Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2022 July 22

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July 22

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New term for the US Supreme Court

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In the new (upcoming) term for the US Supreme Court, are there any "affirmative action" cases on the docket? Thanks. 32.209.55.38 (talk) 05:40, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College... -- AnonMoos (talk) 09:13, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Check out the list of upcoming cases at List of pending United States Supreme Court cases RudolfRed (talk) 16:53, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Pier Luigi Bersani and the Légion d'honneur

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Pier Luigi Bersani is reported as a recipient of the Legion of Honour in the "Honours" section of the omonimous article, by way of a category in the same article and at List of Légion d'honneur recipients by name (B). While I find this believable, the apparent lack of easily identifiable sources and of a mention of this honour in the italian and french wikipedia articles seems suspect. Some diffs: adding the section (2010) [1]; adding to the list from category (2007) [2]; adding the category to the article (2006) [3]. My understanding is that the full list of recipients is quite large, but still manageable and public. 109.119.237.35 (talk) 05:43, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like the original reference to him receiving it was when the article was created by NoSoftwarePatents in 2005. Complete bust on google searches. Luckily no mainstream media outlet seems to have repeated the Wikipedia article info (which is mirrored on other wikis) which would have been another possible WP:CITOGENESIS. Great catch -- thanks for letting us know. SamuelRiv (talk) 06:30, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I actually found an older reference to this [4] (in italian). It doesn't look reliable at all, it has a paywall and it's from 1999 (good luck at finding the full article). Checking a full official french list of recipients (if available) seems still the most solid way to go, but the lack of other sources is quite screaming. 109.119.237.35 (talk) 07:03, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately none of the archives in the WP Library have it:Staffetta Quotidiana, but I don't think there's much reason to think it's not an RS for the purpose of a fact as easily verifiable as a prestigious national award should be (you literally just email the correct office in the French government and ask to confirm (usually it helps to say you're from the media)). But I can't find any mention of it in the newspapers that I can search, of which there are at least a few from France and Italy available. So I was wary, until I finally came across these dead links: "Bersani promuove il governo su Fincantieri, ma lo boccia su Tim". Huffington Post (in Italian). 2017-08-03. Archived from the original on 2017-08-08, and the cache-accessible-only (direct links to caches are blocked on WP) "Fincantieri,Bersani: Renzi ingeneroso, Governo si muove bene". Yahoo! Notizie (in Italian). 2017-08-03 – via Cache. Both use the same quote from Bersani speaking at Radio Radicale:

"Da uno come me che ha ricevuto la legion d'onore - ha detto più in generale l'ex segretario del Pd- non so se Macron abbia fatto un gran servizio alla Francia. La Francia si è mangiata la parola: non credo che con Francois Mitterand o Jacques Chirac sarebbe potuta accadere una cosa del genere su una vicenda analoga".

[From someone like me who received the legion of honor - said the former secretary of the Democratic Party more generally - I don't know if Macron did a great service to France. Francois Mitterand or Jacques Chirac could have happened such a thing on a similar story.] [punctuation omission in source].

That's of course not two sources, but secondary references to a single primary source. And regardless of a politician's ability to seamlessly lie, a lie about what is again an easily-verified fact from a public figure seems just silly (unless you're a pathological liar). So that's two RSes, which is more than sufficient for this kind of thing. I'll be damned. SamuelRiv (talk) 14:02, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
A few more words of the same news item are found here:
29/10/1999 | Leggi e Atti Amministrativi
LEGION D'ONORE AL MINISTRO BERSANI
Su proposta del ministro dell'Industria francese, Christian Pierret,

il presidente Chirac ha conferito a Pierluigi Bersani l'onorificenza di "Commandeur de la Lègion d'honneur" in riconoscimento del contributo dato dal ministro italiano alle buone relazioni econo...

 --Lambiam 14:18, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
There's a searchable database of Legion recipients at https://www.leonore.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr/ui/ but unfortunately it only covers people born before 1945. Beyond that, there doesn't appear to be an official list of recipients online. How rubbish is that? We're going to give you this really high honour, but we're not going to tell anybody about it. Chuntuk (talk) 22:49, 25 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]