Ethicality Of Wikipedia

The concept behind Wikipedia is that it’s an encyclopedia that presents information from consensus. This is a phenomenal concept, very typical of the way we think about the world today, that is, inclusive: YouTube, allows you to perform your own show, even have your own channel; Facebook, allows you to publish “news” about yourself. Wikipedia joins this social revolution and allows you to join the conversation and create knowledge. However, none of these platforms are considered to be scholarly sources on which consumers can rely to get accurate and non-biased information, which is why Wikipedia is viewed in the same light. The notion that Wikipedia is to present this accurate content goes against the fundamentals of Wikipedia itself, which

Citing sources is important for a publications credibility because it signifies the evidence is reliable and truthful, as well as not plagiarized. In the subsections under Famine titled “government distribution policies,” and “cover ups,” Wikipedia provides “citation needed” links seven times. This means that at least seven claims have been made without sufficient evidence, or they were just incongruent when making in-text citations. This goes to show that everything presented via Wikipedia must be taken with caution, as the evidence or assertions presented may not have sound data to back these claims up. Wikipedia should be sure to consult several sources of a wide variety when presenting factual information to improve their own credibility as a source, because their vast readership not only has editing authority, but because so often people don’t question the information they’ve been given. If Wikipedia were to include proper citations within this article, the information they’ve presented regarding Chinese government cover-up efforts of the Great Famine, as well as the government distribution policies would be regarded as more than speculation or conspiracies, which is how they appear now, and more

Now, I must admit that while scrolling through the references section of this page, it seems as though Wikipedia has done a good job of incorporating several sources of varying opinions, with a few exceptions. However, no matter the magnitude, evidence presented from an unreliable source is still unreliable. For example, when discussing rainfall and flooding in China during the time of the famine, a claim is made that 30 inches of rain hit Hong Kong in 1959, and that it was a pattern that occurred throughout all southern China. This data came from a book titled Breast Cancer: Cause, Prevention, Cure. That said, in the book they do include a disclaimer stating that the data presented regarding the weather patterns during the famine in the Encyclopedia Britannica Yearbooks came from the Chinese government. On the Wikipedia page, however, this disclaimer is not made. This example, along with sources like the Disaster Center and an article titled “How We Forgot the Cold War: A Historical Journey across America,” depicts how Wikipedia’s in-depth source research is flawed at