Talk:Boxer Rebellion

Picture

Rather boys-own looking and US/west-centric ... Can we change it to show more actual focus on the rebellion aspect? 2A0A:EF40:8B9:D701:25F7:6692:257A:7F6 (talk) 15:40, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

No, the current pictures shows the largest battle of the war and showed a soldier who is very notable. LuxembourgLover (talk) 16:53, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm open to it, and the description of "boys-own looking" is quite correct. But it's better for someone to bring forward a specific alternative which we can use under the policies and directly compare the current picture to. JArthur1984 (talk) 13:39, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

We should change it back to a battle in accordance with what most war pages do since a map does not exist. I don't understand why we want to "change it to show more actual focus on the rebellion aspect" when Boxer movement exists. The Boxer Rebellion is not understood as a movement but as a war or intervention. I believe we should change it back. ReidLark1n (talk) 13:31, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree, this was a major war. I perfer the original infobox that included three pictures and information on what parts of the British Empier helped. LuxembourgLover (talk) 23:38, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I support making a four-quadrant infobox as a compromise with the 3 old infoxbox images plus the current one (even though it's already in Boxer movement where I personally believe it belongs). That should correct the issue raised by Parsecboy about the infobox being too long. However we need to get JArthur1984 on board since they've reverted changes to the current image which they changed it to. JArthur1984 would you support the old infobox in four-quadrants with your Boxer movement picture? ReidLark1n (talk) 16:32, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds like a solid compromise. JArthur1984 (talk) 16:42, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

This points to a problem: the article title is "Boxer Rebellion" (though I am among those who think it should be "Boxer Uprising") not "Boxer War." So I support the quest for at least a picture that has something to do with the Boxer Rebellion or Uprising. Maybe a map? ch (talk)

Leadership

I think the art article should have a leadership for the national leaders of governments and military during the war. This is a list of the major leaders:

China: Empress Dowager Cixi, Guangxu Emperor

United Kingdom: Queen Victoria, Lord Salisbury, William St John Brodrick (Secretary of State for War)

Germany: Kaiser Wilhelm II, Bernhard von Bülow (Chancellor)

France: President Émile Loubet, Waldeck-Rousseau (PM) Gaston de Galliffet (Minister of War)

Russia: Tsar Nicholas II, Sergei Witte

United States: President William McKinley, Elihu Root (Secretary of War)

Japan: Emperor Meiji, Yamagata Aritomo (PM) Katsura Tarō (Minister of War)

Italy: King Umberto IGiuseppe Saracco(PM) Coriolano Ponza di San Martino (Minister of War)

Austria-Hungary: Emperor Franz Joseph Ernest von Koerber(PM) Edmund von Krieghammer (Minister of War) LuxembourgLover (talk) 13:27, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

For some sources: US Government, Russia, United Kingdom and others. LuxembourgLover (talk) 13:30, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Was any of them actually in China? The Banner talk 23:00, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

This was not an official war declared by any country except China, and the formalities (like Queen Victoria) are not relevant. The article is too long and too complex in the first place. Rjensen (talk) 10:15, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree, this article is very long, we could split, this war saw a lot of commanders. LuxembourgLover (talk) 22:14, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

James Madison was not in africa duing the Barbery Wars, yet he was heavy mentoned and had involment. Just like McKinley during the Boxer War. LuxembourgLover (talk) 22:16, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

The classic WP:OTHERSTUFF EXISTS again. And if you did your homework properly: 1) Madison was not a president during the First Barbary War; 2) de jure, there was no war with the Second Barbary War as the US never formally declared war. Yes, there was turmoil and fighting but formally no war. The Banner talk 22:44, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

What are you talking about? First off I never said Madison was presedent with the First Barbary War. I just said we should add leaders somewhere. Both the boxer rebellion and the Barbery Wars where not declared wars. I do not know what you are talking about. LuxembourgLover (talk) 22:49, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

The point is that infoboxes are for listing key information about a given topic. If figures aren't important to the actual historical event, they shouldn't be uselessly taking up the space. Almost none of the figures you've listed above had any significant involvement in the conflict in their own right. Remsense诉 23:42, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Also @Havsjö, if you think the selection of leaders in the infobox is presently arbitrary, I would agree: but let's do things in the right order and mention them in the article first before we add a summary that doesn't correspond to anything in the body. Remsense诉 11:14, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

@141.155.35.58 and @Qiushufang please stop the edit war and uses this or releated talk page to discuss what leaders we should mention. I still support a separate article or section on military and political leaders. LuxembourgLover (talk) 19:37, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

To add to article!

