Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 October 12

< October 11	October 13 >

October 12

Category:Next Generation Adelaide International subcategories

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: upmerge. Kbdank71 14:37, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: This entire hierarchy of subcategories is overcategorisation. All of the categories listed above contain no more than two articles, and possibly won't ever expand beyond that amount. The parent category of Category:Next Generation Adelaide International is all that is necessary to categorise this information. -- Longhair\^talk 23:13, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Upmerge to both the corresponding parents – Category:Next Generation Adelaide International and Category:1972 ATP Tour etc. Occuli (talk) 02:00, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Upmerge all to Category:Adelaide International, possibly with a second "singles" category. The present structureis overcategorisation. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:16, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Upmerge per all - there is also a template. Johnbod (talk) 13:13, 14 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Vancouver television series

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: no consensus, although if I recall correctly, there was a rename recently that changed movies (I believe) from "shot in" a particular city to "set in" . Kbdank71 14:34, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: Split and/or delete - shooting locations and series settings should not be categorized together. There does not seem to be a widespread categorization scheme for TV series either set in or filmed in a particular city, and given the prevalence of location shooting series could wind up in multiple such categories. If kept, it should be split into categories for series that take place in Vancouver and series filmed in Vancouver. Otto4711 (talk) 22:38, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete, nothing is gained by lumping together films "produced, filmed, and/or [that] take place" in Vancouver. Those are not equivalent features, but rather akin to Category:Television series that have a connection of any kind to Vancouver. Postdlf (talk) 23:16, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Split into Category:Television series set in Vancouver and Category:Television series shot in British Columbia. It is not uncommon to have this pairing of categories. If someone wishes to do away with this category structure, then deletion is not a reasonable alternative. They would need to be listified. Vegaswikian (talk) 19:19, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Members of organizations

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: keep as supercat (it's a bird, it's a plane...) although it may be necessary to renominate it as a rename to fix the title. Kbdank71 14:20, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: Delete - vague overarching category with no reasonable limitation of scope. Could capture everything from members of the Nazi party to members of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Otto4711 (talk) 20:29, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Clear Keep and possible rename. - I think you might want to reconsider this one, Otto. There isn't a single article placed directly in this category -- rather, it's a super-cat/grouping category which is clearly needed to group together all of those sub-categories that deal with members of organizations. We might, however, want to rename it to either Category:People by membership in organization or Category:People by organizational membership. Cgingold (talk) 23:29, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep As a supercat, it is intended to have a wide range of categories and have no limitation on its scope. That's the purpose and this a clearly justifiable aid to navigation. Alansohn (talk) 01:20, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete (or perhaps weak rename). Otto's right, when we consider how many organisations there are in existence (both currently, and in the past), we shouldn't have subcategorises for membership. This is not unlike the previous consensus that we shouldn't categorise characters by membership in a "team". - jc37 10:25, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's an entirely different issue -- none of the sub-cats has been nominated for deletion. As long as they exist, it makes perfectly good sense to group them together in this category. Cgingold (talk) 14:23, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, Category:Kabbalah Centre followers is nominated for deletion directly below. Otto4711 (talk) 00:17, 14 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

keep This is a perfertly good parent category to handle the subcats in it; it is a perfectly good subcat of its parent which would otherwise have to have these subcats in it. There is no valid reason presented to delete this cat. Hmains (talk) 16:00, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Upmerge to Category:People by association which is one of the parents. Organizations includes companies, so this becomes a parent for any people category. By upmerging I feel it would be a little more restrictive in that association implies a more restricted class of of groups. An upmerge would also remove the confusion over placing something in the organization or association category. I should point out that I think there have been several discussions in the past where we have merged associations into organizations so that may be an alternative approach. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:35, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Rename to something: Category:People by organizational membership would do. The present title is unsatisfactory. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:04, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Kabbalah Centre followers

