Talk:Forward Party (United States)/Archive 1

Article professionalism

Independent of discussions over whether this page should be merged or kept, the initial description of this party in the first two paragraphs reeks of overt bias as it is giving a rosy and unfounded look at the "movement" to create this party and whether its beliefs are the "core tenants" of alleviating political polarization or merely the opinion of a single author over what is causing polarization and what solutions to prescribe it. If kept I believe it needs cleaning up to sound more professional and encyclopedic — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cabbagenkings (talk • contribs) 02:38, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Since, according to itself, Forward is not at present registered as a political party, the various instances referring to it as a "Party" seem in and of themselves biased. As stated above, listing the party's core tenets verbatim is also not quite encyclopedic, if you ask me. JebtheTree (talk) 22:48, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

The article is perfect. Lostfan333 (talk) 02:33, 7 October 2021 (UTC)

KEEP?

keep, duh. don't be a normie — Preceding unsigned comment added by C.S.Day09 (talk • contribs) 20:31, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Ideology

I may be wrong, but I was under the impression that Wikipedia only uses established ideological labels in the "Ideology" section of the infobox. "Human-centered capitalism" (which, sure enough, links to an article about Yang's 2020 campaign) is not an established ideology. It's more of a slogan. JebtheTree (talk) 22:51, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

To all the people edit-warring the ideology section, let's try discussing here like adults to form a consensus. This is Wiki, not Twitter. JebtheTree (talk) 18:37, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

JebtheTree, I mean it's not particularly edit war-y, things like "electoral reform" just aren't ideologies. Curbon7 (talk) 18:52, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

I agree with your perspective, but I think it's a matter of wiki procedure. Gotta get our perspective out (policy planks like electoral reform aren't ideology, slogans like "human-centered capitalism" aren't ideology), the other guys to explain how those things are ideologies, and resolve the question one way or another. JebtheTree (talk) 18:56, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Hey, Mt.FijiBoiz, can you pop in here? I'd like to understand your perspective on this whole topic, and preferably stop the edit war going on. JebtheTree (talk) 20:18, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

I disagree that there is any edit warring going on - just editors editing; there doesn't appear to be any malicious reverts or edits occurring. Electoral reform and economic reform are valid ideologies - electoral reform in particular is included as the ideology of numerous political parties on their Wikipedia page, including the Reform Party of the United States of America. As for "Human-Centered Capitalism", this isn't just a slogan but the Forward Party's espoused ideology. It doesn't matter that only the Forward Party is the only party to uphold Human-Centered Capitalism, Wikipedia lists what parties state their ideology is - it doesn't matter if random editors think "it isn't a real ideology". For instance, Socialism with Chinese characteristics is an ideology upheld and espoused by the Chinese Communist Party and no other party but Wikipedia still lists it as their ideology. "Socialism with Namibian characteristics", which doesn't have a Wikipedia article, is listed as the SWAPO Party's ideology even though they are the only party to uphold and espouse this ideology. It wouldn't make sense to list simply socialism on the SWAPO page because they claim to follow a distinct ideology ("Socialism with Namibian characteristics"), just like it wouldn't make sense to not list Human-Centered Capitalism on the Forward Party or listing simply capitalism on the page. Mt.FijiBoiz (talk) 20:32, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

On the question of whether this is an edit war, the fact that we haven't been using the "revert" button doesn't negate the fact that we've been adding and deleting these same three sentences.

As for the point about "not a real ideology", I can't find anywhere on the website where the Forward Party claims "Human-Centered Capitalism" is its ideology. It is listed as a value, which means that classing it as an ideology was already a presumption by us Wiki users - and the point I'm trying to get at is that that presumption is dubious. Re: Electoral reform & economic reform, okay. JebtheTree (talk) 20:47, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Ignoring "Human-centered capitalism", which I have no qualms with tbh, I think we can all agree that "Economic reform" and "Electoral reform" are not ideologies, but just political positions. Curbon7 (talk) 04:41, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Allow me to rephrase my qualms with "Human-centered capitalism": on the Forward Party's website, it is listed in the same breath as - among others - "Grace and Tolerance". Therefore, the judgement of why we class "Human-centered capitalism" as an ideology, and "Grace and Tolerance" not as an ideology, is a subjective one. Thus, in that subjective judgement, I argue that "human-centered capitalism", which isn't described as an ideology anywhere else, shouldn't be something that we proclaim to be an ideology.

tl;dr: Forward/Yang aren't calling it an ideology per se, and no one else does, so I don't see why we should. JebtheTree (talk) 20:00, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

I see no valid argument for the deletion or merge of the Forward Party article.

