Talk:Taylor Lorenz/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Birthday

She was born in 1984. Why does it say 1984-87? JonathanMRosenberg (talk) 18:42, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

This has been discussed extensively before, see Talk:Taylor_Lorenz/Archive_2. We do not have reliable sources for the DOB, and Lorenz has expressed a preference to not have her DOB be public info. Alyo (chat·edits) 18:48, 2 January 2025 (UTC)

Pretty much all public records point to 1984 birth. I don't think a public figure should be allowed to dictate what goes on their Wikipedia page. Her DOB is public info, even if she doesn't want it to be.

What really bothers me is the 1984-87 claim. She obviously was not born in 1987, yet it's listed as somehow a possibility.

If there was a good reason to not list her DOB, then just don't mention it at all, rather than saying she might have been born in 1987. JonathanMRosenberg (talk) 20:27, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Her DOB is public info, even if she doesn't want it to be, not according to WP:DOB. Wikipedia is very strict about that sort of thing. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 13:46, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I will say this is the first time I haven't seen this something like "born 2002 or 2003", unless there's significant disagreement about when someone was born (which is very uncommon in modern biographies). An extended age range instead of that is a bit odd (but it does seem to explain the situation here). Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 13:50, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

She has worked to prevent it from being public due to the harassment against her and her family. While that, in and of itself, isn't necessarily a reason to keep it off her article (that I'm aware of, relatively new here) it does lead to some ambiguity.

Given the range, and the lack of a definitive source, my feeling is that there should be no DOB on her article.

There have been numerous campaigns - some by trolls, some by well meaning editors - to add her DOB. But without a definitive date, that proves impossible. See archives for more discussion. Delectopierre (talk) 08:26, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

The birthdate(s), which are still in the infobox, still present a straightforward BLP violation IMO. Our WP:DOB says Wikipedia includes full names and dates of birth that have been widely published by reliable sources, or by sources linked to the subject such that it may reasonably be inferred that the subject does not object to the details being made public. But none of the dates "have been widely published by reliable sources" (some people have pointed to the popularity of individual sources to argue that means "widely published"), and the subject does object to the details being made public. I pointed this out previously, but a participant in that discussion simply restored the birthday information. There's been a long-term fixation with her birthday here (and on Twitter, where she's gotten an awful lot of "attention" since her conflict with Libs of TikTok).

Some users point to an RfC from 2021 which stemmed from a Lorenz talk page discussion, but it omitted the actual context of the article (that none of the dates have been widely reported, the subject doesn't want the birthdate shared, and has received rather extensive harassment). In other words, the RfC generalized the question in such a way that doesn't actually apply to the Lorenz article given WP:BLPPRIVACY (or, to be more precise, at minimum it doesn't apply today -- I don't know if the subject expressed objections to it being released back in 2021). I was disappointed that the birthdates were simply restored by a user in the previous discussion a few weeks ago, but I figured the choice was to move on or open up a thread at ANI (it's already been to BLPN). Anyway, I decided to go on vacation instead. :) Just reiterating this one more time now for anyone else who may be interested in enforcing WP:DOB. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:23, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I think that's a good point to bring up. I guess it comes down to how you define "widely published", my instinct would be reliable sources including an age. I think it's very important to remember the human aspect here, which is why I'm cautious engaging on this (also because I don't usually do that much BLP work). I will say that my instinct is that estimated birth years do not go against the spirit of WP:DOB, because that's mostly about an exact date of birth. It even says that erring on the side of caution is to include the year. If we're not doing that, there's a lot of biographies that wouldn't even have an estimated age range. I agree that we should not be including her supposed birthday here, but that doesn't appear to be what this discussion is about. The infobox just states that she was born "c. 1984–1987". Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 14:44, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't see why it is such a big deal to know the exact year anyway. Sure, if we have it in RS then we can say it but, if not, then it is enough to know that she was born in the mid-80s. It doesn't add much to the readers' understanding to be more specific than that. --DanielRigal (talk) 14:57, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not saying it should be more specific, I'm saying the current state of things seems alright even if it's a bit unusual compared to other biographies (even if this makes sense with context). Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 14:59, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Sure. I was just making the general point, broadly agreeing with you, that we don't need to agonise over this. --DanielRigal (talk) 15:11, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I have removed it per now per WP:BURDEN and WP:DOB until we come to a consensus, which was not reached before the previous discussion was archived.

I don't think any dates have been widely reported to meet the requirements of DOB, especially when Lorenz has expressed privacy concerns. Looking into this a bit more, it seems that including the date range has lead to attacks against her. [1][2][3][4]

I feel that if we do include it, it should be only the year and should probably use the age as of the date of the Fortune article, since they do age verification for that and Lorenz has explicitly pointed to that to defend against claims that she's secretly much older than her reported age.[5] -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 19:32, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Well, that's definitely an angle I didn't consider. I would've hoped the age range would've helped instead of harmed here. :( I was mostly thinking about it from the "when sources disagree, describe them all" stance and assumed that's what happened here when I read this article this morning and saw all those sources for the range. But that social media post emphasizing that Fortune has the correct year pretty much overrules that imo per WP:ABOUTSELF. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 19:36, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I did as well, which is why I sort of supported it in the archived discussion and didn't really question the range/note when I saw it in the past, but it seems that's not the case as confirmed by Lorenz herself. In that case it would probably be best to just depend on the most reliable source alone, which in this case is Fortune. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 20:51, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

@Patar knight For what it's worth - I posted several examples of the issues she faced regarding the age range being included in the article here.

Support Fortune per my prior reasoning, and the fact the article subject says it was fact checked adds to the reliability IMO.

Awshort (talk) 21:07, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I'll be busy for the rest of the day, but I'll try to take a look tomorrow. Thank you for starting a discussion. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 21:19, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Agree to go with Fortune, also per ABOUTSELF. CNC (talk) 21:03, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

But again, what definition of "widely published" could possibly include a single source? The threshold is satisfying WP:DOB when, again, there are explicit objections by the subject. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:06, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

@Rhododendrites I think for an exact date of birth, we should always go with widely published. That was always my issue with the Politico source. Year of birth has seemingly always had less strict requirements. DOB states we can use a year only if the subject complains, and WP:CALC says we can use an age range based on their age as of a date.

In the majority of BLP articles I have ever edited, a single source for a DOB is usually all that has been required. Someone's name appearing in a Today's Birthdays section of a newspaper is usually the threshold. I'm not saying that is in line with WP:DOB, I'm just saying that is the common usage. Awshort (talk) 21:18, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I think the second criterion (Wikipedia includes full names and dates of birth that have been widely published by reliable sources, or by sources linked to the subject such that it may reasonably be inferred that the subject does not object to the details being made public., (emphasis added)) would apply here, since Lorenz has endorsed the Fortune article. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 21:18, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Hasn't the article subject explicitly objected to these details being made public and included on her Wikipedia page? My personal preference is to simply remove these details entirely rather than provide things like ranges when there is a controversy over the details. – notwally (talk) 21:37, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

She's indicated she tries to keep her DOB private (linked above somewhere), but I don't think she's specifically said anything about inclusion on Wikipedia besides noting that the lack of clarity incited conspiracy theories (my 1st link in this section). DOB's guidance on such cases is f a subject complains about our inclusion of their date of birth, or the person is borderline notable, err on the side of caution and simply list the year, provided that there is a reliable source for it., so listing the year would be fine and would probably alleviate help with some of the theories, assuming we accept Fortune as reliable and her endorsing it as getting around the widely published requirement. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 22:31, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

To save everyone a little bit of time and legwork, I also gathered all relevant conversations in secondary sources as well as her comments that mention her birthdate.

1. Policy Brief: She allows little personal information about herself to be online, like her age or relationships, because she has learned all of those details can be used against her by her harassers. Research brief by her friend Emily Dreyfuss, taken from published interviews and tweets of Lorenz (source, 2022)
2. TheTimes: she has erased any trace of personal information about herself on the internet, including her age (source, 2023)
3. Lorenz: I don’t disclose any personal details like my birth date,(source, 2024)
4. Lorenz: the reason that I don't post about my birthday is because I'm constantly being doxed.[...]So it's like, you know, look, I've been on 40 under 40 lists recently. Right. If people really wanna find my age, I don't think it's hard to find.(source,1:14:07, 2024)
5. Lorenz: I was named to a 40 under 40 list three years ago (which they literally fact check ur age for) (source, 2024)

Awshort (talk) 22:39, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I think there's a difference between an exact birthdate and a birth year, which is explained at WP:DOB. But I also think that it's wise to generally err on the side of caution if we could be doing harm (because that's the general spirit of what WP:BLP is all about). I think I'm going to head out from here on out because I'm starting to repeat myself and not really adding anything new to the discussion. I mostly just came here because I finished reading her book a few days ago and it was really interesting. It meets WP:NBOOK if anyone is interested on collaborating to start an article for it (but come to my talk page for that if you're interested because I'm unsubscribing from this thread). Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 05:23, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

agree with Clevermoss, WP:DOB says we can generally just include the birth year and be done with it. Bluethricecreamman (talk) 05:53, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

Guess I have one more thing to say, actually I've left a comment at Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons#Year of birth because this has implications for how we treat BLPs more broadly. This discussion, particularly Rhododendrites comments, has caused me to think about how providing a year of birth might not always be the best alternative and maybe our policy pages should reflect situations like this one. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 06:22, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

Substack

Her substack goes back to 2018 -- when it was called Threads -- however I can't find any 3rd party sources that say she's launching a substack prior to 2024. Thoughts on how to handle this?

