Talk:2019 Dayton shooting

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A multitude of sources in the very same month the shooting occurred confirmed that the perpetrator's sibling was living a semi-open life as a transmasculine individual and went by the name Jordan Cofer. Since it is notable that the perpetrator killed his own sibling the mention of Cofer should undoubtedly remain, but there should not be edits going back and forth changing the gender of Cofer.

Yes, many mainstream news sources identified Cofer as Megan Betts, but friends of Cofer and his own social media (https://twitter.com/jordandaroomie?lang=en) revealed that "Megan Betts" was a deadname, and thus in order to be respectful and to adhere to the facts, Cofer should only be referred to as a male.

And I do understand that this reverting of Cofer's gender was likely an unintentional mistake, but it should no longer be done.^[1] RaskBunzzz (talk) 22:41, 19 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The labeling of victims and their sex upon autopsy is a scientific metric and will not be changes. How the victims identify has no baring on what is discovered during autopsy. The victim will go under an official scientific registry as female. The article is free to use whatever the victim identified as for clarity because Wikipedia is not a scientific source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.70.153.208 (talk) 22:39, 30 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The labeling of victims and their sex upon autopsy is a scientific metric and will not be changes., oh honey, you say that with such authority for it to be completely against the Wikipedia policy on pronouns and deadnaming. Kingsif (talk) 04:46, 31 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• @ERM1130 and WWGB: I've reverted y'all's edits since the first seemed to mix up trans woman and trans man and the second is just cherry-picking one source that called him a woman, over other, more in-depth sources that called him a man. Is there any dispute, among RS that have discussed the life of Jordan Cofer (referred to in police reports as Megan Betts) in any depth, that he identified as a man? I don't think that [1], which is just repeating police statements about Cofer, shows such a dispute. If we know how he identified at the time of his death—and Buzzfeed News, a green-tier source that interviewed friends of Cofer, says that that was as a man—then per MOS:GENDERID we use that identity. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 03:54, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Tamzin: Sorry, I misunderstood the situation and backed the wrong argument. I see now that the perp's sibling identified as male. Thanks. WWGB (talk) 03:57, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No worries. It mixed me up too, seeing it on my watchlist, since most pages I watch for misgendering it usually goes in the other direction, and I briefly even added an editnotice that got it wrong. Since you and I are in agreement, and based on edit summary I'm thinking ERM was likewise mixed up, I've reënabled the editnotice, this time with the correct set of pronouns. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 04:08, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Some of my family members had been friends with Connor's parents years ago and they usually came to family birthday parties. I knew the kids as Connor and Megan. I hadn't heard about the transgender issue and the last time I saw the kids and their mom (a year or two prior to the shooting) Megan was clearly female, but since it had been sometime ago, things may have changed. I just mention this to avoid confusion as to which direction s/he may have been making the change to (F->M, not the other way around. 98.29.230.122 (talk) 03:38, 8 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry that someone you knew was lost so suddenly and violently, but the source we're using explains that "Megan", who used the name Jordan, was semi-open about his identity at the time of his death. Gender identity can change over time and it is a shame that Jordan was never afforded to opportunity to live openly and freely how they wished to. Raskuly (talk) 19:27, 25 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This edit war seems to have removed some referenced information about the weapon used; one of those references was used elsewhere in the article, which made a ivsible referencing error for the now-undefined reference definition. I've reverted the change that did that. I don't see "Jordan Cofer" or "Megan Betts" mentioned in the text anywhere. -- Mikeblas (talk) 01:42, 31 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Mikeblas, hope you don't mind but I moved your comments to a new section. "Anderson Manufacturing" first appeared in the article shortly after its creation in this edit by JBW95. Two edit requests soon appeared on the talk page asking to have it removed; the first was denied here, and the second was approved here by Kingsif. JBW95 then made multiple attempts to sneak it back in, with the latest one back in April 2020 being successful, and it has remained ever since.

