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Okay, everyone, let's do this!

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
Consensus to remove Barbara Millicent Roberts' full name, and to remove Oppie's nickname.

In this debate editors in support of the proposal attempted to present policy-based arguments for their position; primarily WP:COMMONNAME and WP:INDISCRIMINATE, though several others were mentioned.

However, these arguments were rebutted by editors opposing the proposal, who successfully argued that none of the referenced policies or guidelines applied. Editors opposing the proposal generally did not attempt to make PAG-based arguments for their position and instead focused their arguments on best practices and perceived benefit to the reader.

Considering this, when we assess the strength of argument for each position we find them roughly equal; that there is no policy that is relevant to this debate and thus the community is free to make an editorial decision about what format will be of the most benefit to the reader.

While the arguments presented by many of those who opposed this change were well reasoned, they were not sufficient to persuade the broader community, with approximately twice as many editors supporting this change as opposing it. As such, there is a clear consensus to implement it.

Taking off my closer hat, I will note that I agree with editors like Tamzin who argued that this is a waste of time, and there's a lesson to be learned here about pushing for a minor change when the amount of resistance will be a drain on resources. This is not a consequential change, and the reader will be served either way; it would probably have been better to just leave the caption in its initial format, and I encourage editors who are considering opening such a discussion in the future to think twice before doing so. BilledMammal (talk) 17:30, 29 August 2023 (UTC)


I formally request that the caption of the first two images in the article is changed from "Barbara Millicent "Barbie" Roberts and Julius Robert "Oppie" Oppenheimer" to "The subjects of two films, Barbie and J. Robert Oppenheimer". Nobody's familiar with Barbie's in-universe full name. Likewise, nobody knows Oppenheimer's "Oppie" nickname (unless you read well into American Prometheus and/or other biographies about him). JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 11:56, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Barbara Roberts Rules of Order
  • why editors bothered to mention in the <ref> that Oppie isn't a fake name – Because (IIRC) at least one editor suggested that Oppie was made up and/or that it was used in reference to JRO only obscurely.
@Randy Kryn: Even if you prefer a single footer to separate captions, could you restore the alt text removed here: [4] Rjjiii (talk) 15:48, 20 August 2023 (UTC)
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.

Caption discussion: The aftermath

Killjoy was here.

A couple of thoughts here:

See y'all at the next mashup. Also, apparently we almost had Exorswift, between "Taylor Allison Swift and Satan 'The Morning Star' Lucifer". (Did I do that right?) Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 19:25, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

I want to thank you for that comment. Aside from whether Taylor Swift's Lucifer is really Kanye, I think the full names of the Wizard of Oz and Mr. Peanut are magnificent, and I am pleased to find that our respective pages on those two already report those full names. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:45, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Is there anything to be said for altering the caption so that it says "the subjects of the two films" rather than "the subjects of two films"? I understand that's what the option in the RfC was but like... yeah. ser! (chat to me - see my edits) 10:38, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

