Category talk:Animal rights movement

Categories

Except in exceptional cases, redundant categorization between sub- and main-category should be avoided. The activists should not be here given that a sub-category exists for them. Unfortunately, where the template is employed, they cannot be removed from this category. I have tidied some things where possible. Marskell 13:28, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Problem solved. The syntax to avoid having a template automatically categorize a page is :Category:ABC. Note initial colon. All redundant categorizations have been removed from here as near as I can tell and I have changed the intro to reflect the change. Marskell 15:59, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I disagree. The point of this cat was to have a one-stop shop for the movement. No point in having one about the movement with the activists, who make up the movement, removed. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 16:05, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I'm at a loss as to understand this. The main category is activism. The sub-category is animal liberation movement (ALM), which includes activist groups, individuals, and their concerns. It's particularly inappropriate in the case of the ALM to remove the individual activists because the activists are the movement, and move fluidly between the "groups," which tend to be no more than activist names (leaderless resistance), and descriptions of acts, rather than fixed organizations, with activist movement completely fluid between them, depending on what they're doing. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 16:24, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

And if you don't like that they're in two categories (though what on earth could the objection to that be?), then remove them from the sub-category you don't like, not this one. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 16:25, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Looking through your deletions, the other problem is that you're drawing somewhat inaccurate distinctions between people. You retain people like Peter Singer in the category, who could be described as one of backbones of the movement: not someone we could call an animal-rights activist but very important to them. But you remove Paul McCartney, and you make him an animal-rights activist, even though he isn't (not really an activist, and I have no idea whether he supports giving animals legal rights), but an important member of the animal liberation movement nevertheless (member of PETA, financial supporter of movement in general). Then you'll have a problem with people who have double roles: Steven Best, for example, is an activist (like e.g. Robin Webb) and also a theorist (like e.g. Peter Singer). The way you want to organize this would see him in one category for one thing and another for the other, even though both his roles are part of the same activity.

These people are the animal liberation movement. It's what they call themselves, and it's what anyone knowledgeable about them calls them. Some are what you might call "animal rights activists," some aren't. Some support animal "rights," some don't. Some are members of formal organizations, some aren't. Some of the "groups" have a formal, legal existence, while others are just names (leaderless resistance) certain activists use while undertaking certain types of direct action. Jointly, these people and groups/names are known as the animal liberation movement. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:02, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categorization states "an article should not be in both a category and its subcategory" and later "a good general rule is that articles should be placed in the most specific categories they reasonably fit in." The activists should be placed in one or the other, not both, and the sub-cat seemed "the most specific." If you feel they make more sense here, I'd suggest simply deleting the sub-cat. Alternatively list the sub-cat in a different main category that isn't vertically related to this one, i.e., Animal rights. The double-up is then fine. Marskell 17:40, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Well, first I'm not aware that what it says on the categorization page is policy. It makes no sense to me to say that items may belong in only the category or sub-category. But that aside, having an "animal rights activists" sub-category is fraught with complications, because it's a phrase they don't use of themselves, and it arguably only fits some of them, because it's far from clear what the definition is, and I can't think of what it could be that would fit them all. Animal liberation movement, however, does fit. I'm also confused as to why you went ahead and deleted the category from the activist pages rather than discussing it first. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:48, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

WP:CG is a guideline and the specific ref is in my experience fairly well-established (like "crystal ball" say); the most recent example I can remember is on Talk:Earth where I and other editors were talking to a trollish editor who wanted to re-cat the page. Absolutely, there are arguments against it:abundance and redundancy, for instance (which I think has become sort of archaic due to little citation, but remains a good guideline). The argument in favour—that cat's in general would become unscaleable if listing in vertical-related cats were allowed—strikes me as the stronger argument. There is, BTW, an open thread on the topic on the Wiki Cat page if you want to comment.

Really, I felt this was a basic cat-sort attempt and that's why I edited without comment. If a cat is redundant with a higher order cat (particularly if they are one step-away) the less specific cat should be removed. I actually thought it more browseable: what's wrong, for instance, in removing the activists but also making a ref right at the top of this page to the activist sub-cat? 90+ is sort of longish.

