and the response has been disappointing but those editors, including one vegetarian, who have chosen to answer the question asked have agreed that the articles (mainly this one) are not neutral. Many regular editors here do not seem to accept fact. The rules of the game require us to take account of other, particularly previously uninvolved, editor's opinions. Martin Hogbin (talk) 12:15, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

We're all working for what we think is NPOV. NPOV is about balancing sources, not balancing editor's non-source-based opinions, so RfC editors on such a broad question are only helpful if they take the time to familiarize themselves with the extensive secondary literature before answering. The currently live specific NPOV question is whether it's appropriate to label authors' politics every time we cite sources which declare those politics. We're very much in the D of many simultaneous BRD cycles, so reverts are not meant personally. FourViolas (talk) 13:01, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

The game rules do tell us that we must take account of other editors' opinions, whether or not you think they have properly familiarised themselves with any particular literature. In the end, content is decided by consensus, from which no one is excluded. That is particularly so in this case as I am only talking about style and language. I have not challenged any of the content of the cited sources only the way that it is presented in WP. That is solely a matter for editors here; sources do not tell us how to do that.

Regarding your claimed 'live specific' question that is a minor detail compared with the obvious systemic bias currently within the article. Martin Hogbin (talk) 13:47, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I think attributing positions to our sources, instead of implying that they are mainstream in their fields, would go a long way towards giving the reader proper context to understand these ideas and where they come from. FourViolas (talk) 14:49, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

That would help but the whole tone of the article needs to reflect the fact that the neologism 'carnism' is a word devised by a minority to deprecate a majority activity. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:12, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

That's OR until somebody writes a History of Veganism in the 2010s and explains that. Repeating sources' own assertions about themselves isn't. FourViolas (talk) 16:28, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

You should read what WP:Neo has to say on the subject. Here are some quotes which apply here.

'Articles on neologisms are commonly deleted, as these articles are often created in an attempt to use Wikipedia to increase usage of the term'.

'To support an article about a particular term or concept, we must cite what reliable secondary sources, such as books and papers, say about the term or concept, not books and papers that use the term. [my bold]

'Neologisms that are in wide use but for which there are no treatments in secondary sources are not yet ready for use and coverage in Wikipedia'. Martin Hogbin (talk) 17:14, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I suggested moving the article to Psychology of eating meat above in #POV tag, for the same reasons. Consensus was against it. FourViolas (talk) 21:34, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Break 1

*Perhaps it is time to re-examine that consensus. I have tried to avoid getting involved here because of time constraints, but seeing that very little head-way has been made in resolving the logger-heads in even small points here (and the reasons why), I think may have access to some sourcing that some will find useful in contextualizing matters. In my opinion, this article should explicitly be titled (and housed at the namespace for) Meat paradox (or as FourViolas suggests, something to the effect of Psychology of eating meat). I think this could very much provide the pivot point that would allow us to contextualize and treat the rest of the information in the article in a way that begins to address its numerous and deep issues with regard to WP:Neutrality, WP:WEIGHT, WP:NOTABILITY, and just generally abysmal consistency with encyclopedic tone. As others have noted previously, the wording of the article (including especially the lead) currently lends to it a quality common to WP:ATTACKPAGES, except for the atypical aspect that in this case the parties being criticized are not individuals or niche groups but rather the vast majority of the human species. While some (mostly primary and/or low quality) sourcing has been provided to try to squeeze past WP:NEOLOGISM on technicality, a neologism this term remains, used in very few reliable sources, and being virtually non-existent in common parlance. The term and these few WP:UNDUELY applied sources are then used to leverage a narrow evaluative perspective, predicated on a strong ideological stance, rather than an encyclopedic discussion of the concepts involved.

But if this article were not based on that neologism and the baggage that comes with it, we'd have an opportunity to discuss the root concepts which govern propensity towards meat-eating and the choices that people make with regard to it, which absolutely is a topic of relevance and a field of inquiry with a significant amount of research and sourcing behind it, but the vast majority of which is not treated under the topic of "carnism" nor in any way connected to it, much of it predating the term (which is not utilized anywhere in the research literature) by many years. There is a core topic to be discussed here, which can be thoroughly sourced and contextualized, but it has to be treated in a neutral and encyclopedic fashion. And that means divesting ourselves of the current approach which tries to present the choice to eat meat as a "belief system"; that's just not accurate to how most humans cognitively process their dietary choices, nor to the vast majority of the sources which have explored the psychology behind these choices. I'll try to give a very brief discussion of the history and current standing in research on the topic of how people develop their tastes in food, but I won't have time to appropriately source all of this today, so I'm going to stick to the broad strokes. The thinking is largely governed by the sub-discipline of cognitive science known as evolutionary psychology. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, EP approaches the human mind (and the behaviour it produces) in terms of adaptive benefit, in exactly the same way that evolutionary adaptation explains our physiological features.

Evolutionary psychology is particularly useful at explaining behaviours which seem to us to be counter-intuitive or paradoxical in modern life, because many of these behaviours that seem downright illogical in a contemporary context begin to make a lot more sense when you consider the advantages they would give to hunter-gatherers and (though I know this seems counter-intuitive to those who don't have a background in genetics or biology broadly) our brains have not really adapted much at all in the 150,000 or so years since we became the "anatomically modern" species that we are today (150,000 years being a blip in terms of evolutionary time and selective pressures). As it happens, our behaviours with regard to food (what we crave and what disgusts us) has become a real testbed for EP, because they give a really clear window into these kinds of vestigial behaviours. In a hunter gatherer context, you needed to be able to pick up on the ques of your fellow band members as to what was safe to eat and what was not safe to eat, because much in your environment might be poisonous or otherwise dangerous, and thus having a built-in mechanism that caused you to create clearly-defined boundaries on what was acceptable and what wasn't (based on what the other people around you accepted) was a huge benefit and a major part of learning to safely exploit your environment in a species that met its large dietary needs from a variety of sources. This disgust impulse has been handed down to us now in the form of cultural food preferences which persist even though a majority of us now live in a context where food processing and safety have eliminated many of those risks. If we really wanted to rely on meat with limited ecological impact while also moving towards an arguably more humane system, we'd be eating insects, since we now have a detailed understanding of which species are safe -- but in the hunter-gatherer context, nothing was more risky than biting into a bug, so most of us retain a strong disgust impulse with regard to them. Somewhat similarly, while one culture might view dog as a delicacy, another views it as likely to be "unclean", and in most cases these choices are just accidents of history with regard to what was available in one region compared against another; though it's also true that other psychologically factors (for example our emotional attachment with regard to which animals are considered "pets") also have an influence.

