Wikipedia:Peer review/List of ballot initiatives to repeal LGBT anti-discrimination laws/archive1

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List of ballot initiatives to repeal LGBT anti-discrimination laws[edit]

This peer review discussion has been closed.
This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because while it's a new list I believe it has the potential to attain featured status. I know there are a few items missing sources yet but other than that I'd appreciate feedback with FL status in mind.

Thanks, Otto4711 (talk) 04:16, 3 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The picture is definitely replaceable. Consider writing to one of the organizations that was involved - the Maine gay rights group often puts videos up on YouTube, I'm sure they could provide a pic of them working against a repeal. I'm also not sure domestic partnerships fall under LGBT anti-discrimination laws, those should be available to people regardless of whether they are single or not. Hekerui (talk) 13:41, 4 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I think the title does need to be adjusted to make clear that the article is only dealing with the US. Otumba (talk) 14:26, 4 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Brianboulton comments: Fascinating stuff. I have a few, mainly low-key issues.

  • Say where Ann Arbor is, for the benefit of non-Americans
  • "them" at end of second sentence is undefined. Suggest reorganize the sentence: "In response, opponents began organizing campaigns to place measures on their local ballots to repeal these anti-discrimination laws."
  • In the lead the first repeal activity mentioned is that relating to the Miami-Dade ordinance. In the table, this is preceded by Boulder, Colorado, three years earlier. Shouldn't the earlier repeal be mentioned in the lead as the first of such?
  • The "Oregon measure" needs to be clearly identified in the lead as "Measure 9", which is how it is referred to later.
  • "proactively prohibit"? Not sure about the adverb usage here. The amendments sought to prohibit, not to "proactively" prohibit (whatever that means).
  • "Oregon and two other states, Idaho and Maine, had initiatives..." Wouldn't "faced initiatives" be better than "had initiatives"?
  • "...several municipalities within Oregon passed local measures." Unless I am misreading the table, about 27 localities passed repeal legislation. That is not within the definition of "several".
  • "These amendments are listed here." That's a bit vague. Specify which table you mean.
  • Ambiguous: "These ordinances also became targets of repeal efforts, with opponents having much less success." Opponents of the ordinances, or opponents of the repeal efforts?
  • In the first table, some of the "outcomes" notes are a bit confusing. For example, "Defeated with 63% of the vote" presumably means "Defeated with 63% of the vote against repeal". There are other similar entries which need clarification.
  • In the Oregon table, vote outcomes are given in a few cases, but mainly not. Any reason?
  • Third table: again votes are indicated in one case but not the others.
  • Last entry: It would be interesting to know what rights these couples will lose if repeal succeeds, as well as the ones they will retain.
  • References: access dates:-
    • What are the access dates for refs 6 and 11?
    • A consistent format for access dates shold be used. See ref 21

I can't comment on the completeness/accuracy of these details, but it looks a sound piece of work. On the question of title, I suppose "US" ought to be fitted in somewhere, but the title is already one of the longest in the encyclopedia, so take care. Brianboulton (talk) 16:19, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thanks for the comments. Seems to be cosmetic/stylistic fixes for the most part, but to address the larger points:
  • I don't talk about Boulder in the lead because, while it was first, it didn't seem to get much national play. It was a local story and treated as a local story. Whereas Anita and her hit squads were an enormous national if not international story, so leading with them seems the better choice.
  • Vote outcomes in the Oregon table and elsewhere are included based on whether the sources I could find included them. If they did I put them in. If not I simply said passed or passed by whatever general margin (2-1, 5-1, whatever) was mentioned. For some of those Oregon ones, the only confirmation I could find was an overview story that included verbiage like "to date voters in Foo, Boo, Moo, Noo, Roo and Yoo have all approved ordinances". Strangely, in many cases there would be several sources in the days leading up to the election along the lines of "voters will face contentious issues in Tuesday's election" but then no source from immediately after the election with results would surface. I have a source (appendix for a research paper) that lists percentages for all of the votes but I am unable to confirm that the source meets WP:RS. Otto4711 (talk) 19:20, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]