"Having an 'animal rights activists' sub-category is fraught with complications..." OK, then maybe it should be simply deleted. If the movement is the activists, as you say, then perhaps the sub-cat actually obfuscates things. Marskell 22:45, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

If it's only a guideline, we don't have to follow it, though I confess to barely understanding it, so my sense of whether it's worth following isn't up to much. But yes, the point here is that the individual activists, writers, financiers, and the group names they act under, are the animal liberation movement, and to split them up into other categories would be misleading. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:58, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Well now, we don't have to follow anything at the end of the day :)—really, we don't. If I had an "Order From Jimbo" I'd cite that, but guidelines are guidelines—as best you can offer for what you are supposed to do. But a reasonable BOLD or IAR edit trumps even that. And to say again, I thought this your basic cat-sort undertaking based on a guideline.

That caveat aside, do you wish to delete it? The alternatives I'd suggest are re-catting the sub-cat under Animal Rights or renaming it Animal Liberation Activists. In the latter case, I'd say the redundancy is even stronger and the "one or the other" would come to the fore more obviously. Marskell 23:13, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I meant it's a guideline as opposed to policy. We're meant to follow policies; guidelines are suggestions. Personally, I see no need to have a generic animal-rights activist sub-category, but I didn't create it so I'm hesitant to suggest it be deleted, and I don't see the harm in having both. Can't you just leave things as they are? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:26, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

"Khalas" as they say. I will de-watch this business. Marskell 23:46, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

places targeted by ALM

Should places that have been targeted by the animal liberation movement be categorised here? I don't think they should, because they aren't part of the animal liberation movement. Arfan2006 21:14, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, I think there may be some different opinions on this matter. You suggest not appropriate to categorize them here because they "aren't part of" the ALM. My understanding is that categories are not necessarily "true subcategories" in the sense of a logical "part of" relationship. Categories, as used in wikipedia, also indicate relationship to the subject. So if the targeted status is really significant to the subject of the article, then it should be listed in Cat:ALM -- and in a sense that makes sense, because where else would they be listed? But to avoid confusion with those who are "part of" the ALM and those who are "related to" or "targeted by" the ALM, subcategories would be appropriate -- for instance, Category:Targets of animal liberationists. However, that category might not make sense for other reasons though and might be inclined to be abused. Moreover, categorization of this category is not in consensus now, so it's not really clear how (if at all) it is appropriately subcategorized .... The upshot is that maybe a "List of targets of animal liberationists" would be better for any number of reasons; that doesn't answer whether it should be categorized in Category:Animal liberation movement; I would argue yes. --lquilter 17:06, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Individual activists

Individual activists should be contained in a separate category to allow for easier access to information about such activists and to reference a specific animal rights activists category as a member of other categories without including the general category. For example, Category:Animal rights activists (or whatever you want to call it) should be a member of Category:Activists and Category:Animal liberation movement. For one example, see Category:Civil rights. This makes it easier to find and sort specific information as well as make subcats members of other cats. --Viriditas 22:14, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree - was this previously discussed or handled? --lquilter 01:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Members of Wikipedia:WikiProject Animal rights have been preventing any categorization of animal rights activists. Some of their arguments may be found here. I don't feel that any of their arguments are persuasive, compelling, or even address the issue. I've spent a significant amount of time searching academic databases, and the categorization of animal rights activists is fully supported. Additionally, this allows cross-references in Category:Activists and other categories. The project has gone so far as to redirect Animal rights activism and List of animal rights activists, both valid articles. Lastly, the article Animal rights movement is currently named Animal liberation movement, which violates naming convention guidelines. As you can see by the dated comments, this dispute has been going on for almost a year. —Viriditas | Talk 02:03, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks - I agree there needs to be some clarity & consistency between the other activist categories. --lquilter 02:42, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Subcatting -- for 2 weeks there's been no further discussion of the subcats, which used to exist, for "activists". If we can't reach consensus here, I'm taking it to Categories for Discussion. --lquilter 18:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I support taking this to CFD, however I recommend waiting until winter break is over for most students; the entire Animal rights project will probably block this CFD again, and that may be difficult to counter with fewer people participating. I suggest getting other WikiProjects involved, such as WikiProject Politics and WikiProject Sociology. Some of these activists are considered philosophers, so WikiProject Philosophy may or may not be helpful. There may be others. —Viriditas | Talk 18:28, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, your strategic concerns are probably valid, but I went ahead & did it before I saw your note. --lquilter 18:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

