Wikipedia bias on circumcision
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Wikipedia bias on circumcision has been an issue from the very beginning of Wikipedia.
Larry Sanger, a co-founder of Wikipedia in 2001, told of his embarrassment of what Wikipedia has become. Sanger called Wikipedia "a wholly unreliable source of information", speaking primarily of political narrative. Sanger appeared on the Tucker Carlson show, where he "called out the 'Wikipedia game' being played by biased and partisan editors that constantly change and shape articles on the site".[1] The Heartland Institute pronounced Wikipedia to be "broken, biased, and corrupt".[2]
Unfortunately, bias is equally present in articles about and related to male circumcision.
The English Wikipedia likes to claim that "[a]nyone with Internet access can write and make changes to Wikipedia articles", and to a limited extent this is true. Wikipedia has editors and administrators who have the power to discipline contributors of whom they disapprove.
Wikipedia commenced operations on 15 January 2001. The circumcision article appears to have been created on 7 November 2001.[3]
- Jake H. Waskett, a British circumcision enthusiast, made his first edit to the circumcision article at Wikipedia on 18 October 2004.[3] Waskett, who appears to be driven by emotional issues, seems to have considered his sacred duty to be to promote male circumcision by editing the various related articles at Wikipedia. Waskett seems to have wormed himself into a position of power at Wikipedia.
- Male circumcision has a substantial list of harms, complications, disadvantages, and drawbacks, however Jake apparently wanted these to be minimized while the alleged advantages were emphasized. This put him into conflict with others who wanted the whole story to be told. As a result, there were a huge number of revisions to the articles associated with male circumcision until 18 June 2012,[3] when Jake resigned from editing.
- James Heilman, a Canadian circumcision enthusiast, is another administrator noted for bias in favor of non-therapeutic circumcision. Heilman, under the name "Doc James", made his first edit to the circumcision article on 1 June 2011.[3] Thereafter, he co-edited with Jake Waskett until Waskett resigned a year later. Heilman made a very large number of edits to the Circumcision article and to related articles to maintain the pro-circumcision bias, but he made his last edit on 11 May 2020.[3] Heilman awarded two "Barnstars" to a long-time user who identifies himself as "Alexbrn".[4]
- Alexbrn appears to have taken over the duties of regulating the various circumcision related articles.
References
- ↑
Sanger, Larry (24 July 2021). Wikipedia co-founder embarrassed over how ‘badly biased’ his former website has become
, Conservative Institute. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
Quote:“I’m embarrassed, to be quite honest, and I’ve said so for a long time. I’ve been a leading critic of Wikipedia for over a decade now,”
- ↑
Wikipedia: The fake encyclopedia
, Heartland Institute. Retrieved 27 July 2021. - ↑ a b c d e
Circumcision: Revision history
. Retrieved 29 July 2021. - ↑
User:Alexbrn
. Retrieved 29 July 2021.
