User:Zocky/Country bias

This page neads a good name. Suggestions are welcome.

This is supposed to be the FAQ for people who think wikipedia is biased against their country/nation. The intention is to replace answers to recurring issues with a link to this FAQ thus avoiding endless discussions and decreasing the general level of aggrevation.

The introduction needs to be improved. It should be kept short, though. This also needs links to policy and naming conventions, as well as to other FAQs.

Wikipedia is an international encyclopaedia and should be equally readable and understandable for all readers, regardless of where they come from, and it should not take sides. Where popular beliefs in two countries differ, both should be presented fairly.

If you think that your country/nation is represented unfairly or that an article is offensive to your country, please read these explanations of commonly raised issues

Wikipedia is U.S.-centric

It shouldn't be, but it sometimes is. Because this is the English-language Wikipedia, a disproportionately high number of editors are American and other native English speakers.

There are more articles on U.S. issues than on others. The remedy is simple: write more articles on other issues.
Some articles assume that the reader expects them to be about the United States. The remedy is to correct them:
- '''John Smith''' is an [[United States|American]] [[blacksmith]]
- Sally Jones appeared at [[Liberty Square]] in [[Smalltown, Wyoming]], [[United States]].
- In the [[United States]], a '''Red State''' is one that votes for the [[United States Republican Party|Republican Party]]
- Use common sense. If an article makes clear it is about American issues, there is no need to describe every town, person or organization as American.
- Do not assume that what is true in your own country should be presented as a general case. Wikipedia is an international encyclopedia. Country-specific information is welcome, but should be clearly marked as such.
- Remember, there are probably articles that don't mention they are talking about the United Kingdom, France, Indonesia or Brazil, too.

Wikipedia uses a foreign name for a place in my country

Many places, particularly those which are -- or used to be -- important internationally have different names in different languages. This is especially true if the ethnic composition of a place has changed through time or if border changes have "moved" a place to a different country.

Wikipedia uses names of places which are most commonly used in English. Some places have English names which are unrelated to the local name (Egypt, India), others have names based on the local names but changed because of history or phonetic and spelling incompatibilities (Croatia). Sometimes this name has a specific English form (Germany), but most are same or almost the same as in some other language (Vienna, Cologne).

The article's title should be the most common name in English.
All other common names - important historical names, official and commonly used unofficial name(s) in local langugage(s) - should be listed in the article's introduction.
All other relevant names should be reported lower in the article.
Usage of any name in Wikipedia does not imply a position in any dispute.
- If there is a controversy around certain names, or a dispute regarding naming, Wikipedia should report it, and report the parties involved. Merely reporting that a certain commonly used name exists and is controversial implies no endorsement of whatever position.
Other articles should refer to the place by its most common English name and other names relevant to that article.
If you still think that the article uses wrong name(s), check the articles history and talk page to see if the issue has been discussed before. Research and discuss the correct usage and provide evidence for your point of view.

Some things to consider:

Names of places are to a large extent a matter of language. This is Wikipedia in English, and native English speakers are often the right people to ask for an opinion.
The fact that your country or town has names in foreign languages is an indication of its international importance and potentially something to be proud of.

Wikipedia uses a foreign name for a person from my country

Names of some famous people (especially from history) are spelled and pronounced differently in different languages (Aristotle, Christopher Columbus). Also, in some periods, it was common for people to use translations of their names in other languages, particularly Latin, and some English names are derived from these translations.

Names of foreign monarchs and nobility are commonly (but not always) translated in many languages, so George III of the United Kingdom is known in other languages as "Siôr III", "Jerzy III", "Georg III", "Jurij III", "Jorge III" and many other variants. Again, Wikipedia uses the one most commonly used in English.

The article's title should be the person's most commonly used name in English.
All other common names - commonly used nicknames, aliases, stage names etc. - should be listed in the article's introduction.
All other relevant names, nicknames, rarely used stage names, etc. should be reported lower in the article.
Usage of any name in Wikipedia does not imply a position in any dispute.
Other articles should refer to the person by their most common English name and other names relevant to that article.
If you still think that the article uses wrong name(s), check the articles history and talk page to see if the issue has been discussed before. Research and discuss the correct usage and provide evidence for your point of view.

That's not the history I know

There are several kinds of history. The first is the one taught in schools, which helps form the sense of identity for people in a country. It is always somewhat biased: it concentrates on the parts of history important for that country and it describes events from that country's point of view. One country's days of glory can be another country's age of foreign occupation.