No worries. All we care about is improving the encyclopedia. If we can't find information, or a categorization doesn't work, we should welcome change. —Viriditas | Talk 20:12, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, I started discussion at Category talk:Activists on thinking through the problems of categorization -- the Animal rights movement project people don't have unique problems, but they are problems that should be addressed. Maybe we should spawn a project, but for now I started a discussion. Hopefully it will pull in people from all sorts of perspectives and we can come up with a good scheme that addresses all the issues in a comprehensive & consistent fashion. --lquilter 22:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

As for other projects, we should get Wikipedia:WikiProject Categories involved. —Viriditas | Talk 23:58, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. --lquilter 00:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Famous animals

I removed Category:Famous animals and its subcat Category:Famous apes from this category. I'm not sure how these famous animals are part of the Animal liberation movement. Is the fact of accomplished or well-known animals supportive of the movement? Anyway, if an editor feels strongly about restoring the categories, just Category:Famous animals will suffice, as the other is a subcategory. -Acjelen 18:38, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

I think that a list of abattors in the u.S should be added here.

renaming

I've orginally put the cat up for a renaming to Category:Animal rights movement, but there was already a Category:Animal rights groups I found out. Still "liberation" in this case is not neutral, since "liberation" in this case might mean using force against humans or property. You can share your thoughts here, or at Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion#Category:Animal_liberation_movement_to_Category:Animal_rights_movement. Intangible 22:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

The cat isn't called "animal liberation," which I can see might be POV (at a stretch). It is called "animal liberation movement." That is simply the name of the movement. It contains people who agree with the concept of animal rights, and people who do not. I don't see the benefit of changing it. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with the merge of Category:Animal liberation movement to Category:Animal rights. Animal liberation is a very specific and well defined sub part of the animal rights movement, namely those who engage in liberating animals and employ Direct action techniques to acheive those aims. I'm thinking of thaking this to Wikipedia:Deletion review. --Salix alba (talk) 19:10, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

This renaming was overturned on deletion review [1]

Salix, the bot owner has agreed to stop and reverse what the bot did, so I think it'll be okay. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:20, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

renaming

I again propose this cat to be renamed to Category:Animal rights movement, again for POV reasons. See the earlier CFR [2]. Intangible 13:39, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Yet again we have a poorly advertised CfD [discussion], from what I can tell there was not even a notice placed on the the category page. Dispight the fact that the previous merge was overturned on Deletion review precisle because it was inadaquatly advertised and discussed. --Salix alba (talk) 16:04, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Poorly advertised? See Google Cache. Intangible 17:20, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

From WP:CFD Consider adding {{cfdnotice|Cfd section name}} to the main article's talk page owing to the controvsy over the renaming it would have seemed apropriate in this circumstance. Again we had a CFD discussion where those who know something about the field were not involved. I don't know why but it didn't seem to show up in my wacthlist. --Salix alba (talk) 21:12, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes it was very poorly advertised. Animal rights != Animal liberation and visa versa. I will be taking this to deletion review as people who no nothing about this area should not be able to judge on it without doing some basic research. There is a movement where people think animals should be liberated, it is called the animal liberation movement and the individuals are 'animal liberationists' - they are a subset of the animal rights movement but are not one and the same.-Localzuk^(talk) 18:41, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Subsection & EDIT WAR

I believe this category is seriously overcrowded. I know that some people in the past intentionally seem to have made it so ("one stop shop"). However, that is not the way the category system is supposed to work - we do not put all "United States" material into one category, we have subcategories. So here as well. The specific category at discussion here is Category:Animal rights activists, which one editor keeps redirecting to category:Animal rights movement. However, that latter category is already so full (over 200 articles, the majority of them biography articles) that it sprawls over several index pages. A subcategory is clearly valid.