For reference, the section currently reads:

Lorenz left The Washington Post in October 2024 to start her own Substack publication called "User Mag". Substack co-founder Hamish McKenzie told The Hollywood Reporter that she is an "accomplished reporter with deep experience covering internet trends and culture" whom the platform thinks "will thrive...with the direct support of her audience." Delectopierre (talk) 03:45, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

you don't need to include every publication she has ever worked on. If you want, you can use that link to talk about her newsletter (SPS allows folks to talk about themselves as long as it isn't overly promotional).

... I wonder if it's due to include it, was a huge thing? Bluethricecreamman (talk) 05:16, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

Nah wasn't a huge thing. And I understand we don't need to include every publication. But as it stands, the current wording doesn't seem correct. ie she didn't leave to start her own sub stack, she left to focus on her substack and rebranded it from threads to user mag.

I don't feel strongly about this, just wanted to make sure it's accurate. What are your thoughts? Delectopierre (talk) 08:57, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

I must have been sleep deprived when I started this thread.

@Bluethricecreamman I changed it from October 2024 to start her Substack publication

to October 2024 to focus on her Substack publication to improve its accuracy.

Delectopierre (talk) 22:50, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

@Awshort I reverted* your edit regarding her substack. see conversation here before making any more changes. thanks.

* couldn't actually revert as other edits had been made, so manually changed back. Delectopierre (talk) 01:49, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Delectopierre Please be aware that you have to follow reliable sources, not what you know. The supplied reference says launched, she herself refers to it as 'launch'. Regardless of whether she ran a newsletter before, sources have to be followed - that is policy. Trying to word it to something that isn't supplied by the sources is original research, and against policy.

Awshort (talk) 02:00, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm well aware of what a reliable source is and what's required. Thanks though!

Are you going to address the substance of the discussion or just throw policies at me like that? Delectopierre (talk) 02:05, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Delectopierre The substance of the discussion? She had a pre existing newsletter that was either not being used, or not a huge deal to reliable sources. She left normal media and launched it, which reliable sources covered as a launch. We have to stick to what sources say. That is literally the whole point of the No Original Research policy. Please self revert since your edit was original research and not what what stated by the source (the included one as well as the self published one provided above).

I wasn't being rude, so there isn't really a need for the snarky reply. We have three core content policies we have to follow, and you have said before you are relatively new and that explanations would help you. Then when presented with explanations, you seem annoyed that people are explaining policies to you. I don't really understand how to communicate with you.

Awshort (talk) 02:19, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

WP:PRIMARY states, among other things, that primary sources can be used to describe statements of fact. See below. This is not WP:OR.

3. A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. For example, an article about a musician may cite discographies and track listings published by the record label, and an article about a novel may cite passages to describe the plot, but any interpretation needs a secondary source. Delectopierre (talk) 02:28, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Delectopierre And you have conflicting secondary sources, which are preferred. You are going by a post that says "Hey welcome to my newsletter" (I am paraphrasing), and secondary sources covering the fact she left legacy media while referring to it as a launch.

Relevant portion of WP:NOR This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that reaches or implies a conclusion not stated by the sources. Please just stick to what sources say.

Awshort (talk) 02:37, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

Go to her substack, go to the archives, you will see prior to her announcement that there are significant articles. Existence is certainly a straightforward, descriptive statement of facts.

If you disagree with my interpretation of policy, feel free to take it WP:DRR. Delectopierre (talk) 02:41, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Delectopierre I'm removing this per WP:BLPREMOVE since it's your interpretation of a source, and not what the source states. If you can find a suitable secondary source that directly supports your text, feel free to reinsert. But the burden is on you to provide a source before reinserting.

Awshort (talk) 09:06, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

So you're just gonna act prior to consensus, again? Just like you did last time? This is exhausting, and I'm beginning to think that's your goal. Also, not that you seem to care what policies actually say, but BPLREMOVE applies to contentious material, which this plainly is not.

You can go ahead and revert your edit and then take it to DRR, as I suggested above.

Delectopierre (talk) 09:57, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Delectopierre You seem to misunderstand what consensus actually is. "Prior to consensus" meaning what?

If the "last time" you are referring to is the harassment section, there wasn't a consensus. Consensus is not a head count; it's taking into account what each person says and trying to meet in the middle while adhering to policies. And there are core content policies that have to be followed regardless of what an editor wants the consensus to be (articles have to be written from NPOV, there can't be original research, etc). The NPOV issues with the other section were not addressed so I'm unsure what consensus you think there is or how you think it exists, but that section is still far from neutral and has multiple issues.

Awshort (talk) 10:17, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

Not going to discuss here any longer. Revert it and bring it to dispute resolution - or don't. Delectopierre (talk) 10:19, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

I gave you plenty of time to revert. Because you did not, I went ahead and did so. If you want to discuss further, please post at DRN. Delectopierre (talk) 22:15, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

@Awshort please see Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#Taylor Lorenz Delectopierre (talk) 00:34, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Are you going to address the substance of the discussion... Please remember to assume good faith. You're on Wikipedia; Wikipedia needs to follow Wikipedia's policies. Wikipedia has a very, very long history of bad things happening when policies aren't followed. Every Wikipedia policy is the culmination of collective years of sweat and tears from sometimes hundreds of people from dozens of countries. guninvalid (talk) 06:27, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

RfC close

I'm mobile today so I can't really put together a closure review but I think we need one because this close looks an awful lot like a supervote. If someone opens a review of this closure please ping me. Simonm223 (talk) 20:03, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

On the surface of it, it does look ripe for a review. From a rough count, I made it twice as many D votes than C, noting that half of the C votes were also accepting or inclusive or D. While it's not a !vote, the close implies that the votes for only C must have been 4x better than the arguments for D in order to even consider outweighing D, and even factoring in A/B votes, assuming they'd settle for C over D, would still only be half of D votes. That's just my interpretation from an involved editor at least, take it as you will. CNC (talk) 20:28, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

Simonm223 and CommunityNotesContributor, I agree, and I am also in the same boat as Simonm223. I will open a review if no one else has when I am back home in a few days. – notwally (talk) 21:39, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

@CommunityNotesContributor I don't follow your logic here the close implies that the votes for only C must have been 4x better than the arguments for D in order to even consider outweighing D

Could you explain? nevermind, i figured it out. sorry 'bout that. Delectopierre (talk) 05:44, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm honestly tempted to bring it to closure review myself. I wasn't expecting to get as much backlash as I did, and perhaps it would've been more appropriate for me to leave my review as a "if i were closer" !vote. I don't think I'm going to retract my close, and I'm willing to support my close if it goes to WP:CLOSECHALLENGE. But perhaps I should've at least sat on it for a day or two. guninvalid (talk) 20:38, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

if you close the vote with belief there is a nonmarginal chance it will be “overturned”, as you mention in your close, i think you should strongly consider unclosing and letting someone else close.

didnt fully read reasoning, but if folks are all bringing up supervoting, its not comforting that your write up sounds like you think you could have supervoted yourself Bluethricecreamman (talk) 06:03, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Yea, I didn't really explain that part very well. My thought process was that it could be included with sources, and that individual sources could be litigated until no more sources remained. guninvalid (talk) 06:06, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

this is the intersection of among the most contentious topics. a closer needs significant experience to make a good close (summarizing points, providing a useful count, and a clear explanation of result satisfactory to all etc.)

im also noticing closer has sub 1000 edits too. i strongly suggest closer undo close. i apologize but the most contentious RFCs take more time to handle to avoid further questions from community Bluethricecreamman (talk) 06:17, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

• Per comment the close has now been self-reverted. I would feel comfortable closing this one (have been closing some backlogged RMs recently), and other than archiving have no involvement here (despite above typo). But my comment above and on talkpage has no doubt ruled me out. Even if was only done from a mediation standpoint, that's too much involvement in a dispute ironically. CNC (talk) 11:56, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  the previous closer put back the closure request on wp:cr someone should be by to close soon enough Bluethricecreamman (talk) 16:27, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  should be... guninvalid (talk) 15:14, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

  there is no WP:DEADLINE for wikipedia, so may take a bit Bluethricecreamman (talk) 16:01, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

• What happens when a discussion ends in what essentially is a stalemate? I don't think I've seen a vote that has been so divided before and I wasn't sure what the protocol would be. The lorax (talk) 17:27, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  If that is the case, then it would be closed as no consensus, and according to WP:NOCON the content would not be included as it's BLP. Personally I'm not convinced there's NOCON, but will let a closure make up their own mind. The irony being that consensus for D or no consensus results in the same outcome here. CNC (talk) 17:41, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  possible someone weighs a + b + c together too as c votes, then compares against d. think someone else did math d wins, unless there is a good reason to disqualify some d vote Bluethricecreamman (talk) 18:37, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  @Bluethricecreamman Someone determining consensus would go based on arguments, not a head count. Votes by themselves lacking policy based arguments are irrelevant and often ignored in determing consensus. A "this had 30 +1 arguments lacking anything else, while this had 15 that were heavily based on policy" count would usually make the 15 the stronger choice per policy.

  Awshort (talk) 19:30, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

  see wp:supervote. can def void votes but closer shouldnt be weighing merits themselves, they weigh everyone elses weighing the merits Bluethricecreamman (talk) 20:38, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

RfC on Taylor Lorenz's comments on Brian Thompson's murder

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

What is the appropriate due coverage of the comments Lorenz made about the murder of Brian Thompson and the controversy surrounding them? See details and sources in the previous discussion here.