I personally don't see a reason "Anderson Manufacturing" should remain. While the gun and ammunition types are often reported, the manufacturer is a trivial detail and should probably be removed. We can keep the ref, however. --GoneIn60 (talk) 05:52, 9 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@WWGB: I am reopening the talk on including victims, per WP:CCC. Specifically, the statement from this link (sorry, not sure the best way to link this). The arbitration committee member states that "Consensus that victim names should be included in some form. Importantly, it should not be as a bare list, and editors should take care to ensure that names are used in an encyclopedic way" and "Our policies are not written in stone, but evolve over time through an iterative process of editing and discussion. Sometimes we formalize them in documents. Participants made arguments more broadly about changing editorial practices, consistency across our own articles, and what our own best practices should be. It was publicized on the village pump, the talk page of the Biographies of living people policy, the administrator's noticeboard, and briefly by RfC-bot notifications. On the one hand, there was not sufficient participation to change written policy, but on the other it was widely publicized and broad in scope. While this discussion is not sufficient to change wider editorial policy alone, it should be taken as strong evidence that consensus has changed. Editors should consider further discussions on the wider issues, and absent that consider the arguments made here when making decisions on future articles on mass tragedies." This consensus was reached in 2021, after the last time this page had a talk about victim lists. Per this project-wide consensus, I feel a victim list is important, improves the article, and should be included. Esb5415 (talk) 01:45, 19 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

And sorry, I am not the best at formatting. Esb5415 (talk) 01:45, 19 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Is it due to mention that his brother is transgender in the leading sentence? I think it's notable to mention that his brother was killed, but undue to mention his gender identity, at least as prominent as it is now, as it doesn't seem to be a motive. GLORIOUSEXISTENCE (talk) 03:58, 13 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think "transgender" was added as there was an edit war on whether to use brother or sister, and the inclusion of transgender was meant to resolve the matter. I agree that the brother's transgender status is not essential in the lead. Perhaps we could just use "sibling" instead? WWGB (talk) 04:06, 13 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I noticed that in the discussion entitled Do Not Change the Perpetrator's Sibling's Gender Back to Female. I think it would be appropriate to change it to just "brother" and put a note elaborating; something along the lines of "many sources note that the perpetrator's shooter was his sister, but he identified as a trans man, and was therefore his brother". GLORIOUSEXISTENCE (talk) 01:59, 14 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think there is already a topic open about this, so my apologies if so, but can we please come to a definitive conclusion regarding the gender of Megan Betts/Jordan Cofer or whatever /his/her/there name was? It keeps getting switched back and forth on the article and it's getting ridiculous, so let's come to a definitive answer. I personally think Bett's sibling should be referred to as Megan Betts with female pronouns as that is what the autopsy stated and according to some sources Megan had a boyfriend at the time as well, so it's not even conclusive that she was indeed transgender, and even so her legal gender at time of her death was female. But that doesn't even matter that much, as long as we come to a definitive conclusion either way so it doesn't have to keep getting switched back and forth. Thanks. Genberg47 (talk) 00:50, 20 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

See above. Thanks. Raskuly (talk) 00:22, 26 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You're right that the back-and-forth is disruptive. I've requested page protection. But we already have our definitive answer: In-depth reporting on the sibling calls him a trans man; the only sources that contradict that are ones that were working with less information (e.g. [2]); and so per MOS:GENDERID we say "brother", "man", "he", etc. "Legal gender" is irrelevant per longstanding community consensus. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 19:10, 26 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the request. I check this page every now and then and I'm often disheartened to see a victim of a horrendous crime being disrespected time and time again. I know that some of the people reverting the edit aren't doing so out of malice but I feel that many are, especially IP editors. Raskuly (talk) 19:23, 26 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What level protection? I think we should up the protection one level to semi-protected. Extended confirmed may be necessary due to the very frequent back-and-forth we're seeing, but I think this should only be used if semi-protection is tried and fails, as this would obviously limit constructive edits on other parts of the article. Genberg47 (talk) 00:59, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Daniel Case applied pending changes protection, which is what I'd requested. If that leads to too many rejected edits, or if people are erroneously accepting bad edits, I'm sure any of us can ask Daniel to upgrade it, or request at RFPP. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 01:05, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This should help but I feel like unconfirmed editors/new users aren't the problem, it is just that people of all "experience" levels want to have what they personally feel belongs there, which obviously violates Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Let's wait and see if PC solves the problem, and if not we'll adjust accordingly. Genberg47 (talk) 01:16, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I have also RevDel'ed as many of the edits that triggered the protection as I can. Daniel Case (talk) 03:44, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]