Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Socialist Party USA/2

Socialist Party USA

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • Most recent review

Result: Kept. There have been no comments it is therefore a no consensus outcome which defaults to keep. Szzuk (talk) 14:06, 30 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It was a mistake for this article to have passed the Good Article Review, over a year ago, when there were terrible errors of fact, violations of WP policy, and stylistic problems. I request that its GA status be withdrawn, given the problems of the previous review.

This article falls short of meeting the following criteria for good article—

(a) the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct;

The second paragraph of the lede illustrates the article's need for copy-editing:

The party is officially committed to left-wing democratic socialist ideas. The Socialist Party USA, along with its predecessors, has been met with varying support. Some attribute this to the party having to compete with the financial dominance of the two major parties, as well as the limitations of the United States' legislatively^[1][2] and judicially^[3] entrenched two-party system.

This quote reveals other problems, particularly POV regarding "the" 2-"party" system. There is a huge literature on the question "Why no socialism in America?", which is just ignored in favor of the party members' fantasies.

The most egregious problems concern reliable sources and NPOV:

(b) reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose);

In 1958, the Trotskyist Independent Socialist League led by Max Shachtman dissolved to join the Socialist Party of America. Shachtman, whose politics had changed since his days as a Trotskyist leader,^[4] argued both for militant opposition to Soviet-style communism^[5] and that the Socialist Party should work within the Democratic Party. By 1972 Shachtman's Unity Caucus had taken control of the Socialist Party and blocked a resolution opposing the Vietnam War. In the 1972 presidential election, Shachtman's caucus initially backed hawkish Cold Warrior Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson, then adopted AFL-CIO President George Meany's position of neutrality between the two candidates nominated by the major parties.^[6]

In response, two groups broke off: the Coalition Caucus led by Michael Harrington supported antiwar Democrat George McGovern and went on to form the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (later becoming the Democratic Socialists of America),^[7] while the left-wing Debs Caucus backed People's Party anti-war candidate Benjamin Spock. The Debs Caucus formed the Union for Democratic Socialism, which officially reconstituted the Socialist Party USA in 1973,^[8] when the Shachtmanites who remained in the Socialist Party re-named their organization Social Democrats USA.^[9] Numerous local and state branches of the old Socialist Party, including the Party's Wisconsin, California, Illinois, New York City, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C. organizations, participated in the reconstitution of the Socialist Party USA.^[7]

Even here, I had removed some of the most egregious errors and POV biases in this account, but it was still written from the perspective of an enthusiast of McReynold's faction, which was the smallest of the three— so small that it is often ignored in accounts of the name change to SDUSA. (For example, Harrington's memoirs ignore it. The phrase "numerous local and state branches" participated in the reconstitution is wishful thinking. The crucial fact that is not mentioned is that the convention voted on proposals, and the heroes of this tale, McReynolds and Harrington, lost every time. It, like much of the conspiracy websites of the far right and far left, attributes everything to Shachtman, who was roughly 70

AND DEAD!!!!! ( Kiefer.Wolfowitz 17:46, 11 July 2011 (UTC))[reply]

at the time, and fails to mention any of the other leadership: For example, the notorious ex-Trotskyists and followers of Shachtman (sarcasm), A. Philip Randolph and the chairman Bayard Rustin. This is just not serious, as any honest and knowledgeable editor should readily admit.

User:Orange_Mike previously assured us that this material was indeed in Heilbrunn's article, which would thus seem to differ from the book. Mike, given my difficulties verifying the reference to the WP excerpt, would you please post some relevant quotations with page references here?

IMHO, this paragraph seems to derive from p. 164 of SPUSA officer Busky's book, which is not a reliable source, at least not on U.S. politics (see the sarcasm "because labor was the motor of all social change" on p.164, for example).  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 04:51, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

This material was added without any references, and certainly no reference to Heilbrunn.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 04:58, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

The misleading reference to Heilbrunn was added by User:TIAYN (User:TrustIsAllYouNeed), who also added several paraphrases (sometimes unsourced) of SPUSA positions and introduced the COI/Primary book by SPUSA officer Busky. This edit does raise the question of whether TIAYN is too close to the party, given such edits, and so editing this page appears to be a COI.

I have spent the last weeks cleaning up this and related articles. A comparison of this article, as it now stands, and its state a month ago, demonstrates that this article was very far from GA status. I have discussed criticisms on the article's talk page (and on the talk page of Socialist Party of America). However, I don't have the will to finish cleaning up this article, whose second half seems to be cherry-picked items shedding a a positive light on the SPUSA. To go forward, I believe there should be some admission that there were serious problems with the article, in particular with its extensive paraphrasing of unreliable sources, often from the SPUSA websites or written by its activists (Busky). I believe that editors with conflicts of interest need to declare them (perhaps to a neutral administrator by an e-mail) and be doubly scrupulous about NPOV issues.

I should clarify that pro-SPUSA material (with reliability NPOV problems) was added perhaps 4-5 years ago by editors with no apparent connection to SPUSA, probably somewhat naively in good faith, and without a substantial understanding of history, which would have alerted them to problematic phrases. (Of course, there is positive information on the SPUSA that is free of COI/reliability problems, also.)

I would encourage editors, even with SPUSA ties, to please help with improving the article. Just be mindful of the COI policy. Again, I think that regular editors have avoided COI problems in these articles. Cheers,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:05, 26 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There needs to be a thorough checking of the second half of the article, especially for WP:Reliable and WP:Secondary issues, even before copy-editing can begin. After these issues are addressed, then the article can be considered for GA status.

Thank you!  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 12:54, 14 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]