Conservapedia

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[edit] Overview

Conservapedia is a web site purporting to be a "pro-American, pro-Christian" alternative to Wikipedia. It uses the free, open-source MediaWiki software developed by the MediaWiki Foundation for Wikipedia.

The site appears to be owned and operated by Andrew Schlafly on behalf of the ultra-conservative Eagle Forum organization led by his mother, Phyllis Schlafly.

Unfortunately, due to subtly satirical posting by those opposed to Conservapedia's mission (vandalism), it is sometimes difficult to tell which articles are genuine and which have been written so as to exaggerate conservative points of view (or represent only the most extreme of such). This problem seems to be declining as the site matures and editors become aware of "problem pages", however.

[edit] subpages

  • /blocks: sites which Conservapedia blocks via their spam filter

[edit] related

[edit] copyright

Unlike the other major sources used by Issuepedia (Wikipedia, dkosopedia, and Sourcewatch, all of which provide their content for free under the GNU FDL), Conservapedia reserves copyright on its contents and threatens to sue for infringement under the DMCA.

[edit] temporary closure of editing

As of 2007-02-25, editing was closed (you have to log in to edit, and the "log in/create account" page was log-in only), probably due to the vandalism; blog comments on 2007-02-21 indicate that new user registration was recently available. New user accounts were reopened sometime prior to 2007-03-13, so editing is essentially open once again (log-in is still required).

[edit] Links

[edit] Reference

[edit] Filed Links

  • 2008-06-27 /S/D/ It Just Keeps Getting Better - Conservapedia Censors Its Own Users Over Lenski Letter “It began with Andrew Schlafly demanding that Doctor Richard Lenski turn over any data on his 20-year experiment. Lenski politely noted that the necessary evidence was already available, but this did not satisfy Schlafly, who made further demands. Lenski then replied with a carefully detailed response which essentially shredded many of the contentions Schlafly had been making in exchanges elsewhere on Conservapedia regarding Lenski's research, and which highlighted Schlafly's total lack of a plan for what to do with the data that he was demanding. .. Now, RationalWiki posts the scoop on some of the underhanded tactics that Schlafly, et al, have gotten up to in posting the exchange on Conservapedia.”
  • 2008-06-24 /S/D/ Lenski gives Conservapædia a lesson “Once again, Richard Lenski has replied to the goons and fools at Conservapædia, and boy, does he ever outclass them. For a quick outline of the saga, read this summary at A Candid World; basically, Andy Schlafly has been demanding every bit of data from Richard Lenski's work on the evolution of E. coli, despite the fact that Schlafly doesn't have the background to understand it and doesn't have any plan for what he would do with it if he got it. Lenski has been polite and helpful in his replies; his first response is a model for how to explain difficult science to a bullying ideologue. Now his second response is available, and while he has clearly lost some patience and is unequivocal in denouncing their bad faith efforts to discredit good science, he still gives an awfully good and instructional discussion.”
  • 2008-05-24 /S/D/ Conservapedia on The Hour “The Hour's Nick McCabe Lokos and Darby Wheeler look at Wikipedia's conservative twin, Conservapedia. Watch on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos.” It's not clear what this blurb means. Embedded video of Andrew Schlafly decrying Wikipedia's anti-American, anti-Christian bias and explaining how Conservapedia is an unbiased answer to that. (direct link to YouTube video of Schlafly) Commentary: Pharyngula
  • 2007-02-21 /S/D/ I'm assuming many conservatives are embarrassed by Conservapedia “At least, I hope so. The "conservapedia" is supposed to be an alternative to Wikipedia that removes the biases – although one would think the creators would be clever enough to realize that even the name announces that Conservapedia is planning to openly embrace a particular political bias. Unfortunately, that bias seems to be more towards stupidity than anything else.”

[edit] Discussion

  • 2007-02-28:
Blake Stacey said, on Contrary Brin (internal links added):

I discovered a few days ago that the Conservapedia article on judicial activism had been written by a parodist. This bloke, going by the 'nym of "DrShaffopolis", said the following:

There are two major types of judicial activism practiced in the United States' court system:

  1. Liberal judges striking down laws that uphold core conservative American values
  2. Liberal judges refusing to strike down laws that subvert core conservative American values

The most famous example of this is Roe v. Wade

He then confessed at Pharyngula. "Earwig" added the following text, including references to FOX News:

Other examples include Brown v Board of Education which stripped state powers of control over education and put them in the hands of the federal government, McCreary County v. ACLU in which judges stripped free speech and religious freedom from McCreary County and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld in which the Supreme Court sided with terrorists over the protection of the United States of America.

"Conservinator" then added a blurb at the end, "and that case where the judge decided to murder poor Terry Schiavo, just because she was in a wheelchair." The project's Fearless Leader, Andrew Schlafly, then reverted the article to its previous state, keeping all the additions of DrShaffopolis and Earwig.

Not too surprisingly, the joke article soon got uncritically accepted by a blogger looking for material to laugh about. Conservapedia was so hammered by traffic (thanks to its publicity at ScienceBlogs.com) that it took me ten minutes to load the page revision history and see what had really happened.

Neither the person who wanted to make fun of it nor the man being mocked could tell they were falling for a parody! The satire has become the object of ridicule; the map is now the territory.

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