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: delete because its status as a defining characteristic for those included has not been demonstrated. Also note WP:BLP#Categories, which requires that a religious belief be both publicly self-proclaimed and be relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life. Applying these criteria would likely empty the category of living people, except for the Bergs, the family that runs the centre. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 01:40, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: Delete - trivial category capturing association with faddish organization. I believe everyone in the category is already listed at the main article but if not anyone missing can be sourced and added. In the alternative, if it's deemed a defining characteristic then merge to Category:Kabbalists. Otto4711 (talk) 20:25, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep A strong defining characteristic for the individuals included in this category. The proposed upmerge target of Category:Kabbalists include those people who are associated with scholarly development and study of the Jewish mystical practice of Kabbalah, not the pop culture version practiced at the Kabbalah Centre. I do question the inclusion of the leaders of the Centre, the three Bergs listed in the category as "followers", but that does not affect the validity of the category itself. Madonna (or is it Esther?) is just one of many celebrities that have a strong defining link to the Kabbalah Centre. The article "The Garden of Kabbalah; Kabbalah gets dismissed as a fad-with its chic red string bracelets, "blessed" water, and star convert Madonna-but the practice has changed some of Hollywood's biggest egos into, well, nicer people." in Vanity Fair is just one of thousands that cover the phenomenon and its celebrity followers. Alansohn (talk) 01:30, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You need to learn the difference between "notable" and "defining characteristic." Otto4711 (talk) 02:04, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am more than familiar with the difference, as you are already well aware. You are free to disagree, but I would hope that you would present an argument for your views supported by facts and sources as I have done here, rather than just arguing in an uncivil manner. Alansohn (talk) 06:30, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You also need to stop with the ad hominem phony-baloney cries of "incivility." Otto4711 (talk) 08:41, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questioning my knowledge of basic fundamental policy that I have quoted on dozens, if not, hundreds of occasions is uncivil. I'm more than willing to listen to arguments, not to questions of my knowledge that you already know the answer to. No editor should have to deal with these attacks. Alansohn (talk) 13:11, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not saying you don't know the policies and guidelines. I'm saying you don't understand them. Big difference. Otto4711 (talk) 23:02, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete doesn't seem to qualify as a religion, or denomination of Judaism, so not defining. But whatever we do, don't merge with the 18th century etc rabbis of Category:Kabbalists, which already has some sub-cats. Johnbod (talk) 02:31, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Johnbod. Whether it is worthy of note within an individual's article is a much different question than whether it is defining enough to merit a category. Postdlf (talk) 23:13, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:People by race or ethnicity et. al.

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: no consensus. Kbdank71 14:28, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: This entire hierarchy of categories (this and all its children) is fundamentally unencyclopedic and fatally flawed. At best, in the cases where there is little or no dispute regarding who would/should belong in which categories, the classification is worthless and pointless. I would hope that the bygone days of corralling people into various groups to discriminate or edify the membership in an orgy of prejudice and stereotyping are, in fact, really gone.

The typical case, however, is to POV war over category membership in order to make a political point— adding or removing someone from one of those categories create full scale total war between factions— and that harm isn't even vaguely balanced by any reasonable putative benefit to the encyclopedia.

Finally, the categories themselves are hopelessly worthless. Do they include self-identification? Or exclude it? What about timelines? Someone who is born in X but who lived all their lives in Y? What is an "Ethnic German"— does that include an Austrian from Rhine descent?