1. Whole section (2+ paragraphs)
2. Whole paragraph (3-6 sentences)
3. Short mention (1-2 sentences)
4. No mention

Vegan416 (talk) 19:39, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

Notifying all the participants in the previous discussion above

@Alyo @Delectopierre @Innisfree987 @Patar knight @Astaire @PerseusMeredith @SuperSkaterDude45 @The lorax @Bluethricecreamman @Marquardtika (Hope I didn't miss anyone)

Vegan416 (talk) 20:20, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

4 Delectopierre (talk) 00:48, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

Survey

• D It's WP:UNDUE weight puffed up by right-wing commentators who wanted to take a shot at her by misconstruing what she said. She is an internet commentator and she's commentating on the internet. It also appears that the brouhaha has died down with nothing new since her Piers Morgan appearance. No WP:LASTING impact or significance in Lorenz's biography. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:43, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

  None of the commentators misconstrued what she said. Only some of her apologetic fans seem to try and whitewash what she clearly said. Also the interest has not died down and she is continued to be mentioned in this context in RS even after December 18, i.e. after 2 weeks had past since she made the first comment on the subject. Vegan416 (talk) 20:06, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

  Lol, I'm no "apologetic fan". They said that she expressed joy at Thompson's murder when she commented on the joy Internet users expressed. Big difference. The last significant coverage of Lorenz in this that I saw was two weeks ago, passing mentions since then mean little. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:08, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Muboshgu 1. It is very concerning that you are repeating the apologetic falsehood as if she only "on the joy Internet users expressed". In fact she explicitly said that she herself also felt joy. Here are her exact words: "that’s why I felt, along with so many other Americans, joy". You can see it yourself in this video of Piers Morgan show https://twitter.com/i/status/1866263320870682697

  2. Contrary to your claims, Taylor Lorenz continues to be mentioned in a significant way in this context even 4 weeks after her initial comments. See here for example https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/12/astonishing-level-dehumanization/681189/ where she is given as the first named example of a person who expressed positive feelings in response to the murder. Vegan416 (talk) 18:06, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

  It took you two weeks to respond to me? Why? This is a WP:DEADHORSE with apparent consensus formed on either C or D. A tweet from Piers Morgan is not RS about Morgan and one Atlantic source from December still doesn't meet LASTING. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:25, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

  1.The only reason it took me two weeks to respond is that these days I rarely log in to Wikipedia, as I have a lot to do busy me in RL. 2.There are lots of RS about what happened in Piers Morgan's show for example TheWrap (that's where I took the quote from),The Hill, The New York Sun , and the source I brought from December 31 in the Atlantic.

  3. As for the consensus - though I voted for B, I have no problem with a consensus around C as well. Vegan416 (talk) 18:44, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

  This all died down before she went on Piers Morgan, and then after a brief spike it died out again. I still prefer D. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:27, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

• B This is WP:DUE. Had been mentioned tens of times in RS including two weeks after the beginning of the controversy. The claim that she was just commenting on the internet in her capacity as an internet commentator is clearly false. She went far beyond commenting dispassionately on an interment trend into fully supporting it. Vegan416 (talk) 20:11, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

  Tens of times in which RS? So far I can't find one green source that mentions this, and I really am trying because my first inclination here is C or even B. But the total lack of good sourcing here is pushing me strongly towards D, which I'd initially dismissed out of hand. Loki (talk) 04:35, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

• C/D - the article on lorenz isn't too long, and a controversy that lasted a week really shouldn't take much space. Too much space to this controversy is definitely WP:UNDUE Bluethricecreamman (talk) 20:17, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

It didn't last a week. It is still being mentioned in RS even after 2 weeks. Vegan416 (talk) 20:21, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

• all the latest mentions of the lorenz scandal seem to be from 2 weeks ago when i search up lorenz on google news.
• though you can reply to RFC replies if there is something you want to correct, replying to every reply on an RFC to repeat the same info over and over is WP:BLUDGEONing.

Bluethricecreamman (talk) 20:26, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

But what if someone repeats a demonstrably false claim like you did now about all the sources being from 2 weeks ago?

Vegan416 (talk) 20:29, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

1) Regarding recent coverage proving dueness

i don't see reputable coverage, mostly political spin or passing coverage with only a single quote or mention of lorenz. to prove wrong, find a source from NYTimes or some other source on WP:RSN within the last week talking mainly about her. The few sources I found within last week:

• outkick[6], a self-described "anti-woke" alternative to sports commentary
• WP:NYPOST[7], which is disallowed by WP:RSN
• The Western Journal[8], a journal the nytimes apparently described as "a torrent of sensationalized, misleading, or entirely made-up stories,"[9]

These are all right wing partisan outlets fanning rage flames in their audience, not real enduring coverage.

2) Regarding Bludgeoning

At least two others have accused Vegan of WP:BLUDGEON, and I see Vegan has put up close to 30% of comments in talk section comments about this controversy. I suggest you only reply to comments you disagree with if you are adding something new nobody else has put up yet. Bluethricecreamman (talk) 20:50, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

1) Look at the footnotes here. Also, the requirement you invented that the sources should talk mainly about her has no basis in any policy. This requirement appears in policy pages only as a condition for notability for having a separate article on a topic. Not for establishing DUE for an item inside an already existing article. Vegan416 (talk) 20:54, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

This RfC is going to become tedious really quickly if you WP:BLUDGEON the process. (I wrote that before I read Blue's comment, so make it three others.) – Muboshgu (talk) 23:09, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

• C or D - it's probably undue, check if anyone is still talking about it in 6 months. Red Fiona (talk) 23:06, 21 December 2024 (UTC)
• C, I’m willing to compromise to shorten the blurb about her comments. I think her comments received a significant amount of media coverage, and I also understand that while some of it might have been in bad faith, on the other hand, she didn’t shy away from it, defending her comments on TMZ Live and Piers Morgan Uncensored. Perhaps something like this below might work:

In December 2024, Lorenz made several Bluesky posts in the wake of the killing of UnitedHealthCare CEO Brian Thompson criticizing Blue Cross Blue Shield Association's decision to not cover anesthesia for the entirety of some surgeries. "And people wonder why we want these executives dead," she said. Her comments were criticized in numerous op-eds. In a post on "User Mag", she defended her comments, saying, "Let me be super clear: my post uses a collective "we" and is explaining the public sentiment."

The lorax (talk) 23:12, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

• First choice D, C as an acceptable, but significantly less prefered second choice. Most of the sources that go in-depth on this are opinion pieces or biased, right-wing sources that have uncharitably mischaracterized Lorenz's statements and arguments, which raises BLP issues as I discussed in the above section. It's still unclear whether the coverage will still continue after the craze around Luigi Mangione dies down. My first choice would be to revisit after a few months, but if consensus is to cover it, it only merits a couple sentences at best. Anything longer would be WP:UNDUE. While nothing is formally proposed for this RFC, the passages proposed in the above section were about as long as Lorenz's entire pre-WaPo career and about 2/3 the length of her time at WaPo. That length obviously fails WP:BALASP. ---- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 01:13, 22 December 2024 (UTC)
• C/D I'm not sure this important enough to justify inclusion into a biography. This probably doesn't pass the ten year test. Having RFCs on recent events like this are difficult without having time to properly put this into context. A good compromise would be to table this for at least six months and reaccess. Nemov (talk) 02:46, 22 December 2024 (UTC)
• A - This appears to be the most noteworthy statement this person has ever made. PerseusMeredith (talk) 03:01, 22 December 2024 (UTC)
• C or D (leaning towards option D) per Pater knight and Muboshgu. Although, I must say, it's quite disturbing that this sort of thing with targeting CEOs / executives has been profiteering in recent days, but obviously we can't do anything about that. 2601AC47 (talk·contribs·my rights) Isn't a IP anon 11:27, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

Could you elaborate, if you want, about the meaning of "profiteering"? Do you perhaps mean the selling of related paraphernalia, e.g. t-shirts? -The Gnome (talk) 12:22, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

Yep. And not for the first time I fear, given as far as how violence like this is seen by some people and in a way that appears approbative (not outright or willingly; imo, it's still wrong, regardless of who or what they're about, even if they're corporative healthcare providers). Either way, we're bound by the need to be neutral and not engage in dispute. 2601AC47 (talk·contribs·my rights) Isn't a IP anon 13:48, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation, 2601AC47. I'm afraid being approbative, or expressing or manifesting praise or approval of something, e.g. of an act of violence, has nothing to do with making a profit out of it. "Profiteering" denotes an act of making a profit, almost always a monetary profit, by methods considered unethical. Perhaps you meant to say "profiting to engage in propaganda" or something like that. It was confusing. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 18:57, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

• C easily. Our subject's comments are not the most noteworthy news related to the assassination, nor is she a significant public figure. Her comments, though, have made an impact in the media, and, hence, are worthy of inclusion in the article, with about a couple of sentences. No more and no less. -The Gnome (talk) 12:19, 22 December 2024 (UTC)
• A or B per arguments made for inclusion. The very fact that this is being discussed two weeks from now with news coverage from reliable sources still being prevalent even after the initial outbreak shows that Lorenz is to some extent, one of the more notable figureheads for the ever-growing popularity of Mangione with sources ever clearly demonstrating this for younger demographics. I'm still confused as to how this is a B-class article though given that there are sections of her article where it is notably underdeveloped compared to other sections and could use expansion to make the inclusion of a paragraph seem less like WP:UNDUE. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 14:03, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

  Just because something could be expanded doesn’t mean it should be. The aim is always to write an encyclopedic bio; for someone like a head of state, there will be many topics of encyclopedic significance to include. For most people there will be many fewer. This is already a pretty long article relative to the available encyclopedic material, in my view. Innisfree987 (talk) 09:25, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Innisfree987: In comparison to articles I personally make for the past four years of me joining Wikipedia which are of even less notability in regards to a broader audience I personally disagree as other articles have similar sections added once a more notably comment gets made. Considering the amount of media coverage including NBC and CNN, I fail to see what makes this particular instance not notable when even non-partisan sources covered it. Regardless, this article is more of a C-class article based on the inconsistent quality as is. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 14:32, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  This is a matter of WP:NOTNEWS. Wikipedia is not a repository for news reports or celebrity gossip. People getting mad because Lorenz had a Take the News of the Day is both news reports without indication of lasting notability and, very much, celebrity gossip. Simonm223 (talk) 14:52, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  To add on to this, WP:BLPGOSSIP exists to further expand on WP:NOTGOSSIP and requires editors to: Ask yourself whether the source is reliable; (many sources are not as discussed in the above section) whether the material is being presented as true; (the sources are certainly doing that}} and whether, even if true, it is relevant to a disinterested article about the subject. There's evidence as shown in my posts in the above section that Lorenz is not calling for or celebrating the act of killing someone itself, which many sources claim as true. Readers may be interested now, but we're still very much caught up in the Luigi Mangione mania right now.