For the subcategory also speaks the fact that it sits perfectly well in existing container categories like Category:Activists by issue.

The editor opposing the subcategory argues that the issues aren't always clear. Some people may be related to the animal rights movement, but not be "activists" (I do however believe that he/she argues from a too narrow interpretation of "activism"). This, however, I do not consider an acceptable argument. Wikipedia is anenternal unfinished work, and will always require judgement calls on some matters. The fact that we have to look at individual articles and see whether they merit inclusion in the subcategory does not make that subcategory invalid. Ingolfson (talk) 07:08, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

The editor also keeps placing redirects over the subcategory, arguing that I should leave this matter unless it has been resolved. Since I acted WP:BOLD by moving the articles into the subcategory (costing me quite a bit of work), and since placing a redirect puts that work at risk of bot-automated reversion (and also makes those articles in the subcategory unavailable for the time being), I argue that it is his/her duty herself to "leave it alone" for the moment, especially as I have also offered to stop moving further articles into the subcategory. Ingolfson (talk) 07:10, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Said User talk:SlimVirgin has now undone over half an hour of my work in a way that cannot be reinstated without putting in same amount of work AGAIN, despite me asking him to let us discuss this first. He has also engaged in an edit war with me trying to protect his status quo. I will now seek mediation. Ingolfson (talk) 07:16, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Part of the reason it may seem overcrowded is that people are being added who really aren't connected to the AR movement. That's a question of going through every article and checking the sources unfortunately. As for deciding who would count as an "activist," it would be impossible to do it well, which is why we have this category. You should certainly leave things in place until there's a consensus to change it. All you've done today is cause us both extra work. I am having to undo manually what you did with a script. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 07:17, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

"You should certainly leave things in place until there's a consensus to change it." - when was the last time you read WP:BOLD? Not wanting to be offensive, but it sounds like you do not understand the idea.

All I was doing was using a tried and tested and ABSOLUTELY commons creation of a subcategory. Have you read WP:SUBCAT?

No, you were removing the AR category too. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 07:32, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Of course I was!!! If you have an article categorised "United States", and you change it to "Oklahoma", you do not leave the "United States" category on the article. Basic categorisation logic. Ingolfson (talk) 07:42, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Your argument that "As for deciding who would count as an "activist," it would be impossible to do it well," is extremely weak:

1. A majority of the biography articles that I moved had subcategories like "American activists" on them. So obviously people are making the call. Wikipedia is not perfect, Wikipedia is a work in progress. If an INDIVIDUAL choice is considered wrong, change that. Do not oppose it whole cloth.
2. Other biography articles have "animal activist" in the very lede, or in referenced content. Frances Power Cobbe's lede (before you edited it to suit your argument after I called your attention to it) called her an animal rights activist. The article still says "She founded the Society for the Protection of Animals Liable to Vivisection (SPALV) in 1875, the world's first organization campaigning against animal experiments,". Activist enough?
3. Even if I was willing to agree to you and say "Okay, let us only move those articles into the subcategory that SPECIFICALLY, WITH HARD AND CLEAR REFERENCES show that they are animal rights activists" - you oppose even that, because you have removed the subcategory itself, and speak out against it iself.

In summary, you seem to oppose my changes because you don't like them, not because they are against Wikipedia rules. Ingolfson (talk) 07:28, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Ingolfson, what you have to understand is that the concept of animal rights and the movement is fluid, rapidly changing. So Jeremy Bentham, for example, is a key member of the AR movement, one of the first to advocate animal rights, but he was never an AR activist because there was no such as AR in those days. Other current examples would be Peter Singer, one of the backbones of the movement, but not an activist at all; he doesn't even argue in favour of animal rights, strictly speaking. So it's complex, and you have to know a fair bit about who's who to be able to construct the category. Trying to break it down into who is, and isn't, an activist, really would be very tricky; actually impossible to get completely right.

