Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment - Violations, misuse, and other issues

I'll put in a "no cut" argument just for the sake of making one. We can get by with just a lock.

Short of outright cutting (which is still my preference), I could see an argument for restricting UsefulNotes.Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic to things that directly affect media, e.g.:

• Cancellation or delays of in-production projects due to quarantine
• The push toward releasing first-run movies on streaming and the backlash from theater companies like AMC
• The resurgence in web content with things like Some Good News, etc.

It would probably still need locking when that work was done.

The current Wall of Text is bloated, unworkable, and off-mission. Locking it is insufficient; that would just make it an out-of-date bloated, unworkable, off-mission Wall of Text.

Edited by HighCrate on Jun 1st 2020 at 9:25:16 AM

The Coronavirus page was discussed elsewhere and should ideally continue to be discussed on that thread; we need to talk about The New '20s and UsefulNotes.The New Twenties, not the COVID page.

The only reason the page should be cut is if it's too much of a hassle to keep locked. I don't see that.

There isn't an edit war going on yet (as far as I can see), but that doesn't matter when the content is off-mission to begin with and just serving as an outlet for tropers' political biases. We should have a Useful Notes page on the decade at some point, but IMO it would be better to write one towards the end of the decade so people can look at it at least somewhat dispassionately, not launch one the second it started. We're not a news site.

I think we should have pages about decades (including the current one), but they should be for listing tropes that became popular in media created during that decade, not tropes that describe events from that decade. Describing current events like we would a work of fiction is bound to cause trouble in the future (and has in the past).

Exceptions might apply for the Turn of the Millennium and earlier, since people have hopefully calmed down enough about major events from then, and said events have had enough time to develop a major presence in pop-culture.

I've noticed the Overshadowed by Controversy entry (and to a lesser extent the Values Dissonance one) on YMMV.Ganbare Goemon 3 Shishijurokube No Karakuri Manji Gatame comes off as defending the use of a certain slur against trans people as tame (while also saying it's "problematic" (quotation marks theirs), which strikes me as Weasel Words). That really doesn't seem like something we should be condoning.

The entry continues on to provide a rather biased take on the situation relevant to the trope. The facts as I know it about it are thus: Kurt Kalata of Hardcore Gaming 101 discovered the line and posted about it on Twitter. In response, DDSTranslations (the programmer) doubled-down on the word choice, while Tom (the translator) put out what he felt was an apology, claiming to have not known of the chosen word's gravity, but also claiming to have been harassed over the situation. Subsequently several sites associated with a movement whose name rhymes with "lamer hate" (of which discussion was banned on the TVTropes forums) ran the story (presenting it almost exactly as the trope listing does), and plenty of harassment from people hand-wringing about accuracy was sent Kurt's way over it all.

The entry strikes me as needing a rewrite, if not being removed entirely. Thing is, I'm a little too close to this issue to be an impartial judge of the matter (I'm a moderator of HG101's Discord), so I figured I'd best get second opinions from people more detached from the situation.

Too soon to tell whether the fan translation has been overshadowed. I'd lean toward removing it anyway, considering that it was probably added by someone trying to import drama.

I removed the OBC example for failing Examples Are Not Recent (I assume the controversy happened in January 2020, but I'm not 100% sure on that, so I might have been too hasty).

The Values Dissonance example seems okay since it's about the crossdresser/trans(?) characters in the game itself, rather than about how the Fan Translation handled them.

The discussion about the New Twenties page has fizzled out, but we still need to solve the problem.

Most of us seem fine with locking the page for cleanup, so should we ask the mods for a lock first?

Should we keep an eye out on any areas of the wiki involving cops? Especially right now with the George Floyd incident.

agreed re the Values Dissonance entry.

Yes.

About the George Floyd thing, should the examples on Too Soon involving this be removed?

Those are fine. Since they outright affected show broadcasts in some cases outright cancelling those shows.