  Even then, the best sources for "lasting coverage" presented here are one American opinion piece (WP:RSOPINION) that explicitly describes Lorenz's take as "violence may be wrong but explainable"; three Indian news sources, all of whom only devote a paragraph to this that is mostly her analysis of public sentiment with no mentions of critics; and a British piece that devotes all of one-sentence to the problematic Morgan interview. Only the last one is from the past week.

  The CNN coverage from the start of the controversy [10] includes one paragraph of Lorenz's analysis and then one sentence saying that it received backlash without further details. The NBC piece, [11] also from that period, has problems as previously noted and still devotes twice as much space to Lorenz's explanation than to the actual comments.

  All in all, this is not a very strong argument for inclusion and at best would require only a couple of sentences (e.g. 1/1.5 for analysis/explanation paired with a brief mention of the criticism). -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 15:42, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  Exactly. And that gets back to what I was saying about this being routine. Lorenz is an online pundit whose job is, at least in part, to respond to the trending news of the day with "takes" that are ideally controversial enough to generate attention. This week it's the CEO of a health company getting shot. Next week it will be whatever the hot news of the day is next week. A few people will remember that Lorenz had this or that take but, generally, only in the context of yet another bullet on a list of reasons why she's the greatest / the worst. This is just her doing her job. And if we listed every one of the takes she's generated for her job we'd have an indiscriminate list of stuff, not an encyclopedia article. Simonm223 (talk) 15:47, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Simonm223: @Patar knight: So wait, an online pundit making notable takes but yet it's now deemed "not news" when other figures of similar popularity and reach make similar opinions? Fact of the matter is that this isn't even ordinary gossip when again, substrative news coverage emerged and she's arguably one of the primary voices behind the unusually large amount of support of Thompson's murder. Considering its nearly Christmas now and we're still having this conversation shows that yes, this is beyond ordinary pundit controversy that is only reported by opinion pieces.

  By the way: There's evidence as shown in my posts in the above section that Lorenz is not calling for or celebrating the act of killing someone itself, which many sources claim as true. Unless you have a reliable source that explicitly states that these are indeed false claims, this is blatant WP:OR. Doesn't help that she's later made similar statements on the Piers Morgan interview, so the burden of proof is quite massive with this one. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 17:03, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  One thing you misunderstand is the direction of WP:NOTNEWS it's not saying we should avoid stories which are not news stories. It's saying that Wikipedia is not a news source. There's no lasting relevance to a pundit doing her job and generating attention to her opinion of a news story. It's not even a blip on the radar of her career - it's the ground upon which her career is built. It's routine. As such it's not due inclusion. Simonm223 (talk) 17:12, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  We're talking about it because Wikipedia is a lagging indicator from reliable sources and since this wasn't immediately apparent as relevant and worth including, the discussion dragged. News sources have largely moved on. Maybe it'll show up in a Lorenz profile months or years down the line.

  OR does not mean that editors are not allowed to analyze the accuracy of sources, especially when there are serious WP:BLP concerns. Even if that was the case, the CNN and NBC articles that you yourself cited as reasons for inclusion do not go so far as to explicitly accuse her of celebrating the murder itself and predominantly focus on Lorenz's explanation of her posts. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 17:21, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Simonm223: So with this sudden precedent you've established, you're effectively wanting to say for example, omit the Puerto Rico "joke" made by Tony Hinchcliffe because he's a comedian and not a political commentator as despite initial speculation that this would affect the 2024 election, it ultimately didn't? And I could very well for example, use this very logic on some of the events included in the article as they are of relative obscurity in the broader scope as Lorenz is just not that notable of a person outside of a specific niche of the US political scene that wouldn't interest say, someone that isn't American such as myself. As you can see, this a rather absurd precedent.

  @Patar knight: So then why has no legal action has been taken against, in your words, the variety of sources that have made the claim? You'd think this would be an easy case of defamation and yet... nothing. Once again, you're under the burden of proof for this specific statement considering that you lack a source to verify that this is indeed, a definitive case of false claims, I'm not exactly moved by your statements on their own without anything backing them up. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 18:53, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  I am sorry but I don't follow your logic at all. Aer you suggesting that it's a routine part of Tony Hinchcliffe's job to go to a presidential rally and describe American colonial holdings as "Islands of floating garbage"? Simonm223 (talk) 19:01, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Simonm223: Your logic is that a event should only be documented if it's had a notable effect or basis on the career of the individual. Now I don't know about you but not having your podcast renewed by Vox isn't exactly the tiny insignificant event you're attempting to portray it as. Unless I misread it, that's generally what I interpreted it as being. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 20:30, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  The podcast non-renewal isn't relevant to this discussion as the decision was before the comments that are the subject of this RfC: "Vox’s decision not to renew the show was made before Lorenz’s comments this week, in which she appeared to justify the killing of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO as an expression of public discontent." [12] – notwally (talk) 20:47, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Notwally: And yet this prompted Lorenz herself claimed the article was misinformation through several posts on BlueSky. These were made three days ago as of writing this. Even if this was true, other sources have attributed her comments as part of a wider discussion on internet reactions to the Thompson murder such as this for example, well beyond the initial dates of 5 and 6 December. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 22:40, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @SuperSkaterDude45 I wouldn't regard that opinion piece with much weight since it is an opinion piece, and from the article itself The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the view of The Hill.

  Awshort (talk) 22:50, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Awshort: Wasn't the discussion primarily about if the incident was irrelevant past the two days of its initial outbreak per WP:RECENTISM. I don't see what it being an opinion piece has to do with the fact that this is still at least mentioned past the initial grace period. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 22:55, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  I agree that an opinion piece is not going to be reliable for this type of contentious material or useful in determining weight. SuperSkaterDude45, where are the sources saying that her professional career with Vox was notably affected by the comments under discussion here? – notwally (talk)

  @Notwally: Okay, so going by this apparent new criterion, Lorenz is mentioned by name within two paragraphs in this NDTV article when talking about the significance of the zenith of popularity of the idea of the assassinations of CEOs. As far as I'm sure, this was published by NDTV in-house. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 23:19, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  You might want to read WP:NEWSORGINDIA - Wikipedia generally treats Indian news sources (like NDTV) with extra skepticism due to the preponderance of undisclosed paid content. Simonm223 (talk) 12:56, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Simonm223: Sure? But so far, I have yet to find a discussion specifically about NDTV. While I'm admittedly mostly unfamiliar with the internal politics of Indian news media, from what I could find, many concerns in regard to businesses and celebrities are that they tend to receive undisclosed paid content for more favorable perceptions of them. Furthermore, a majority of the issues seem to stem from internal corruption within India with nearly every notable instance involving a regional politician. I'm not sure how this affects a mention of a political pundit that's only really notable in a specific subset of US politics. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 15:33, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  SuperSkaterDude45, you had said that this comment had impacted the article subject's career at Vox, which is apparently not true as those decisions had been made prior to the comment. Now your response to me asking for evidence of your initial claim is an unsigned NDTV article that mentions the article subject in only three sentences, none of which mention Vox or any impact on her career. – notwally (talk) 19:18, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Notwally: It's rather evident at my point has extended beyond Vox and about how this overall incident is about her prominence within online reactions for the Thompson murder. If you are being continuously mentioned as a source of reference behind external reactions behind a specific interest, yeah, that generally makes it a rather significant moment in your career. I have also to see any sources or really anything beyond your own personal interpretation if Lorenz WASN'T at minimum, someone that wasn't a notable reactionary for the Thompson murder. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 19:35, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  SuperSkaterDude45, you should strike your prior comment if you do not have any evidence supporting it. – notwally (talk) 19:42, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  Lorenz herself claimed the article was misinformation. As the rest of her posts in that Bluesky thread make clear, she was referring to the apparent mischaracterization of her relationship with Vox in that she controls the IP and publishing, while Vox doesn't have the power to cancel/renew the show since it seems like they only provided some funding and advertising. She does not seem to be disputing that the decision was made before her Thompson comments. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 23:05, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  I wouldn't put much stock on the presence or absence of a lawsuit in respect to the truth or falsity of any particular statement about American public figures.

  Because most American jurisdictions require parties to pay their own costs instead of the more common English system where the winning party is entitled to a portion of their legal fees paid, it is usually ill-advised to go against rich opponents. Lorenz is well-off but probably not rich enough to sustain a protracted legal fight. Engaging in legal action would also keep the story in the news cycle and invite continued harassment, which Lorenz would probably not want.

