Conservapedia

Conservapedia

Type of site	Internet encyclopedia project
Available in	English
Owner	Andrew Schlafly
Created by	Various
URL	http://www.conservapedia.com/
Commercial	No

Conservapedia is a wiki based web encyclopedia project with the stated purpose of creating an encyclopedia written from a socially and economically conservative viewpoint supportive of Conservative Christianity and Young Earth creationism. Andrew Schlafly, the site's creator and son of noted conservative Phyllis Schlafly, stated he founded the project because he felt Wikipedia had a liberal, anti-Christian, and anti-American bias.

According to the site's FAQ, Conservapedia originated as a project for homeschooled children, who wrote most of the initial entries. Schlafly has said that he hopes the site becomes a general resource for United States teachers and works as a general counterpoint to the liberal bias he perceives in Wikipedia. Conservapedia is not affiliated with Wikipedia or Wikipedia's umbrella organization, the Wikimedia Foundation, although both sites use the free MediaWiki software. In addition to its role as a Christian-Conservative encyclopedia, Conservapedia is also used by Schlafly's "Eagle Forum University" program. Material for various online courses (e.g., American history) is stored on the site. Eagle Forum University is associated with Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum.

Users cannot edit Conservapedia from an anonymous IP address, requiring participants to register a user name. The site had 13,000 registered usernames of which about 7,000 were permanently blocked (about 54%).

As of early September 2007, the site estimated that it contained about 16,300 articles. Conservapedia's earliest articles date from November 22, 2006.

Conservapedia and Wikipedia

Conservapedia stated a need for an alternative to Wikipedia when it launched its online encyclopedia project due to editorial philosophy conflicts. Conservapedia's editorial policies are guided by Conservapedia Commandments, while Wikipedia's editorial policies are guided by a range of policies including neutral point of view (NPOV), Verifiability, No Original Research and attribution. In contrast to Wikipedia's core policy of neutrality, Schlafly has stated that "It's impossible for an encyclopedia to be neutral. I mean let's take a point of view, let's disclose that point of view to the reader."

One example of article content differences stemming from editorial philosophy conflicts is evolution. Conservapedia presents the theory of evolution as lacking support and states that creationists, creation scientists and some secular science journals state that it is contra-evidence whereas Wikipedia presents evolution as a biological process defined by observable, empirical, and measurable evidence, subject to specific principles of reasoning.

Conservapedia's criticisms of science are not limited to the topic of biological evolution. The site criticizes the theory of relativity, suggesting that academicians who question the theory suffer for their beliefs. These conclusions have been heavily criticized, and are not found in Wikipedia's article.

Another example is Wikipedia's article on the Democratic Party, which refers to the party's historical origins. Schlafly has claimed this is an "attempt to legitimize the modern democratic party by going back to Thomas Jefferson" and that it is "specious and worth criticizing."

English Wikipedia's policy allowing both CE/BCE and AD/BC notation has been interpreted as anti-Christian bias. Conservapedia also interpreted the policy allowing both British English and American English spellings, as anti-American bias and had a policy that only allowed for American spelling on the site. However, their policy against allowing British spellings was later revised.

In a March 2007 interview with The Guardian newspaper, Schlafly stated, "I've tried editing Wikipedia, and found it and the biased editors who dominate it censor or change facts to suit their views. In one case my factual edits were removed within 60 seconds — so editing Wikipedia is no longer a viable approach." On March 7, 2007 Schlafly was interviewed on BBC Radio 4's flagship morning show, Today, opposite Wikipedia administrator Jim Redmond. Schlafly raised several concerns: that the article on the Renaissance does not give any credit to Christianity, that many Wikipedia articles use non-American spellings even though most users are American, that the article on American activities in the Philippines has a distinctly anti-American bias, and that attempts to include pro-Christian or pro-American views are removed very quickly. Conservapedia has asserted that, "Wikipedia is six times more liberal than the American public," a statistic which has been criticized for its poor extrapolation and lack of credibility . Schlafly has indicated that Conservapedia has not adopted what he considers "Wikipedia's complex copyright rules," adding that Conservapedia "reserves the right to object to copying of its materials."

Wikipedia's co-creator Jimmy Wales has stated that he has no objections to the project and that "free culture knows no bounds" though he has denied Schlafly's claims of bias on Wikipedia.

Reactions and criticisms

The Conservapedia project has come under significant criticism by the general public for factual inaccuracies and factual relativism. Conservapedia has also been compared to CreationWiki, a wiki written from the perspective of creationism.

Widely disseminated examples of Conservapedia articles that contradict the scientific consensus include the claims that all kangaroos descend from a single pair that were taken aboard Noah's Ark. Schlafly defended the article as presenting a valid alternative to evolution. Another claim is that "Einstein's work had nothing to do with the development of the atomic bomb." An entry on the "Pacific Northwest Arboreal Octopus" has received particular attention, a page which Schlafly has asserted was intended as a parody of environmentalism. As of March 4 2007, the entry has been deleted. Science writer Carl Zimmer points out that much of what appears to be inaccurate or inadequate information about science and scientific theory can be traced back to an over-reliance on citations from the works of home-schooling textbook author Dr. Jay L. Wile.

Tom Flanagan, a conservative professor of political science at the University of Calgary, has argued that Conservapedia is more about religion than conservatism and that it "is far more guilty of the crime they're attributing to Wikipedia [than Wikipedia itself.]" Its scope as an encyclopedia is limited: According to the founders, it "offers a historical record from a Christian and conservative perspective."This is seen by many as a clear admission of bias.

The project has also been criticized for promoting a dichotomy between conservatism and liberalism and for promoting the notion that there "often are two equally valid interpretations of the facts." (See also false dilemma fallacy)

On March 19, 2007, the British urban free newspaper, Metro, ran the article Weird, wild wiki on which anything goes. The article ridicules Conservapedia for providing only one side of controversial content.

Conservapedia, and more specifically its article on homosexuality, was discussed and lampooned by comedian Lewis Black on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on June 27, 2007, being compared to the Wikipedia article of the same name ending with Black stating "On Conservapedia, Gay sounds much more interesting."

Iain Thomson, writing in Information World Review, has written that "leftist subversives" may have been creating deliberate parody entries. Stephanie Simon, writing in the Los Angeles Times, reported that:

After administrators blocked their accounts, Lipson and several other editors quit trying to moderate the articles and instead started their own website, RationalWiki.com. From there, they monitor Conservapedia. And — by their own admission — engage in acts of cyber-vandalism. Conservapedia's articles have been hit frequently by interlopers from RationalWiki and elsewhere.

Licensing of content

The project is not licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) or a similar copyleft license. Jimmy Wales has raised concerns about this, stating that "People who contribute [to Conservapedia] are giving them full control of the content, which may lead to unpleasant results". Instead, Conservapedia allows users to "use any of the content on this site with or without attribution." However, the copyright policy also states "This license is revocable only in very rare instances of self-defense, such as protecting continued use by Conservapedia editors or other licensees."

Conservapedia does not allow users to use Wikipedia content or mirrors as a reference, specifically listing the practice as a violation of its first commandment.

See also

• GodTube
• QubeTV
• MyChurch
• SourceWatch
• Christianity
• Objections to evolution

External links

• Conservapedia