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label text (roudn 1)

languages/i18n/en.json

Includes message defaults:

These are seen on the user preferences configuration page here: Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-personal.

We do not currently have any of these customized. Following up from a discussion with SandyGeorgia, it seems the labels may suggest that these selections are prescriptive vs illustrative, specifically that the "unknown" (undefined default) option suggests that an editor "prefers" to be called a "they" vs just preferring to not share this value.

I'm suggesting changing these to focus on the illustrative nature, perhaps:

  • When mentioning you, the software will use gender neutral terms when possible (e.g. "their settings")
  • When mentioning you, the software will use feminine terms when possible (e.g. "her settings")
  • When mentioning you, the software will use masculine terms when possible (e.g. "his settings")

If this workshops well, we could backport it to the core messages. Any objections? (Opening the sudo above to attract patrolling admins). — xaosflux Talk 18:11, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply

Is the preference used when the software refers to the logged-in user, a generic user, both, or something else not covered by those choices?
Is this preference used by the GENDER: magic keyword, or does the keyword use another preference setting? isaacl ( talk) 18:35, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
@ Isaacl: I'm not looking at changing any of the "mechanics" of the gender functions - just to better explain the options on the preferences page. Not-logged-in IP's default to the notknown setting. — xaosflux Talk 18:45, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
Yes, I understand; I'm trying to understand how the preference is currently used so I can better suggest ways to explain the options. isaacl ( talk) 18:47, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
Specifically, these settings are not designed to be asking "What is your sex?", "What is your gender?", and to the point that started this "Do you prefer to be identified with the gender pronoun 'they'?". That being said, if you don't specify one, messages may end up calling you a they - but they could also call you other things as decided by message authors. — xaosflux Talk 19:08, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
True enough that templates like {{ He or she}}, {{ they}}, {{ gender}}, {{ pronoun}} and so forth still leave it up to the person using them to decide what pronoun to use, by deciding what template to use and what parameters to provide. Unfortunately they seem to be getting promoted as a one-size-fits-all solution to a greater extent than they really are. For the preference, I suggest the following wording:
Gender used in messages:
  • Use gender-neutral terms when possible (e.g. "their contribution") – default
  • Use feminine terms when possible (e.g. "her contribution")
  • Use masculine terms when possible (e.g. "his contribution")
Setting this preference is optional. The software uses its value to address you and to mention you to others using the appropriate grammatical gender. This information will be public.
isaacl ( talk) 19:56, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
  • I think we should modify MediaWiki:Yourgender To have the intro be: "What terms should the software use when mentioning you?" This makes it clear, up front, what this setting is for. While we have templates that editors can use to incorporate this info into talk page messages, in my experience they are exceedingly rare (if that changes I'd support reevaluating the characterization here). With that in place, I think the wording Isaac suggests for each individual option is good. In general tough, I support any change that makes it clear that the choice is largely a software configuration, not something that editors will necessarily use or know about. — Wug· a·po·des​ 22:25, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    @ Wugapodes: note, the setting on this is public and things like navigation popups to show this (hover my name if you have that enabled). — xaosflux Talk 22:27, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    Oh yes, I assumed we wouldn't be changing that part of the message; the public nature of the setting should be very clear to users. When I say "use or know about" it's not that editors can't access it, but rather, being able to do so requires a bit of esoteric knowledge that most editors either won't have or won't use. Even I'm not sure about what navigation popup setting you're talking about; I just get "User:Xaosflux" as a tooltip, and I wouldn't know where to go to enable the feature you're talking about (nothing jumped out at me when I quickly glanced at the betas and gadgets). For most new, casual, or inexperienced editors toying with their settings, they probably see this as a "choose your pronouns" switch. Most of our users, when asked about gender and pronouns, expect it to be normative or prescriptive---it will be easily available and so everyone (not just the system software) would be expected to know and use it. That's not really how this is used (for now), and if we don't make the difference from typical expectations clear, it could create conflicts we would rather avoid. Hopefully that makes sense? — Wug· a·po·des​ 22:45, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    @ Wugapodes: if you have Wikipedia:Tools/Navigation popups (from Gadgets) and you hover me, you should also see the list of my user groups, right before "abusefilter" you should see the "male" symbol (compared to yours that has no symbol). — xaosflux Talk 00:21, 3 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    Oh, cool, didn't know we had that---I'd just been using the beta/default pop-ups that readers get. Do we have usage stats on that gadget? How would I find them? At the VP discussion I advocated writing guidance, so that would be a great tool to recommend, and usage stats would be a good metric to measure impact. Anyway, to the issue at hand, I really like isaac's proposed wording after sleeping on it. What's teh roadmap for implementing this? — Wug· a·po·des​ 23:06, 3 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    @ Wugapodes: according to Special:GadgetUsage there are ~54,000 editors that opted in to navpopups (it is the most popular optional gadget). I've got to mock this up over at testwiki to make sure I don't break anything with formatting across the skins - no one seems to think this is a bad idea - just have to make a little time for it. — xaosflux Talk 00:12, 4 March 2021 (UTC) reply
    Well, I won't go through all of them... they has the most of the four I listed, with 1566 transclusions. gender comes next with 498; he or she has 216; and pronoun just has 48. isaacl ( talk) 22:49, 2 March 2021 (UTC) reply
  • I'm not a fan of local solutions to global problems. Couldn't the default messages themselves be changed? Nardog ( talk) 03:23, 4 March 2021 (UTC) reply
  • @ Wugapodes and Isaacl: I set the examples on testwiki, you can see them at testwiki:Special:Preferences. Take a look in there and let me know if you see any issues. @ Nardog: I agree, if we can settle on something that is both "better" and wanted I'll file a request to have the mediawiki default changed and we can revert back to it - its much simpler to tweak locally in case there are a few rounds of updates to make as many people happy as possible. — xaosflux Talk 03:29, 4 March 2021 (UTC) reply