  On the merits (though this obviously isn't legal advice), since New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, American case law has required actual malice to succeed in defamation claims from public figures such as Lorenz, especially in respect to journalistic publications. This requires not just a finding that the claims were false, but that the defendants had actual knowledge that the claims were false or were reckless as to the truth. Many of the less egregious comment would probably be written off as opinion or fair comments (which is not the same as being true). Unless the defendants literally have communications proving actual malice, it would probably fail, and to even get to the discovery stage would probably not be cheap. Overall, a defamation claim would probably not be worth it, regardless of the underling facts. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 23:23, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Patar knight: Whilst there might be some basis of truth within this all of this, the lack of a definitive source that demonstrates that these claims are false and not clarified as is the case with both initial reports and later perspectives leads me to think that at the very least that I'm still going to find more credibility in the existing secondary sources as is due to how they are strongly preferred on Wikipedia over their primary equivalents. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 23:34, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  You do not need a secondary source to critically examine a reliable source to see if there are issues with accuracy, neutrality, BLP, etc. that would affect whether to include something or not. Sometimes even reliable sources get it wrong. You would if someone was arguing to put it in wikivoice that the criticism was false/mischaracterized, but nobody is doing that. However, if we're putting in this controversy, then BLP obligates us to include her denials (WP:DENIALS) and then we quickly begin running into WP:BALASP issues. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 00:27, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  @Patar knight: The difference between WP:SECONDARY and WP:WSAW is that WSAW is ultimately an essay that could be made by any editor without any chief consensus reinforcing it. Furthermore, I don't exactly see WP:BALASP issues given that if I were to be as conservative as possible, I'd include something similar to what The lorax wrote in his latest proposed inclusion in a few sentences given how many reliable sources have also added clarifications whilst still noting that she's a major figure when it comes to an explanation regarding the high support for the murder. SuperSkaterDude45 (discusión) 01:20, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

  WP:OR, which SECONDARY is part of, leads with Wikipedia articles must not contain original research., so I guess it's a good thing this isn't article space. WSAW is an essay, but it shouldn't require a policy or guideline to support the position that sometimes reliable sources are wrong or lack context which in turn affects editorial discretion. Since you're out of step with the community and determined not to engage with the substance of my posts, I'll drop this thread here. Merry Christmas. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 02:00, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

• D as not important enough under WP:NOTNEWS. A few comments about a sensationalized media story does not seem significant enough to include in a biography. If we started adding these types of examples in, our biographies would be full of these types of "controversies". I do not think it is likely that coverage of this article subject in the furture will mentioning this as a significant part of her life. – notwally (talk) 18:41, 22 December 2024 (UTC)
• D per Nemov and Notwally. The goal is to write a biography such as you’d expect to see in an encyclopedia. I think way too many passing flaps are included in BLPs generally, so I’m glad we’re having an RfC to address that. Innisfree987 (talk) 02:42, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• C certainly worthy of some basic mention due to the broad coverage in media. Mediafocus (talk) 08:55, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• C or D because it's entirely normal for an online pundit to have a take on the news of the day. Her angering some guys on Twitter is just a routine day at the office. This is unlikely to have lasting significance. Simonm223 (talk) 12:48, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• D per Muboshgu and Patar knight. WP:NOTNEWS and this isn't even news. Gamaliel (talk) 12:54, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• Comment: No matter how the discussion goes, arguing that our subject's comments about the murder of Brian Thompson are "not news" is simply an arbitrary, baseless assertion, since a plethora of sources testify to the opposite. We may disagree about the durability or the importance of those widely reported & reproduced comments. But we cannot credibly suggest "they are not news." -The Gnome (talk) 13:10, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  Citing WP:NOTNEWS doesn't mean that stuff should not be included because it is literally not in the news, but that it doesn't rise above routine events and gossip about notable people that news covers but might not have the enduring qualities that make it suitable for inclusion in an encyclopedia (WP:NOTGOSSIP also redirects there). For example, the news will always have in-depth analysis of professional sports matches but most individual athletic plays will not be suitable for inclusion on athletes' articles per NOTNEWS. Citing it here just means that it looks like a case of a cultural commentator getting discourse on her work, which is part and parcel of her job. Maybe this has legs, but it doesn't look like it, and this doesn't fall into a category of event where it can be immediately ascertained (e.g. charged with serious crimes, loss of a job, a journalist committing plagiarism, etc.) -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 15:55, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

  WP:NOTNEWS means Wikipedia articles are not news articles and therefore should not cover topics the same as news media. – notwally (talk) 20:47, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

Patar knight, notwally: My comments addressed the claim that our subject's comments were not newsworthy. Check out, for example, the assertion above that literally goes "this [her comments] isn't even news." The plethora of sources reporting on her comments and reproducing them is a trivial proof of the contrary. -The Gnome (talk) 12:45, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Given Gamaliel’s experience and that NOTNEWS was cited right before that statement, I understood it in that context and not in the literal “0 news outlets have reported on this” sense. It’s like something you might exclaim if you’re watching a new channel and it switches from a story about foreign coup to something like “minor internet celebrity threw up in a fancy restaurant”. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 13:42, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Patar knight is correct in their interpretation of my comments, thank you. Colloquially in the United States, "this is not news" does not literally mean "this has never been the subject of news coverage", it means "this is too insignificant to deserve substantive news coverage". Gamaliel (talk) 15:23, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

• D although can reassess in the not too far future; unlikely to ever justify more than C. It's just UNDUE compared to current actual scope of Lorenz article at this time, if nothing else. Skynxnex (talk) 16:25, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• D, with the small possibility of C if there remains sustained coverage beyond the standard "twitter person of the day" type stuff as the Thompson news story/coverage progresses. As of now, this is all outrage coverage of a political commentator whose words have constantly been taken out of context through this whole saga. If/when this gets added, it should be no more than "Lorenz was criticized for comments made after the Thompson murder, with Lorenz saying XYZ". Otherwise this is undue weight, with proposed additions being longer than sections describing her entire tenure at other jobs. I've been following this discussion since the beginning, and I do not believe the standard for inclusion has been met. NOTNEWS, BLP, and DUE all lean against inclusion. Alyo (chat·edits) 17:23, 23 December 2024 (UTC)
• D. Lorenz is entirely peripheral to the Thompson story, where she gets one sentence and a very short quote, which is fine. That's the correct level of coverage in the correct location. It helps to elucidate the responses to the killing. It is about Thompson and the public response, not about her. Anything else is undue. The pretence that every single thing she says is an intolerable outrage against God and man is simply not something that we are required to take seriously. If I strain very hard then I can see that C might be just about be arguable but I am unable to comprehend how anybody could think that A or B were even worth proposing. This whole RfC seems misconceived. I know that some people think that Lorenz is Satan incarnate, personally responsible for every evil that befalls the earth, but this is all just plain silly. Her haters are never going to stop trying to make her the main character of the internet. We are in no way obliged to assist them in that endeavour. --DanielRigal (talk) 00:46, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
• D This article is the BLP of Taylor Lorenz and those comments do not seem to have been a major event or had a major impact in her life. Give it a few months and see if there is some large result but unless that comes to pass I would lean on have the restraint of WP:BLPCRIME and WP:BLP1E and not put spread the topic into other articles than directly about the murder itself. I'm also not inclined to approve of edits sight unseen and not descrribed in any detail other than length - there's nothing to say what content the edits are in mind, so really no way to tell if there even is WEIGHT and RELEVANCE to this article. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:56, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
• D for now; just not enough WP:SUSTAINED coverage to establish relevance for her personal biography about something so tangential to her, especially given that it seems to have already died down. RSes barely covered this and the coverage that did exist wasn't really significant. A sentence in the article on Brian Thompson's murder certainly makes sense, but the sources that do exist don't really treat it as relevant to her biography - they mention her in passing when making other points about the Brian Thompson murder, they don't have much to say about her. --Aquillion (talk) 15:07, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
• Comment This is starting to look like WP:SNOW.And just in time for xmas. Simonm223 (talk) 15:34, 24 December 2024 (UTC)
• C, nothing more or less. As it stands, the article is not long enough to justify including more than a few sentences without WP:DUE concerns. However, Lorenz' comments have clearly passed the coverage bar for inclusion:
  • The comments themselves were covered in reliable sources such as CNN, Al Jazeera, and NBC News. In particular, Lorenz' comments are the focal point of the NBC News piece, which treats them as representative of a wave of radicalization online.
  • Lorenz' comments were the main subject of at least four national-level op-ed pieces: The Telegraph, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and the National Post. While these editorials may not be reliable for facts per WP:RSOPINION, they do further establish WP:DUE (as I explained above on this talk page, opinion pieces also contribute to WP:DUE).

In addition, many of the D !voters' arguments fail to withstand scrutiny.

• WP:LASTING and WP:SUSTAINED have both been cited here, but these policies refer to notability for a standalone article, not for whether a passage is due for inclusion within an article. There are no WP policies requiring that BLP pages contain only events that have received coverage over an extended period of time; if there were, then much of BLP pages' content would need to be stripped out.
• WP:BLP1E and WP:BLPCRIME have also been cited, but these are also irrelevant. BLP1E is for standalone pages for briefly notable people and BLPCRIME is for people accused of a crime, neither of which apply here.
• WP:NOTNEWS has been cited, but without explaining which aspect of "Wikipedia is not a newspaper" would be violated. (IMO, NOTNEWS is one of the most frequently misinterpreted parts of WP policy.) It is not "original reporting" - Lorenz' comments have been reported in multiple reliable sources. It is not "routine news coverage of announcements, events, sports, or celebrities". It is not "celebrity gossip" or "personal details" about which readers would likely be uninterested.
• Some D !voters have tried to argue that because Lorenz is a "pundit" whose job is to "commentate on the internet", this level of coverage is expected or routine, and therefore worthy of exclusion. Respectfully, this argument is nonsensical. First, Lorenz is much more of an analyst than a pundit: her job (both before at the Washington Post, and now as an independent Substacker) is to provide reporting and commentary about internet goings-on - not to become the subject of internet debates herself by making inflammatory statements. Second, the D !voters making this argument should produce another example where Lorenz made routine statements in the course of her job that received this level of coverage in national news media - I very much doubt that it exists.