How about no additional wording before or after 'Barbie and J. Robert Oppenheimer' per the finding of the close: "Consensus to remove Barbara Millicent Roberts' full name, and to remove Oppie's nickname". Maybe the closer BilledMammal can clarify (and while here consider addressing Anomie's caption-policy concern above, thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 10:57, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
While I'd learn towards what I suggested above, just 'Barbie and J. Robert Oppenheimer' would be better than the current caption, imo. (Editor's note: as I was typing this response, the caption was changed to add "the" to it. By "the current caption" I meant the one without "the". I'm fine with the new edit.) But we can wait for the closer to comment. ser! (chat to me - see my edits) 11:03, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
Thank you for the ping. I meant to clarify that aspect in my close rather than just hinting at it, but I must have forgotten: There was minimal discussion of the exact wording, and what discussion there was tended to dislike it, so there was no consensus to use "the subjects of two films".
Regarding Anomie's caption-policy concern, I did notice those arguments but as few editors raised them I didn't feel it warranted mentioning in the close. My assessment of it was that while it was a good argument, whether a caption leads readers into the article is subjective and the notion that this caption does so was implicitly opposed by some oppose !voters who argued it is intrusive to readers and that The use of full names here is confusing and distracting. BilledMammal (talk) 11:10, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
BilledMammal, thanks for the clarification, I've edited out the extra wording which, to the surprise of none, doesn't mention Ken's jealousy at his girl being so closely tied to another man. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:22, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
Thanks BilledMammal, for clearing up this matter of life and death, and I'm fine with going with the edited-out version. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:54, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
@Ser! I think that this should be included, in this way, with the "the". Without the "the", it reads in a confusing way. It sounds like Barbie and Oppenheimer are subjects of just "two films that exist". With the "the", it makes it obvious that the caption refers to the two subjects of the films in question within the article. I suspect the caption without the "the" that was included in the RfC was probably just a typo. Strugglehouse (talk) 11:50, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
You're saying that everyone who supported the change supported a typo? What a commentary on the reading ability of your fellow Wikipedians, there's an argument to be made that some of them know how to read. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:28, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
@Randy Kryn Well, no, because there wasn't really consensus for whether to include the first part, only to remove the full names. No one was really for or against the "subjects of films" part. People were much more concerned about the full names, and I was just saying that excluding the "the" doesn't really make sense. Strugglehouse (talk) 12:32, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
I see. "Support" actually means "support some of the thing I'm supporting but not the rest". Got it. The closer did clear that up above, and the caption now contains only the nickname of the female and the full name of the alpha male. All back to normal. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:41, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
@Randy Kryn Look, all I'm saying is that I don't recall seeing much discussion about the "subject of two films" part. The !votes I read were about the inclusion of the full names of the subjects. I was just saying it could have been a typo as I don't think excluding "the" makes much sense. But fine, forget about that if you really want to. I'm saying now that I would support the full caption reading "The subjects of the two films, Barbie and J. Robert Oppenheimer". The other captions in the article have a bit more info than just the names of the things or people shown, and I think this caption should have this too. If you think that everyone who was supporting the removal of the full names was also supporting the full version of the caption (excluding the "the"), then why doesn't the caption reflect this? Strugglehouse (talk) 12:59, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
Because the close clarified the wording. Nothing against your points, just a commentary on the disrespect shown Barbie, an iconic symbol of a strong woman who literally has a full in-universe name, and the respect shown Oppie, I mean J. Robert Oppenheimer, a scientist who, as a male, accomplished a big bada boom. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:26, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
sharp kick in the ass to those who wasted so much community time - Completely agreed. There have been 158 editors on this talk page, and just five generated 83.1% of the text, with the top two contributing less than 1% of the article itself. (I'd normally not highlight this sort of discrepancy, as there are lots of helpful ways to contribute to an article that don't add big blocks of text and plenty of ways to help through constructive discussion -- it's just in this case, it's more about a handful of people digging in their heels, responding to everyone, and escalating utterly utterly unnecessary conflict rather than solving problems, and nearly all of it over something so trivial.) — Rhododendrites talk \\ 14:06, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
Incidentally, 3 of those five opposed removing the caption 2600:4040:475E:F600:9897:130:9C13:565C (talk) 14:11, 2 September 2023 (UTC)
Rhododendrites, your comment above is a swing and a miss at me. Please do a deep dive into my early-days edits on the article compared with the progress and topic flow of the page. You may find, well, I'll let you describe it, see what you come up with. The crack about other editors not contributing to the article should also be questioned. For instance, the lead caption is what many readers will read first, and if EEng presented the case well on this talk page there is no reason to criticize. Recent attempts to change and add words to the RfD decided caption, and a comment in the summaries about something missing, may offer a chance for some editors from the RfC to look again at both captions and, maybe, "do you miss me yet?" feelings about the former caption may surface. Randy Kryn (talk) 01:21, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
I'd dispute that it was a "swing" as much as illustrating where EEng's sharp kick would actually land if we were measuring time wasted via words here vs. words in the article. YMMV. I'm not keen to spend any more time on this topic, though I'd be curious what the active editors here thought about the double feature sometime. For me, I'm still excited to see Barbie, but found Oppenheimer kind of 'meh'. Kind of an old fashioned way to tell a historical story, sacrificing historical detail, the science, and the contributions of the all of the "minor players" in order to focus on the perspective of a "great man", when that man's perspective, at least through the movie, didn't really provide any insight into the underlying subjects -- just sort of perspective for the sake of making a cinematic biography. And now I'll show myself the door and invite arguments on my talk page :)Rhododendrites talk \\ 03:07, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
But you're neglecting the educational and entertainment value of the discussion. EEng 07:16, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
Apology accepted. Randy Kryn (talk) 10:41, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
I accept my kick in the ass with solemn resolve. jp×g 04:55, 7 September 2023 (UTC)