July 2021 follow up from UTJW

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T61643
See Special:PermaLink/1032799354#They/Them for more background. — xaosflux Talk 19:01, 9 July 2021 (UTC) reply
  • One can read that discussion for background information. Briefly put, I would propose the addition of a true 'unspecified' option, which does not enforce the use of any specific pronouns. Instead of using a pronoun, it would use 'this user'. RGloucester — ☎ 20:03, 9 July 2021 (UTC) reply
    @ RGloucester, what do you expect the software to do with a true 'unspecified' option? How would you expect that to work in the other languages you're familiar with? Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 02:26, 10 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I don't even know what 'software' is, so I'm not sure how you expect me to answer. All that I am asking for is a return of the ability to mark one's gender as 'unspecified'. The option previously existed, without the imposition of 'they' pronouns. 'They' should be an option for those who choose to publicly express a gender neutral or non-binary identity, but it should not be imposed on people who do not express a preference for it, and prefer to have their gender identity undisclosed. I am one of those people, and it seems that SandyGeorgia previously expressed a similar opinion. As for other languages, that's beyond my understanding, but given that this option existed previously without the imposition of 'they' pronouns, I cannot see why there should be a problem. I do not see why such an option could not replace the pronouns used in system messages, various templates, &c., with 'this user' or 'this user's'. RGloucester — ☎ 03:15, 10 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I am pretty sure I agree with RGloucester. I suspect (unsure?) that one of the issues in other languages (for example, Spanish), is the need for gender. And, people like me who don't care ... probably also don't care ...that Spanish may default to male. Really don't care, and don't like that Wikipedia is forcing me to take a stand when ... I don't. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 18:06, 10 July 2021 (UTC) reply
The English Wikipedia has customized this locally. You can see the default wording on Meta-Wiki at m:Special:Preferences, which says:
How do you prefer to be described?
  • They edit wiki pages (When mentioning you, the software will use gender neutral words whenever possible)
  • She edits wiki pages
  • He edits wiki pages
Setting this preference is optional. The software uses its value to address you and to mention you to others using the appropriate grammatical gender. This information will be public.
In 2008, when this screenshot of Special:Preferences was made, there was no prefs setting related to gender. The original text at the top, from about 2009, was the single word "Gender:" The options were – and still are – unknown, she, and he.
How "unknown" (the default) gets handled depends on the language. As far as I can remember, English has always used the singular they for the default option. See, e.g., MediaWiki:Editinguserpage, which has said "Note: You are editing a user page. To leave this user a message, [$1 edit their talk page]." since 2011. The first version of the prefs might not have told you that was the style that would be used, but it actually was the style that got used in English for accounts with an unknown gender.
Most of this is not visible in English. As an example, apparently past-tense verbs indicate gender in Russian, so if you want Special:Log/move to report that "WhatamIdoing moved page Example to Name" – a sentence that gives no indication of anyone's gender in English – you need to write "WhatamIdoing переместил страницу Example в Name" if you think I'm a man, but "WhatamIdoing переместила страницу Example в Name" if you think I'm a woman. Unknown genders (including bots) get the masculine wording in Russian, and this seems to be generally true in most heavily gendered languages. Some translators go to a lot of trouble to avoid gendered words, which is great. I understand that it's manageable in some languages, and impossible in others. Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 01:02, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
Thank you for this explanation. If it is true that this is a problem specific to customisation on the English Wikipedia, then I suppose we don't have to worry about other languages at all. In that case, I would like to renew my request for a differentiation between a 'non-binary' option, and an 'unspecified' option. This setting has become increasingly used by templates on the English Wikipedia to determine what pronouns are used on-Wiki to refer to a specific user, and in this situation, it is inappropriate to have people being referred to with the wrong pronouns as a result. RGloucester — ☎ 16:18, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
Did you see that the mediawiki default is to pick between "they, she, or he"? We've tried to help explain here that this is only an illustration of what you may see - not how you "identify". — xaosflux Talk 16:51, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
