Talk:Margaret Sanger

Member of the Nazi party and the KKK

She was both a member of the NAZI party and the KKK. They had to remove her from the leadership position she held in 1942 because the Nazis declared war on America on December 11. She still made statements of Nazi support after the declaration of war. 2600:1015:A027:EEB6:9EDA:C257:318D:C030 (talk) 19:06, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

This is not true. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:13, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

Oh yes, we'll just ignore WP:Verifiability and WP:BLP and just put those extreme things right in with no sources just because you said it. North8000 (talk) 19:20, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

Of all the things that never happened, this one never happened the most. Gamaliel (talk) 23:50, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

July of 2020 they removed her racist name from the headquarters of Planned Parenthood. case closed. 2600:1015:A005:3806:191C:2FEC:644C:7859 (talk) 06:27, 18 December 2024 (UTC)

Removing her name from the headquarters of Planned Parenthood is no proof that she was a member of either the Nazi party or the KKK. Peaceray (talk) 20:22, 18 December 2024 (UTC)

Good article nomination?

This article was a GA article in 2011. That lasted for four years, but it got de-listed in 2015 due to edit-waring. It was not de-listed due to failing GA criteria (other than the edit-warring criterion). Currently, the overall quality of the article looks pretty decent these days, so I was thinking of making a pass thru the article and - if it is suitable - doing a GA nomination. I don't doubt that vandals will come along and attack this article forever, but that is no reason to avoid GA status (see Heckler's veto) Any objections? Noleander (talk) 18:35, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

I've started making some minor improvements to the article. Overall it seems to be in pretty good shape. If anyone has any changes you think should be made to bring it up to GA status, let me know. Noleander (talk) 22:39, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not able to find many more improvements (appropriate for GA status), so I guess I'll nominate it for GA soon. If anyone has any comments, let me know. Noleander (talk) 17:15, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea. North8000 (talk) 20:24, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

I used to do a lot of GA reviews and took a closer look here. I think it looks pretty good. One thing that caught my eye. The lead should be a summary of the article. Regarding her position on abortion, it is summarized (and heavily sourced/cited) in the lead but I see only scattered mentions of it in the article, and don't see those same cites in the article. Any cites/source that are in the lead should also be in the article (and usually don't need to be in the lead). To me this is a bit of a red flag that either there is material in the lead that is not in the article or that the citing/sourcing is missing from wherever it is in the article. Especially for those reading it in current times, IMO coverage of this topic in the body of the article should be strengthened up a bit, with solid sourcing, and any sourcing/cites that are in the lead should be in the body. North8000 (talk) 20:49, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Good points. I'll work on those things. Noleander (talk) 21:08, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

When I see a lead section that has zero citations, I'm always impressed ... it looks clean, and indicates that the article _probably_ has all the lead info replicated (and expounded on) in the body. Of course, to remove the cites, all the lead info/text must be replicated & cited in the body. I guess I could remove all the cites (after ensuring info is in the body) and see what the reviewer says. Noleander (talk) 21:13, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

I went thru the lead, and ensured that all the lead info was also represented in the body (some was not: I had to move/duplicate it). I then moved all footnotes from the lead to the corresponding body text (if not already there). So, there are now no footnotes in the lead; but 100% of the lead info is in the body, and footnotes are there. Noleander (talk) 04:37, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

"Sexuality" section could be trimmed?

The section Margaret_Sanger#Sexuality seems a bit large, considering it was not a major aspect of Sanger's life work. All the info in there looks accurate & useful, but its large size may mislead readers into thinking it almost of equal importance as family planning, abortion, etc. But maybe I'm underestimating how much effort she put into the subject. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 20:45, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't see any objections, so I think I will simply replace some of the numerous quotes there with paraphrases. Not deleting any material, simply tightening some quotes by making them encyclopedic prose. Noleander (talk) 18:58, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

New "Perception in the modern era" subsection under "Legacy"

Regarding the content in the "Legacy" section about 21st century impressions of Sanger, and criticisms from anti-abortion activists I created a new subsection "Perception in the modern era" and moved the text into the subsection. The content is not large, but it was not consistent with the other info in "Legacy". I looked at the Christopher Columbus article to see how they dealt with recent criticisms of Columbus & his impact, and that article had a subsection under "Legacy" called "Criticism and defense". So, I modeled that , but named the subsection "Perception in the modern era". It is not a large section, but it seems beneficial to have it. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 20:19, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Margaret Sanger/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Noleander (talk · contribs) 03:11, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

Reviewer: Shushugah (talk · contribs) 15:58, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Looking forward to reviewing. Below are some immediate feedback on structuring of prose in the body/layout. I will need some more time to go through the different sources, and given the length/important of this article, I hope you're willing to take longer to review this. Let me know how I can make this reviewing experience a positive one for you, for example pinging you/structuring my feedback in a certain way etc.. ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 15:58, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for helping with this article. Back in 2011 I re-wrote it, and the article was given GA status (GA1), but it gradually degraded (edit warring, etc) and lost the status in 2015. So, here I am a second time.