Astaire (talk) 17:20, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Consensus is an "effort to address editors' legitimate concerns through a process of compromise while following Wikipedia's policies and guidelines". Consensus cannot violate policies, but not every legitimate concern raised by editors has to be directly based on a policy. Further, WP:NOTNEWS #2 says: "Wikipedia considers the enduring notability of persons and events. While news coverage can be useful source material for encyclopedic topics, most newsworthy events do not qualify for inclusion and Wikipedia is not written in news style. For example, routine news coverage of announcements, events, sports, or celebrities, while sometimes useful, is not by itself a sufficient basis for inclusion of the subject of that coverage (see WP:ROUTINE for more on this with regard to routine events). Also, while including information on recent developments is sometimes appropriate, breaking news should not be emphasized or otherwise treated differently from other information. Timely news subjects not suitable for Wikipedia may be suitable for our sister project Wikinews." Enduring significance is a requirement for notability but is also relevant for determining whether content is due. – notwally (talk) 19:36, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Let's take a closer look at WP:NOTNEWS #2, in particular the first two sentences:

Wikipedia considers the enduring notability of persons and events. While news coverage can be useful source material for encyclopedic topics, most newsworthy events do not qualify for inclusion and Wikipedia is not written in news style.

Notice that the first sentence mentions notability, which as defined at WP:N refers to "whether a given topic warrants its own article" (emphasis mine). The second sentence confirms this by discussing whether "newsworthy events" do or do not "qualify for inclusion" in Wikipedia. Thus, just like WP:LASTING and WP:SUSTAINED, WP:NOTNEWS #2 is about creating standalone articles, not about whether content should be included within an article.

Consensus cannot violate policies, but not every legitimate concern raised by editors has to be directly based on a policy.

Per WP:DETCON: "Consensus is ascertained by the quality of the arguments given on the various sides of an issue, as viewed through the lens of Wikipedia policy." As such, concerns are only "legitimate" inasmuch as they are grounded in policy.

Enduring significance is a requirement for notability but is also relevant for determining whether content is due.

This is trivially true, in the sense that enduring significance and coverage helps provide greater prominence to a certain viewpoint. To quote from WP:DUE: "Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in those sources." Notice that WP:DUE does not place any limitations about how the "prominence" of a particular viewpoint is achieved - whether by a slow trickle of coverage over time, or by a spike in coverage, as was the case here. And when a person makes comments that become the subject of multiple op-eds in national newspapers, the bar for WP:DUE has clearly been met. Astaire (talk) 20:37, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

C per Astaire ꧁Zanahary꧂ 17:37, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

• D Falls under WP:NOTNEWS and WP:NOTDIARY: Even when an individual is notable, not all events they are involved in are. ... all these sources would lead to overly detailed articles that look like a diary. Not every facet of a celebrity's life...warrants inclusion in the biography of that person Some1 (talk) 02:37, 31 December 2024 (UTC)
• C per Astaire. Thriley (talk) 03:24, 3 January 2025 (UTC)
• Could someone arguing for inclusion share what they think are the 2-3 best sources supporting WP:DUE? Keep in mind this should exclude unreliable sources, opinion pieces, passing mentions, etc. Trying to decide between C and D after my own search returns a ton of unreliable stuff. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 18:20, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

D per DanielRigal humorous approach. The article for the actual murder mentions her in a single sentence or two, so I can't rationalize how people think A or B are possible. Weak support for C if there was shown to be evidence that she lost partnership deals or it otherwise had a lasting effect on her professional life. This does not include the current Semafor claim regarding Vox severing all ties with her, since it was heavily disputed by Lorenz and Vox offered no support confirming it. Awshort (talk) 23:15, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

>The article for the actual murder mentions her in a single sentence or two, so I can't rationalize how people think A or B are possible.

Articles for events, movements, etc with many people involved often discuss a person involved much less than the person's article discusses their involvement. In this case, I think her comments on Brian Thompson are more notable to her than she is notable to the Brian Thompson shooting. All the "humorous approaches", metrics, and WP:POLICYs often serve as a giant repository of rationalizations wikipedia editors use to justify politically motivated editing decisions. When the political motivation isn't as obvious, a veneer of impartiality and indifference attracts many editors, and you get these ridiculously long threads. An RfC related to P'nut the squirrel also comes to mind. 24.126.13.20 (talk) 21:26, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

Comment: I previously closed this as C but undid my close because I rushed it in hindsight. It would be best for an uninvolved administrator to close this instead. I don't think my decision was wrong, but it was probably rushed and definitely very badly communicated. guninvalid (talk) 06:26, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Prior closure text: This was really a discussion between C and D. As the closer, I am going to settle on C, with room for B but only to provide more context if necessary. This may also be overturned to D in the future, but for now C. Much of this discussion focused on providing and discussing sources, which is certainly a good practice to do, but many of these discussions became isolated disputes over a handful of sources between individual editors. As I see it, there's enough sourcing to justify inclusion. Individual sources can of course be litigated separately, but there's enough consensus here to keep the comments without playing source whack-a-mole. guninvalid (talk) 06:27, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Update: This RfC slowed in exact correlation with coverage of Lorenz's comments slowing in right-wing media. There is almost zero coverage of her Thompson comments in 2025. I'm striking my nod towards C as a result--there is no lasting coverage here. It's already over and done and everyone has moved on. We should too. Alyo (chat·edits) 18:48, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

perfect example of WP:RECENTISM especially eith microcelebritiness of lorenz.

not every political gotcha is worth coverage in an encyclopedia User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 19:41, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

References

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RSN discussion of Media Manipulation policy brief by Emily Dreyfuss

There is a discussion on the reliability of one of the sources uses in this article on RSN, see WP:RSN#Media Manipulation policy brief by Emily Dreyfuss. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:24, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

Harassment section naming

User:FMSky renamed the section to just Harassment (formerly was "Harassment and coordinated attacks")

I reverted as their edit note only indicated "original research." They've reverted back again to their version, per WP:BRD we should discuss.

FMSky- any reasons for the change? It seems to me like the contents of the section warrant the title.

Thanks! SpookyTwenty (talk) 23:26, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

There's no evidence the attacks against her were/are coordinated --FMSky (talk) 23:27, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

I disagree - from the article: "Lorenz argued that Carlson's coverage was 'an attempt to mobilize an army of followers to memorize my name and instigate harassment'"

From further in the article, the times called it a "cruel and calculated attack" SpookyTwenty (talk) 23:31, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Thats one case then, but attacks (plural) doesnt seem to be supported. Why the big deal about this lmao, the way the section is currently is informative and neutral --FMSky (talk) 23:45, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

The big deal is that coordinated attacks/bullying/harassment are quite damaging to their target; more so than random/individual instances. Removing the 'coordinated' diminishes the harm described in this article. Delectopierre (talk) 01:36, 16 March 2025 (UTC)

@SpookyTwenty: The Times social media post is misquoted; it states it was a calculated and cruel tactic. I also don't see the huge focus on this, and if RS aren't calling it coordinated then I see no reason why we should call it such. And stating they are 'damaging to their target' or 'diminishes the harm' is POV pushing, plain and simple. Nothing is lost from naming it harassment in terms of context. (I meant to reply to your post above but it messed up the layout and replied to @FMSky: instead.

Awshort (talk) 01:57, 16 March 2025 (UTC)

Just going to note that this has been discussed ad naseum:

• Late Dec 2024 Talk Page
• Somewhat here
• At RSN
• At DRN

• As a note, this was put on hold and allowed to be archived off the DRN page. I assume that means the case was declined, however, I'll ping @Steven Crossin for visibility.

I think I'm forgetting a venue, but will add it if I remember. It's been discussed a number of times in passing, too. Delectopierre (talk) 03:28, 16 March 2025 (UTC)

Thanks! Figured this wasnt the first rodeo and didn't want to get into an edit war! SpookyTwenty (talk) 22:16, 17 March 2025 (UTC)

No problem. I wonder if it would be helpful to add a FAQ to this talk page with a few commonly attempted edits: this one, adding her birthday, etc. I'd be happy to comb through the archive to provide thread lists if others concur, though it's not so long that one needs familiarity with previous threads to do so. Delectopierre (talk) 19:23, 18 March 2025 (UTC)

Probably. That's what the {{FAQ}} template is for. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:54, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

Seems like a good idea! Particularly for a page that's in and out of protected status like this one has been. SpookyTwenty (talk) 16:46, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

I don't like ==Harassment== by itself, because it is ambiguous. Specifically, that section heading could mean that the subject is a perpetrator of harassment, rather than the victim of it.

I think that an unambiguous heading such as ==Target of harassment== would be preferable.

I wonder whether the "coordinated attacks" dispute is because people don't understand what "coordination" means. If you're thinking that you have a bunch of people waiting for the "coordinator" to say "Okay, blue team, I want you all to focus on Facebook. Post a snarky comment once a minute for the next two hours. Red team, your job is to post comments on news articles. Your talking points are in the e-mail message...", then that kind of careful orchestration is (I hope and believe) not what's going on here.

