Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2009 November 20

AXAH – Restored and listed at AfD by the deleting admin. Nothing more for DRV to do here. NAC. – Tim Song (talk) 05:16, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The following is an archived debate of the deletion review of the article above. Please do not modify it.

Inappropriate, out of process deletion by Altenmann. The page was previously redirected as a likely search term. The deletion log claims it was an expired prod but it was not. Seems to be related to these AfD's the deleting admin just initiated: [1] [2] [3] [4]
--Tothwolf (talk) 23:23, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The prod was removed, so I'm not sure that rationale holds water. However, have you tried asking Altenmann about this? AniMate 23:31, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Overturn Tothwolf had handled it correctly according to WP:BEFORE. The deleting admin seems to have removed a good and useful redirect on the basis of it having being a prodded article. there were two prods on it previous to Tothwolf's redirect: prod1 gave no reason; prod2 said "The article contains only a dictionary definition of a technical term. Details are well-covered at AHAH." a very good reason to change it to a redirect, as was done, rather than delete: the article contained only the text "Asynchronous XHTML and HTTP, or AXAH, is the similar to AHAH. The only difference is specifying the markup as XHTML." and a link to [Examples of AXAH]--clearly not supportable as an article. This sort of thing usually happens as an e.c., but the deleting admin did it 15 hrs after the change to a redirect. I suspect the reason to be that they had opened a window or tab for it earlier, and not finished it until half a day later & forgot to look for changes. An edit would have given an edit conflict message, but apparently a deletion does not. I consider it simply a careless technical error on their part--it could happen to me easily enough also. DGG ( talk ) 00:07, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The article was prodded on 14 July 2009, [5] redirected on 21 July 2009, [6], and then deleted 20 November 2009 [7] as an "expired prod". --Tothwolf (talk) 00:32, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - My mistake. I was looking at several similar pages. This one was a redirect to a wrong (IMO) page, so I opened an old version to see the content. Then I proceeded to nomination for deletion of some of them. This one (opened on old version) I mistakenly assumed as "prodded" and deleted myself. I guess there is a bug in the software, since the deletion page automatically substituted the "expired prod" text, so I suspected nothing. - Altenmann >t 01:14, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  Please, someone more experienced, report the wikimedia bug, easily reproducible. - Altenmann >t 01:12, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - It isn't really a bug. If you restored the old revision, that's exactly what you'd see. Basically the "expired prod" text comes in because it has been more than 7 days since the prodding; AFAIK the template's logic has no way to tell if it was an older revision or not. Tim Song (talk) 09:26, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    IMO it really is. If you look ito the history, I did not restore it: I only viewed it in history. - Altenmann >t 05:06, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
From deleting admin: In any case, the redirect target was about a different software which has no slightest mention of AXAH. A single letter in name may be a totally different product, such as Synopsis and Synopsys. This is expecially sensible with abbreviations. If AXAH is notable in itself, such a redirect is misleading and hence harmful, rather than helpful. The deleted page says that it is "similar to AHAH". Well, we have zillions of similar products, which are nevertheless different, and not all of them are notable. For all we know AXAH may be a college dorm knock-off of AHAH, no reason for promotion in wikipedia, unless solid references of notability provided. Then there is no problem with article recreation. - Altenmann >t 00:17, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Undelete. This was just a little mistake? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:38, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'm confused. If this was deleted as an expired PROD, why isn't it simply restored at a user's request, and whatever other issues are involved addressed in the appropriate places? Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 17:40, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- It wasn't an expired prod, which is why I listed it here. See my reply to DGG above. --Tothwolf (talk) 21:02, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If you think it was not the same software, and that a redirect was inappropriate, then the best way to clarify the situation would be to restore the article, and list it at AfD for a proper debate which can be better cone there than here. DGG ( talk ) 01:10, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done. - Altenmann >t 03:33, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The redirect was appropriate based on the information I could find. The proper procedure would have been RFD, but that was not done. Now it is listed at AfD like the other 4... --Tothwolf (talk) 04:10, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"AXAH" is not mentioned nor somehow hinted in the AHAH page. Please never redirect to a page when a reader will not find the term he is looking for. If you have found an information which allows you to believe that you may create redirect, and it is missing in wikipedia, please add it, with the corresponding reference, and only then redirect. - Altenmann >t 05:00, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are of course free to argue for a redirect at AFD. Tim Song (talk) 04:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

But first create a basis in wikipedia itself: notability, sources, you know the ropes. - Altenmann >t 05:03, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Honestly, I don't really care anymore as I'm growing tired of people attempting to game the system. --Tothwolf (talk) 05:05, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above is an archive of the deletion review of the page listed in the heading. Please do not modify it.

Dorian Davis – Unsalted to allow an article that meets inclusion criteria to be created in good faith; without prejudice to a fresh AFD on the new article if there are objections at that point. –xeno^talk 14:12, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The following is an archived debate of the deletion review of the article above. Please do not modify it.