Agree this review may take longer than normal.

Thanks for offering to make it a positive experience! The ideal reviewer would be sensible, a good listener, have lots of WP experience, and aware of GA criteria (and how they differ from FA criteria :-) And did I mention sensible? Noleander (talk) 16:38, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Lede

Currently the lede is very long. I think it could be shortened to 1-2 paragraphs. The first paragraph says nearly everything that she is most prominently known for, whereas the institutional context or her family influence is better saved for the body of article itself. It should note earlier, that she was a Eugenicist member. It should also note that a lot of her activism, was using court cases to bring publicity, being arrested 8x over her career.

Yes, it is too large, I'll make it shorter. Most FA articles on important people have 3 to 4 paragraphs in lead, so I'd prefer 3 minimum. WP:LEDE indicates "250 to 400 words" is standard for FA articles; MS lead is 421 words now, so I'll try to get it to around 300-350? Noleander (talk) 16:44, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

I got it down to 254 words, 3 paragraphs. It still needs some word-smithing, but I think the size is about right now.

Re: "....she was a Eugenicist member" better words for her relationship with eugenics are: adhere/adherent; subscribe/subscriber; endorse/endorser; proponent; support/supporter; advocate/advocate; or propose/proposer. The word "member" suggests there is some official club, or a single official organization. Noleander (talk) 17:36, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

 Done. Now at 267 words, 3 paragraphs. Noleander (talk) 03:41, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

Layout and structure

The actual section ordering and naming is generally reasonable. I would shorten Planned Parenthood era to Planned Parenthood to be consistent. The body text is sometimes misplaced, for example in section about her death is content related to her legacy. I will make specific suggestions below

Regarding the sections in the article (not just "Planned Parenthood Era" section): The article is broken into three parts: (a) first several sections of the article (before "Views") are a chronological story of her life. (b) Within the "Views" section are the four contentious topics that deserve special focus because many readers will want to zoom in on them and get in-depth coverage. Ideally those four topics would be scattered thruout the life story, but that is not practical due to controversial nature of the 4 topics. These topic/issue subsections are not intended to hold any events or personal info. (c) After "Views" is the caboose: miscellaneous/references/legacy.

The "personal life" events (marriage, divorce) are scattered thruout the upper chronological sections, rather than concentrated in a "Personal life" section. (Ditto for all events in her life: they are in the appropriate chronological section). This is the model used in many biographical articles, such as Douglas Macarthur. I'd prefer to keep it that way. Maybe we could try something like Woodrow Wilson, where there is a "Marriage and family" section (in lieu of "personal life" section); that article also (like this MS article) has several chronological sections, followed by a topic/issue section "Race Relations" ... very much like is found in the MS article now. Unless there is a compelling reason, we should probably maintain that pattern. Noleander (talk) 16:27, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Below, you mention renaming some top-level sections (Birth Control Movement etc) ... we should probably get consensus on the overall layout (above) before acting on those. So, I'll not act on those particular suggestions (below) at this point in time. Noleander (talk) 16:30, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Ditto for suggestions like "Her brother is unrelated to her death, should be moved to personal life section" ... I'll refrain from responding to that until the overall layout is finalized. Noleander (talk) 16:51, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

I've been looking at FA-quality biography articles, and there seems to be a clear pattern:

1. The articles always begin with several chronological sections presenting the complete life story
2. The final (sub)section within the life story portion is always Death (or similar)
3. After the life story portion of the article, some (but not all) bios will have one or more "deep dive" sections for topics/issues that are especially significant for the subject of the bio. These topic/issue sections go into detail, but generally do not internally use a chronological or event-based approach
4. There is always a "Legacy" section at the bottom of the article, and if there are topic/issue sections, "Legacy" follows those.
5. "Personal Life" sections do not appear in articles of historically important people, but are found in bios of living celebrities.