Regardless of whether you buy the framework presented above as an explanation for how our disgust modules arose, there is no doubt that this kind of environmental-tuning of our innate prejudices towards meat (and all forms of food) is hard-coded into our brains and our behaviour. Research has repeatedly verified (and in any event, any parent can tell you) that when children first start on solid food, they will generally eat whatever is put in front of them, but very quickly children begin to become very finicky eaters (this becomes particularly noteworthy around the age of a year and half to two years of age, about the time that they would have needed to start discerning for themselves how to select food in a primitive context). Their tastes often shrink from "anything offered" to a very limited spectrum of what they deem acceptable foods. Those preferences then largely stick for childhood and then throughout adulthood they very slowly expand again. But with regard to certain foods which are deemed disgusting in the cultures and peer groups they belong to, they may never be able to stomach them at any point in their lives.

So the "meat paradox" is a bit of misnomer, in that it makes perfect sense as an adaptive trait for the simpler context that we lived in for the vast majority of our history up until "just" thousands of years ago (again, nothing in evolutionary time), even if it seems very strange to us today. It's just one of a countless number of examples where, even when we have new information that casts our decisions in an illogical light, we often still cannot "out-think" our instincts. But calling these choices a "belief system" is inaccurate and nonsensical, because most people make these choices merely on impulse and without cognizant choice. It is mostly those (including some of this article's authors) who have conceptualized these tendencies within a moral framework relating to animal rights, who think of these choices in more explicit terms. We could be discussing all of this; these have been topics of inquiry in cognitive, social, and evolutionary psychology for decades and the sourcing is just sitting there waiting for us to utilize it and contextualize human attitudes towards meat in an objective, encyclopedic fashion. But it means leaving behind the activist stance upon which this article has been repeatedly created by single-purpose accounts (and then appropriately deleted for). And I think that starts with moving away from the neologism as the namespace (though it can certainly still be utilized within sections of the article) and towards a title which will allow a much broader usage of our ample sourcing on the core topic.

Apologies for the length of this post (and appreciation for those who wadded through it in its entirety). This is simply a very complex topic and I believed the science behind it needed to be explained in some detail in order to steer this mess towards consensus on how best to present the subject in an encyclopedic context. I will do my very best to try to supply the relevant sources in the coming days in order to help improve the verifiability and contextualization of our treatment of the topics involved here, but it may be a slow process as my time for editing is incredibly limited at present and stretched between other obligations. Snow ^{let's rap} 23:49, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I would very much like to see psychology of eating meat developed into an article, and in fact I have been collecting sources on that subject for a while. However, as I've said before, it's a different subject from carnism. In the first case, as a putative belief system, carnism is about other things than just psychology. In the second case, the psychological studies which build directly on Melanie Joy's ideas are only a small part of the much larger body of work on the psychology of meat.

Let's for the sake of argument assume an extreme version of your position: that "carnism" is a concept endemic to a small population of activists, developed for the sole purpose of attacking meat-eaters, and lacking any support in psychological research. (Of course I do not believe this is true.) Even in this case, I think it is inarguable that, even as a propaganda idea, it easily passes the notability bar for a standalone article. We have already hashed this out at the AfD, and the current version of the article has plenty of sources, even if you discount the experimental psychology sources. So, your proposal to merge this concept into a different article, then reduce it to nothing by citing UNDUE, would simply leave a new article to be written solely on the "propaganda" aspect of this concept.

Of course, the experimental psychology sources shouldn't be discounted. Even though they are only a small part of a larger body of work on the psychology of meat, they are the specific small part that directly tests Melanie Joy's ideas. The paper by Piazza et al., for example, is dedicated to testing whether the specific patterns of reasoning Joy identified as being central to the "carnist" belief system are actually borne out when people are asked to reason about their food choices. The papers by Loughnan, Bastian, and Bratanova, similarly, unambiguously build on Joy's ideas about carnism.

Part of what you're saying about the psychology of food choices is absolutely true, of course. It's definitely the case that the main factors in people's attitudes towards food are mainly determined by visceral emotions that have an evolutionary basis, especially feeling disgusted by unfamiliar foods. However, this article is not simply about the fact that people eat some animals and are disgusted by others. The main point here is that people perceive the mental characteristics of animals differently according to whether people eat them. As the sources in the article show, this extends even to unfamiliar or fictitious animals. A source added by SlimVirgin, Ruby's 2012 article, indeed identified disgust as the main factor in determining what people wanted to eat, but also found that this disgust was strongly predicted by perceptions of an animal's intelligence, and that this phenomenon varied greatly across different cultures, clearly indicating that perceptions of food animals are cultural, not innate.

I think you misunderstand what the "meat paradox" means. It is the cognitive dissonance entailed in the apparent contradiction between typical views about animal welfare and typical views about the appropriateness of eating meat. Whether or not you think that's a real thing, there are sources on it, and it's clearly something that can't be explained by evolutionary psychology alone. Fundamentally it's a cultural phenomenon, a common but not universal one, which is not experienced by those who have completely consistent views, such as those who totally deny the moral relevance of animals, or who believe that the way meat animals are treated is completely acceptable.

As for your assertion that it's nonsense that people's attitudes about what animals are food and how food animals should be treated ought to be considered as constituting a "belief system", we simply don't have a source saying anything like that. We have a bunch of academics endorsing the idea, including Gibert, DeMello, Gutjahr, Packwood-Freeman, Rothgerber, and Joy herself. --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:27, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Thank you, Snow RIse, for the major contribution towards straightening this out. I agree with your position, and would be happy to split the article into Psychology of eating meat (the middle sections) and Carnism (the "Background" and "Vegan discourse", latter fleshed out and properly attributed from https://www.carnism.org/resources/press-kit. However, I think there might be some issues to resolve among ourselves as we go ahead with a move/split proposal, and a lot of us are already quite tired of talk-paging. I suggest that, before we get into this, you all join me for a pleasant cup of tea together. FourViolas (talk) 01:34, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Hey, I'd like to claim credit for finding and adding Ruby/Heine [1] :). I agree that Carnism should be a stand-alone article with a significant discussion on vegan discourse and activism, all the experimental psych which directly discusses Joy's ideas, the sociology/philosophy about the culture of meat-eating even without the word "carnism", and a link to the Psychology of eating meat page (for Loughnan, Ruby, Bilewicz, and so on). Some research related to the meat paradox (most commonly formulated as "people love animals and love eating meat") would belong to each article. FourViolas (talk) 01:42, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi Sammy. I believe we're largely on the same page here. That is, I think we probably have a similar outlook on the topic itself, and differ mostly in regards to what is the best way to organize this content under policy. You've made a number of salient points, and I'll do my best to address each here in the brief time I have available.