Off with their heads! — Coren ^(talk) 20:00, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Edit: I've added Category:People by religion explicitly even though it is a child category of the main one, in case the discussion diverges towards that topic specifically. As far as I'm concerned, that and Category:People by nationality are equally divisive, uninformative and problematic as all the rest. — Coren ^(talk) 20:32, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Make sure all categories further down in the hierarchy get tagged also. A lot of people are not going to know about this CfD otherwise. If that task is too overwhelming I'm sure there are some admins running bots who could help you with it. Also, I suggest notifying affected WikiProjects as well as the Village Pump. Maybe even the English Wikipedia mailing list. __meco (talk) 20:08, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't do mailing list (though you are welcome to raise a flag there); I am in the process of making noise on the topic on relevant noticeboards as we speak. — Coren ^(talk) 20:12, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question: Coren, why haven't you gone on to tag the subcategories as I requested yesterday? Several people have pointed out that any endorsing outcome of this discussion will be overturned on precedural grounds for this reason. It's plain irresponsible to fuel a big debate in this way that can lead nowhere. If you are intent on having a serious and valid CfD on these categories, please request that somebody assist you in tagging all relevant subcategories that you want to have included in this nomination. __meco (talk) 15:39, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I saw a bot request somewhere that got started and then halted. That might explain things. I'm also going to go and count the number of these categories. There should be some sort of limit to large nominations like this one. OK, the bot request is here, and it was started by Coren, so you might owe him an apology. I agree, though, that Coren should have arranged and got approval for the tagging before opening this discussion. Carcharoth (talk) 15:56, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I stumbled upon it also after having posted the above question for Coren. There seems to be some not clearly presented reason why the bot request was accepted and initiated and then halted. I'm also thinking about having in place some way of putting a nomination such as the present one on hold pending for instance resolution of technical problems with tagging a category hierarchy. __meco (talk) 16:30, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Query – are you sure? Category:People by nationality is one of the subcats (although perhaps it should not be). Category:People by religion is another. This is all because you think Israeli footballers shouldn't be categorised as Jewish (see ANI)? Occuli (talk) 20:22, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That too. I was in the process of finding the right parent category and adding it. :-) — Coren ^(talk) 20:24, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Being pretty sure that Category:People by nationality and Category:People by religion are not subcats of Category:People by race or ethnicity I have removed them (from Category:People by race or ethnicity). Occuli (talk) 20:56, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep all – nationality is surely defining for anyone, ethnicity for many, and religion for some. The Jewish ones are a special case, best considered one by one (eg we have deleted Category:Jewish mathematicians but kept Category:Jewish scientists). Occuli (talk) 21:08, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would say that, in the rare case where ethnicity or religion really is a defining characteristic of someone, then that would be easily sourced and ripe for inclusion in the article prose; that's hardly a good argument for a category, however. But why should "Jewish" be a special case as opposed to "Buddhist" or "African-American"? — Coren ^(talk) 21:59, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Paul Krugman's religion doesn't define him yet we give his religion emphasis. Who cares that Paul Krugman is an American Jew? He is an Economist, that category is giving emphasis and focusing on an irrelevant personal trait. We are dividing people along racial and religion lines, that's what we are doing. EconomistBR 17:37, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all: Vague and pointless categories. Is Tiger Woods African, Asian, Native American, Caucasian, or what? --Carnildo (talk) 21:24, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete the race and ethnicity ones. "Race" is a little-used classification these days and it's bloody hard to verify and pin down ethnicity. Religion, I'm not so sure. At least this is in theory verifiable. Moreschi (talk) 21:30, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
An interesting question then becomes "when and according to whom"? I would expect only self-identification has any sort of reliability, but what about people who change their beliefs (and the corresponding self-identification) several times in their lives? Which category would they fall under? — Coren ^(talk) 21:49, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This certainly doesn't apply in Africa - ethnicity is generally defining. Eg the genocide in Rwanda was Hutu/Tutsi. What about Kikuyu in Kenya, Ndebele in Zimbabwe, Hausa and Category:Igbo people in Nigeria. Flemish in Belgium, various in ex-Yugoslavia, 3 distinct language groups in Switzerland etc etc. Occuli (talk) 22:01, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete them, these arguments convince me. Protonk (talk) 21:54, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
keep since there is no accepted agrument to delete all subcats, this category is needed as the grouping parent of them all. A very reasonable category for WP. Hmains (talk) 21:59, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I suggest deleting every subcat, the parent category is an obvious side-effect. Do you mean that you don't agree with deleting the subcategories, or did you just think I meant deleting the parent categories by themselves? — Coren ^(talk) 22:01, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
keep this cat; the subcats were not nominated, but keep them also; you can waste all the time you want on this; these categories are repeatedly kept after every discussion as they should be; they are an important part of WP; become acquainted with it Hmains (talk) 03:20, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all - Rarely can race or ethnicity be correctly determined, not to mention it adds no value to any articles. Category:People by Religion should be deleted aswell because it is not relevant unless you are the Pope or Dalai Lama. Hubschrauber729 (talk) 22:02, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete some This process wil obviously take longer, but very obvious categories should be kept. ie the Hutu/Tutsi. If they either are one or they're not and there's no inbetween there's no reason to delete a good category. Others on the other hand just cause editwars and too much drama. This has to be a case-by-case basis. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:13, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
While I agree in principle, do you have a set of objective criteria to follow or are you suggesting nominating the categories individually and discussing each? — Coren ^(talk) 22:29, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nominate each one individually. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 00:27, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
keep there is nothing controversial about these categories. heck, even censuses ask about race and ethnicity. The controversy may be only about people asigned into them. But the latter is matter of article content dispute. `'Míkka >t 22:25, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Procedural keep. The subcategories are not tagged or listed here. As a result, essentially this is a discussion whether or not to delete two parent categories, each of which houses hundreds of categories. Deletion of the parent holder categories will not accomplish the nomination's objectives and will hurt the project by leaving hundreds of categories without the appropriate parent category. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 22:44, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all Per well reasoned nom. Garion96 (talk) 22:49, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all following nom. There are such things as genetic strains among many species, ours too, but among people these are for the most part way skeinish, entwined, not at all yet thoroughly described or understood in meaningful scientific ways and hence, open to endlessly misleading labels. Carrying sourced commentary about an individual's ethnicity and/or ancestral origins in an article is ok, even helpful, but trying to plug that into stark categories is fraught with ways to botch and let down readers. Gwen Gale (talk) 23:17, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Clear Keep (but probably rename to Category:People by ethnicity so as to remove the contentious term "race"). My time is very short right now, but I did want to go on record without delay. For the moment I will simply say this: Aside from the fact that these are super-cat/grouping categories for many hundreds of sub-categories, the nominator is simply asserting his personal prejudice against the very idea of providing this type of information, based on what appear to be some very simplistic beliefs about why these categories exist and what purpose they serve. I strongly object to his assumptions on that issue, as articulated in the following statement: "I would hope that the bygone days of corralling people into various groups to discriminate or edify the membership in an orgy of prejudice and stereotyping are, in fact, really gone." That is patent nonsense, and frankly, I consider it extremely offensive. The fact that he considers Category:People by nationality to be "equally divisive, uninformative and problematic" speaks volumes. That's all I have time for now. Cgingold (talk) 00:01, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Allright, I'll bite. What encyclopedic purpose do they serve? — Coren ^(talk) 05:01, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all That the categories are targets for edit wars is not a rationale for delete. We need to insure that ALL such categorizations are verified in reliable sources, but lots of people self-identify by race and ethnicity and religion, and for large parts of history, these characteristics were one of the driving forces for human behavior, even if we wish it weren't so. Merely because policing such categories requires diligence does not mean that they are unimportant or unworthwhile categories. