A whine
Hi Dan, I gave up trying to be polite to this lot a few years ago after being on the receiving end of the opposite in quite a nasty way from some of them. I am finishing up my last bird papers, having had enough of the behaviour of colleagues operating in this sphere, and it's liberating to be able to speak the truth without being too bothered about which important person's feathers might be ruffled.
I have had 32 proposals rejected (and 30 passed) compared to your 3 passed and 5 failed. This was an unprecedented contribution to the SACC list from a non-member. Several of those proposals came out of work on the Colombian checklist and field guide and were made to seek a view on issues where one could go either way and indeed various were recommended for rejection (e.g. Forpus flavicollis, some English name proposals). However, various relate to original papers and they have a pretty similar fail rate.
Some proposals which especially irk are those on Dysithamnus, Atlapetes nigrifrons, Grallaricula kukenamensis and Zimmerius. In two instances, proposals are based on many years of careful research and involve a highly conservative but rational step forwards for the group. In two instances, these are Ridgely splits of birds which do not seem even vaguely related to one another, which we could not stomach lumping for Colombia when we moved to SACC treatments (with a few exceptions) for the checklist generally a few years ago. In some instances, certain committee members and other commentators have resorted to the basest sort of exaggeration and unprofessional behaviour to get sensible proposals rejected, with Zimmerius being probably the high water mark of nonsense. There were some drafting issues with the proposal, which I regret. But not with the paper (except for a mis-labelled subspecies name in the figure caption to a photo of a specimen, which name was actually based on the data on the specimen label itself). When someone else more respectable or whatever comes to a similar conclusion, then the same proposal miraculously passes "now that adequate data is available" or whatever. This has happened with Dysithamnus, will happen with Zimmerius now, will happen one day too with Atlapetes once molecular work is published and Grallaricula once a short note is published on more recent sound recordings of kukenamensis. It would however be nice to be taken seriously one day. You can also go back into history and look at the unnecessary, destabilising and often incorrect 'hatchet job' done on various Ridgely splits in the early years of the committee. Does anyone who knows both birds (except for a few SACC committee members) really think that Western/Eastern Woodhaunters or the Quail-Doves Geotrygon purpurata / saphirina are each a single species? Where an organisation keeps making dumb mistakes like these, which are often undone and shown to be wrong later, they deserve criticism. If they don't like it, then committee members should try getting taxonomic decisions right more often, instead of using their position on a committee as some sort of promotional vehicle to show how hardcore a pedant or Peters enthusiast they are, or for the basest expression of academic rivalry. Some of these approaches are so outrageously and demonstrably wrong and inconsistent that questions should be raised as to whether outcomes are not sometimes influenced by ad hominem bias. Also, with the SACC, one is sometimes reminded of Galileo's struggles to show the earth went round the sun, which were rejected by a self-appointed committee citing a lack of evidence and the contents of old books (there, the Bible, here, Peters' checklist).
As a further and current example, two new antbird treatments are currently up for passing and rejection. Long-tailed Antbird is up for a 4-way split which will and should pass unanimously, based on a paper co-authored by Remsen research group members. (I agree fully with the recommendations, for the record.) Immaculate Antbird is up for a two-way split which will probably be rejected based on a shitty Donegan 40-pager in Bull BOC. The proposed Santa Marta species of Long-tailed Antbird is split based on two differences in loudsong only (3 vocal differences is usually a requirement for splits based on the Isler model), and assumed differentiation in a call with a sample of n=1 recording. There is also a vocal sampling gap of several hundred km between two of the proposed split species, which approach one another to tens of km distance. To date in voting: a few positive, sycophantic comments and several yes votes. The Immaculate Antbird split is based on 3 diagnosable differences in male song, 2 in female songs and one in calls (with a considerably greater sample of calls than for Santa Marta Antbird). The sampling gap between proposed new species is a few tens of km. The Immaculate Antbird proposal was published first. Outcome to date: criticism about the sample size and lack of analysis relating to calls (!) and no votes at all. Expected? Yes. Consistent? No. The criticisms here are OK, constructive and reasonable, but you will probably see this used by some as grounds to have the proposal rejected; whilst one rarely sees adverse comment on approaches proposed by committee members' research groups and even where genuine concerns are received on such papers, they are brushed aside as irrelevant or nit-picking.
I've also criticised BOU on this forum several times for over-splitting (Green-winged Teal and American Herring Gull will be examples you are familiar with, things get worse in old world passerines and gulls). Is that whining too? There must be a happy middle ground somewhere between routinely rejecting well supported, conservative taxonomic proposals based on peer reviewed, published research (SACC); and PSC splitting based on slight mtDNA differences or miniscule plumage variations (BOU)? Whilst SACC carries on making bad decisions with regularity, I'll carry on criticising them. Isn't discussion of taxonomic matters and treatments what this forum is for? If they want this nipped in the bud, they should try getting their decisions right, or at least achieving higher levels of objective consistency or predictability.
