Wikipedia:No disclaimers
 | This page documents an English Wikipedia content guideline. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Warnings about content should not generally appear in articles. All articles are already covered by the Wikipedia disclaimers. |
A disclaimer in a Wikipedia article is a statement or visual template that editors may attempt to insert as a warning to readers. While ideas like this have been continually proposed, the consensus is that disclaimers do not belong in encyclopedia articles and should be deleted. The general disclaimer linked at the bottom of all Wikipedia pages and the other accessible five disclaimers are sufficient.
Some examples of unacceptable disclaimers in template form:
 | Spoiler alert This article contains spoilers. |
| Warning This article contains vulgar, profane, or otherwise offensive language. |
| Content warning This article contains media that may potentially trigger seizures for those diagnosed with photosensitive epilepsy. |
| Malware warning Opening this link may expose you to malware. |
 | This article contains content that is suitable only for ages 18 and older. Viewer discretion is advised. |
Acceptable disclaimers
[edit]There are a few notable exceptions:
- "Technical" disclaimers assisting the user with display problems, such as {{Contains special characters}}. These do not refer to article content but to issues related to the proper display of article content.
- Current event and temporal templates such as {{current}} or {{recent death}}. These alert the reader that the article content may be subject to a flux of recent and upcoming significant changes for reasons beyond the control of Wikipedia.
- Cleanup templates, such as {{POV}}, {{original research}} or {{cleanup}}, are by design temporary. They point to deficiencies in the article that should be corrected promptly.
What are disclaimers?
[edit]For the purpose of this guideline, disclaimers are templates or text inserted into an article that duplicate the information at one of the six standard disclaimer pages:
- Wikipedia:General disclaimer: Wikipedia makes no guarantee of validity
- Wikipedia:Content disclaimer: Wikipedia contains content that may be objectionable
- Wikipedia:Legal disclaimer: Wikipedia does not give legal opinions
- Wikipedia:Medical disclaimer: Wikipedia does not give medical advice
- Wikipedia:Risk disclaimer: Use Wikipedia at your own risk
- Wikipedia:Survey disclaimer: Wikipedia has some rights when you participate in one of their survey
Why disclaimers should not be used
[edit]- They are redundant with the disclaimer linked at the bottom of every page, from where you can also access the content, legal, medical, risk and survey disclaimers.
- Wikipedia is not censored.
- Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a how-to guide.
- It is hard to define which articles should have a disclaimer (e.g., what defines an "adult content" article, which varies dramatically by culture and individual). Allowing some disclaimers would generate a significant overhead of disputes regarding where to draw the line; this draws editors away from more productive tasks.
- Having disclaimers might create the impression that any potentially problematic content will be flagged, and thus an article can be assumed to be "safe" if no disclaimer appears.
- They take up large amounts of page space when used in banner form.
See also
[edit]- Wikipedia:Perennial proposals
- Wikipedia:Spoiler
- Wikipedia:Templates for discussion
- Wikipedia:Content labeling proposal (failed proposal)