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 00:31, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all Not only has the nom not followed procedure, but this is a clear POV nomination. --Pwnage8 (talk) 01:09, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What, pray tell, would that putative POV be? — Coren ^(talk) 02:47, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"I would hope that the bygone days of corralling people into various groups to discriminate or edify the membership in an orgy of prejudice and stereotyping are, in fact, really gone." This appears to be what the nomination hinges on. This is blatant POV and by far the worst reasoning I've ever seen on Wikipedia for proposing deletion. --Pwnage8 (talk) 04:14, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's called an opinion on what is or, in this case, isn't good for the encyclopedia. By definition any statement on any project space is such an opinion— and indeed the gathering and discussion of those opinions is the very reason for the existence of the project space. My position here is that those categories serve no useful encyclopedic purpose, are divisive, and are impossible to populate rationally. That's certainly a "point of view", but NPOV applies to article contents which I am not discussing here. "Useless, prejudicial, divisive and harmful" is most certainly a very good justification for deletion— you are quite welcome to disagree but dismissing the argument as "worst reasoning" as you did is neither productive nor civil. — Coren ^(talk) 05:08, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Really? I'm being too tame. You know, there's people that have suggested you be blocked for disruption. Categories affect the article contents, and by deleting these categories you are imposing your own POV on the contents of the article. --Pwnage8 (talk) 05:18, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep All these are some of the most fundamentally encyclopedic examples of defining characteristics. The nomination includes the oft-spouted "what about this hypothetical borderline case" which might be valid to exclude an entry or two, it provides no justification for eliminating the category in its entirety. Alansohn (talk) 01:41, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Vague or hard to determine inclusion criteria is very commonly a main argument in successful CfDs. __meco (talk) 15:48, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think it is important to distinguish between cases where the inclusion criteria will be vague or hard to determine for all potential members, and cases where the the inclusion criteria will be vague or hard to determine for only a small subset. If there were 1,000,000 FOOIANS and 5 controversial-FOOIANS, is that a reason not to categorise FOOIANS? Similarly, if there are lots of people that reliably be sourced and categorise a certain way, the fact that a small subset can't be is not reason to strip everyone of the categorisation. Carcharoth (talk) 15:56, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep all and block proposing editor for disruption of our project. Badagnani (talk) 02:17, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Just to clarify thing, should only I be blocked for disruption or should the other administrators and editors who agreed with my nomination also be blocked en masse? — Coren ^(talk) 03:25, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all almost every person on Wikipedia defines themselves in some way and many chose ethnicity and religion. I understand if editors themselves don't define themselves in this way, but the subjects that they are editing many times do. -NYC2TLV (talk) 02:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all. A quick review of the comedians I was trying to group into a new sub-category for Saturday Night Live alumni shows a disproportionate categorization by religion, ethnicity, and national origin. While lacking categorization based on achievements, style, retinue affiliations, or other relevant aspects. My new subcategory was not allowed due to policies intended to address over-categorization. If categories must be pared down these are the first that should go. - Michael J Swassing (talk) 05:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all, these categories are remarkably useless as navigation aids go, and tend to encourage the yes/no labelling for identifications that are best dealt with in prose. When you combine the fact that these don't actually help the encyclopedia very much at best, and tend to be divisive drama magnets at worst, I don't think Wikipedia is well served by keeping them. ~ mazca ^t|c 07:58, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep while I agree that how we categorise by race and religion needs to be addressed I think that the end result will be that some people are notable because of the their race or religion. What I think should happen is the creation of a policy/guideline to address the POV issues the end result will be that these super cats will still be valid groupings Gnan garra 08:53, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Would it not suffice to retain categories for activists and advocates related to any one ethnicity? __meco (talk) 15:56, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep all : Unconvincing rationale. This is a huge change, which should be discussed at a broader audience apart from here. Also there is no need of this Bot request for Mass CFDing all the subcategories before a clear consensus is made. -- Tinu Cherian - 08:54, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm pretty sure this current discussion inherently includes all the myriad subcategories - that bot request seems to be purely to tag the pages to alert a broader audience. ~ mazca ^t|c 09:00, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- The procedure is to tag first, start the CfD second. So of course there is "a need" to tag them. As it is, things have been started in a bass ackwards manner; let's not compound the problem. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 09:02, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Agreed partially as is per usual procedure. But here we dont a clear consensus in even deleting the main categories itself, therefore questions the need of blind Mass Tagging of all subcategories ( 100s of them) using Bot ( possibly need to revert them all after the closure of this CFD). It would have been appropriate if the nominator personally tag and CFD individually 'problematic' cats, stating specific reasons for them than "I dont like them ALL" reason. It would have been a different case if there was a consensus for deletion here .Just my 2 cents -- Tinu Cherian - 10:06, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - Yes, I see what you're getting at and agree. At this stage, there may not be much point now. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 20:54, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all for now There is a valid argument for a proper review of how we use such cats, but Cfd isn't the place to do it. At various times there have been nationalist or emancipatory movements with many people be they artists academics etc identifying as part of these movements. Further, whatever problems there are with racial or ethnic classifications, they are not withering away out in the big wide world but required in various legislatures, whether for ethnic monitoring in the UK, engineering the ethnic profiles of South African sports teams etc. By all means set up a centralised discussion, but don't go for the razed earth policy of a cfd for all cats that will leave us starved of soem useful cats in the future.--Peter cohen (talk) 09:45, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all in order to oppose the creeping censorship, sickening political correctness, and the denial of science and fact-gathering which now threatens to overrun Wikipedia and destroy its usefulness and effectiveness. The nomination of these categories also seems to me to be a half-veiled attempt to first and foremost delete ALL of the categories dealing with Jews from this encyclopedia. --Wassermann (talk) 10:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comments - I would like to suggest two things. The first is that the ethnicity cats and the religion cats be nominated in two separate discussions. (If it's too late for that, I understand. It would just make discussion easier.) The second is that whatever day these these are all tagged (if not already by the 12th), would another admin please move this discussion to whatever day that is. - jc37 10:34, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Tagging versus categorisation - One of the uses of such categories is as tagging. When you have very large groups like this, it is difficult to query the encyclopedia for a list of all English people or all French people or all people born in the 19th century or all Muslim or Christian crusaders or rulers. People making such queries should realise that the answer will be incomplete and not definitive, and this is not a reason for not attempting to aggregate and organise the data (and with such large groupings, lists and simple searches become unmanageable). But in order to make such queries, the articles need to be tagged in a suitable fashion. This is similar to answering the question of how many of our "people" (or 'biographical') articles are about men, and how many are about women? Currently, there is no tagging on articles to distinguish men from women. The first step to answering this requires that the "group" ariticles (covering more than one person) are tagged accordingly, and that the "single" articles (about a single person - I'm talking about the title of the articles here, not who is mentioned in the article) are also tagged accordingly. Then the tagging for gender (including "other") can be done. This points up one of the failings of the category system (and CfD as well). Categories are instinctively used by many as tags for basic data, even if that data is in some cases unclear. Stuff like "year of birth", "age at death", "place of birth", "place of death", "place of burial". These are all verifiable facts (with a few disputed cases - you always have to allow for some of that) that can be put in articles (even though they are not defining characteristics), but once in plain text in articles it becomes difficult to group related articles. CfD in particular has sometimes tried to remove "tagging" categories, and move towards "defining characteristics" categories, but that has its own problems as can be seen at many CfD debates. One answer is to use templates or special markup in the article text to allow "tags" and "data" to be extracted. See Wikipedia:Metadata for some examples. The systems there allow geographical data and ISBN data to be systematically mined and extracted. There are basic biographical data that can be extracted in similar ways, but using markup can impede the ease of editing. In some cases it is best to allow editors to write the information into articles in plaintext, and then have other editors come along and use that information to create metadata tags, whether that be microformats or category tags or templates in infoboxes. However, this is a work in progress and will take years to accomplish. Deleting whole swathes of the category structure like this risks losing large amounts of data that have been built up over the past eight years, and which would be slowly consolidated over the coming years. So keep all where verifiable. Carcharoth (talk) 11:07, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep All. I hope I am wrong here, but the motivation behind this nomination seems to be more the nominator's personal beliefs concerning the topic, rather than something based on improving the categorisation system. Because, as far as I can see, no reason has been provided for deleting these categories that is grounded in policy, I cannot support. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 11:39, 13 October 2008 (UTC).[reply]
