Talk:Springfield pet-eating hoax

NPOV editorializations such as "baseless" and "hateful"

"Baseless" ought not to appear in descriptions of claims, whether the author of the article believes they are baseless or not. "Baseless" is a decision to be made by the reader, which should be self-evident from the available evidence, and not reside in the "purposed domination of the author" (with apologies to Tolkien).

Also, "hateful conspiracy theories" is loaded language and editorialization when referring to the Facebook posting that started this hoax. The author's exact words should be quoted, or the language should be neutral, such as "expressed regret that her posting [may have] started this hoax."

Atrobinson (talk) 17:50, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

'Baseless': This is the appropriate word in context. If there is no factual basis for a claim, the claim is (by simple definition) baseless. It is not a matter of judgment that needs to be left to the reader. An encyclopaedia must present facts as they exist and are documented by reliable sources. The current vogue in US political discourse for "alternative facts" -- summed up best by Giuliani's quote, "Truth isn't truth" -- is not something an encyclopaedia should encourage or enable.

Absolutely disagree. "Baseless" assumes knowledge that we do not have. Even if all the knowlege available supports the claim of "baseless," then that renders the word redundant since anyone who has access to the available knowledge will arrive at that conclusion. If they do not, either because they are irrational or because they have knowledge that we do not, then the word "baseless" is either irrelevant (first case) or false (latter case). "Baseless" is a judgement, not a statement of fact. Much referred to as "alternative facts" are actually alternative interpretations of the same evidence. Such differences are the foundation of all political diversity, and claims of categorical truth as regards social, moral, and often economic questions is are (nearly always) arguments from ignorance (the fallacy). I do not withdraw my dispute. Atrobinson (talk) 18:59, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

"Baseless" assumes knowledge that we do not have... "Baseless" is a judgement, not a statement of fact. No, no, no. Please look up what the word means. From online dictionaries: "Not based on facts". "Without foundation in fact." "Baseless" is a straightforward, neutral term indicating that an assertion is unsupported by fact. Full stop. This should not be controversial.

Some things are inherently hard to prove or disprove, which is why the word "baseless" is different than the word "false". In this case, it's hard to prove that no Haitian immigrant in Springfield has ever eaten a stolen cat or goose. But that doesn't make the accusation true!

Much referred to as "alternative facts" are actually alternative interpretations of the same evidence. On the other hand, much referred to as "alternative facts" is complete bull hockey. Carguychris (talk) 19:49, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

I understand your reasoning and see your point. I still disagree. Baseless literally means (both from the root components and common usage) 'without a basis in fact'. As an example, if I had claimed in 1885 that the moon was made of granite with large, liquid-water seas, that would merely be false. It was based on science as it was known, the visual characteristics of the Earth extrapolated onto its satellite, and a reasonable set of assumptions (that other celestial globes are probably similar to our own); it was eventually disproved by examining the moon up close. It was wrong, but it was not baseless. If, in the same era, I had claimed the moon was made of green cheese and was the home of the blue fairies that paint the dew each morning, that would be both wrong and baseless. It has no grounding, no basis, in fact. It is based on nothing more that conjecture that happened to match my preconceptions, and maybe some statement from a man at the pub who claimed to have met the aforementioned fairies. This hoax -- and remember that the hoax was not Ms Lee's original post, but the use of that rumour by those who had already been informed by local officials that it was false -- falls into the second category. Next, you say it assumes facts not yet present int eh article. That is inaccurate. 'Baseless' as a term (and many related terms like 'falsehood' and 'lie') appears frequently in the reliable sources used. We (and more importantly the RS) have skads of info proving the claim to be baseless, including information from Ms Lee herself. The word is not an interpretation by an editor, not an opinion, not a judgment call; the word is part of a factual statement supported by valid, verifiable citations. The hoax is built on a baseless claim, and that claim will continue to be baseless regardless of one's political bent or personal belief system. Cheers, Last1in (talk) 22:21, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

'Hateful': I agree with you assessment. In the context of the sentence (and the section itself), I do not feel that the term can pass MOS:PEACOCK or MOS:LABEL. The two other instances in the lower Subsequent Violence & Threats section are appropriate. One is a direct quote, and other is supported by the text of the RS. At a stretch, you could base the disputed claim on the text of the WashPo article that repeatedly uses the term, but never in a way that I think would legitimately be used to support that particular sentence. If you would remove that particular word, the rest of the paragraph is supported by the citations. @Atrobinson, can you please remove that word and your tag? I am reluctant to remove another editor's disputation tags. Cheers, Last1in (talk) 18:24, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

Wilco, thank you. Atrobinson (talk) 18:59, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

Per WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY, it's wholly appropriate to use the phrase "baseless claims" to summarize what's said in the body. The body quotes officials saying things like "no credible reports," "disinformation," "no evidence of this at all," and "baseless." The body states that the claims have been "variously described as debunked, false, or a conspiracy theory." It's also easy to find RSs calling it "baseless," such as here, here, here, here, here and here. FactOrOpinion (talk) 21:37, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

Presenting it as possibly true (by removing modifiers like "baseless") would be a failure of WP:NPOV and WP:FRINGE. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:48, 25 September 2024 (UTC)

Should the navbox template Presidential Debates be added at the bottom?