In addition to that, you have the other problem of "animal rights activist" conjuring up an image of extremist activity, so many people who are AR advocates don't want to be called AR activists. We run into BLP problems if we try to force them into such a category. I know this because a couple of them emailed me over being called activists on one of the AR templates. For all those reasons, AR movement was chosen as the cat. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 07:32, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

That would still allow the use of a subcategory where only those are listed that are referenced as "animal rights activists" (again I note that about 25% of the articles I looked through used those words anyway. If only 1 out of 10 of the biography articles in here is referenced that way, then we would have a population of the subcat in the low dozens). You now seem to be arguing from a "It's too hard!" point, which I find a problem on its own.

That said, we are both arguing against a wall here, and you have undone my whole work anyway. I will leave it for the moment to let others consider the two viewpoints. Ingolfson (talk) 07:37, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

But if only 25 percent of the articles used those words, why were you moving 100 percent of them into the activist category? Seriously, we will get BLP complaints if you call certain people animal rights activists. We would have to check all the articles and all the sources, and make sure we could justify it. It would be a lot of work, and for no benefit that I can see. And you would have to learn about animal rights, so you could spot who is and who isn't, and who should be in a welfare activist category instead of a rights one.

And Ingolfson, it was you who undid my work, and with a script. It has just taken me ages to restore it. Please don't use these scripts for anything that people might object to, because you move much faster with them than people can easily undo.

I'm very happy to work with you if you want to suggest a subcat, but it has to be accurate and sustainable. It can't be something that's going to lead to complaints and inconsistency, and a load of extra work to keep on sorting it out. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 07:43, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

"But if only 25 percent of the articles used those words, why were you moving 100 percent of them into the activist category?" Yesterday, when I created this category, I admit that I moved, maybe 80-90% (not 100%) of all I checked. In a wider sense I DO consider Jeremy Bentham an animal rights activist. "Activist" is just a modern label - in my view someone back in 200BC who opposed his fellow villagers from torturing an animal could conceivably be listed as an animal rights activist in my books (even after you explained where you are coming from).

As for the use of a script, why should that be a problem? It is only a tool (which you can also use). And I stopped using the tool when you made it clear that this was not just a little "ships passing in the dark" kind of change back and forth, but a real full-blown disagreement. Ingolfson (talk) 07:57, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

As for "you would have to learn about animal rights," - I disagree. In fact, I should be able to do so without knowing one whit about it. All I should know is how to spot a good reference from a dodgy one. If the references call person X "animal rights activist", in he/she goes. I should NOT be making that call, actually. Ingolfson (talk) 08:00, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

In summary, the only argument that I see that I could go along with is your statement that creating a category would need of lot of maintenance work, which might not get done (and no, admittedly I won't be committing to doing it in perpetuity!) and thus lead to BLP issues. All the other arguments - as per my rants above... But I said I was trying to leave well enough alone for the day. Cheers, Ingolfson (talk) 08:00, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

(ec) But you can't engage in original research and add him because you think he's an AR activist. Animal rights is a very specific concept, as indeed is activist. As for the tool, the Hotcat page says it shouldn't be used for making lots of changes like this: "Rapid addition and removal of categories across several pages are extremely unconstructive and can be considered as vandalism, if you persist in doing it you may be blocked from editing."

What exactly do you see as the problem with the current AR movement category? It's really not that large, and as I said, it will be trimmed somewhat now that I see there are several people in it who ought not to be. SlimVirgin ^{TALK contribs} 08:03, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Tagged with cleanup

I have place a cleanup tag on the article. It does not follow the accepted convention. My attempts to clean it up were reverted. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 01:34, 7 May 2012 (UTC)