Keep all Aside from the inappropriate POV-pushing in seeking to eliminate the ability to search for and research information related to factors that have played and do play enormous roles in human interactions (apparently on the "if-it-can't-be-named-it-won't-exist" theory of social problem-solving), the trend toward abolishing/minimizing/ignoring racial and ethnic differences is medically destructive, dangerous, oppressive and bio-ethically misguided: For example, organ shortfall for those in need of organ transplants disproportionately and adversely affects non-whites globally, and racial/ethnic minorities within developed societies. It's remedied by soliciting increased donations from potential donors most likely to be organ matches for those in need of transplants. We know that more of, e.g. Native Americans are going to need liver transplants than there are matching livers donated, and that other Native Americans will be better matches on average than WASPs, and that people know their race even though they won't know their HLA genotype. So targeting Native Americans by race through voluntary organ donation drives is the best way to meet a known, unmet need. Impeding that effort by preventing identification by race/ethnicity sentences disproportionate numbers of minorities to suffer from organ shortfall, and is unjustifiably inhumane. PlayCuz (talk) 11:58, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Ok, I'll change my vote to keep if the voluntary organ donation drives use these Wikipedia categories as their source for organ donors information. I somehow doubt it though. Garion96 (talk) 12:01, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for being willing to take into consideration information you may not have known before. But why would you doubt such ethnic typing is done for good medical care? See here and here. Racial differences aren't a problem -- it's how people respond to such differences that is the problem. PlayCuz (talk) 23:35, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PlayCuz, as best I can make out your argument, we should classify Wikipedia subjects by race so that they can be identified as suitable organ donors. I am concerned that anyone would even consider that an appropriate use of Wikipedia, let alone a particularly valuable one. Risker (talk) 14:26, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ask the families of minorities who are dying while waiting for kidneys how "appropriate" and "valuable" it is. They watch whites who have been on the list for shorter periods get organs sooner because they are better matches for the available kidneys. Don't misunderstand: people who are the best match for the organ should get it because the chances of surviving transplant rejection are enhanced. But the best hope for those getting passed by is for more people who are likely to be good matches to donate organs. It's a no-brainer to figure out what groups are neediest and yet under-donating. Targeting that population for voluntary donations is just good public health care. It can't be done if you can't type those who need the donations & those who are potential donors by ethnicity. What's the moral problem you see with Wikipedia not deprecating what is a routinely-done medical recruitment process? PlayCuz (talk) 23:35, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Only the living ones, of course... Really, I think, even if PlayCuz was making a serious point about Wikipedia (he or she is definitely making a serious point about real-world concerns), the point here is that high-flying idealistic aims are not the way to approach categorisation, whether it be a medical point or Coren's "hope those days are gone" point. The "history" point made elsewhere is a valid one (we shouldn't impose modern ideals on the past), as well as the point about notifying all the ethnicity and religion-focused wikiprojects. Carcharoth (talk) 14:37, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep all per hundreds of precedents here, incomplete nomination & laughable liberal-imperialist nomination - one man's "I would hope that the bygone days of corralling people into various groups to discriminate or edify the membership in an orgy of prejudice and stereotyping are, in fact, really gone" is another's "you are suppressing my ethnic or national identity". Have, for example, the Basque and Judaism projects been told you are proposing to delete all their people categories? Johnbod (talk) 12:13, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all - nationality and ethnicity are the first things that appear in lead sections for people, and are top-importance distinctions. Religion might not be important, but it only seems to apply to religious people who clearly identify with a certain religion, so there's no reason to delete it. Moreover, this is clearly a WP:POINT nomination stemming from a recent WP:ANI case. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 12:53, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Way too broad, and the nomination does seem to be trying to make a political point. "I would hope that the bygone days of corralling people into various groups ... are, in fact, really gone." First, we don't do things based on hope, but on verifiable, reliable sources; is it really indisputable that no one classifies people based on heritage or religion any more? Second, even if people aren't classified this way any more, surely even the nominator would agree that they used to be, and this is an encyclopedia not just of the present, but also of the past; surely we don't want to throw out Category:Austria-Hungary because there is no such thing any more? --GRuban (talk) 14:10, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all May as well remove birthplaces, citizenship, country of origin, etc. from the articles themselves. Rmhermen (talk) 16:27, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - as a follow-up to my long comment above, would anyone here be interested in this discussion? Carcharoth (talk) 15:07, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Prior discussions (other may exist):
Is it just me, or has the category structure here got out of control? Carcharoth (talk) 16:04, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Out of control? Not sure I would go that far. I think these categories developed and grew as a way to reduce the size of some people categories to reasonable sizes. So if that is a valid and acceptable reason that does not cause WP:BLP or other issues, then we can keep. Otherwise a delete may seem to be the right choice. I'm not sure yet about these and I await further comments about the need for these categories. I would really like to see more of the Keep editors explaining why these are not POV issues. Also we seem to be getting keeps being supported by WP:ILIKEIT and WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. One final issue. At some level, this may not be a valid delete, but an upmerge. Not sure at which point that would need to be considered. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:46, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all pretty much an open invitation for WP:BLP violations. BanRay 18:34, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the nominator and those who supported deletion above, and therefore support deletion. seresin ( ¡? ) 21:30, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep -- This is appropriate as a parent category. For some people religion is an important characteristic, so that we need a category; for others is is non-defining and a person should not appear in a category. Likewise not all ethicities are nationalities, so we need a parent for race or ethnicity. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:10, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all Defining characteristics, encyclopedic information. Dimadick (talk) 15:10, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all. The advantages do not outweigh the disadvantages and problems. Take e.g. Dutch (ethnic group). This article (and a number of researchers into this) consider people from Flanders to be ethnically Dutch. However, many people in Flanders would find it incorrect to be labeled "Dutch" in a list or category, and would never identify themselves as Dutch. Category:Dutch people is a classification by nationality, but says that it is "A category to group articles about Dutch people.", where Dutch links to the ethnic classification, not the Netherlands. Ethnicity is hugely confusing, potentially offensive, and rarely defining. If such categories are kept (ethnicity, religion, ...), they should only be used on people who are clearly, reliably sourced as such. If people are not (self-)described as Dutch, they should not be categorized as Dutch, even when this makes sense from an ethnological point of view. If people don't associate themselves with a religion (by publicly stating or displaying their religion), they should not be listed as belonging to any religion, either in categories or lists. To summarize: preferable delete, but if kept, remove on sight anything not or insufficiently sourced. 08:06, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
Comment -- this is just to point out that User:Coren, the person who nominated these categories for deletion, quite obviously does not adhere to one of Wikipedia's most important and basic policies despite being an administrator, namely maintaining a WP:NPOV -- he/she made the blatantly POV demand of "Off with their heads!" as a censorious rallying cry when he/she originally nominated these categories for deletion (in my opinion this extreme level of POV should be grounds for admin. recall). I very much hope that highly POV comments such as these are taken in to account when the (hopefully neutral) closing administrator decides the fate of these very long-established and extremely well-populated anthropological/sociological categories. --Wassermann (talk) 16:50, 16 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment. While I disagree with the nominator that the categories should be deleted, I think some assumptions of good faith would be in order. I read the "off with their heads" comment as a playful comment revealing nothing more than the nominator's enthusiasm for their own suggestions to delete the categories. This isn't a Sarah Palin rally, so I don't think we need to take the comment all that seriously. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 20:37, 16 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  BLP violation asterisked out (see [1]) Andjam (talk) 04:57, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Please don't edit my comments without my permission; thx. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 06:51, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all; the Wikipedia category system isn't a sharpening stone for axes to grind. SparsityProblem (talk) 22:53, 16 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm worried that the nominator has confused describing a situation with endorsing it. If we can't talk about ethnic groups, then how would we be able to say that none of the previous 43 presidents are from a certain ethnic group when roughly 4 or 5 of them "ought" to have been? Andjam (talk) 01:29, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all - Why should we give emphasizing to people's religions or ethnicity? Who determined that those personal traits are so important as to require such emphasis? All those categories do is invite racism and prejudice. The fact that Paul Krugman is an American Jew is completely and utterly irrelevant, yet we are giving emphasis to it. More important are his views on Keynesianism and Monetarism, but I don't see those categories. EconomistBR 17:37, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment That is why I said that a centralised discussion on the use of ethnic categories is the way to go. Just because the categories may sometimes be used inappropriately, doesn't mean that they always are.--Peter cohen (talk) 09:50, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Cross-platform software