I think the article's current layout is consistent with this established pattern. That said, I can see some potential improvements: (a) Improve names of individual sections, e.g. add word similar to "era" to the titles of the life story sections; and (b) Perhaps promote subsections under "Views" to be top-level sections?? .. but that seems like it would lead to more confusion. [Edit: cannot sensibly promote the subsections under "View" because readers would (in Table of Contents) perceive them as chapters in the chronological life story] Noleander (talk) 19:59, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Section specific feedback

Early life

• Rename this to personal life, so that it can include her relationship with HG Wells here in a more structured manner.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• Mention who Grant, Stuart and her third child are in the body itself.
• Wikilink to Union army (so people know which side)  Done

Social activism =

• Can rename and shorten section to Activism, there isn't any kind of activism that is not social.

 Done Noleander (talk) 20:45, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• Wiki link Socialist Party of America – linked to Socialist Party of New York instead, as the original text read Women's Committee of the New York Socialist party.
• Wiki link Comstock law (once per section is not only allowed, but helpful here)  Done
• The paragraph about Neo-Malthusian should make it more explicit this is connected to Eugenic politics.

I'm looked into that, and it looks like Malthusians are 100% concerned with overpopulation, and do not concern themselves with the fitness of the human race. The Malthusianism article only mentions eugenics once, and that is to say that eugenics was influenced by Malthusianism (as an argument to impose sterilization/birth control) but not the other way around. I learned that neo-malthusiansm only originated around 1920 or 21, and since Sanger's encounter was in 1914-15, the word in this paragraph should be "Malthusianism" not "Neo-Malthusianism". I improved the paragraph so it now reads: "She shared the concern of Malthusians that over-population led to poverty, famine and war.". I agree that the connection between eugenics and malthusianism should be included in the article ... and the Eugenics section already talks about overpopulation as related to eugenics, so if we need any additional emphasis, it should probably be added there. Noleander (talk) 21:07, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Birth control movement

• Missing the most important/notable claim, Today, Sanger, along with Emma Goldman and Mary Dennett, is viewed as a founder and leader of the birth control movement.

Not sure that is appropriate. The first 7 top-level sections are intended to be a chronological listing of events in her life. Retrospective statments such as "today she is viewed ..." are better in the Lede or Legacy sections (or maybe the four Topic/Issue/Views sections). But if you feel strongly about it, I have no objection. See also discussion above about overall layout/sections for this article. Noleander (talk) 21:23, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• Should be renamed to Birth control, as it's not primarily about the movement, but Sanger's activism/views around it. Of course the movement is relevant, and she is an early pioneer of it.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• Paragraph about her relationship with HG Wells should be moved to personal/early life section, and her publication should be moved to her works. It comes off odd in a section that's about birth control movements

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:49, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

American Birth Control League

• What does shifting from radical politics mean? Some sources I read, suggest that it means she stopped defying laws/being provocative, but it's not clear here.

 Done "Shift" in that paragraph means transisiting from solo, low-level efforts (e.g. submitting articles to socialist newpapers) to establishing large, well-funded organizations (ABCL). I'll improve I improved the wording to clarify. Noleander (talk) 19:47, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

• The 3 paragraphs starting from Sanger invested a great deal of effort communicating with the general public. From 1916 onward seem to have nothing to do with American Birth Control League and are better placed in (social) activism section.

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 19:48, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Death

• Her brother is unrelated to her death, should be moved to personal life section

Waiting for resolution of layout discussion above at Talk:Margaret_Sanger/GA2#Layout_and_structure Noleander (talk) 20:46, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Eugenics

This is probably most controversial and challenging section to summarize in WP:NPOV manner and claims should be weighted/backed accordingly. This line is written in a wikivoice, and yet seems contradicted several lines later: Sanger's approach to eugenics did not have a racist component. Instead we should rely/summarize what different historians say (as does happen a lot here)

• I will ask other editors for feedback/extra set of eyes here, as this is an important section where expertise could be invaluable

Thanks for helping on this: Eugenics is the one section that I know is not GA status yet. I've been working on it the past 2 days, and it is still not there is getting there. One thing I would tell reviewers is: that section is unique because it must be written now, in 2025, in a way that will help editors in future decades maintain it and stave-of edit wars. In other words: it should have more citations (sources) and more footnotes (with quotations and insights) than a typical WP article. Thus, a large number of cites & footnotes (and quotations) in the Eugenics section is not a reason to fail GA (provided the cites & footnotes are pertinent and reasonable). The only alternative to large footnotes (that I can see) is a statement in the Talk page about the Eugenic sources & content, perhaps pinned to the top of the Talk page; I've seen that in some articles about contentious subjects. But footnotes have the advantage that readers can see the information (not just editors) thus avoiding criticisms that the article is censored or ignoring sources. Noleander (talk) 16:59, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