"Coordinated attacks" means something with a lot less direct control than that. For example, years ago, Wikipedia was the victim of a coordinated attack: some television comedian encouraged people to vandalize a specific article, and his fans did. That's an example of a "coordinated attack". The opposite of "coordinated attacks" is "random attacks" (our everyday, one-off scattershot vandalism). WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:08, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

Yeah that all makes sense and rather of harassment seems like a clear way to state it SpookyTwenty (talk) 16:44, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing Maybe a more informative way of presenting it to an everyday reader would be presenting her past work involving harassment as well as what people other than herself say about what has happened to her, with a suitable title? She has reported on harassment as often as she has reported on tech over the years and it could be neutrally shown. What that subheading would be at that point isn't as clear..."Works with Harassment"? "Reporting on harassment "? In that instance, "Target of harassment" would not work either since it would be more or less a presentation of her work involving it with less reliance on interviews and more reliance on what secondary sources are stating about her own harassment.

I think it would also make more sense to possibly split the material equally between Career and Personal life. I don't think people can realistically say that we should cram every instance of when she mentions the word harassment or harassment-style issues into its own subsection when she herself is describing how harassment has affected her personal life, but that it is somehow not suitable for inclusion under personal life since "all harassment material should be here". It turns into a WP:BADTHINGS section that seems to go against how the material is presented in secondary sources as well as interviews to make something that is trivially mentioned by the subject or the source into a bigger perceived issue.

Random afternoon thoughts upon just waking up lol.

Awshort (talk) 17:48, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

I think that "journalist writes about harassment professionally (sometimes using herself as an example)" should be considered a separate subject from "individual human is the victim of harassment". Her books, etc. should go in ==Career==. Since it is largely organized chronologically and by publisher, then perhaps that will be sufficient for these – less "Works about harassment" and more "While employed at The Washington Post, she also...".

It is possible to also put her being a target of harassment into the ==Career== section. For example, the bit about being harassed while working at The New York Times could go in the paragraph about her working there.

I don't think that a strict "only if written by secondary sources" approach is a good idea for what is, ultimately, a personal experience. First, I'm uncertain whether you actually mean secondary or if you mean independent, because Wikipedia:Secondary does not mean independent. Second, we need her view of what happened to her (in addition to other people's views), and that may be best found in interviews or her own writings. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:45, 4 April 2025 (UTC)

This is spot on, @WhatamIdoing. Delectopierre (talk) 20:09, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

Recent changes

@Awshort you need to stop removing anything that mentions harrasment of Lorenz just because you WP:IDONTLIKEIT. It's not in line with NPOV and you know it.

You can cite a policy in your edit summary, but this is NOT an edit that policy mandates or dictates. Neither does the policy you quote in your edit summary apply here:

→Career: Copyedit section to be in line with WP:IMPARTIAL; removing Lorenz tweet and summarizing what both of their respective media outlets stated. ("Try not to quote directly from participants engaged in a heated dispute; instead, summarize and present the arguments in an impartial, formal tone.)

I do not know whether you mean to or not, but: your continued battle against including mention of the fact that Lorenz is a victim of harassment that has at times been coordinated closely mimics some of the disgusting tactics used in gamergate. It serves to deny her reality; a reality that has been verified by reliable sources time and time again.

So if you are going to continue that battle, you're now going to be doing so knowing that it is a NPOV violation and what the behavior resembles. I hope that you don't.

Before
While working for The New York Times, Lorenz faced online harassment and heightened media attention after being mentioned by name on Tucker Carlson's Fox News show following a social media post she made in support of International Women's Day. Lorenz argued that Carlson's coverage was "an attempt to mobilize an army of followers to memorize my name and instigate harassment." The New York Times defended Lorenz, stating "Taylor Lorenz is a talented New York Times journalist doing timely and essential reporting. Journalists should be able to do their jobs without facing harassment" and called Carlson's actions a "cruel and calculated attack".

Awshort's edit
In 2021, while working for The New York Times, Lorenz was criticized by Tucker Carlson on his Fox News show regarding a tweet she made in support of International Women's Day in which she said she herself had faced online harassment and a smear campaign, and urging others to consider supporting women going through the same. Lorenz said this led to further harassment . Both The New York Times and the International Women’s Media Foundation would issue statements in support of Lorenz that condemned the actions of Carlton, with the The New York Times stating "Taylor Lorenz is a talented New York Times journalist doing timely and essential reporting. Journalists should be able to do their jobs without facing harassment" and called Carlson's actions a "cruel and calculated tactic". Delectopierre (talk) 10:30, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

First, figure out how you want to proceed since I've already previously said I don't want any interaction with you going forward and you have said the same regarding me. Having a back and forth conversation will make that impossible.

Other than her tweet, nothing was removed so stating that I 'remove anything that mentions harassment' has no merit. The fact that I've tried to work on asking other editors in this discussion how to further expand her harassment material also proves that that is bullshit. Add to that the fact that I am the original person who tried to expand the article coverage about how The Times covered her harassment also disproves your accusation. Not to mention I previously had tried to work with you 1 on 1 on wording and expanding the section to avoid any issues going forward, which you specifically said you intentionally ignored. And comparing trying to figure out how to present the material neutrally while expanding it with it somehow mimicking gamergate tactics against her is just unbelievable.

Take a step back and look at it objectively and actually realize that you are still complaining that I am trying to dehumanize her by removing a section based on her past harassment and it's effects on her life when I am trying to figure out how to present it most accurately, and expand it to show how it has affected her personal life. The only difference is you think it should consist of tweets and quotes from interviews while presenting her tweets, and I think it should consist of what outside sources have stated first and then use her quotes to support that material without adding extra weight to it by summarizing it.

And lastly, pinging only the users who had previously seemed to favor your viewpoint in the same discussion that they will already receive a notification for "for visibility" comes off as attempting to sway the consensus by stacking votes in your favor and I would highly encourage not doing it.

Awshort (talk) 12:09, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

References

Pinging @SpookyTwenty and @WhatamIdoing for visibility. Delectopierre (talk) 10:39, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

I made this edit to align the content more closely with what the cited sources say. For example, The Hill directly states that "It all led to more abuse for Lorenz", rather than qualifying every statement about harassment as "she said". I also separated the first sentence into separate sentences to be easier to read. – notwally (talk) 11:10, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

I think that a bit more attention to chronological order might help this paragraph. Here's what I understand so far:

1. International Women's Day is an annual event that most decent people don't really have a problem with.
2. On the day of that event in 2021, Lorenz tweeted something in support of that event. Specifically, she tweeted that online harassment against women is a real problem. This is a claim that most decent humans with any experience of the internet find believable.
3. Tucker Carlson said something (what?) on his TV show about her tweet.
4. Carlson was condemned by various other entities for what he said (which was?).
5. Carlson and his TV channel claimed that whatever he said about her tweet constituted "legitimate criticism of their reporting, claims or journalistic tactics". (Which again makes me wonder: What did he say?)
6. Lorenz (and maybe various other entities?) worried that Carlson's comment was going to lead to even more harassment (and maybe it did?).

What have I got wrong so far? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:16, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for summarizing, @WhatamIdoing. This is great. You nailed it. I think there are relevant things that can be added, though:

0. The context is that prior to this incident, she heard someone use the r-slur on a clubhouse discussion and mistakenly attributed it to venture capitalist Marc Andreessen when in reality it was Ben Horowitz. They were both on the speaking panel, and are partners and co-founders of a VC firm. She was immediately pilloried and became the target of harassment (more than she already was) for the mistake, despite correcting it quickly. This served to distract from the fact the Horowitz used the slur. That was Feb 2021.

3. Then in early March 2021, Carlson starts attacking her. His attacks were summarized thusly:

• From the Guardian: Carlson called Lorenz, an internet culture reporter who formerly worked at the Hill, “privileged” and dismissed her experiences as “not real harassment”.
• And from Variety: Carlson said Lorenz, a tech and internet culture reporter, was “at the top of journalism’s repulsive little food chain” and that she is “far younger” and “much less talented” than other prominent New York Times reporters in a segment discussing “powerful people claiming to be powerless.” “You’d think Taylor Lorenz would be grateful for the remarkable good luck that she’s had. But no, she’s not,” Carlson said. He then read a tweet from Lorenz, posted on International Women’s Day, saying how online harassment and smear campaigns have destroyed her life
• It's also relevant that Carlson mobilizes his audience to go after the people he targets. Spending two nights in a row railing against her on his show was quite clearly a bat signal. I will try to find the article I recently read that describes this pattern: Carlson goes after someone, his fans go after them, rinse and repeat. It's also mentioned in the NYT statement after the Carlson attacks.

6. There certainly has been more harassment. The incidents were in the coordinated harassment section, prior to the slow and steady dismantling of that section by removing items, downplaying them, or attributing them to her and claiming that it violates WP:POLICY. These are from memory so will need to be verified, but wanted to make sure they're part of the conversation:

A. She and her family have been swatted, received death threats

B. She was physically attacked at the Charlottesville Unite the Right rally.

C. She's been stalked and had to be escorted to safety at a conference when a stalker who had made violent threats against her showed up there.

D: She discovered a craigslist post offering payment for covert photos of her.

E. She printed libsoftiktok's real name. Despite the name having already been published, and being publicly available, she was accused of doxxing the woman running the account, and accused of harassment by knocking on the woman's door despite this being a normal reporting tactic.