I added a link to the template, with a portion of the viral phrase that Trump said to the Template. [1]

Aceing_Winter_Snows_Harsh_Cold (talk) 00:26, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't have a full objection to it, but it is odd that it is the only phrase without a standalone article. --Super Goku V (talk) 05:31, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Suggest we split out a subsection dedicated to the debate, point the redirects there, and MOS:BOLDREDIRECT the quote. I agree with @Last1in that Donald Trump's debate quote is likely to become the most historically durable aspect of this whole mess. Carguychris (talk) 18:47, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I concur, but have literally no clue how one would do that. I have worked hard NOT to learn any admin tricks over the last couple decades. ☺ Cheers, Last1in (talk) 19:13, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Why does it need a subsection? You can just redirect the quote to this article? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 19:35, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Variations of the quotes already redirect here. They're eating the dogs. They're eating the pets. They're eating the cats. Carguychris (talk) 12:48, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Adding the subsection and editing the redirects is simple, no admin voodoo required. To view and edit a redirect, you navigate to the target page using the redirect, then click the "Redirected from [alternate term]" bluelink under the article title. Carguychris (talk) 12:51, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

• Excellent addition. I agree with @Super Goku V that this is an outlier, as the phrase itself is the 'target' for other, similar subjects. I think there's a strong possibility that the historians that write the real RSes will end up referring to the episode as, "They're eating the pets!" Our Wikidescendants will probably end up changing the title of this article to that phrase (after 67 more RMs as we chase the news instead of waiting for actual secondary sources; something I've given up fighting against). Cheers, Last1in (talk) 12:55, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

  I think there's a strong possibility that the historians that write the real RSes will end up referring to the episode as, "They're eating the pets!" That is the best name I've heard someone propose for this article, but yeah, it's probably too soon to propose that. ...after 67 more RMs as we chase the news instead of waiting for actual secondary sources... You got that right. Unfortunately, another RM I've proposed proves that when a proposed RM doesn't seem serious and scholarly, its use by >95% of quality secondary sources isn't enough to convince Wikipedians. Heaven forbid we use lighthearted and catchy titles here! (gasp) Carguychris (talk) 13:21, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't see why not. I went ahead and added it (and remove {{2024 United States presidential election}}, because this article doesn't appear to be linked therein). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 12:58, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

hoax-adjacent claims

Some of the "Continued spread" section is not about spreading the pet-eating hoax itself, but instead about adjacent claims (e.g., claims that immigrants in Springfield are causing other problems, Haitians have been shipped to Charleroi, Haitians need to be deported, temporary protected status isn't legal, Springfield and Aurora immigrants have military weapons). On one hand, these can be interpreted as Trump and Vance using the hoax as a hook to draw attention to the adjacent anti-immigrant claims; Vance said as much with "The American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes." And RSs sometimes link them a bit, for example, saying "Donald Trump has made further allegations against migrants in Springfield." On the other hand, Vance and Trump were already making anti-immigrant claims, and these other claims are not about the hoax per se. I figured it's worth discussing whether we should keep these other claims in the article, and if so, how to bound which other claims are included. My own opinion is to keep them, and to bound them by limiting them to claims about Springfield or Haitians. FactOrOpinion (talk) 18:07, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I see the pet-eating hoax as the central discussion around which various other stories and allegations revolve. When Vance/Trump made the claims, we saw unrelated claims about a photo of a man carrying a goose and a US-born woman arrested for eating a cat in Canton, both tied directly to the pet-eating hoax through misinformation. Trump's promise to deport the Haitians came directly out of the pet-eating narrative. Trump and his supporters are now throwing various other claims at the wall to see what sticks, revolving around the same community. I mean there's absolutely a bigger subject of ~"demonization of immigrants/anti-immigrant rhetoric during the 2024 Trump campaign" (though that subject is covered in multiple other places already), but it's hard to tell what doesn't belong here.
IMO we don't need to cover every detail of e.g. the weapons allegations, but insofar as the media reports on it being part of a doubling-down on the pet-eating hoax it would be worth summarizing here. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 19:41, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