The next change I was planning on making to the Eugenics section was to remove all Sanger quotes (I think there are 3 remaining) into footnotes; and replacing the quotes with prose equivalent, based on secondary sources. [There are 2 or 3 quotes from scholars in that section that are encyclopedia-worthy; I was not planning on removing them]. But I'll wait on that task until you or other editors weigh in ... don't want to thrash the section. Noleander (talk) 17:05, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

I think the Eugenics section is in fairly decent shape now ... perhaps GA quality? Before today, I do not think it was quite there. The tone is encyclopedic, sources are on-point, and primary sources are generally relegated to supplemental footnotes (leaving 2ndary sources in the citations). And it covers all the major points that sources discuss. Most importantly, the section now has a logical flow to it, whereas before it was a disjointed sequence of (valid) facts. There are a relatively large number of footnotes, but - due to the contentious nature of the section - it seems wise to keep them, so future readers & editors will have quick access to the data (vs a Talk page section), and they can resolve questions faster. Noleander (talk) 14:31, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

In popular culture

• Currently is bullet point list, while the legacy section has prose about her depictions in popular culture. Consider merging the two sections somehow

Agree "In Popular culture" (IPC) is peculiar. Initially, its content was part External Links section, but (I think) it somehow got moved into a dedicated section, and named "In Popular Culture". I don't think the IPC bullet items deserve prose ... rather than make it prose and merging with Legacy, maybe move the IPC bullets back into "External Links"? Noleander (talk) 16:50, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

 Done. I deleted the "In Popular culture" section and moved its contents (bullets) into External Links section. Let me know if you're not comfortable with that. Noleander (talk) 17:10, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Find copy of article "America Needs a Code for Babies" in "American Weekly"?

The Eugenics section of the article uses a source: "America Needs a Code for Babies", an article in American Weekly magazine, 27 Mar 1934. I'm trying to find copy of that article. The article is important because opponents of Sanger quote from it a lot, and the quotes contain some inflammatory proposals (however, the proposals are clearly presented as hypothetical, perhaps exaggerated, proposals meant to stimulate debate... since the article itself states: "All that sounds highly revolutionary, and it might be impossible to put the scheme into practice. But for purposes of discussion...")

The only copy of the article I can find, hardcopy or digital, is at not reliable anti-abortion website: https://blackinamerica.com/content/292940/america-needs-a-code-for-babies That website says they got the content from NYU Margaret Sangers project, but - if it was ever at NYU - it is no longer there.

The same website says "Typed draft article. Source: American Weekly, Mar. 27, 1934 , Margaret Sanger Papers, Library of Congress, 128:0312B . Because only a partial copy of the printed article was found in Sanger's papers, the editors have used the complete typed draft in its place."

Im not 100% sure what that means, but it sounds like a copy of the magazine itself no longer exists anywhere, but at some point late in Sanger's life, the Library of Congress got some papers of hers, and among the papers was a typed draft of a magazine article. Indeed, the Library of Congress web site names a "America Needs a Code for Babies" paper from a Margaret Sanger collection, at https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms998010.3. I suppose that is the typed draft. Did that draft paper ever get printed in a magazine?

Anyway, this article is going through a GA review, and the Eugenics section, of course, needs special scrutiny, and we need to be able to read all the referenced sources. So: Does anyone know where to find a copy of the "American Weekly" article?

I dont' think the document in Library of Congress will be useful, since that is merely a typed draft, and may or may not have made it into the magazine. Noleander (talk) 02:17, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

Until we can find & read a copy of the American Weekly magazine, I changed the citation in the article to mention that it is a draft manuscript. I left the quotes (from the magazine) in the footnote. After we find the article, we can change the cite back to the magazine article. Noleander (talk) 02:50, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

I posted a request for this article at WP:RX ... with luck, they'll find it. Noleander (talk) 02:56, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

A helpful editor at WP:RX found the article at https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/1043726343/ .. apparently it was a weekly insert; this particular source was in the "The Washington Herald".

Since this appears to be a legit article that did make it into print, I'll restore the cite in this MS article to name the article. Noleander (talk) 04:10, 17 January 2025 (UTC)