• I just don't see the argument that carnism is a distinct topic from the topic of human choices in meat consumption. The small handful of sources which directly use the term carnism (a fraction of the total sources employed in article, which is always a red flag for notability/pov issues) are, with one exception, all primary. This issue is tied in with the notion that carnism is a belief system, and you're defending that stance on the basis that we don't have sources saying otherwise. But that's not exactly accurate. We do in fact have access to mountains of sources which say that our motivations in our behaviours with regard to meat consumption are generated by mental modules which we are not consciously aware of (the exact opposite of a belief system, which is a set of concepts which we overly recognize and actively embrace). The only difference is that these (vastly more numerous sources) which discuss our species' propensity for meat consumption in these terms, do not use the term carnism, which is a neologism that exists specifically to reframe the debate on this topic in a specific way, by making a first-order assertion. But that's exactly why we have a WP:NEOLOGISM policy in the first place - to avoid WP:POVFORKS of this nature. So what we have here is a circular argument using an improper approach to first principles. The core topic is actually why most human beings eat meat and why they make the selections of meat that they do. Carnism is simply an ideological bent on that topic, but you can't assert against WP:WEIGHT that these choices are a notable belief system and then say that because they are belief system because they are a notable topic. That approach just doesn't hold water for me, logically or policy-wise.

• All of that being said, you are quite correct in the nuance that you point out, that, even if we don't accept the premise that there is a separate topic here in terms of concepts, that there are cases where we allow independent articles where the terminology itself becomes notable. There's a few problems with that in this case though. First, the sourcing just isn't there to support such an exception. Strip away all of the sources which are really about meat consumption in general and do not mentioned carnism or its proponents at all (that is, the vast majority of references currently used in this article in a borderline or overtly WP:OR fashion), and you have only a handful of mostly primary sources, which would not stand-up to the POVFORK test if we already had our article on psychology of eating meat, which we could source with literally thousands of references. Second, if this article were to be about carnism as a operative term, irrespective of whether it represented an actual belief system, it would need entirely different language from that employed within it now. Indeed, the biggest problem with the article at present is that it seriously conflates the concept of carnist thinking and terminology with the actual principles that govern human meat consumption. Lastly, just because we technically could have an independent article on carnism even if we had a fuller article on "psychology of eating meat" doesn't mean that we should; all across Wikipedia on a daily basis we have instances where a topic conceivably could pass the minimal standards of WP:GNG but consensus finds that the topic would represent forking or otherwise is just better understood within an article on it's broader context, and/or would be misleading outside that context. In my opinion, this unambiguously one of those cases. I absolutely support some discussion of carnism here on the project, and of Joy's notions. I just don't think it makes any kind of sense to do that indepedently of discussing the other (and much more abundantly sourced) frameworks for the mental processes that govern behaviour in this regard. And the non-neutral mess that currently constitutes this article is the best argument for why that approach is problematic. You're wholly correct that this is a broader topic of social psychology that involves multiple competing modules, but that's all the more reason to handle discussion of the differeing viewpoints in an explicit and contextualized manner.

• "I think you misunderstand what the "meat paradox" means. It is the cognitive dissonance entailed in the apparent contradiction between typical views about animal welfare and typical views about the appropriateness of eating meat." Meaning no offense or attempt to discredit your entire views based on this one point, but I think you're the one who has significantly misunderstood what the term "meat paradox" refers to. The term was coined to very specifically reference the inconsistency with which some species are treated as livestock and others precluded from being food sources despite a lack of a fundamental trait distinguishing why each is relegated to its relative category. It is not a type of cognitive dissonance itself; rather the argument is that people employ various conceptual strategies to get around the fact that they make the choices they do with regard to meat (based on subconscious mental processes described above, of which they are generally unaware, as most people have little to no knowledge of cognitive science and why they crave what they crave) and to thus reduce the cognitive dissonance involved. But the term "meat paradox" refers to the inconsistency itself (hence the use of the word "paradox"), not the dissonance involved or the coping mechanism. And it absolutely can apply to those who do not extend animals moral rights and those who have no qualms about the manner in which meat animals are treated. Indeed, these are prototypical examples of the kinds of behaviours necessitated for coping with dissonance; it is the other class of person -- the type who simply never thinks about the issue because food production is so greatly divorced from food consumption in certain advanced nations -- who might be said, for periods of time anyway, to be the only ones not subject to the psychological paradox. Again, meaning no offense, but you seem to have the meaning of the term very much reversed in your presentation there.

Anyway, I know I've gone on at some length here presenting counter-arguments to some of your points, but I want to reiterate what I said at the outset; we seem to agree on much more than we agree on; it's just that the complexity of the topic and how policy applies to it here is very complex and necessitating that we go on at some length. I very much want a discussion of carnism, but I want it to take place in a manner in which we can better explain what it refers to, and I just can't see that happening if we leave the discussion of the topic at this namespace. It's one particular conceptual approach to a given human propensity, but the approach it represents (conceptualizing the choices of meat-eaters as a belief system) is just not the way in which most researchers and other sources on the topic of that propensity and the associated behaviours view the situation. So ideally it should be treated as a subsection of a discussion of the larger topic. There needs to be better attribution and contextualization of this niche view, not tacit and non-neutral augmentation of a fringe outlook that does not conform to the broader treatment of this topic that will come from giving the notion its own namespace and then failing to distinguish what the theory's proponents say from what is consensus view of research on the topic. Snow ^{let's rap} 08:24, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I support the idea of moving the article to a more suitable title but we need to move it to a title that accepts the mainstream position as the norm. A better title would be, 'The psychology of vegetarianism', or maybe this article would be better as a section of the vegetarianism article.

The undisputed facts are that today, and throughout the whole of human history, most humans have, to a greater or lesser degree, eaten meat. The reasons for this are obvious; it is a food that easily supplies nutrients that are hard to get from other sources and humans have therefore evolved to like eating it. The mainstream science position is that humans evolved as omnivorous hunter-gatherers, adapting their diet to suit their environment but nearly always including some meat. It is therefore not eating meat that needs the explanation but vegetarianism. Meat eating is our natural state ('natural' meaning only that it is, and has always been, the most common state).