In general, I would be interested to hear any arguments for the negative consequences of keeping any existing article--provided that it is about a genuine entity in the world. The Forward Party exists. It is not Andrew Yang. Why should there NOT be an article about it? Other than a negligible increase in server costs and an even milder affect on search efficiency, I think you'd be hard-pressed to even make a case for why an article about an actual political entity shouldn't exist. Obviously there are plenty of reasons to edit or correct an article, and if such errors exist, then by all means correct them. Though he founded it, The Forward Party is NOT Andrew Yang, and it is reasonable to expect the party (and the article) to grow independently of Andrew Yang. At the very least, I can say it already served a useful purpose, for I myself found it valuable in linking me to the Forward Party's website. Googling "Forward Party" brought me first to Wikipedia, and I'd have had a harder time trying to find the link by scrolling through Andrew Yang's article. Additionally, I'd urge everyone to be wary of attempts at censorship. Articles of a political nature are likely to attract attempts at censorship. Does acknowledging this reality indicate my failure to assume good faith? Perhaps. But I speak not of any particular case, but simply of the importance of acknowledging that if anyone were to attempt censorship of a Wikipedia article, this is precisely the sort of article where we should expect to see it. 76.189.243.122 (talk) 01:32, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

I agree completely Lostfan333 (talk) 03:08, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

The deletion debate - as I see it - is about whether the Forward Party really is an entity independent of Andrew Yang. At present, there's a strong case to be made that it is not, kinda like Kanye West's "Birthday Party". JebtheTree (talk) 21:53, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Policies

I've just completed a rewrite of the "policies" section. It's now written in complete sentences, consolidated, and (I hope) more encyclopedic in language. I think this section would greatly benefit if it were reinforced with further third-party sources, but I think it's better now than it was before. JebtheTree (talk) 20:16, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Is Jacobin a reliable source for the political position of the Forward Party?

The claim that the Forward Party is "Center-right" is backed up by Jacobin, a source which is considered to be only marginally reliable by WP:RSP. Are there more reliable sources that discuss the political position of the Forward Party? X-Editor (talk) 01:12, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

There was a Business Insider article that described the party as centrist, but it was removed in this edit [1]. David O. Johnson (talk) 01:50, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

I do not think we should try to find a different source. Jacobin's 'problem' here is being openly leftist and thus biased towards said worldview, but for an article to prove whether Yang's party is in the center-right or centrist as it is self-described, an analysis and justification would be needed, and there is simply no manner in which this analysis couldn't be biased as the nature and conclusion of it will be determined by the writer's ideology.

TL;DR: any article that could be used as a source for the political position, will be biased. Jacobin's is merely one case of this happening.

P.S: the Business Insider article did not mention the party being centrist, hence I removed it in favor of the Jacobin one Fasscass (talk) 02:15, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

I also don't feel that the Jacobin article should be included. Aside from it being noted on WP:RSP as "no better than marginally reliable", it's bias of editorial opinions to the extreme left doesn't make it a reputable source for discussing a radical centrist movement. They're not really known for their factual reporting but more of an opinion and analysis magazine from a socialist perspective. Bailmoney27 ^talk 03:22, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

I don't think we should keep the Business Insider source. David O. Johnson (talk) 02:46, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

No worries, it's been removed for 4 days now Fasscass (talk) 04:02, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

I meant to say the Jacobin source. David O. Johnson (talk) 04:11, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

Please elaborate. If the justification is that it is biased, then please reply to my first comment instead as it would disagree with that idea. Fasscass (talk) 04:40, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

• @Fasscass: Note that you’re on the record as saying that biased sources can’t be used at all, at least thats what you’re arguing over at Talk:Dictator. Why is Jacobin usable but Freedom House isn’t? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:52, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

No need to use fallacious arguments and strawmen.

"TL;DR: any article that could be used as a source for the political position, will be biased. Jacobin's is merely one case of this happening."

Fasscass (talk) 23:07, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

So you oppose the use of Jacobin here? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:35, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

• @Mt.FijiBoiz: Do you have reason to believe that Yang's policy leanings have changed since his mayoral run? As far as I know, his policies have stayed consistent from presidential run till now. At the least, all 8 core principles of the Forward Party have always been present - Yuurt (talk) 23:21, 19 October 2021 (UTC)
  • I don't believe that Yang's positions have changed but you can't use a source for Yang's mayoral race for the Forward Party. The source predates the founding of the party. Yang sources ≠ the Forward Party sources. Mt.FijiBoiz (talk) 00:45, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

Valid Criticism?

Can we try to find more valid criticism? Obviously this doesn't make any sense: "why bother going through the trouble of building a third party if its creation is the only thing it intends to accomplish?" The Forward party has a number of platform topics that they are trying to accomplish, not just "creating a new party." There should be lots of valid criticism, but I don't think this seems to make any sense. You can see the platform here: https://www.forwardparty.com/platform. One stated purpose of the forward party is to do for Ranked Choice Voting and Open primaries what Yang did for UBI. Myclob (talk) 16:44, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Other than the opening sentence that states some Democrats worry about splitting the vote, the rest of this section is a thin collection of quotes from sources—either leftwing or institutionalist—that oppose the existence of Forward, and either misrepresent it or take potshots. It does nothing to advance the conversation. As mentioned above, valid criticism about the danger of splitting opposition or about actual party platform or leadership is welcome, but not snide remarks from opinion writers. PFR (talk) 23:04, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

Not populism, remove it from ideology?

Remove? 2600:1010:B049:D24:E847:46FB:6ECD:CF98 (talk) 15:13, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

Why not populism? That appears to be the *core* of the Party's political ideology. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:16, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

Position

I have read the 'Political positions' section, and it seems to me this party is much more left-wing than the Democratic Party. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.144.246.65 (talk) 19:46, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

At the time of this comment, the position section described the original Forward Party PAC founded by Andrew Yang. The platform of the new Forward Party organization (merged from RAM and SAM and FWD) need to be added to the article. JHelzer💬 04:58, 15 August 2022 (UTC)