For reference, the Too Soon entries under discussion are (let me know if I've missed any):

• In wake of the death of George Floyd, HBO Max pulled Gone with the Wind so that a content warning could be added concerning the film's content.

• The 2020 civil unrest following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police lead to the delaying of several video game-related events:
  • An event showcasing the Playstation 5 was originally slated for June 4, but wound up getting delayed to June 11 due to the protests. Sony stated that it was not the time for celebration, and that they wanted to "stand back and allow more important voices to be heard".
  • Nintendo and Game Freak quietly delayed the announcement for the expansions for Pokémon Sword and Shield from its planned June 2 livestream in English-speaking regions for the same reason.
  • The "Night City Wire" presentation for Cyberpunk 2077 was pushed back from June 11 to June 25 by CD Projekt RED in light of the events in Minneapolis.
  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019)'s fourth season was postponed from its original June 2 release date for similar reasons to the Playstation 5's delay. Additionally, the release of a season of an online military shooter would've been in poor taste, as some protests saw military action being taken to quell them.

• Following the George Floyd murder and the subsequent resurrection of the Black Lives Matter movement that encouraged many nonblack content creators to listen more urgently to black issues, Musical Hell removed her reviews of The Wiz and The King and I. She explained that black viewers had informed her on how important The Wiz was for its representation and Christi believed she was not qualified to talk about the movie as a white woman, and she removed The King and I review due to jokes mangling Prince Chulalongkorn's name, which may be hurtful to Thai people.

• The Bubble Guppies episode "The Police Cop-Etition!" was pulled from both reruns and the Nick Jr. and Noggin apps due to the murder of George Floyd by police.

• Three years later, Lego asked stores to remove any marketing for Lego products that feature police, as well as a donut shop and the White House, after protests erupted in 2020 over the killing of George Floyd.

i don't think so; they all look alright to me.

Edited by ChloeJessica on Jun 11th 2020 at 2:11:14 AM

All Are fine.

Thoughts:

• HBO Max pulling Gone With the Wind: It's fine. It neutrally describes an action taken as a direct response to the Floyd issue.
• PS 5 showcase: Not sure about this one. Too Soon is about something that's related to the event that is censored/canceled/delayed. The PS 5, to my knowledge, has nothing to do with the Floyd protests; while the given reason is that it's "not the time for celebration," the real reason is likely simply that Sony didn't want their big media announcement to be lost in the shuffle at a time when people are preoccupied with other news.
• Pokemon expansion announcement: Same as the PS 5 showcase.
• Cyberpunk 2077: Ditto.
• COD:MW: This can stay, since there's a direct thematic link, a reason why this game in particular is Too Soon.
• Musical Hell: This can stay, although the bit about the King and I seems only tangentially related.
• Bubble Guppies: Fine.
• Lego pulling police figures: Can stay, although in case anyone has been living under a rock, for full context it would be good to specify that the police figures were pulled due to protests after a police officer killed George Floyd.

re: the PS5 entry, removing it based on what you think the real reason is falls under Speculative Troping, doesn't it?

i mean, you're probably right, but it's still an unconfirmed assumption, and we generally don't act on those.

The only Too Soon example that seems off is the one about video game events, since there is no correlation between the presentations' content and the event that inspired the delays.

Leaving aside what the "real" reason is, the point is that there's no connection between the Playstation 5 and the Floyd protests. It's not Too Soon; they have nothing to do with one another.

yeah, fair enough. you're right and i don't think they're worth me fighting to keep them in any case.

Re:the Pokémon DLC being "quietly delayed"; it must have been so quiet that Google searches for "Pokémon Sword and Shield expansion delayed" and "Pokemon DLC delayed" don't bring up any news about it being delayed, only speculation that it will likely be delayed due to COVID-19.

Edited by rjd1922 on Jun 11th 2020 at 5:56:33 AM

The DLC itself was not delayed; only its announcement was.