A similar concept is Celibacy. Today and throughout all of human history most humans have engaged in some form of sexual activity but there are those who, for various diverse reasons, choose to abstain from it. That is a similar situation to meat eating; most people do it, some choose not to. Rather like the celibacy article we should explain clearly and neutrally the reasons that people have for not eating meat. It is not our job to support or deprecate vegetarianism. Whenever we give a view that is not part of mainstream science or generally accepted opinion we should properly attribute it to the appropriate specialist school of thought. Celibacy#Augustinian_view is a good example of the way that we should present points of view. Martin Hogbin (talk) 09:50, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Just as a matter of clarifying research on these matters, while you are correct that scientific consensus views human beings as generally omnivorous species, in the case of hunter-gatherers there was a great degree of variability on meat consumption from region to region and there is abundant paleontological and anthropological evidence to support the notion that for many stone-age peoples, there was very little meat in their diet and some cases of virtually none, aside from invertebrates. Of course, it's also worth noting that these people were much more likely to suffer from certain forms of nutritional deficiencies. This continued to be an issue found amongst certain of the most recently "discovered" hunter-gatherer peoples of Indonesia right up until contemporary times. The best that can be said for the universality of meat in human diets is that when it was around a given people, they tended to exploit it as much as they could, for the dietary reason you mention.

In any event, that caveat done, I have to disagree that the appropriate place for this discussion is psychology of vegetarianism. While I strongly agree that this namespace is an inappropriate place to discuss the root concepts that the theory of carnism is meant to address, and that this attempt to validate the neologism and its attached thinking has lead to deep confusion as to what the article is actually about, the namespace you propose would not be the right place to discuss the meat paradox and the other related concepts and research which absolutely are sourced and absolutely do warrant discussion here. The topic is not just one of when people choose to eat meat generally, but also of how they select a very limited variety from amongst a great number of potential sources. That really has nothing to do with vegetarianism and you can find numerous seminal works on the topic which never even raise the question of diets which exclude meat altogether. There are hundreds of hi-quality reliable sources which discuss meat consumption as an independent topic--indeed, the number of sources that do so outweigh those which discuss meat consumption as a counterpoint to vegetarianism. While I think it is clear we need a more neutral title here, I believe your suggestion overcorrects for the current problem a little too far in the other direction. Psychology of meat consumption or, better yet, simply Meat paradox strikes me not just as the appropriate middle-ground solution between the two extremes, but the one which best represents our sources on what the core concept is here. Snow ^{let's rap} 10:50, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I have to reiterate: it's not just a matter of choosing a more "neutral" title. You are talking about writing articles on separate topics. --Sammy1339 (talk) 11:46, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I think the confusion comes primarily from the fact that the word "carnism" comes up when pro-veganists are discussing a topic—the psychology and cultural traditions of meat consumption—which is also the subject of very extensive research unrelated to vegan activism (and this unrelated-to-veganism research almost never calls its subject "carnism"). So although the vegan position is that "Carnism" is an appropriate title for discussion of meat psych, if we objectively look at the sources which actually use the word, almost everything we would be directly justified in placing here actually falls under "animal-rights perspectives on meat psychology and cultural traditions". I think Snow is right that we (including me) have been making an important SYNTH oversight in saying, "many sources ABC [all pro-vegan] say 'meat psych=carnism', so it's okay to put research on meat psych which doesn't use the word "carnism" into this article." Some sources do use "carnism" or "carnist", such as Rothgerber, but most don't, including many we have yet to add [2] [3] [4] [5]. FourViolas (talk) 12:10, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I have always opposed including too many such sources, for exactly this reason. The psychology articles I included are those which directly build on "carnism", not meat-related psychology in general. --Sammy1339 (talk) 12:56, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

However, I also have to point out that it isn't as though there's other "non-carnism" research that contradicts the results here. I'm not a meat-psychologist, but I've been collecting a lot of sources on the topic, and I have yet to encounter any which offer a fundamentally different perspective on this issue. The sources that build on Joy's work are not dissimilar to earlier research on the psychology of meat. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:06, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

The reason you are not seeing the sourcing which explicitly contradicts Joy is because most researchers in this field do not have an interest her WP:FRINGE definition of human behaviour with regard to meat consumption. The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence; that is to say, Joy's notions very much run against the grain of what collective research says about how people conceptualize their meat-eating behaviour, but the fact that the vast majority of that research does not directly respond to her niche interpretation doesn't mean that her perspective represents consensus thinking on the root topic. That underlying topic is what we really need an article on--and in the absence of that article, her paradigm is being presented as a dominant model for how experts view meat-consumption habits, which it most assuredly is not. It's a neologism and a POVFORK, albeit it a fork for a topic that we don't presently cover in its own right. And we should correct said hole in our coverage, which will then give us more than ample opportunity to discuss the carnist interpretation, and our coverage of it will be much better for the increased framing context and attribution, as opposed to the confused mix of inter-conflictory and poorly weighted and presented definitions we have in this article at present.

And this is really the ideal solution for those who want to see some coverage of carnism somewhere on the project; there is a reason why this article was deleted twice before and why it only skirted deletion via a "no consensus" in the last AfD; if this topic comes up for review under its current namespace, I can virtually guarantee that it won't survive that AfD either. Rolling it into an article on the larger discussion of the psychological basis of meat consumption (a topic that has more than enough sourcing to survive scrutiny) will preserve the term's inclusion on the project, while also avoiding the current confusion as to just what exactly it means. Snow ^{let's rap} 13:56, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

@Snow Rise: It's really lame (and wrong) to claim that a subject covered by numerous academic sources, and supported by widely-cited research, is WP:FRINGE. If you want to argue that the views represented in these sources are not mainstream, you need to provide sources backing up your argument. Then we can have our epic rap battle. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:26, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Well, unfortunately, its rare that a discussion on fringe concerns proceeds in that way. The very nature of fringe arguments is such that they are usually not addressed by mainstream authors on a given topic. Sometimes they are directly discredited by an authority on the over-arching subject, but much more frequently editors simply have to come to a consensus about whether the claims of the source are consistent with the views of the majority of sources on the topic or whether they represent an outlier view of dubious consistency with the perspectives of other researchers. I know you feel you've familiarized yourself well with the sources on this topic, but I've been dealing with the relevant social, cognitive, evolutionary and developmental psychology going back a long time. That is to say, this is firmly within my expertise/wheelhouse, and I strongly believe that the notion that this is a human behaviour governed first and foremost by an explicit belief system is in fact a fringe view when compared against the bulk of research on the topic. In terms of our policy decisions here, I can't expect you to accept that just on the basis of an argument from authority, but I can suggest you take my assessment as an honest one from someone with a formal background in the relevant fields--or, at the very least, that you suspend your ultimate assessment until I provide additional sourcing as to the consensus views on this matter. Snow ^{let's rap} 14:41, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

@Snow Rise: On the contrary, reliably-published and widely-cited "fringe theories" invariably have respectable sources directly refuting them. I accept that you know a lot about this topic (my comment to that effect was not meant sarcastically) and especially for that reason I would like you to point me to sources which support your view. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:50, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