Multiple people have also tried to help explain to you that these settings are increasingly being used on the English Wikipedia by templates and gadgets to refer to people. I do not want to see 'they' in reference to myself. I am not 'they', nor have I ever consented to being referred to as 'they'. At the time I selected 'unspecified', there was no indication that it would result in me being referred to as 'they', whether by the 'software' or otherwise. Picking 'unspecified' does not mean that one wants to be referred to with 'they' pronouns, whether by the software or otherwise. What is hard to understand? RGloucester — ☎ 17:18, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I was only clarifying that the usage of the word "they" on the preferences page here was not some "specific to customisation on the English Wikipedia". We can make it clearer that the value for this is actually stored as "unspecified" on the pref page, but that will have no bearing what people do with templates, etc -- and certainly no bearing on how editors actually refer to other editors manually. — xaosflux Talk 18:11, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
If, for some reason, you do not want to add additional options, or at the very least, change what presently uses 'they' to use 'this user', you might consider removing the ability of templates/gadgets to draw from this function. You continue to push the idea that this option is a mere technical formality, but this is not how it is actually being used in practice. RGloucester — ☎ 18:19, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
@ RGloucester: we (the editors/admins/etc here on the English Wikipedia) are not technically capable of adding more values to the backend database. You may certainly request at by filing an enhancement request on phabricator (c.f. WP:BUG). All we can do on the preferences page is to adjust what the label next to the button says. As far as any template/module/gadget/ or some other label says - the place to request improvements to them is on the associated talk page of said component. (For example, if you want navigation popups to be different you can discuss it at Wikipedia talk:Tools/Navigation popups. I do think there is room for further improvement to these specific labels on the pref page though - and will mock something up. — xaosflux Talk 20:22, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
@ RGloucester, what pronouns do you want people to use to refer to you? Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 22:13, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
The whole point of my clicking the 'unspecified' option is that I prefer not to disclose my preference. Given that the option that we are discussing is apparently purely technical in nature, I see no reason why any pronouns need to be used at all. 'This user', 'this user's, should suffice. RGloucester — ☎ 22:26, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
First, you probably didn't actually click the 'unspecified' option, because that's the default. Your account came with that setting pre-clicked.
Second, it's not purely technical. Actual humans look up your public preference setting so that they know how to address you in plain old words. Now, some of us might wander over to your talk page and guess that anyone who's username is a reference to Richard III of England could fairly be addressed as he (perhaps also My Lord Duke and His Grace, if we are trying to be funny and want to confine ourselves to the pre-reign titles), but flesh-and-blood people looking at your prefs setting (e.g., via WP:NAVPOPS, which says he/him for male, she/her for female, and nothing for the default option) are going to see that there's no information about gender, and they will have to make a purely human-enacted decision about how to refer to a person whose gender is unknown. Different editors will make different decisions. For myself, I often substitute the editor's username (because it has the additional virtue of providing absolute clarity about which person I'm speaking about), but even I will sometimes want to avoid repeating the same username many times in quick succession. Many choose to use the singular they in the absence of any other information. Others may play the odds and guess he/him. Do you want to establish a standard for the English Wikipedia that people aren't allowed to use personal pronouns to refer to each other unless those pronouns are explicitly stated? Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 22:42, 13 July 2021 (UTC) reply
