Tag alias: scowl -> frown

BUR #2387 has been rejected.

create alias scowl -> frown

Reason: 1) The two words are synonyms.

2) The two tags' definitions on their respective wiki articles are effectively identical.

3) frown's article explicitly references "scowl" as an alternate name.

4) frown eclipses scowl in sheer number of posts.

PS: What does "conflicting wiki pages" mean? I kept getting this error message before I eventually gave trying to make sense of it and checked "skip validations".

EDIT: The bulk update request #2387 (forum #164294) has been rejected by @evazion.

MarqFJA87 said:

PS: What does "conflicting wiki pages" mean? I kept getting this error message before I eventually gave trying to make sense of it and checked "skip validations".

It means both tags have a wiki page that's not identical, they can't be merged automatically when/if the alias is done.

MarqFJA87 said:

1) The two words are synonyms.

But they really aren't? A frown can be a look of discomfort or frustration or sadness or worry. It's an exceptionally broad term. A scowl is more specific; it refers to a hostile expression, one that directs displeasure towards someone or something.

2) The two tags' definitions on their respective wiki articles are effectively identical.

3) frown's article explicitly references "scowl" as an alternate name.

A wiki rewrite may be in order, but I'm not sure it would help much. Facial expressions are notoriously hard to describe in few words. You either know what they look like or you don't.

4) frown eclipses scowl in sheer number of posts.

Unsurprising, considering how bad a lot of users seem to be at recognizing and tagging emotions and expressions. I'm actually quite amazed by the number of posts that are tagged frown, because I see faces that would fall under the frown umbrella all the time that either get tagged expressionless or are simply left untagged.

There's no harm in leaving this tag alone. Everyone who can read faces well enough to tell the difference between a frown and a scowl will continue to use both tags differently, and anyone who can't read faces isn't being affected by the existence of scowl anyway.

MarqFJA87 said:

1) The two words are synonyms.

Synonym does not mean interchangeable.

Dash, sprint, jog, gallop, and bolt are all synonyms of run, but they all give a different image of how someone runs. You wouldn't use jogging to describe someone running as fast as they could.

A scowl is a more intense expression than a frown, it's the difference between someone looking just upset, and someone looking absolutely livid.

post #3809728 is a frown

post #3801933 is a scowl

Any objections to making an implication instead?

I could imagine that a scowl would implicate a frown but it shouldn't be an alias since as already mentioned by the other users scowl is a more hostile emotion in comparison to frown.

iridescent_slime said:

Unsurprising, considering how bad a lot of users seem to be at recognizing and tagging emotions and expressions. I'm actually quite amazed by the number of posts that are tagged frown, because I see faces that would fall under the frown umbrella all the time that either get tagged expressionless or are simply left untagged.

What might help Users to tag the right emotion/expression if all those emotion/expression tags would link to the tag_group:face_tags to make it easier to find those. Especially for those Users who don't have english as their first language and might struggle to remember/find the right word.

I was actually suprised to find out that there is no emotion/expression tag_group in the first place. I looked for a while when I finally figured out they were under the face_tags group.
So maybe it would be a good idea to create a emotion/expression tag group that would link to tag_group:face_tags?

skylightcrystal said:

Any objections to making an implication instead?

-1. post #3826284 and post #3720518 aren't frowns, yet they're recognizably scowling.

The bulk update request #2387 (forum #164294) has been rejected by @evazion.

For some reason, even though I've been subscribed to this topic, I didn't get any notifications about all the responses that have been made.

iridescent_slime said:

But they really aren't? A frown can be a look of discomfort or frustration or sadness or worry. It's an exceptionally broad term. A scowl is more specific; it refers to a hostile expression, one that directs displeasure towards someone or something.

Okay, that actually makes sense as a distinction, but needs to be reflected properly in the wiki article.

A wiki rewrite may be in order, but I'm not sure it would help much. Facial expressions are notoriously hard to describe in few words. You either know what they look like or you don't.

That's what illustrative examples are there for, though.

Unsurprising, considering how bad a lot of users seem to be at recognizing and tagging emotions and expressions. I'm actually quite amazed by the number of posts that are tagged frown, because I see faces that would fall under the frown umbrella all the time that either get tagged expressionless or are simply left untagged.

There's no harm in leaving this tag alone. Everyone who can read faces well enough to tell the difference between a frown and a scowl will continue to use both tags differently, and anyone who can't read faces isn't being affected by the existence of scowl anyway.