F. Another example of people jumping down her throat after making a mistake, or when they just disagree with her reporting is around the Johnny Depp/Amber Heard trial.

I think there's more but that's what I recall right now.

Lastly, I'll add that this casebook couldn't paint a clearer picture of the coordination of the attacks against her (it's been dismissed on this talk page as OR because they don't use the word coordinate, and there's been an effort to dismiss it as a RS):

Anons on 4chan also brainstorm how to find her personal information to use it against her, and discuss how to bait her into revealing information about herself that they can weaponize.

It also paints a picture of why adding her birthday has been so contentious; I'm not accusing anyone who has tried to add her DOB as someone coming from 4chan, but their behavior at least mimics the behavior that 4chan espouses. Delectopierre (talk) 22:30, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

Just to clarify the above, 6. There certainly has been more harassment. following the Carlson incident isn't exactly correct when the examples listed happened either prior to that segment, or are still included under the subheading of harassment.

• The incidents were in the coordinated harassment section, prior to the slow and steady dismantling of that section by removing items, downplaying them, or attributing them to her and claiming that it violates WP:POLICY. No, not all of them were, or they had undue focus with a single source stating something and were UNDUE. Several were discussed with multiple editors, and reworded or removed.

A. She and her family have been swatted, received death threats Included in the harassment section still.

B. She was physically attacked at the Charlottesville Unite the Right rally. Included in her earlier career section since it happened years before.

C. She's been stalked and had to be escorted to safety at a conference when a stalker who had made violent threats against her showed up there. Included in the harassment section still under her being stalked.

D: She discovered a craigslist post offering payment for covert photos of her. Never mentioned in article as far as I can remember, but I would imagine covered under being stalked. Undue to single out a single instance.

E. She printed libsoftiktok's real name. Despite the name having already been published, and being publicly available, she was accused of doxxing the woman running the account, and accused of harassment by knocking on the woman's door despite this being a normal reporting tactic. Covered in the reporting she did on LibsOfTikTok still.

F. Another example of people jumping down her throat after making a mistake, or when they just disagree with her reporting is around the Johnny Depp/Amber Heard trial. Criticism of her reporting on it is still in the article, as reflected in secondary sources.

Lastly, I'll add that this casebook couldn't paint a clearer picture of the coordination of the attacks against her (it's been dismissed on this talk page as OR because they don't use the word coordinate, and there's been an effort to dismiss it as a RS) The discussion at RSN ended with the decision that the policy brief should be treated as RSOPINION. Since no prior conversation existed on whether it was or wasn't a reliable source, a discussion needed to happen to determine if it was usable, and how it could be used.

Awshort (talk) 01:48, 6 April 2025 (UTC)

I had initially attempted to avoid a back and forth between the quotes of he said/she said in the article by removing her tweet accusing him of wrongdoing and not including his comments insulting her, but to fill in the gaps a bit I've tried to include all the prior material below (apologies in advance for the excessive quotation marks; they were in the sources that contained the material. Also, apologies for the Wall of text but wanted to be thorough) -

Initial Lorenz Tweet:

“For international women’s day please consider supporting women enduring online harassment. It’s not an exaggeration to say that the harassment and smear campaign I’ve had to endure over the past year has destroyed my life. No one should have to go through this.”

The high-profile Times reporter continued, "I’m slightly open [about] some of what I deal w/ but the scope of attacks has been unimaginable. There’s no escape. It has taken everything from me. The only mild solace I’ve found is w/ other women who have had their lives destroyed in the same way. We’ve developed deep trauma bonds."

What Carlson initially said:

Carlson said Lorenz, a tech and internet culture reporter, was “at the top of journalism’s repulsive little food chain” and that she is “far younger” and “much less talented” than other prominent New York Times reporters in a segment discussing “powerful people claiming to be powerless.”

“You’d think Taylor Lorenz would be grateful for the remarkable good luck that she’s had. But no, she’s not,” Carlson said. He then read a tweet from Lorenz, posted on International Women’s Day, saying how online harassment and smear campaigns have destroyed her life

“Destroyed her life, really? By most people’s standards, Taylor Lorenz would seem to have a pretty good life, one of the best lives in the country, in fact. Lots of people are suffering right now, but no one is suffering quite as much as Taylor Lorenz is suffering,” he continued.

New York Times press release response:

“In a now familiar move, Tucker Carlson opened his show last night by attacking a journalist. It was a calculated and cruel tactic, which he regularly deploys to unleash a wave of harassment and vitriol at his intended target,” the New York Times PR tweeted in a statement. “Taylor Lorenz is a talented New York Times journalist doing timely and essential reporting. Journalists should be able to do their jobs without facing harassment.”

Lorenz reply:

Lorenz later wrote on Twitter, “I hope people see this and recognize it for what it is, an attempt to mobilize an army of followers to memorize my name and instigate harassment.” She also posted an example of a vulgar message she had received.

She wrote, “As I said in this thread on international women’s day, no one should have to go through this, it’s become a far too common experience. Women, POC, LGBTQ journalists all suffer higher rates of abuse online, it has to stop.”

Carlson rebuttal to NYT/Lorenz:

Carlson says he "told you" about the reporter" during a Tuesday segment about how "the most privileged in our society now consider themselves oppressed."

She "is certainly a shining example of that principle," Carlson said. "A New York Times reporter from Greenwich telling you what a victim she is."

According to her, "saying mean things about her on Twitter is 'harassment,' disagreeing with her on the internet is 'harassment,' failing to affirm her as she self-actualizes... is 'harassment.' There's a lot of real harassment out there. This is not it."

"We were embarrassed for Taylor Lorenz, she spends her entire life on the internet, so of course, he has become a deeply unhappy narcissist -- that's what the internet does to people."

"It's a pretty good little scam the New York Times has running -- they get to hurt you at will, but you're not allowed to notice. Notice what they're doing and you are 'calculated and cruel.'"

Your timeline is correct. Outside of that timeline, the later comments in favor of Lorenz following it were several opinion pieces, press releases or Lorenz bringing Carlson up in interviews in the following years and calling him obsessed with her or similar. Sources and comments in favor of Carlson were right wing sources/opinion pieces or public figures in the right wing arena referring to her negatively and generally calling her names. There were also public figures from the right that commented on the original tweet of Lorenz and mocked her., her journalism, or dismissed what she was saying etc.

Michael Tracey, journalist:

If you are this traumatized and disconsolate from your adult professional choices, that's unfortunate and hopefully you have mental health resources available. But using it as a battering-ram to stigmatize as 'violence' all criticism of you, a public figure, is totally absurd."

Glenn Grenwald comments:

"Taylor Lorenz is a star reporter with the most influential newspaper in the US, arguably the west. Her work regularly appears on its front page," independent journalist Glenn Greenwald reacted. "Her attempt to claim this level of victimhood is revolting: she should try to find out what real persecution of journalists entails."

Greenwald continued, "If you're going to insinuate yourself into polarizing political debates and report (or pretend to 'report') on the powerful, you'll be 'attacked' online. It can be extra toxic due to race, gender, sexual orientation, etc but it's still just online insults. That's not persecution. With all the suffering and deprivation and real persecution in the world, it is utterly astonishing how often coddled, well-paid, highly privileged, coiffed, insulated, protected US [sic] elites posture as the world's most oppressed class. It's quite sickening and offensive."

Lorenz reply to Greenwald:

"'She should try to find out what real persecution of journalists entails' is exactly the type of threatening dog whistle commentary that contributes to harassment campaigns. It’s not ok," Lorenz wrote. 

She added, "Female journalists, stars or not, should not have to endure harassment for doing their job."

There was also a study done which examined how Carlson's coverage caused an increase in 'harmful tweets' to Lorenz following his segment, but one of the three people involved in the study was the head of the IWMF, the organization that had issued a press release in defense of her following Carlson's initial comments as well as the organizer of the Coalition Against Online Violence which she had initially tweeted about on International Women's Day. Still, as a fan of data science, I think we can showcase their findings while presenting it neutrally. I'll try to source that portion later tonight and add it in if time permits.

Awshort (talk) 22:36, 5 April 2025 (UTC)

So a young woman says she's getting harassed online, and a multi-millionaire with a TV show bearing his name says that she should be "grateful" for having "remarkable good luck"? I wonder how many of us think "a pretty good life" includes death threats.

This is followed by another man exaggerating her complaint about harassment to say she's claimed "all criticism" of her is "violence".

And then another man, also reputedly a multi-millionaire, says that all of this ("this" includes swatting her and her family members, which, to be clear, is a process that involves strangers in uniforms appearing unexpectedly at your home with guns drawn and prepared to kill someone) is "just online insults".

And these people can issue these judgments confidently because they're magic and know absolutely every little thing that happened to her, right?

This article should not make the WP:GEVAL mistake. Name calling (e.g., "narcissist") is not journalism. Spouting off when you've read a tweet but don't know all the facts is not journalism.

Having the head of the IWMF involved in the study is not a problem, even if they previously issued a press release. Issuing a press release shows is that the charity is in favor of their mission and trying to get their name in the news by commenting on a current event; it does not show that there is a real-world conflict of interest between Lorenz and the IWMF. Wikipedia:Independent sources means that Lorenz should not be paying ($$$) the IWMF or in some sort of significant contractual or personal relationship with them. It does not mean that they cannot ever have met, interviewed, said anything about, etc. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:05, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

Could someone else take a look at all the Awshort reverts just made? I try not to interact with them.

• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taylor_Lorenz&diff=1284654964&oldid=1284654223

• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taylor_Lorenz&diff=prev&oldid=1284653359

Delectopierre (talk) 22:55, 8 April 2025 (UTC)