Complaining: Bias Steamroller

Copied the live page over to Sandbox.Bias Steamroller, cut the bad examples from the live page, and left a link in the Discussion page as discussed earlier.

Wicks A-C cleaned.

I broke down the Armond While example into four subbullets, since they're all good examples and they are not interconnected.

On other examples: Cut Rex Reed. There's no consistent bias identified, just his habit of going off on tangents about things unrelated to the film he's reviewing.

Cleaned wicks D-G.

On Armond White, the first and third entries (Noah Baumbach and Pixar) might be valid, but I'm having a hard time with the second and fourth (Wes Anderson and Steven Spielberg). To constitute a bias, it would need to be shown that he gave preferential treatment to films made by those filmmakers solely because they were made by those filmmakers and not on their own merits.

It's possible to like Steven Spielberg's movies, not because you have some kind of bias in favor of the man, but because you like the way Steven Spielberg makes movies. He does, it turns out, have a reputation for being pretty good at it.

edited 7th Mar '17 11:48:25 AM by HighCrate

AFIAK Armond White is actually a pretty controversial figure in the animation community not only for the way he runs Cartoon Brew but because of his bias towards clinging to the "classics" and not really giving new shows or movies a chance.

I should note that the example about Bennett the Sage on Tim Burton is valid. He bashes movies solely for being Tim Burton movies. In a crossover review with Film Brain, while Film Brain judged the movie on its own merits, Bennett just went in with a preconceived notion that being directed by Burton means he'll automatically hate it, refused to listen to counterarguments, and spent a good chunk of the review bitching about Tim Burton. He even complained about Burton constantly casting Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter, even though neither of the actors were in the movie.

edited 8th Mar '17 4:49:20 PM by TVRulezAgain

That sounds like a pretty clear bias to me.

Especially if he lapsed into complaining about things Tim Burton does that had nothing to do with the work in question just to get in his punches at the guy.

I'm not sure if any agreement was made on what Bias Steamroller should be definition wise, but to me the main idea seemed to be that; A Bias Steamroller refers to when someone, usually a critic, has their opinion on a work effected (Positively or Negatively) by their own personal bias towards a element of the work, not the work itself.

Just want to make sure I have the right idea before I even touch going through any of the examples.

That's basically it. In general, add "and acknowledges that bias." Otherwise we get back to people adding critics onto the page simply because the critic doesn't like the same things the editor does.

Acknowledges the bias is a shaky road because critics will often deny their biases, but that doesn't erase them.

True, but you can usually catch them slipping up somewhere in one of the rants and saying something that reveals the bias, even if it's not an overt "I hate X and will never give anything they've done a good review."

Usually someone stopping during a review to complain about something unrelated to the work itself like it's genre or creator is a dead giveaway,

Especially the example above where he started complaining about Tim Burton tropes that didn't even appear in the movie in question.

edited 17th Mar '17 2:16:54 PM by shoboni

Yes, that would also count. Or comments like "as usual, this work by X is <list of attributes, good or bad>." "It's a <Y> game, what are you expecting?"

Bump. Can we start the cleanup already?

Go for it. The example page and wicks A-G have been cleaned, so anywhere from wicks H-Z still need doing.

edited 23rd May '17 12:22:21 PM by HighCrate

It's too hard for me to do so myself; any other volunteers?

Why hasn't anyone cleaned up the H-Z wicks yet?!

Why don't you tell us how much you've done, and then we'll have a better idea of what still needs doing.

edited 21st Jul '17 8:48:03 PM by HighCrate

How does a cleanup work, exactly? I've only been making minor edits, spellchecks mostly, since I joined this site.

Go on the Bias Steamroller related pages, and look at every page on the list that hasn't already been checked (we've done pages alphabetically from A to G so far). If the page is misusing the trope, remove it.