Another kind is the "history" created by popular mythology and media. Some of it may be accurate and some maybe outrageous misrepresentations. This is the kind of history we should report (including its sources), but never present as facts. (Indeed, it may be interesting to document facts such as the deliberate omission of some historical episode in the standard history curriculum of a country.)

Yet another kind of history is the one that takes all views into account and tries to establish facts through careful research of written sources and evidence. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and it's international, so it's interested in this kind of history.

Factual information

If you disagree with a description of an event:
- Check the article's history and talk page to see if the issue has been discussed before.
- Research and read sources carefully, both those you agree with and those you don't.
- Form an opinion of a similar event with reversed roles, either from history or imaginary.
- Form an opinion of a similar event with different sides involved, either from history or imaginary.
- Consider that different opinions can be due to different world views, tastes, values and other things you can't change.
- Consider that for some events, no accurate description can be formed because of insufficient or conflicting sources and evidence.
- If an event can't be accurately described, it could be unencyclopedic or it could require fair representation of different interpretations.
If you discover that a commonly held view is in fact legend, describe it as such and include links to evidence.
If you are not certain your information is accurate and complete, present your argument on the article's talk page before editing the article.

Discussing the objectives or intents of historical figures

Many historical disputes do not focus on the historical facts (who invaded whom...) but on the intentions, objectives, beliefs and future plans of political leaders. Such concerns are inherently subject to speculation, since there are usually fairly few hard facts to validate one thesis or another. Depending on one's national and political point of view, one may be more likely to believe the pretended intents of some leader, or believe that their "real intents" were otherwise.

If there are hard facts supporting some thesis as to the intentions or beliefs of a leader, please state them. Remember that memoirs and other such documents may have been written so as to convey a particular version of history.
Beware of assigning intentions to a group of people. In particular, there often exist discrepancies between the displayed intentions or objectives of the leader of a country, their real intentions, the displayed opinions of the citizens of the country and their real opinions.
Beware of discrepancies between the display intentions and goals of a government of their actual action in practice. What one considers as the legitimate liberation of a country from an oppressive regime may be considered by another as a colonial or imperialist invasion.

Discussing alternative histories

Another possible area of dispute is speculations as to what could have happened should some historical event not have occured, or occured differently. These often arise in arguments excusing a country from some behavior considered reprehensible: "sure, this action was dreadful, but if they had not done it, worse things would have happened".

Even though one can validly discuss the validity of speculations about alternative pasts and futures, one should never forget that speculations are... speculative, and leave ample ground for unfounded suppositions. One should therefore be extremely prudent in discussing theories on alternative histories.

"Wikipedia misrepresents my country" or "I consider writing on a foreign country"

In all countries, the education system and the media propagate some false or inexact information on foreign countries, sometimes intentionally, but often by error and inertia. Information that people believe because they heard in school and heard it repeated in the media may simply be a self-replicating error. It is therefore not surprising that such inadequate representations may occasionally creep in encyclopedia articles. On Wikipedia, we must do as much as possible in order to remove such misinformation.

If you think that your country is misrepresented in an article, you are free to correct the misrepresentation. If necessary, provide links to authoritative sources of information on the talk page.
Some misrepresentation is actually an accurate representation of a past situation. It is commonplace for people to have ideas about foreign countries based on situations that were current decades ago. Feel free to update the information.
When reporting governmental decisions, some precautions have to be taken. In all countires, decisions can be taken by several authorities: the national executive, the supreme court or equivalent, a lower court, etc. It is also a different thing for a law proposal or a declaration to emanate from an individual member of a legislature, from a major political group, or from the national government or the majority party. Feel free to correct any such error.
When discussing legal matters, keep in mind the difference between de jure ("according to the law") requirements and de facto ("in practice") behavior. When discussing a law, give, if possible, a reference to its actual text.
Beware of journalistic or polemical hyperbole. Political and other pressure groups often tend to use excessive phrases, terms or adjectives, so as to attract attention. It is generally an error to consider them to be meant literally.
When reporting about opinions published in the media, be careful not to imply that they are representative of the opinions in the general population, unless there is some fact or at least strong indications to back this up.
Media often focuses on outrageous, exceptional, or picturesque events. This is especially true for news from faraway places and foreign countries. Do not assume that international media reports are representative of the general situation of a specific country.