I don't agree with leaving this alone. Allowing bad examples to proliferate will confuse users who seek out illustrative examples to figure out what qualifies for a given tag, since the user's interpretation of the term may not always fit what the "consensus" definition of it on the site is.

blindVigil said:

Synonym does not mean interchangeable.

Actually, yes, it does. That's how it's properly defined. It's just that the average person conflates "synonym" with what linguists call "meronyms", "hyponyms"/"coordinate terms", "metonym" and others.

A scowl is a more intense expression than a frown, it's the difference between someone looking just upset, and someone looking absolutely livid.

post #3809728 is a frown

post #3801933 is a scowl

The second one doesn't look "absolutely livid". She looks like she's feeling a mix of anger and worry/discomfort, like she's seeing something she hates (which, given the commentary, is probably something like a love interest getting uncomfortably cozy with someone else) but feels powerless to do anything about it at the moment, hence the nail-biting.

@Hillside_Moose said:

-1. post #3826284 and post #3720518 aren't frowns, yet they're recognizably scowling.

... I don't know what you're on about. Both of them are frowning, unless to you a "frown" means something that doesn't include furrowing the eyebrows like they're doing (it's not as super-blatant as many examples are, but they are doing it).

MarqFJA87 said:

I don't agree with leaving this alone. Allowing bad examples to proliferate will confuse users who seek out illustrative examples to figure out what qualifies for a given tag, since the user's interpretation of the term may not always fit what the "consensus" definition of it on the site is.

I didn't mean "leave all the posts with this tag untouched", I meant "don't alias this tag to something else". Obviously if a tag is being used incorrectly it should be cleaned up.

MarqFJA87 said:

... I don't know what you're on about. Both of them are frowning, unless to you a "frown" means something that doesn't include furrowing the eyebrows like they're doing (it's not as super-blatant as many examples are, but they are doing it).

Is post #3436209 a frown?
Is post #3849041 a frown?
Is post #3756560 a frown? This one doesn't even have a mouth to frown with.

A scowl's visual focus is in the eyes, not the mouth, so I don't know why you're trying to hammer this scowl peg into a frown hole.

Hillside_Moose said:

Is post #3436209 a frown?
Is post #3849041 a frown?
Is post #3756560 a frown? This one doesn't even have a mouth to frown with.

A scowl's visual focus is in the eyes, not the mouth, so I don't know why you're trying to hammer this scowl peg into a frown hole.

Yes to all three. A frown is done with the eyebrows; if you're talking about an expression done with the mouth, that's called "pursing one's lips".

And to be honest, this site is the first place where I've seen "frown" and "scowl" treated as significantly distinct (if overlapping) concepts; everywhere else, they're more or less universally treated as interchangeable.

MarqFJA87 said:

Yes to all three. A frown is done with the eyebrows; if you're talking about an expression done with the mouth, that's called "pursing one's lips".

Wikipedia:

The appearance of a frown varies by culture. Although most technical definitions define it as a wrinkling of the brow, in North America it is primarily thought of as an expression of the mouth.

Site is North American, and defaults to North American definitions.

Furthermore think of frown as in the context of a "frowny face", which at its most simplified depiction is only different from a "smiley face" by the difference in the shaping of the mouth.

MarqFJA87 said:

The second one doesn't look "absolutely livid". She looks like she's feeling a mix of anger and worry/discomfort, like she's seeing something she hates (which, given the commentary, is probably something like a love interest getting uncomfortably cozy with someone else) but feels powerless to do anything about it at the moment, hence the nail-biting.

That's Parsee, by the way, jealousy, though most people mistakenly represent it as envy, is her thing. She's basically a physical embodiment of jealousy, the commentary doesn't really imply or suggest anything beyond her just being herself.

I don't know how you could look at that face and not think, "Wow, she looks pissed!" I mean, even saying she looks like she sees something she hates should be enough to label that as a scowl, regardless of how pedantic you wish to be about what is or isn't a frown and/or scowl.

NWF_Renim said:

Site is North American, and defaults to North American definitions.

Furthermore think of frown as in the context of a "frowny face", which at its most simplified depiction is only different from a "smiley face" by the difference in the shaping of the mouth.