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: no consensus, but some sort of reorganization or reworking is encouraged. This category could be re-assessed after some further organizational work has been completed. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 04:19, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: It is more common for a software package to be available for more than one platform than for only a single platform. Thus, the majority of articles about software packages fall into this category, and it is not a useful classification. Delete SparsityProblem (talk) 17:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep: Many popular desktop software is not cross-platform (Windows Media Player, Windows Live Messenger, Internet Explorer, Nero Burning Rom, utorrent, emule, ImgBurn, daemon tools, transmission BT client, etc...), and I think this is a very usefull category. I am very surprised this got proposed for deletion... SF007 (talk) 18:48, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Make this only for "Windows AND Linux AND Mac software" if needed, but I think deleting is a very very bad idea... SF007 (talk) 18:50, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What would you propose to rename the category to in that case? "Software available for Windows, various dialects of Unix and GNU/Linux, and Mac OS" is a very long name. SparsityProblem (talk) 22:41, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why rename in that case? just keep the same name, and a simple introductory paragraph in the beginning. I think many people might be looking for cross-platform software (like I was, when I noticed this category was missing!), and this is a very useful thing... SF007 (talk) 01:08, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But if it's not renamed, almost every single open-source software package and lots of proprietary software packages that are available on Unix would belong in this category, since there are many different flavors of Unix. SparsityProblem (talk) 02:14, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If someone (which would take a lot of work) chose to add all of the topics which meet the same criteria as those which have been selected, it would cover most of the existing software topics. That's because of the inclusion of different hardware and software platforms. Tedickey (talk) 14:50, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Given the stated criteria, there are other programs which are not cross-platform (which have been omitted from the category so far) that are not Windows, Linux or Mac. Tedickey (talk) 15:14, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep: Useful category as SF007 explained. rootology (C)(T) 20:12, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - or substantially reorganize. The category as given covers at least three potential subcategories, which if populated would eliminate more than half of the examples given by SF007. Tedickey (talk) 21:37, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep: Useful category , Not All software are cross platform. -- Tinu Cherian - 13:33, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Thousands and thousands of applications run on more than single platform and this ability can be added over time (or dropped). Morover being multiplatform is not something clear cut - application can be available for several platforms but provide different capabilities on each (typically GUI part is available only on Windows). This category would accumulate huge number of items, making it practically useless and chronically out-of-date. Inclusion criteria are not clear - is Windows CE or Xbox different platform? Pavel Vozenilek (talk) 16:29, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That problem would be solved by making this category only for Windows AND Linux AND Mac programs. I'm not sure there are many programs that fit that description SF007 (talk) 18:25, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's little point in that (except to collect existing links of programs which run on those platforms, which would be better spent by devising platform-specific categories - reduce clutter). Tedickey (talk) 20:19, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Speedware Autobahn (server side tool to create websites) runs on Windows and HP Unix systems. Quite a few application developed for Windows get run on Linux using Wine. Some applications developed for system X could be shipped on N other platforms using VMWare. In my opinion categories are not a proper tool to capture information so volatile and hard to define precisely. Pavel Vozenilek (talk) 19:37, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Being "cross-platform" is as noted, not clear-cut. If it were, the topic would not be mixing together multiple definitions (hardware platforms, software platforms, virtual platforms). The topics currently marked with this category are similarly mixed. Tedickey (talk) 20:36, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Hard rock groups