No, I actually intentionally clicked the unspecified option not long I after I made this account. I remember it distinctly, and it was a very intentional choice, as I have a complicated relationship with matters of gender identity. Now it seems you are contradicting Xaosflux, who said many times that this preference was not one of 'identity' or public preference, but rather something narrowly used by a few system messages (at least on the English Wikipedia). Which is it? If it truly is one of identity, then I must absolutely object to being forcibly referred to by 'they' pronouns. I am less concerned with how actual people refer to me in normal conversation on Wikipedia. They are free to use whatever they like. What I do not accept is that my checking of the 'unspecified' setting now implies that I use or prefer they pronouns, when I do not, and furthermore, that it displays they pronouns in reference to me on templates, &c. Unspecified means 'unspecified', not 'they'. As I said in the discussion at Mr Wales' talk page, I was forced to remove the talk header template because it was changed to use they pronouns for people with the unspecified box checked. Can you not see that this is a problem? RGloucester — ☎ 00:17, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
The database doesn't know what "identity" means. It records whether you have clicked the radio button next to MediaWiki:Gender-notknown, MediaWiki:Gender-female, or MediaWiki:Gender-male (or nothing, in which case you get the default, which is the "notknown" option). That's what the software does.
Humans then write things, such as Template:Talk header and WP:NAVPOPS and Special:Log, that look up the database setting and modify their behavior according to their own human understanding of the rules for the language they're working in.
For example, after a short discussion, @ Sdkb changed Template:Talk header to call Template:Gender. That template, in turn, was changed to use singular they in 2016 (it originally followed the male as norm language model), with the discussion on its talk page pointing at an apparent consensus formed in this earlier discussion on another page (which AFAICS was a general conversation and didn't mention that template by name at all).
I don't really see a practical way to prevent English-speaking humans from deciding that an unspecified gender should not be associated with singular they. Right now, the database records three options, and humans decided that the first/default option in the list should often be referred to with singular they. Let's imagine that we add a fourth option: "notknown", female, male, and non-binary.
I expect that editors would then program templates such as Template:Gender to use singular they for both "notknown" and non-binary. There isn't any way for the prefs database to force template writers to use something other than singular they when referring to editors of an unknown gender. I therefore think that the way to reduce the use of singular they here is to establish a local guideline that says template creators at the English Wikipedia shouldn't use singular they for editors who haven't specified an alternative. However, I'm very doubtful about this being feasible. Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 21:22, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I am not suggesting you take some kind of action to regulate individual human editors, creators of template, &c. Those things can be dealt with as and when they arise. Simply put, all I desire is the ability to express my preference, and presently, the system is not allowing for this by its lumping together of openly non-binary editors and those who choose not to disclose their identity. RGloucester — ☎ 21:51, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I seem to recall (and could be wrong here!) that at one point this value was initially uninitiated and a "not known" value was default, as opposed to the "unspecified" option, the message outputs for those were the same and this may have been combined on the back end as it didn't matter for messaging if the reason it was unspecified was because of default or user selection. — xaosflux Talk 10:06, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
I've never seen evidence of a fourth option, and if anyone ever clicked it, the non-default option should have appeared in Wikipedia:Database reports/User preferences (which it didn't).
I believe in practice that there are (or at least were) four settings in the database: it was sometimes possible to tell the difference between a person who had never set a preference and a person who had set the pref and then switched back to the pref that currently happens to be the default. However, in practice, not selecting is treated exactly the same as selecting the default. The only time that can make any difference is when the default is being changed.
(Imagine two editors who created their accounts when MonoBook was default. One went to prefs and tried out each of the listed skins, and then decided MonoBook was best and switched back to it. The other never looked in their prefs. Both see MonoBook, but their prefs settings are recorded as "MonoBook" and nothing [i.e., the default]. When Vector was introduced, the first editor needed to change the prefs setting to get Vector, and the second editor would have remained 'default', but they'd both see Vector after that. When your choice matches the default, specifying your choice has no practical effect.) Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 21:32, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply

While there is certainly still room for improvement, I've updated our local label in Special:Preferences to indicate that the default option is "unspecified" right now. — xaosflux Talk 10:06, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply

This is indeed an improvement, and it is greatly appreciated. However, I would suggest that whomever is in charge of the broader software consider expanding the options available, given that, as the Wikimedia Foundation's representative above has specified, this has now become a matter of public preference, and indeed identity. This setting is not fit for purpose in the current era. RGloucester — ☎ 14:56, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
Will keep looking for what we can do locally as well. Just as a reference (and I 100% know this is not binding in any way) the APA style guide was updated to use singular they for those of unknown or unspecified genders in formal writing. Ref1 — xaosflux Talk 15:34, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
Yes, but you may consider that, at present, people who do not use the masculine he or feminine she presently have no option other than 'unspecified'. In other words, a substantial number of people are being excluded altogether from being able to make their preference known. If this were a mere technicality, then perhaps it would not matter, but as I've repeated time and time again, and as has been stated by the Foundation envoy above, this is not actually the case in practice. But, I shall finish my involvement here for the time being. I look forward to any potential improvements. RGloucester — ☎ 17:08, 14 July 2021 (UTC) reply
@ Xaosflux, what do you think about updating MediaWiki:Gender-notknown to give another example? It could say '(e.g., "their contributions" or "the editor's contributions")'. Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 19:44, 24 September 2021 (UTC) reply
@ Whatamidoing (WMF): I suppose "as an example" it should be relevant to somewhere it is actually used - is that "the editor's" phraseology actually deployed anywhere? — xaosflux Talk 20:09, 24 September 2021 (UTC) reply
I don't know. I'm not entirely certain that "their contributions" is used anywhere controlled by this setting, either; I couldn't find that phrase anywhere in Translatewiki.net, but it's a difficult site to search, so maybe I just missed it. MediaWiki:Gadget-modrollback uses singular they, but it's static text that doesn't respect the prefs settings, just like MediaWiki:Abusefilter-warning-userpage says "this editor" for everyone. MediaWiki:Emailpagetext currently uses the prefs setting for he knows/she knows/they know, but it could just as easily (in English) use the setting to say he/she/this editor knows. MediaWiki:Tooltip-t-contributions/en says "this user", and is tagged to respect the prefs setting for "this user", but there is no difference in English. Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 05:07, 25 September 2021 (UTC) reply
@ Whatamidoing (WMF): messages such as That user has not had {{GENDER:$1|his|her|their}} autoconfirmed status suspended (from MediaWiki:Abusefilter-reautoconfirm-none) do exist, and seem to be using correct grammar to me. I suppose we can always use this for custom localizations, I added the example "that editor" to the label though. — xaosflux Talk 10:13, 25 September 2021 (UTC) reply
Thanks for updating MediaWiki:Gender-notknown. Perhaps it will be a little clearer.
I wouldn't change MediaWiki:Abusefilter-reautoconfirm-none. "That user has not had that user's autoconfirmed status suspended" would be awkward, even though technically grammatically correct. Whatamidoing (WMF) ( talk) 19:43, 28 September 2021 (UTC) reply
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