So, this was brought to the repair shop because of complaining, which is fine. It was decided to remove examples, including those that have nothing to do with complaining, including pot holes of bias steamroller, appropriateness of context ignored. Putting bias steamroller next to cuckoo lander commentator is not a sinkhole, because both tropes cover the same activity, not that that was even the reason given. It's sure wasn't complaining, making me wonder, just why?

And as I look at which examples are kept and which are not, I can see that either the search method is not alphabetized, or there is some serious inconsistency in the choices of deletion inspired by this thread.

Portia Perez isn't a bias steamroller for dumping on baby faces doing anything illegal or what she thinks should be illegal while excusing their heel opponents of similar, the exact same or worse by her own seeming standards. Fine, there's every heel color commentator in the business then. The entire pro wrestling folder, is gone. Perez only got on bullet points and potholes because 1) she was still an active wrestler on the same shows she did commentary, performing said her own "illegal" actions for yet another layer of hypocrisy 2) she was especially favorable in commentary regarding Tag Team partner Nicole Matthews.

But wait, one of the most outstanding examples in the genre, who by not qualifying seemingly disqualifies all others, is being removed with prejudice but Steve Corino's loyalty to ROH over outsiders, Caprice Coleman, in his shameless slant against all things Bullet Club, Matt Taven, and...his fanboying of Hiroshi Tanahashi? Dislike of War Machine? The blatant favoritism and unfairness is definitely there with them too, especially the latter two, but it isn't nearly as prevalent in their commentary roles.

They are they still up but not Perez? If that is just the search method not getting to them yet (R comes before S), why should they be removed? Corino's got his bias for ROH, Coleman against Bullet Club, Taven has various personal vendettas and fan boy tracts, that's enough examples for a pro wrestling folder right there. I guess most color commentators are more "professional" than insane "broadcast journalists" like Bobby Heenan, professional enough not to let their biases become the focus of their commentary(You skirt wearing freak! It's not a kilt, it's a skirt!) but the fact color commentators, by their very nature, are allowed and even expected to give their opinions, suggests they should at least be considered. Otherwise we'd just have two play by play announcers. One to call the actions taken and another to explain anatomy, make historical references or...hell no. The second guy says the coach should just punt, or needs to call a timeout, should call someone off the bench or just flat out calls him inferior to the opposing coach. That sort of dialog should at least make them eligible. I'm not even sure what could be making them ineligible, because it wasn't complaining.

The only bias steamroller cases I can even remember complaints on this wiki about would be JBL, Michale Cole or Jerry Lawler. And even then the complaints were not about them being bias steamrollers and thus still exist, properly documented on the your mileage may vary tab (and when "Michael Cole bingo" not only exists but is prominent enough to be mentioned on air by Cole himself, you know said complaining has spawned a hatedom quantifiable for this wiki to mention). If the things Meltzer has said about JBL on the three to a table period were true, then complaining would in fact be justified by the fact he was supposedly derailing shows in his efforts to be against whatever stance the other commentators took. You know on the appropriate YMMV tab bullet point, but potholing to bias steam roller while elaborating would be perfectly valid.

Please post a courtesy link to the page where the deletion happened. That will allow us to see what exactly was deleted and by whom without attempting to scale that wall of text you have constructed above.

In large cleanup projects for tropes which show a consistent pattern of complaining and misuse, a "cut first and ask questions later" policy is often best for getting through large numbers of wicks quickly. Pot Holes / Sink Holes are often the first to go, since there is seldom enough context to judge whether the usage is proper.

Examples can be and often are later restored after discussion and sometimes adjustment of the example text. If you wish to argue for a deleted example to be restored, a polite and constructive tone is more likely to yield results than the accusatory one you've adopted.

edited 9th Aug '17 7:32:17 AM by HighCrate

Aside from the trope page itself, Daffney's page is the only one where I haven't added back, mainly because the last time I was on Daffney's page there was another cleanup issue that needed addressing, but that's also the example that drew my attention to this thread, and I maintain that it was not a sinkhole because the subject of the entry was commentary.