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Comment by poszlem | Hacker News Reader

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> editors identify as Democrats at about three times the rate of Republicans

This seems to presume that the desireable middle ground would be the average of two US parties. But Wikipedia is global. (Not to imply it would be fine for the US, but that's another argument)

More interesting to me is the study that shows that Wikipedia editors start off being very radical (who else is going to invest the effort required), but moderate significantly over time.

Can't find the link I wanted, it was on HN this year, IIRC.

Exactly what you’d expect given any moderated system. Certainly you can learn what will not be accepted and moderate one’s approach without sctually shifting ideologically.

Counter-evidence: the rest of the internet. Reddit and pretty much all other large Internet sites are highly moderated and radicalize people, they don't moderate them.

Yeah, but Wikipedia doesn't work the same as Reddit. Wikipedia insists on verifiable sources, and wants to be a universal and reliable source of information for everybody. Reddit has no such aspirations (though it can still be remarkably useful at times).

My point is that Reddit is the norm, Wikipedia is the exception.

Could it be this one: https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w22744/w227...

Hmm, how many Democrats do you think should serve in Conservapedia’s editor community?

I don't know, does Conservapedia claim to have NPOV?

No, it does not, hence the name. It is a reaction to the way Wikipedia has been taken over, not an honest effort to create a true encyclopedia.

A better solution would be to create a Wikiproxy which adds the missing viewpoints to Wikipedia articles without throwing out the baby with the bathwater. This will be impossible for some articles which are too heavily slanted but even there such articles can be included as an addendum to real NPOV articles. Such a proxy should do away with the 'Perennial Sources' scam which is used by Wikipedia to keep out dissenting voices, relying on editors to weed out nonsense.

Now that I think of it there might be a way to get something off the ground fairly quickly by creating a 'meta-encyclopedia engine' which pulls in articles from several user-definable sources, e.g. Wikipedia, Britannica, Everything2 and whatever other sources [1] and allows editors to comment on subjects by referring to content from upstream articles as well as by adding their own content.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_online_encyclopedias

:shrug:

Academia has always leaned left - make of that what you will.

Are you suggesting DEI?

I think it just seems that way because at this period in time, truth, science, and facts are seen as left-wing. Although universities have always been interested in exploring new ideas, which probably tends towards progressiveness.

It's probably just that reality has a left wing bias.

Given that early universities were founded by churches, ‘always’ is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.

That's like saying science would be better (more factual) if we required that 50% of scientists be republican.

Social sciences probably would be. Right now it’s just progressives congratulating themselves on the smell of their own farts.

One thing to consider is that Republican affiliation is a minority opinion, so it makes sense that they would be outnumbered in a random sampling, though I would expect 2:1 rather than 3:1.

According to Pew’s most recent National Public Opinion Reference Survey (Feb–Jun 2025), 46% of Americans identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, and 45% identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/fact-sheet/party-affili...

In a truly random U.S. sample you would expect Republican identifiers to be nearly as numerous as Democratic identifiers.

Not sure where you got your numbers from.

Those in the United States who choose to contribute to a collaborative encyclopedia likely don't mirror the population as a whole; it's reasonable to assume they're more formally educated and more technically oriented, traits that tend, on average, to correlate with liberal or left-leaning political views.

I think I may have been working with outdated figures. Things are worse than I thought and I hate the democratic party lol

> Make of that what you will.

Conservatives are making up their own reality as they lie and hate their way through life. What I make of that editor ratio is that Wikipedia will remain truthful and less corrupt when presenting factual information - and not yet another propaganda mouthpiece.

My make of it is the Left wing social values and perceptions of reality are broadly more tolerated than those of the far right that is complaining.

Is an editor "evil" for deleting or debating the addition of a politically charged article? Come on.

I weep for this country: if we had a voting system that allowed multiple parties (>2) to really compete, we could have an intellectually honest right wing.

Can you not just say 'right' without the need to add 'far' in front of it?

Do you consider the left wing to be intellectually honest in your country? If so, why? Could you explain in your own words why the right wing is not intellectually honest while the left wing supposedly is? It all sounds rather strange to me considering the way left-wing politics is so often driven by feelings instead of facts.

You berate me for being specific and then you overgeneralize without providing any personal detail.

The left in the US ranges from "preserving the ante-Trump status quo for the administrative state and rule of law and centrism" to "publicly funded healthcare and more action on climate change".

The right, which to your credit is most of the Republican party, is silent or else cheering the destruction of the United States government and are either tree sonally malicious in their desire to weaken our economy and national security, or path etically ignorant to the fact it's already happened.

The right operates on feelings of misplaced anger and economic and geological ignorance.

> Could you explain in your own words why the right wing is not intellectually honest while the left wing supposedly is?

This one is easy. The right wing is peddling lots of conspiracy theories and misinformation, and is more likely to embrace those that don't originate with them. This isn't just true in US politics (where the effect is blatantly obvious), but it's also something I see (to a lesser degree) in Dutch politics, for example.

I don't know why this is the case, and I don't think it's universally the case, but at this particular moment in history, it's very much the case.

> It all sounds rather strange to me considering the way left-wing politics is so often driven by feelings instead of facts.

I'm afraid the opposite is true. Again, look at US politics, but also for example the irrationality around the Brexit vote. That was entirely driven by feelings, not facts. Conservative politicians promised nonsensical and contradictory things, and obviously were unable to deliver.

> I’ll probably get downvoted

Always happy to oblige.

But honestly, I find this sort of upfront self-victimization annoying and not conducive to honest debate.

> Wikipedia’s volunteer editor community leans heavily left wing politically.

I think they lean heavily towards verifiable facts. In some countries, those may be the same thing, but I don't think that's universally the case.

Your prediction was right, of course.

Hacker News has become like Reddit, where facts and logical arguments don’t matter. If your post isn’t sufficiently leftist, it will be downvoted.

It’s a pity, and it reflects badly on the left. They have some crazies in their camp.

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