@Sammy1339: Of the sources I just gathered in the below #Statement of Explicit Problems, this book introduction is probably the clearest evidence that Joy's ideas are at the fringe of contemporary academic study of human-livestock interactions, even in a culturo-sociological context. pp 10-11 discuss broadly similar concepts without mentioning her or "carnism". I encourage you to read through the introduction and chapter titles for a sample of the ideas exciting meat researchers these days. FourViolas (talk) 05:46, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

This link shows that even in the article about vegetarianist narratives, "carnis*" is not used. FourViolas (talk) 05:56, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm not going to engage in an argument about un-sources. --Sammy1339 (talk) 06:27, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean. The book claims "address the key issues of…meat consumption". It quotes rave reviews by three respected academics in the field, and is published by a subsidiary of T&F. It contains twenty chapters on topics from "meat and inequality" to "meat and climate change" to "creating plausible anti-meat narratives". It is absolutely a reliable source for whether or not Joy's work is a mainstream academic framework for considering meat. The answer is that it isn't. FourViolas (talk) 11:02, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Break 2

Yes, this is my interpretation of the sourcing (and the course of action which I feel WP:WEIGHT requires of us as a result of the nature of that sourcing) in a nutshell. The collective propensities of human beings with regard to meat consumption is an old topic with abundant discussion within psychological research, and a great deal of sourcing, primary and secondary. Carnism is a neologism representing a very specific take on those behaviours, one which has been proposed by a single academic (Joy) and which classifies these behaviours as a belief system. However, the vast majority of scholarship on the topic does not employ this interpretation, making this a POVFORK which takes us a away from a neutral encyclopedic representation of what sources collectively say on the topic of how people conceptualize their behaviours with regard to meat (and a rough summary of those perspectives, as regards the bulk of research into the topic, is that some people do sometimes make their choices on the basis of a belief system, but those people tend to be those who avoid meat, due to animal rights motivations and/or environmental concerns, while people who do eat meat do not typically conceptualize their decision to eat meat as a "belief system"; many don't think about it at all, if they are not made to face the reality of how that meat gets to their plate, as most people in advanced western nations do not).

The biggest of numerous problems with the current article and its namespace is that it implies that this concept of a belief system is a fact, and mainstream consensus on how people formulate these choices, and that's just not correct. It's a sociological paradigm, but it doesn't jive with our much more abundant sourcing on the social psychology of meat consumption, nor our sources which treat more intuitive mainstream perceptions of the topic. Complicating matters even further, and causing needless confusion for our readers, is the manner in which the article is written, especially the lead, which conflates the concept of Joy's theory with an empirical fact, treating it as an established belief system, rather than a paradigm. If it were a belief system, you'd find people who self-identify as "carnists" much as people self-identify as vegetarians or vegans. But when you find "proponents of carnism" the term is actually referring to that small number of proponents for Joy's notions. That disconnect is illustrative of how the nomenclature has been flubbed here (and I think more so by our application than by Joy's theories themselves; I don't think she meant for the term carnism to be applied in the fashion we have here). Either a person is a carnist is a person who specifically embraces an explicit, unambigous, and avowed philosophy of dedicated meat eating (in which case it applies to almost no one) or carnism is the habit of eating meat under any circumstances, in which case it is not a belief system, but just the activity itself. But what we currently have in this article a confused combination of those two non-contiguous semantic interpretations. That's why I think the clear solution here is to construct an article which utilizes the collective sourcing for the study of the psychological and social factors that govern consumption of meat amongst human beings, and then merge the content here into it, including a section on Joy's notions, which we can then contextualize and attribute properly, without the worry that we are pushing that narrative beyond its weight.

By the way, not that it should matter to our encyclopedic purposes here, but none of the above sections suggest a significant break from presenting the kind of information that anti-meat activists might appreciate. Myself, I do eat some meat, but I also recognize that it is somewhat of a selfish impulse -- putting aside the ethics with regard to how food stock animals are treated (which is generally pretty abysmal), there's also the fact that planet cannot ecologically withstand the toll that meat production puts on it as our population increases; it's an untenable system, at percentage of meat we currently indulge in collectively. I'm happy to work passing reference to those facts into the "meat psychology" article (though mostly for that topic we should link to the articles that already discuss the animal rights and food production issues). But none of this stops me from being able to understand (and encyclopdically represent) the actual science and facts that govern human behaviour in this arena, as they are presented in the balance of our sources. The carnist paradigm is just one take on those behaviours, and not one which has been adopted beyond a niche following. It should be discussed in that context, not presented as established fact and scholarly consensus. Snow ^{let's rap} 13:36, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

YES. This is what I have been inelegantly trying to say for weeks. The number and weight of sources which discuss carnism, formulated the "belief system" or "ideology" of human meat consumption, is greatly inferior to the number and weight of those who simply study the activity and the associated psychology. Therefore, gathering information on the topic in general under the title "carnism" is not only OR, but more importantly gives undue weight to Joy and those who agree with her position (that meat eating is best understood as the focus of an ideology). FourViolas (talk) 23:49, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I may try to write a more comprehensive response to all the things you've written, but I don't have a whole lot of time. I'll just address what you've identified as the main point, which is that, you claim, "... it doesn't jive with our much more abundant sourcing on the social psychology of meat consumption, nor our sources which treat more intuitive mainstream perceptions of the topic." This is just not true. We have numerous sources on the topic which do treat it as fact; I also have a lot of sources on the psychology of meat eating more broadly construed, but they do not take a fundamentally different approach, and do not disagree with what's in this article. I have to ask you to provide sources supporting your view. Because you appeared to be an expert, I have accepted your assertion that there is a large body of literature written from a contradictory perspective, but after a lot of searching I don't actually have any such sources, and I would appreciate if you could point them out.

Currently, you are proposing merging this article into a hypothetical article as a back-door to deleting it. It would make sense for you to write the target article first, which I encourage you to do. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:06, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

See my comments above. Rolling coverage of this term into the parent topic is not only not an attempt to delete this article indirectly, it is probably the only chance of retaining some mention of the concept on Wikipedia. This article has already been deleted twice, basically on the same arguments I have presented above. And it only narrowly avoided deletion in the last AfD as a result of a "no consensus" result, not a "keep". I can almost guarantee you that another AfD will see it gone, and this time, I'm betting it goes away with a WP:SALT recommendation. Placing it inside the broader article not only better contextualizes what is currently an abysmally-represented concept, it will also shield discussion of canrnism from outright removal, since the over-arching topic of the psychology of meat consumption has much more robust sourcing. If you're really married to the inclusion of the topic somewhere on the project, this is your best bet. That said, whether the process should proceed from moving this article to a new namespace and then adjusting the content, or rather by creating a new article altogether and merging the content here later, I'm not really sure, but I don't have particularly strong feelings on one approach over the other. Snow ^{let's rap} 14:27, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Consensus is against this move. If you want to merge this into a new article, which I would oppose for reasons explained above, repeatedly - mainly that this topic is not just "broader", but lacks the social theory aspect of "carnism", then please write the target article so that we can all see this broader context wherein carnism is a fringe theory.