How is it possible that someone wrote an article on the Boxer Rebellion, but forgot to include the number of casualties (deaths)? There's not even a section listing casualties in the infobox. That's definitely not encyclopedic. Most sources indicate that there were about 100,000 deaths, mostly Chinese. Please fix the situation of this crucial, fundamental information not being contained in the current version of this article! 98.123.38.211 (talk) 01:03, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

The casualties were originally in the infobox, however for a unknown (at least I have no clue) reason they were removed. The infobox is changing almost every day so I will just say wait and eventy the daily edits would die down once people can finally decide what to do for the infobox. LuxembourgLover (talk) 14:45, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

It's been edited thrice in the past two weeks. I think I figured out what happened, and it was a total accident: if you look at the article source, the information is still there—it's just that it's not displaying due to a typo in the code. Fixed it. Remsense诉 14:53, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 July 2024

Please remove the errant </ref>tag here:

Contemporary British and American observers levelled their greatest criticism at German, Russian, and Japanese troops for their ruthlessness and willingness to execute Chinese of all ages and backgrounds, sometimes burning villages and killing their entire populations.{{sfnp|Cohen|1997|p=185 ff.}}</ref>

. 76.14.122.5 (talk) 03:09, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

 Erledigt Hyphenation Expert (talk) 04:17, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 August 2024

The title of the chapter of "Aftermath" should be changed to "The massacre and other cruel acts of the Eight Nation Alliance" or something that showcases the Eight Nation did worse things than "Massacre of Chinese Christians and of missionaries". Otherwise it doesn't emphasise the reason for these events itself and mislead readers to believe "Massacre of Chinese Christians and of missionaries" matters more than the terrible crime of the Eight Nations. How can an article talking about the Chinese fighting against the Eight Nation who violate the sovereignty of the former but only have subtitles saying Chinese people kill the violator, without showcasing that the cause of such events is because of the cruel Eight Nation's terrible behaviour? Asdfa06 (talk) 23:39, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

What kind of person specifically joined the church? Landlords and gentry worship foreign things, cling to the thighs of foreigners, use their power to bully others, commit evil deeds, and oppress the truly poor and unaffordable common people. Without delving into such details and discussing what bad things these believers did that led to violent resistance from the poor, it is necessary to describe the violent resistance of the Boxers as a "cruel massacre" without questioning the use of the term "massacre" itself. This is misleading readers and very imprecise. Asdfa06 (talk) 00:26, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

We use the language of our sources, and are not free to editorialize. Remsense诉 00:35, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Then maybe you can mention how Chinese use “uprising”, "revolt" instead of "massacre" to descirbe this event. And provide complete information on the things you neglected and the actions of the believers that I mentioned in the original text. Asdfa06 (talk) 01:42, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: I don't see a major discrepancy in tone between "Massacre of Chinese Christians and of missionaries" and "Occupation, looting, and atrocities". In any case, if people don't get enough from the titles, they're free to read the actual paragraphs themselves, which should help. Remsense诉 00:34, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

What I mean is to change the subtitle of next chapter,"aftermath", to "How the Eight Power Allied Forces Killed the Chinese". If you want to discuss an uprising in which the Chinese people fought against foreign invaders, but specifically mentioned in the title how the Chinese slaughtered the invaders, not how foreigners slaughtered the Chinese (this is actually more cruel, and is the reason for this uprising, but I did not see any paragraphs emphasizing this reason). So such a title is misleading readers. Indeed, some readers can find descriptions of aggressors' actions in paragraphs, but not everyone will carefully read every sentence; Some people will only glance at the beginning of the website (this part has no blame on the Eight Power Allied Forces, and describes the invasion of Chinese territory by the Eight Power Allied Forces and the prevention of Chinese resistance as the lifting of the siege), and glance at the title, and these messages leave the impression that "the Boxers have done bad things".

You can't assume that readers will read every sentence carefully. Instead, you should objectively, fairly and clearly mark in the title the "Boxer Rebellion Massacre" which is as important as "Boxer Rebellion Massacre" and "Eight Power Allied Forces Massacre Boxer Rebellion and Massacre of Chinese People". Otherwise, this is prejudice and misleading.

Similarly, as I mentioned earlier, you mentioned the Boxer Massacre, but did not mention how the believers bullied the Chinese earlier, and how some Chinese landlords bullied the poorer Chinese after they joined the church. You did not clearly and equally describe these two things and their causal relationship. The consequence of writing in this way is to leave readers with a simple impression that the Boxers were murderers. If you do not state in this entry what the believers have done to Chinese civilians with equal importance, most people will not conduct additional searches and will assume that the believers are completely innocent. Asdfa06 (talk) 01:37, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I do want to restructure this part of the article: I don't think the Massacre section should be a top level section at bare minimum, but I will not promise I will carry out these precise changes. I do appreciate the broad thrust of your concerns, and am going over the literature to make sure our presentation isn't taking undue sides in its characterizations of events. Remsense诉 01:41, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I appreciate your patient response, but as the editor in chief of the entry, I believe it is your responsibility to promise to make as precise modifications as possible to any conflicting parts of the entry. Since you are the editor of the entries, you should know how these entries are regarded as unique guidelines by most Westerners, and even cited by the academic community. If we do not guarantee as precise modifications as possible, the bias of the entries themselves will create a butterfly effect, constantly deepening people's misunderstandings of historical truth. Asdfa06 (talk) 01:45, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I am not an editor in chief: I have written very little of the article as it exists and when I first read it became one of many articles I saw needed these kinds of improvements. Remsense诉 01:47, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply, but I believe you are at least one of the people capable of editing entries and reviewing editing requirements. I think the content I mentioned is also something that you need to be responsible for. If you do not have the ability to take on such responsibility, please tell me how to emphasize the importance of the issues I mentioned and to whom. And I also hope that you can respond to the proposals in my other sentences with equal emphasis. Asdfa06 (talk) 01:52, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

As much as I wish articles were fixed in a short time, it's healthier to recognize it is a volunteer project driven by consensus. It is one of many articles on my and others' watchlists. If you would like to help out by providing additional reliable sources that would be useful in citing for improvements( that would be deeply appreciated. Remsense诉 02:02, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for emphasizing the provision of sources. I will try my best to include complete sources in my next suggestion.