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: rename. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 01:20, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Propose renaming Category:Hard rock groups to Category:Hard rock musical groups

Nominator's rationale: For consistency with other, similar categories- generally, such categories are named "[genre] musical groups". There is a past precedent for this at CfD, I'm happy to dig out some examples if anyone wants them. J Milburn (talk) 15:31, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Rename per nom. Lugnuts (talk) 16:00, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Phone thriller/horror movies

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: SPEEDY DELETE as recreation; see prior CfD. Postdlf (talk) 23:40, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator's rationale: Weird psuedo-category which, even if cleaned up, is too narrow in its scope and does not represent an established film genre. PC78 (talk) 11:02, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete: This is definitely a very limited category. I would note, however, that if it ends up being kept, it needs quite a bit of filling. Among the titles that are currently missing (which I won't add if the category's going to be deleted in a week): Cellular (film), Eagle Eye, Phone Booth (film), When a Stranger Calls and When a Stranger Calls (2006 film). BookhouseBoy (talk) 16:02, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep A description of a genre of films that keeps on being made. There are about a dozen listed in the category description (not the category), and several more have been listed in an argument for delete. And let's not forget When a Stranger Calls Back and Dial M for Murder. Alansohn (talk) 05:05, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete (Weak listify - the creator appears to have been trying to create a list.) In one sense too narrow, and in another too broad. "Phone" is too narrow, and combining the two genres "thriller" and "horror" makes it too broad. We could just as easily say "Car thriller/horror" or "television thriller/horror". It's categorising by an object related to the plot/content of the work of fiction (a film/movie in this case.) And we could do this with innumerable items which appear in a work of fiction. (Incidentally, you forgot Dial M for Murder : ) - jc37 10:25, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment for those swayed by sources, the term "phone thriller" is indeed described in the media as a film genre and has been applied to a number of the films in this category. "PAY-PHONE THRILLER DIALS M FOR MURDER" in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette uses the term to describe Phone Booth (film). "KIM BASINGER CALLING... It's enough to make you pick up her cell-phone thriller" from the Daily News (New York) does the same for Cellular. There's more where that come from for "phone thriller", but "phone horror" seems to be harder to support. As reliable and verifiable sources back the description of the genre, the concerns of this being a "weird psuedo-category" are addressed, perhaps by removing the word "horror". Alansohn (talk) 16:12, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Neither of those sources "describe" a "film genre"; they just pair the nouns to describe those individual films because the films were thrillers and phones were central plot elements of those films. Do you have a source that does describe "phone thriller" as a distinct genre? Postdlf (talk) 23:01, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Antisemitism in France