I'll also note that in that AfD discussion, even the nominator changed his vote to keep, and the closer noted that the debate was strongly tending towards keep. The debate was closed as "no consensus" mainly, it seems, because editors who voted before the rewrite, back when this was a polemical screed, did not return to change their votes. The other two AfD discussions are years older and pre-date the best sources on the topic. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:40, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't think consensus presently is against this move, but I'm certainly not suggesting that we need to decide this definitively right now. Being as I haven't the time to write such an involved article on my own, it would be improper for me to push strongly to move the article immediately, though I would endorse such an action. But the problem I have with the article is that, while improvements have been made, it remains heavily influenced by its origin as polemic screed, with continuing issues with regard to weight and neutrality. You seem to be unsure of my motivations here (I've become involved because the policy arguments interest me some and because I happen to be decently familiar with the sourcing for the broader topic, but I didn't come looking for this topic, I came across this discussion incidentally) but I've been party to a lot of AfDs and merger proposals over the years, and my honest assessment is that this article would not survive another AfD, especially if the POVFORK arguments were added to the concerns found in the earlier AFDs. I honestly have little investment here; I just love sharing what I know about social psychology by way of the evolutionary framework. If I can parlay that into a policy discussion and improving an article, all the better. But frankly, lately I have had a hard time finding time to edit even the articles I really, really intended to edit, so its questionable how long I will be engaged here. Snow ^{let's rap} 14:58, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I am firmly in favour of a move or deletion. I would have supported keeping it if it had been written in a neutral manner but as as it is now it is a promotional article for a minority view. Martin Hogbin (talk) 15:01, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Snow Rise, the problem is that we're not being given time to write the article, as you can see from the talk page. I've started doing the reading, and I'm finding what Sammy has found, namely that most scholarly treatments are in accordance with Joy, whether the authors use the term carnism or not, whether they're meat-eaters themselves or not. I'd appreciate it if you could list some of your sources so that we can see what you base your views on. Sarah ^(talk) 15:07, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Certainly SV. I've exhausted the amount of time I have for editing today on the abstract discussion here (which is rather the type of complication I think you are referencing here), but I'll put together some sources to explain the consensus view as I know it, hopefully by tomorrow. I remain dubious that this topic can ever be anything but a POVFORK, but I for one reserve judgement until due time has been afforded to the effort (and with my free time for editing, my assessment of a "due amount of time" is pretty liberal!). Anyway, providing you a preview of where I feel Joy's sociological paradigm conflicts with broader scholarship on the matter, the crux of the matter lays in the fact that most researchers will tell you that meat-consumption does not necesitate (nor is it usually best described in terms of) a "belief system". Indeed, the "critical period" in which children form most of the preferences with regard to food choices occurs well before their brains are developed enough to conceptualize anything remotely resembling a belief system.

The problem is that joy is not really an experimental or cognitive psychologist, that I can tell from her writing. Rather she seems very rooted in the approach of a sociologist, whereas most researchers who have done empirical/scientific research on this matter are cognitive scientists of one variety or another, who value data over broad strokes. Sociologists do not do first-order empirical research as a general rule, though they often employ a kind of empirical methodology. Their work often constitutes a kind of meta-analysis of the findings of other researchers. That's why said work is often presented in the format of paradigms and general (and sometimes nebulous) models. It's a way of translating detailed work into a language meant to represent broader trends. The problem is that this sometimes leads to serious disconnects with the primary research and leaps in meaning that the original researchers might not have intended. That certainly seems to be the case here, and the translation is exacerbated by the fact that her works in question here aren't written for an academic sociological context, but are even further abstracted and simplified for a general audience. Complicating things even further is the fact that I don't think her claims are being faithfully translated here either. It's basically become a long process of telephone, with the original meaning becoming more confused with each translational step. Anyway, those are my general observations; more precise sourcing to come. Snow ^{let's rap} 15:43, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Snow Rise, I agree with much of what you say about the belief-system issue and lack of clarity (in the sources and the article). The major issue is that we're not being allowed to write the article so that we can resolve the issues, or determine that they can't be resolved. Ideally those who want to write it would be given a few months to get on with it, then those wishing to critique it could do so (I would hope after having read some of the sources). Instead we have a situation where we're having to stop our reading and writing to reply to repetitive, and often minor, objections from people who haven't done the reading and probably never will. (This criticism is not directed at you.) Some space would be much appreciated.

Re: sources, thank you, that would be very helpful. Sarah ^(talk) 17:09, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

 ===Moving the article=== Snow, I know that diets that include meat are not universal (invertebrates are meat by the way) but they are dominant human diet, historically and in the present day. I think that psychology of vegetarianism therefore is the correct place for this article rather than meat paradox for example. Having 'meat paradox' would be the equivalent of having an article called Sex paradox instead of celibacy. It gives too much weight and prominence to the minority view that we should abstain from sex/meat-eating. It is fine to have minority opinions in WP but they must be presented as such. 'Meat paradox' suggests that there is widespread debate about whether we should eat meat or not; that is not the case. There are communities and groups who do not eat meat but the dominant philosophy is that meat eating is fine, therefore this is not an opinion that we need to defend. Of course veg(itari)ans claim that the majority of the population are deluding-themselves or suffering from some kind of mental confusion when they eat meat but that is a minority opinion. Articles on minority views, no matter how sincerely held, must named after the minority view not the opposite majority philosophy. Martin Hogbin (talk) 14:57, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Again, and as always, we need to base this on sources, and not on your views, and your views of the public's views. --Sammy1339 (talk) 15:00, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Sorry Martin, but that's a bit of a non-sequitur argument for me; there is no topic known by "sex paradox" that I know of, whereas "meat paradox" is an established term within the sourcing on this topic. Furthermore, the observation that humans vary in which animals they view as viable food choices has nothing to do with the weight ascribed to abstinence or indulgence in eating meat. Those are two completely different subjects. Psychological research on the meat paradox neither endorses nor argues against the advisability or acceptability of eating meat generally (or of any other dietary recommendation for that matter). The arguments put forward above for moving the article to "meat paradox" or "psychology of meat consumption" have nothing to do with "defending" the practice of eating meat. It's simply a reflection of what the actual topic of discussion is here, which is definitively not vegetarianism. And yes, I am aware insects constitute meat; that was the entire crux of my reference to them. Sorry, but I can't put this any more plainly really than I did above. This topic is not about vegetable consumption. The rest of us here vary wildly in how we perceive this topic, but I think we all share a consensus that vegetarianism is a related, but tangential topic here, not one which can be defined as an "opposite" in the way you are using the term. Snow ^{let's rap} 15:14, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I have not read Joy's book but as I understand it 'carnism' refers to meat eating and not to the fact that most societies eat some animals and not others. This is what the introduction on the carnism.org page says [my bold]:

Carnism is the invisible belief system, or ideology, that conditions people to eat certain animals. Carnism is essentially the opposite of veganism; “carn” means “flesh” or “of the flesh” and “ism” denotes a belief system. Martin Hogbin (talk) 15:26, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

It's difficult to hold a discussion when people haven't done the reading, so Martin I'd appreciate it if you would at least read Joy. Otherwise the discussion deteriorates into people swapping prejudices, when it's meant to be about which sources to use and how to interpret them. Sarah ^(talk) 15:34, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

It is harder to hold a discussion when people cannot even be bothered to follow a link put in front of them. The link above ( carnism.org) is to a page that starts with a video of Joy and clearly states her views underneath. The above quote is from that page. Martin Hogbin (talk) 15:47, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Well, the lead is very confused as to what carnism means; that has been a major driving factor in why I've commented here at length. But "meat paradox" is a well-defined psychological term. It refers to how one animal can be conceptualized as acceptable foodstock and another rejected for that purpose without any fundamental physical quality to explain the difference. So it really has no relation to vegetarianism. Likewise, most topics in the discussion of the psychology which governs meat consumption have little to nothing to do with the alternative diets of vegetarianism. It's worth noting that carnism.org is not a WP:reliable source and shouldn't be used here to support content or policy arguments. I agree that carnism is not the root topic here, but neither is vegetarianism. Snow ^{let's rap} 15:51, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Snow Rise, the meat paradox is that most people do not want to harm animals but have adopted a diet that does harm them. See this footnote for some quotes from academics. Sarah ^(talk) 16:27, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

It seems clear now that this article should be deleted. No one is even sure what the neologism means. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:11, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

It looks like 'meat paradox' is not a good name for an article either since there is no agreement on what that means. Martin Hogbin (talk) 16:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater.DrChrissy ^(talk) 17:00, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

There is no baby, we have just a bath full of dirty water. What exactly are we writing an article about? It seems to me that some editors here want to write an article promoting Joy's opinions, whatever they may be. Is there really an encyclopedic article to be written, and if so what exactly will it be about. Martin Hogbin (talk) 17:59, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

The article is about a word and what that word means. It is not (immediately) about the politics of the person that coined the word or the people that subsequently used the word. I am with SV on this one - an AfD did not close with a deletion, so let the people who want to work on it do just that, rather than all these extremely time-consuming and distracting complaints.DrChrissy ^(talk) 18:13, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

We do not have articles about words and what they mean on WP. If that is all the article is about there is no justification at all for keeping it. Martin Hogbin (talk) 19:39, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Statement of Explicit Problems

NPOV or POV-bias

Is the tone and style of this article really NPOV? Does the article actually present a completely balanced and impartial viewpoint? Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 23:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

• FourViolas' position: The tone is less pro-vegan than most of the sources that discuss "carnism", but remains more anti-meat than the mainstream academic position on the phenomenon of meat consumption. Leroy 2015 is closer to what I think is mainstream, and here's part of an actual academic overview of how scholars look at the situation. FourViolas (talk) 04:34, 30 July 2015 (UTC)
• As 'carnism' the article is unredeemably biased. The only way forward is deletion or moving the article to a title that properly reflects the minority status of the content. I have suggested that something like The philosophy of veganism would be more appropriate. This is the way that minority views are normally treated in WP. I have given Celibacy as an example but could give plenty more.

Source bias: should authors that have sourced material in-article have a notation or statement of "animal-rights advocate" (or similar) and vice-versa, if they have a vested interest and partisan bias?

This is mainly concerned with Melanie Joy and various quotes associated with her, but this can still have an impact on how the article is read, both for pro and anti views. Does adding the notation/statement allow for more article NPOV? Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 23:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

• FourViolas' position: Yes. If they declare they have an agenda, they probably have good reason to. If they provide information which can be sourced elsewhere, we should use the other sources. In a contentious topic, openly partisan sources must be handled very carefully. FourViolas (talk) 04:34, 30 July 2015 (UTC)
• Source bias is inevitable so long as we call the article after a pejorative term used by veg(itari)ans. Since the term is not widely used outside the veg(itari)an community it is quite obvious that most sources relating to the word will be anti-carnist. Properly attributing content to these sources is necessary but it is not sufficient to make the article neutral. Martin Hogbin (talk) 08:40, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Article Structure

What structure do people suggest be used, as I notice that this has become a point of contention, though I think there is some consensus. I would suggest that if you have a particular suggestion about an area that you create a Level 4 heading and label as your suggestion, to avoid ideas being suggested mid-discussion of an earlier suggestion (having two ideas discussed under one title). Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 23:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC) For example:

• We should follow the structure of other article on minority positions. Celibacy would be a good model to follow. Martin Hogbin (talk) 08:40, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

User:FourViolas's Example Structure (I think it was discussing the Meat Paradox, but I'm not 100% sure)

Please note that I am using this as an example, and that this is not endorsed by User:FourViolas, this is purely an example. [6] It is right at the bottom (it's a fair few scrolls), and I can't seem to find the actual edit for the one comment, so my apologies for the finger work-out. The possible structure was "split the article into Psychology of eating meat (the middle sections) and Carnism (the "Background" and "Vegan discourse", latter fleshed out and properly attributed from [7]" quoted from the comment under section "You really do need to listen to what other independent editors say".

Please note that I am using this as an example, and that this is not endorsed by User:FourViolas, again, it is an example.

I would have used other examples from different user's as well, but I simply ran across this and decided to use it. Please don't hate on me. Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 23:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

• FourViolas' position: Yes, something like that. Only "carnism"-containing sources belong in the Carnism article. Since, per RS, the concept has a political agenda, it is improper to group sources under the term unless they do so themselves. See section below. FourViolas (talk) 00:53, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Here are a few recent sources on meat sociology and psychology which don't use the word: Boer 2005, Loughnan 2014, Dhont 2014, Hayley 2014, Schôsler 2015, Graça 2015, De Backer 2015, Blidaru 2015. FourViolas (talk) 04:34, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Because of WP:V and WP:CONLIMITED, this proposal is a non-starter: we cannot form a local consensus on how this article should be sourced, which differs from the standards on all other articles. Policy says most of the sources should directly address the topic, though not necessarily the word. As a practical matter, I am generally in favor of preferring those sources whose connection to the term is clearest, including those that cite Joy and those which are identified by other sources as being about the topic. However, imposing some strict special rule like this is against policy. --Sammy1339 (talk) 06:35, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Can I please get a clarification @Sammy1339? "This proposal" - do you mean the example structure or the sources used in the article?

Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 10:52, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Sammy, Dr Crazy is trying to get a summary of the current live disputes (which are currently inaccessible for new voices to follow), not spur new (or ROUNDANDROUND) discussion. What's your position on article structure? FourViolas (talk) 11:30, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

What have I missed?

Feel free to add a sub-heading, with posing a question and clarification of the question. Dr Crazy 102 (talk) 23:38, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I think you've got a great idea of the situation. Thank you so much for making the effort to catch up on, and distill, this enormous discussion.

However, SlimVirgin, a very experienced editor, thinks it is not productive to be discussing all of these right now. If my proposal below is accepted, I think your discussion-organizing scheme would be a great template to start from when we do discuss NPOV (if we even need to after the development period). I accidentally proposed a slightly different, NOR- and V- plus NPOV-based division line within my proposal. FourViolas (talk) 00:53, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Sources

I'm leaving this in case people see me swap one source for another, and wonder why.

It's best to avoid tertiary sources, such as encyclopaedia articles, when writing articles like this. These usually summarize the secondary-source material. They're useful when trying to establish notability, and also useful when showing how an issue is broadly viewed (although this works only when it's a high-quality article). But otherwise it's better to use the primary and secondary sources directly.

So when I find that tertiary source X in 2015 is simply repeating the view of secondary source Y in 2012, I'm removing X and adding Y instead. Sarah ^(talk) 17:11, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the improvements and the explanation. FourViolas (talk) 17:35, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Can we please avoid websites such as allcreatures.org? We're already pushing it using Francione's website, but I'm hoping I can find him saying something similar elsewhere. The article needs to be kept on track as an academic exploration of an idea. Sarah ^(talk) 18:11, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

It's a strong self-published source for an important (per earlier consensus) element of the idea. The ideas presented are fully attributed per WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV; I'm hardly endorsing the idea that carnism must be challenged. I'm commited to an academic viewpoint myself, and greatly prefer the academic side of the discussion, but the concept is frequently invoked outside of academia, with strong connotations which need to be mentioned. The sentence I added is objective and factual, and does not impugn the intentions of other scholars who use the term (as other editors wanted).

All that said, I can look for an interview hosted elsewhere in which Joy explains the intent behind her coinage if you want. FourViolas (talk) 18:31, 26 July 2015 (UTC);edited 18:33, 30 July 2015 (UTC) after a request to clarify. I have never held a position as a professional academic.

I have to reiterate what I said before: that there is no good reason to put this information in the lede section, for the same reason similar information does not appear in the lede sections of homophobia and patriarchy even though we all know what sort of social views people who use those words on twitter and tumblr are likely to have. Joy coined the term carnism, but she doesn't own it, and her views and reasons are already given enough space. Citing WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV here really makes it sound like we're making an argument that the whole concept is propaganda and the reader must be warned of this - this is not supported by the sources. --Sammy1339 (talk) 22:58, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

I think the status quo post gracila virginem, with Joy's agenda in the body but not the lead, is an appropriate reflection of the secondary sources. Joy's intention is currently a relatively nebulous passive-tense syllogism: Joy compared carnism to patriarchy, arguing that both are dominant normative ideologies that go unrecognized because of their ubiquity. Naming ideologies allows them to be examined and questioned. I'd like to present Joy's propagandistic intention behind the word more clearly; the sources, WWLDEPWC and the removed interview on Understanding Carnism and Cultural Conditioning, are very strong on this.

I'll go along with disregarding the widespread use of the idea among social media activists and "lay" vegans, as long as secondary sources don't comment on them and as long as we scrupulously avoid mirroring their rhetoric (in the images for example). FourViolas (talk) 23:22, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Speaking of sources: please oh please can somebody get ahold of pp. 162-164 of this book on vegetarianism? I think it's exactly what we've been looking for, two pages of dispassionate discussion on how vegetarians use the word. FourViolas (talk) 02:56, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Carnism is a theory or paradigm

SV just changed the lead to make it clear that the frame of "carnism", a discrete belief system, as a way of understanding the human behavior of meat eating, is not universally used. I believe this finally resolves the biggest NPOV problem, that of presenting a minority perspective on a broad topic as the generally accepted one. I also believe it reflects reliable sources' usage.

I'd like to apologize for straining anyone's patience with my inexpert attempts at consensus-building. If this lead is agreeable to everyone, I'd be willing to remove the POV tag, let the article be for a while, and work on psychology of eating meat instead. Thanks again to everyone for your hard work. FourViolas (talk) 18:29, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

I think that is wrong. Carnism is not a theory it is a word. I propose this:

'Carnism is a term was coined in 2001 by psychologist and animal rights advocate Melanie Joy to describe the use of animals for meat. It was introduced in her book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows (2009) which views the use of animals for meat and other products as a dominant ideology supported by a variety of generally unchallenged assumptions and defence mechanisms'. Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:47, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Regarding removal of the tag, we have only done the first paragraph of the lead. We need to make the rest of the article neutral and encyclopdic. Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:49, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Good point, sources don't call carnism a theory. It's a word used in a particular theory to describe meat eating (& its associated practices) as an ideology. However, that's more of a wordsmithing job than a POV problem. The current version is very close to mutually acceptable all around; I think it could be fixed with a very slight change. Maybe: "Carnism is a term for the use of animals for meat and other products. The term is used in a theory which describes carnism as a dominant ideology supported by a variety of generally unchallenged assumptions and defence mechanisms."

As for the rest of the article, I think it really would be better to let it grow undisturbed for a while. As long as the lead makes clear that the framing of meat-eating as a "belief system" is a sociological paradigm, not the mainstream consensus on the practice, the rest of the article is correctly focused on the research of those who choose to use this paradigm. I think it's a reasonable reflection of that subset of meat researchers, and I've also noticed the tone improving almost with every copyedit. Brief mention should be given to those who specifically object to the term's use; I think the attributed quote being discussed in the section above is neither more nor less than sources justify, unless you can find a better source. Other than that, I'm going to step away from arguing NPOV here to let the article expand (as it is in the process of doing), and take up any problems later. FourViolas (talk) 01:58, 31 July 2015 (UTC)