... That's weird. I had never come across anything that hinted at this, and to be honest this would pose the new problem of hwo to set apart a "frown" from a "pout", "pursed lips", "sneer", and other words that I see used where you say "frown" is supposed to be used.

That said, citing Wikipedia is ironic on your part, because the very same source starts with this (emphasis mine):

Wikipedia said:

A frown (also known as a scowl) is a facial expression in which the eyebrows are brought together, and the forehead is wrinkled, usually indicating displeasure, sadness or worry, or less often confusion or concentration.

So despite what you said, the article itself still supports my argument about frowning being mainly an eyebrow thing, as well as the synonymy between "frown" and "scowl".

Furthermore, from the beginning of the description section:

Charles Darwin described the primary act of frowning as the furrowing of the brow which leads to a rise in the upper lip and a down-turning of the corners of the mouth.

This implies that the mouth's part in the expression is actually a side-effect of the primary action, which is the furrowing of the brow. This makes sense, because the facial muscles are rather interconnected, so actions by one part tend to affect other parts as well.

blindVigil said:

I don't know how you could look at that face and not think, "Wow, she looks pissed!" I mean, even saying she looks like she sees something she hates should be enough to label that as a scowl, regardless of how pedantic you wish to be about what is or isn't a frown and/or scowl.

That's because "pissed" (regardless of whether or not it's emphasized in writing) is much milder in comparison to "absolutely livid", which by its own wording implies being unambiguously overwhelmed with rage. Think of any character that glares so intensely at the object of their wrath that, in an utterly comedic work, would have their eyes generate flames and their head erupts like a volcano; the look on their face, irrespective of the aforementioned comedic visual tropes, is what "absolutely livid" is about. In other words, looking like you're a straw away from erupting into either a screaming fit or bloodthirsty violence.

MarqFJA87 said:

... That's weird. I had never come across anything that hinted at this, and to be honest this would pose the new problem of hwo to set apart a "frown" from a "pout", "pursed lips", "sneer", and other words that I see used where you say "frown" is supposed to be used.

It's not difficult to judge that differences of these expressions, and all of them can exist without frowning. I think you're misinterpreting something.

Main point is, enough people on the site appreciate the difference between frown and scowl that they should not be aliased or implied. There doesn't need to be a strict definition or anything (or else we'd have problems with color tags).

MarqFJA87 said:

That's because "pissed" (regardless of whether or not it's emphasized in writing) is much milder in comparison to "absolutely livid", which by its own wording implies being unambiguously overwhelmed with rage. Think of any character that glares so intensely at the object of their wrath that, in an utterly comedic work, would have their eyes generate flames and their head erupts like a volcano; the look on their face, irrespective of the aforementioned comedic visual tropes, is what "absolutely livid" is about. In other words, looking like you're a straw away from erupting into either a screaming fit or bloodthirsty violence.

This is not at all relevant to what's being pointed out to you. The point was she looks angry, scowling mad.

MarqFJA87 said:

... That's weird. I had never come across anything that hinted at this, and to be honest this would pose the new problem of hwo to set apart a "frown" from a "pout", "pursed lips", "sneer", and other words that I see used where you say "frown" is supposed to be used.

All of those things are very easy to distinguish, especially in cartoon/anime style art like is almost universally present on this site.

Charles Darwin described the primary act of frowning as the furrowing of the brow which leads to a rise in the upper lip and a down-turning of the corners of the mouth.

This implies that the mouth's part in the expression is actually a side-effect of the primary action, which is the furrowing of the brow. This makes sense, because the facial muscles are rather interconnected, so actions by one part tend to affect other parts as well.

That... doesn't really make any sense at all. My mouth does not move because my eyes move, I can furrow my brow without moving my mouth, and vice versa. The multiple parts of the face that move don't directly affect each other, I don't need to do anything with my brows to frown, though I obviously can.

More importantly than that, you picked out the single sentence that supports your argument, and completely ignored everything immediately after that.

Scott Fahlman first suggested the use of the colon with the left parenthesis to iconically represent a frowning face on the Internet in what has become a well-known emoticon.[5] In this form the frown is entirely presented as a curve of the lips facing away from the eyes. Specifically, frowns that incorporate the furrowing of the brow are a response to perceived obstacles to the achievement of goals, while frowns that involve movement of the cheeks reflect an unpleasant reaction.

This is right below the Darwin quote. And everything following this states that a frown can be as little as turning down the corners of the mouth. Furrowing the brow is optional.