<soapbox> This is why chasing the news is such and incredibly bad idea for an encyclopaedia. If we would (or even could) wait for real WP:SECONDARY sources to be created, there would be far fewer speculative claims, hysterical-talking-head theories and rhetorical rabbit holes in which to get lost. In an post-truth age, when sources like Wikipedia and Snopes are some of the rare, (reasonably) neutral resources working to distill fact from the political bollocks, we don't always have that luxury. </soapbox> There is not a strong, recent precedence for this phenomenon, thus there is no useful guide to follow from another article. 'I am not a crook' and 'I can see Russia from my house!' do not have dedicated articles; Ich bin ein Berliner was not a hoax, and bigger than a simple phrase; 'Mission accomplished' did not have the direct, societal impact and was more a bog-standard political lie; and 'Let them eat cake' was not recent and was somewhat an opposite case (an accurate summary of the situation, but never actually said by Marie Antoinette). For now, I think we fight to keep the article as trim and focused as possible by excising things that are not direct-line associated to the debate claim. We'll fail as the winds of the culture wars push things around, but it gives us at least a way forward. With that said, I think the ancillary facts about the impacts belong in the article (goose-man, deportation, vilifying Haitians), but not those related to follow-on phenomena (legality of temp protected status, etc.). Cheers, Last1in (talk) 13:24, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

the whole "should wikipedia cover current events as they unfold" debate is a tough one. I prefer too err on the side of WP:DELAY more than WP:RAPID, but at the same time I think what we have here is probably the best single source on this subject out there. In the long term, yeah it will involve adding a bunch of tangential stuff, working to better integrate it, and eventually paring back parts as the discrete subjects become clearer in hindsight. For now, and probably until the election, IMO keep going as we have been, then reassess. YMMV. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:45, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

To use an historical American political trope from the far right that has (thankfully) fallen out of fashion, Ditto. Cheers, Last1in (talk) 16:13, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Eurabia conspiracy theory/White genocide conspiracy theory

How are these two articles related again? Trade (talk) 18:23, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

@Trade, you could remove those from See also, asking in the edit summary for an explanation of why they're related. Obviously if someone reverts, come back here and ping them rather than reverting again. Valereee (talk) 18:59, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

I didn't add them and don't feel strongly, but the connection doesn't seem too tenuous: Popular 21st century right-wing race-based conspiracy theories, no? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 01:24, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Maybe we need List of conspiracy theories involving race and ethnicity? Or just add Template:Conspiracy_theories? I feel like there are too many subcategories at Category:Conspiracy theories involving race and ethnicity to just add random articles to See also sections. Valereee (talk) 12:45, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

I concur with the removal. If we listed every race-based conspiracy theory in the See Also section, the bottom of the list would read, "continued on next article." Eurabia is one of the more tenuous connexions, since Haitians do not tend to be a Muslim-leaning group (Islam doesn't even make the chart of religions in their country of origin), and Eurabia is an Islamophobic concept. Cheers, Last1in (talk) 14:22, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Related question: Like Eurabia, Great Replacement is rooted in Islamophobia, and is largely focused on European ethno-nationalism. Should we replace that See Also link with one to White genocide conspiracy theory? The latter is far more targeted at the anti-immigrant white nationalism prevalent in the US, and much of the article focuses on ideologies and groups that are perpetrating this latest panic/hoax/canard. Cheers, Last1in (talk) 15:55, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

I agree with @Last1in and @Valereee that the connections to Eurabia and Great Replacement seem tenuous. For better or worse, most American Islamophobic conspiracy theories focus on terrorism rather than immigration, because few areas of the U.S. have seen the type of massive, concentrated Islamic immigration like that in Europe. In fact, some GOP figures have made overtures to court Islamic voters because the demographic is socially conservative and includes an outsized percentage of small business owners—in other words, they're similar to the traditional GOP core constituency. Trump has muddied this effort by courting Laura Loomer, but I digress. Carguychris (talk) 16:22, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Photo and caption edits

The photo used in this topic can be updated with the understanding that official photos should be used during the election period. The current official photo is provided for reference.Goodtiming8871 (talk) 06:10, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

thumb |thumb Related content 1) STATUSQUO's_Infobox_photo image, [[2]] 2) Wikipedia administrator's advice that the general consensus is to use official photos for US presidential election photos, [[3]] 3) Related RfC official photo usage information. [[4]] Goodtiming8871 (talk) 06:10, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

I think more RS need to be updated on this controversial topic. Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources , incorrect claim about Haitian immigrants eating pets. Goodtiming8871 (talk) 12:21, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

References

Disagree with using official photos. This isn't the election article or even a candidate's article. It's about things various people -- politicians, candidates, influencers, law enforcement, journalists, etc. have said. There is no obligation to use an official press photo in every instance when we want to depict someone who's running for office. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:30, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

BTW what does that BBC ref, which is already cited in the article, have to do with photos/captions? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:33, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

I also was skeptical about using official photos, thanks for restoring the older ones. The statements were made in their capacity as candidates, not office-holders. Feoffer (talk) 13:45, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Since this was a photo used during the election period, I thought we should use an official photo. I updated caption with WP:RS.Goodtiming8871 (talk) 05:39, 14 October 2024 (UTC)