It’s “devastating, the worst I’ve ever seen,” “free-for-all brawl,” and “it has taken on huge proportions.” These are the ways some of the Wikipedia donors who were interviewed by Le Monde have described the issue that has rocked the French-language version of the online dictionary for a while. The majority wished to remain anonymous, which is a sign, among other things, of the “nasty environment” they described.
The origin of the issue is thought to be related to a conversation over the “deadnames” or morinoms of transgender people in French. Should Wikipedia include information about brands that are no more in use, such as birthnames? If so, under what circumstances and circumstances? Contributors to the English-language version agreed to only discuss the names of those who rose to fame under that name in a 2015 settlement without much controversy. But, among French-speaking Wikipedians, the query has remained unresolved and also comes up frequently.
It already had caused a lot of controversy in the community in 2022. An op-ed with the signatures of 40 famous people, including Virginie Despentes and Paul B. Preciado, was also published in the regular magazine L’Obs. The word criticized “Wikipedia’s treatment of trans, non-binary, and transgender people,” citing, among other things, the use of deadnames. “Disclosing the deadnames of transgender people against their will exposes them to believable abuse, discrimination, physical and moral murder.”
Long conversations on Wikipedia at the time had already yielded a number of suggestions regarding the memoirs of transgender people, including the use of the nouns or pronouns they use to refer to themselves. Nevertheless, it made a clear solution to the deadname problem.
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In January 2024, rumors rekindled. One source expressed anger, saying, “For almost two decades, I’ve thought that this kind of thought should be decided by society voting across the board.”
Therefore, a survey of donors was launched on January 29. One Wikipedian (we’ll call her Anne) told Le Monde that “that’s what set things off.” The groups tried to phrase the questions in a way that matched the solutions they wanted, but the review preparation turned out to be disorganized. This assessment was finally launched on February 12 after some difficulties.
On the one hand, those who supported including dead names in reports claimed that it represented “encyclopedic knowledge of big interest,” at least in biographies of people who had established a name of their own, at least in terms of reputation. The explanation of the opposing side was based on the Wikipedia rule that applies to writing biographies of living people: “Do no harm.” According to a contributor with almost a century of experience who has been known as Nattes à chat and who defines themselves as non-binary, “As I see it, that’s the priority,” they told Le Monde. I don’t understand why we would do that because using someone’s old name makes them suicidal, as they say because it’s private information! What matters is what that individual has accomplished.