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: creation of Category:Anti-Semitism in France supported. Feel free to do so at any point. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 01:18, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

fr:Catégorie:Antisémitisme en France look big. Maybe Category:Antisemitism in France would be good. Could include Robert Brasillach, Edouard Drumont, Irène Némirovsky, Georges Oltramare, Jacques Ploncard d'Assac, Antisemitic League of France, Jules Guérin, Au Pilori, Henry Coston. 89.2.243.42 (talk) 10:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Seems sensible - we don't seem to have national sub-cats, but Category:Anti-Semitism could do with reducing the huge number of articles in the main category. Remember to remove articles from this if they go in a national sub-cat. Johnbod (talk) 12:38, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Support -- the simplest way to recategorise will be to add " in France" to the present category. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:12, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Cable HD channels

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: merge. Kbdank71 15:23, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Suggest merging Category:Cable HD channels to Category:HD channels

Suggest merging Category:Satellite HD channels to Category:HD channels

Nominator's rationale: Merge. This breakout and odd subcategory inclusions is not necessary. What exactly is the difference between the channels provided via cable or satellite? Merge these to the parent and then if needed break these out in another way, say Category:HD sports channels. Vegaswikian (talk) 00:43, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merge per nom - if nothing else, surely a large amount of channels are actually available on both. And beyond that, I agree that it's not a very useful criterion for categorisation. ~ mazca ^t|c 17:05, 13 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge as many channels are available in both mediums, Australian PayTV providers offer the same channels on either cable or satellite dependent on where you are Gnan garra 15:50, 14 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge and there are OTA HD channels... which aren't separately catted, merge to prevent someone thinking it should be created as part of a series. 70.55.200.131 (talk) 07:11, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.