But as the reviewer of the entry editor's suggestion, do you also have a responsibility to search for information to verify the loopholes in the entry I mentioned? Or is it that whoever makes a suggestion must provide the source, and the editor in chief of the entry is not responsible for verifying and modifying the vulnerability? Asdfa06 (talk) 02:09, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

In general it works as the following: the editor who wants to add material must provide sources verifying the claims. Material that isn't cited can be challenged and removed at any time, and it can't be readded without a source. Remsense诉 02:23, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for explaining it.

So no one's in charge of the logic or tone of the whole article, as well as the balance of importance between details and the correlation between facts? Asdfa06 (talk) 03:33, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Editing works via consensus, with policies and guidelines essentially being the strongest, broadest level of consensus, which is then applied more specifically per topic, but usually per article. We can't just override site policies for a specific article without a good reason, and it's important that no editor feels they are the owner of any given part of the site. Our core content policies here are verifiability, with no original research (we can't create new knowledge, only present what has already been established, with everything we write having to be check-able by the reader in a reliable source) and neutral point of view (represent what all sources say in proportion to how common each view is). For the latter, I have been concerned this article does not follow a neutral point of view as concerning its characterization, and since this conversation started have been putting together a list of new sources not cited in the article, and then I'll start making sure that the existing text actually matches what the sources say. This work always takes a long time for me. Remsense诉 03:52, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I understand how much effort it would take to form a rigorous article including all the references. I really appreciate your effort in understanding my feelings and explaining everything to me although in many of the sentences I sounds push and not calm which I apologise again. Please forgive me for being like this because I haven't read anything sufficiently neutral on Wikipedia when they talking about China's history.

But I should not neglect other details you do have in this article and I really appreciate your time on it.

I sincerely hope this article would be modified to a more strict one. When I have time I would try to find sources for what I've suggested. Asdfa06 (talk) 04:04, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Also, if there's an "editor in chief", is it true that this person doesn't need to be responsible for those mistakes I mentioned above? Even if people have pointed out some mistakes or wrong emphasise/logic that might misleading other readers to form their view in a bias way (sometimes even the world view), as long as there's no source offered the "editor in chief" doesn't need to contribute in time to investigate and verify the information, and just leave the biased message on the Internet, which might be checked by thousands of people everyday?

Sorry if my words sound sarcastic but I really don't mean to be like this. Just so far I do have this feeling. I don't mean to judge you (who kindly reply to me very quickly) or anyone edit this article. I just don't feel right about how things work like this.

Because in my life experience, even if some infamous bloggers made mistakes on social media, when readers points out mistakes in their articles or even just few sentences of feeling they would make some effort to correct it.

I apologise again if I sounds too push. I respect your rules and knowledge and effort put into this article. It's just I don't think some readers view are valued in the same way, and a whole country's history isn't been taken seriously enough. Asdfa06 (talk) 03:56, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I wouldn't want to explain all of our policies and guidelines here at length, as discussion on talk pages should generally hew towards direct discussion of the article in question. Do you mind if I pick this up on your talk page? Remsense诉 03:58, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, sure. Asdfa06 (talk) 04:05, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 August 2024

Surprisingly, the brutal situation of the Eight Nation Alliance burning, killing, looting and plundering in China was not mentioned throughout the article, which was the reason for the birth and resistance of the Boxers and countless other Boxers. Such an important background should have been placed in the introduction, but all the references to the Eight Power Allied Forces in this article were just the opening remarks that "the Eight Power Allied Forces entered China to" lift "the Chinese" siege "of foreign invaders. "Siege" refers to the occupation of other people's land by the invaders through illegal means. It is the land illegally entered by the Eight Power Allied Forces into Chinese territory and "besieged" the Chinese people. It is the Boxer Rebellion's attempt to lift the siege of the Eight Power Allied Forces. This sentence should be changed to: The Eight Power Allied Forces forcibly entered Chinese territory, sabotaged the Boxer Rebellion's action against the invaders, and prevented the Chinese people from fighting for their own land and living rights. Asdfa06 (talk) 01:26, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Remsense诉 01:27, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

If you would like to discuss changes, please engage in a regular threaded discussion here and don't request edits to make your points with if they're not requesting specific edits with citations, it becomes disruptive very quickly. This article needs a lot of work, I agree, but we work from reliable sources first and foremost. Remsense诉 01:28, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Do you mean I need to offer souce of my request? Asdfa06 (talk) 01:38, 4 August 2024 (UTC)