Dorian Davis' Wikipedia article was deleted two years ago, and since he has gained more notability and I would like an opportunity to improve the article. I have collected some references. Feel free to review my contributions and user page. Dan Leveille^TALK 02:53, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unsalt per S Marshall. It's been two years, and an editor in good standing wants to work on it. Tim Song (talk) 02:58, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Is it possible to get a copy of the article as it stood, so I have something to work with-even if it's placed here temporarily: User:Danlev/sandbox/Dorian_Davis. Thanks. --Dan Leveille^TALK 03:18, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - Done. AniMate 05:26, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Tim Song correctly predicted what I'd say! Unsalt per, er, well, me.—S Marshall ^Talk/_Cont 08:54, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- :) Tim Song (talk) 09:27, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above is an archive of the deletion review of the page listed in the heading. Please do not modify it.

Fort Hood terrorist attack – Deletion endorsed. Because of the extended discussions we have had on this, I ask that the redirect not be recreated even if a new source is found, unless it is brought to DRV and recreation is permitted. – NW (Talk) 15:26, 27 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The following is an archived debate of the deletion review of the article above. Please do not modify it.

Inappropriate THIRD Close while discussion was ongoing. --William S. Saturn (talk) 05:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unclose, let the discussion continue, This was an obvious no consensus as noted by User:Protonk. --William S. Saturn (talk) 05:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse closure - Saturn has been obsessed with this terrorism label (leading to an ANI complaint[8]), and wants the circular debate to go on forever. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:26, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn to no consensus, and possibly open a RFC on the broader issue This, and a few previous cases, make it clear there is a fundamental disagreement about whether, and the degree to which WP:NPOV and WP:BLP can meaningfully apply to redirects, or whether redirects should, as navigational aids, be understood not to convey any opinion about the subject. I strongly subscribe to the latter belief, absent obvious mischief, which this is clearly not. The admin's closure rationale makes clear that he was incapable of understanding one side of the argument, and thus he acted, in good faith but inappropriately, to dismiss that side's arguments entirely. We are left with little more than vote-counting, which, I believe, Protonk read appropriately as no consensus. Ray^Talk 05:28, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Editors commenting here, who are concerned about the overall issue, are invited to comment at Wikipedia_talk:Redirect#Section_regarding_neutrality_of_redirects for a more general discussion about redirect rules. Our current guideline is that NPOV (and, by extension, such parts of BLP as depend on NPOV) do not apply to redirects. I like that, but it appears a lot of people don't. Those who agree, or disagree, with me, are invited to talk the subject over in generality there. Ray^Talk 06:08, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment These things have time frames for a reason. If anything, it was overdue. Grsz¹¹ 05:30, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse closure as correct interpretation of discussion, as well as correct action to take to uphold WP:BLP and WP:NPOV. GlassCobra 05:32, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse closure per GlassCobra. Interestingly, William S. Saturn had no objections to the discussion being closed when it was a result he agreed with, he only called for more discussion when he disagreed with the result. AniMate 05:36, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That's because no consensus was the right decision although I favored further discussion. --William S. Saturn (talk) 05:38, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse close Technically the original one by Black Kite was the correct close, being that it was the first. But Crum's close comes to the same decision, so endorse this one for the sake of less fuckassing about. Viridae ^Talk 05:40, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse closure - The "while discussion was ongoing" is particularly bizarre since we're already well well past the standard 7 days afforded XfD discussions. Why should it be allowed to continue, because this outcome isn't to saturn's liking? Tarc (talk) 05:47, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse deletion. Black Kite had it right the first time. Not sure why this became an issue; admins should know better than to feed AN/I drama.... --MZMcBride (talk) 05:49, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse deletion by Black Kite. No offense to Crum, but he shouldn't have had to do it. Grsz¹¹ 05:53, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Close POV fork evading consensus at Fort Hood shootings, highly unlikely search term, BLP issues as well, ten days of extended discussion already. PhGustaf (talk) 05:59, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Greater than 100k hits on Google [9], over 7000 on Gnews [10], is an unlikely search term? It's a redirect, and thus can't be a POV fork either. Would you like to rephrase? Ray^Talk 06:04, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Put the phrase in quotes and the gnews hits go down to 17, mostly opeds and blogs. Such redirects as Barack Osama have been deleted, too. PhGustaf (talk) 06:24, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
In quotes on google fetches 102,000. --William S. Saturn (talk) 06:26, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
This redirect does not mean we are calling it an act of terrorism, or the shooter a terrorist. Otherwise, the title of the article would reference terrorism. Redirects are an aid to navigation; if it is reasonable to suspect that a person would type in X intending to get to an article he does not know we have titled Y, the redirect is valid. In this case, it is absolutely reasonable to suspect that a reader would type Fort Hood terrorist attack and need to be redirected to Fort Hood shooting. Though DRV is not RfD II, Crum's closure was an incorrect interpretation of the debate. It is not a violation of BLP to have this redirect because we are not labeling anyone a terrorist; his reasoning was flawed. BK's close was better, but links in the RfD show that BK was wrong when he said nobody would call this a terrorist attack. The closure should be overturned and the RfD relisted. ÷seresin 06:05, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comparison to Barack Osama is not at all valid. People searching for that know well what the correct name is. A perfectly reasonable person could think of this as "Fort Hood terrorist attack." Is also isn't a play on a name in smearing fashion or anything like that. It is a really bad comparison. JoshuaZ (talk) 04:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Closure by Crum in the terms laid out by Viridae. Crafty (talk) 07:28, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Delete was within the discretion of the closing admin, though obviously it wasn't the conclusion I came to. Protonk (talk) 08:09, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- "I just tried to justify 'delete' multiple times and I couldn't" (User:Protonk). --William S. Saturn (talk) 08:21, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - And I have the capacity to distinguish between a close that I would have made and a close I feel is beyond the pale. I would not have made the same close (quite obviously, given that I didn't), but it is within the discretion of an admin to do so. Protonk (talk) 08:29, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- An admin involved (Black Kite) had no business closing the discussion. You did because you were not involved. --William S. Saturn (talk) 08:33, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse deletion. Correct decision, AN/I drama-mongering notwithstanding. --Calton | Talk 08:53, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse close. Nominator did not even bother to come up with a valid reason to overturn ("inappropriate"? "discussion was ongoing"?) though a couple of other editors have done so. Seresin provides a valid argument, however I do not agree that the closure (any of the three, including Crum's) "was an incorrect interpretation of the debate." As with many contentious XfDs, there were multiple ways in which this could have been closed. Giving greater weight to the BLP argument (which is absolutely legitimate—a "terrorist" redirect associates the shooting and by extension the accused shooter with terrorism, which was precisely the point of those supporting deletion) when judging consensus was valid, as suggested by the fact that two separate admins came to that conclusion and the third who did not believes per a comment above that it was "within the discretion of an admin to do so." So there's nothing warranting a DRV here and we have already wasted an extraordinary amount of time on a stupid redirect and a lot of ancillary shenanigans. Let's move along. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 11:16, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
~~weak endorse~~ I think current policy doesn't support the deletion and I'd have !voted to keep as a reasonable search term, but the close is not an unreasonable interpretation of the discussion. Hobit (talk) 11:19, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- In discussion about NPOV and redirects I've become convinced that redirects should be targeted to commonly used terms. Given the massive news coverage that labels this a possible terror attack (including the NYT OpEd piece below) I think that a redirect is appropriate at this time. With no fault attached to the closer (it was a reasonable close, just events have passed it by) I suggest we overturn the closure. Hobit (talk) 07:03, 27 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Like Hobit, I endorse the closure as a reasonable interpretation of the discussion. Unlike Hobit, I think we should nevertheless overturn the debate itself because, as Seresin very ably points out, it did not come to the correct conclusion. The debate should properly have highlighted the value of a redirect here, but it failed to do so.—S Marshall ^Talk/_Cont 11:32, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse my close and Crum's close. Or am I not allowed to comment because I'm involved? Who knows, when people are allowed to invent their own definition of the word? Black Kite 11:40, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. A reasonable close. Tim Song (talk) 13:43, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse closure and delete and Salt. 88.172.132.94 (talk) 13:44, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse delete. Until an investigation establishes that he was acting for political motives, it's a BLP violation to call it a terrorist attack.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:02, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. Black Kite's original decision was solid and I believe a proper interpretation of the consensus, taking WP:BLP and WP:NPOV into account. This "involved" definition has become ludicrous. BK's closure should never have been reversed and reclosed, but instead taken straight here for review. I hope the admins in this case will learn a lesson to not hastily overturn others' decisions in the heat of the drama. JamieS93 14:15, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse - good close, based on a read through the discussion. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:22, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Question- forgive my being naive, but I'm not seeing where BLP comes into play here, can someone explain it? The way I'm looking at it is the word "terrorist" is used solely to describe the attack, and not reflecting on the suspect. And with a well known politician like Joe Lieberman referring to it as a terrorist attack... I'm just not seeing why this is so controversial. I'm not saying that I AGREE that its a terrorist attack, but that I don't get why having a redirect with that word is such a horrible thing that we have to delete what seems (to me at least) a reasonable redirect and even, as at least one person suggested above, salt it. This is not meant to endorse or question the decision, I'm just curious. Thanks. Umbralcorax (talk) 17:23, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- There's only one suspect, so if you call it a terrorist attack, you're calling him a terrorist. BLP violation. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:27, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not seeing where one follows from the other. Calling the INCIDENT a terrorist attack is, at least to me, completely seperate from calling the MAN a terrorist. Now if a redirect to the suspect was Fort Hood Terrorist, then I see the BLP issue, but the incident and the suspect are not the same, and I'm just not getting the ire in any event. Umbralcorax (talk) 17:32, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Passive language like "a terrorist attack happened" is as diversionary as "the victims were shot with a gun." Guns don't shoot people, and terrorist attacks don't just happen. For there to be a terrorist attack, there must be a terrorist. So who committed the "Fort Hood terrorist attack?" ~YellowFives 17:54, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Then answer me this- if there were no suspect, would we even be having this discussion? Or would we be so afraid of potential BLP issues for someone who wasn't even identified that we'd STILL be having this discussion anyway? Umbralcorax (talk) 18:00, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The BLP aspects complicate this decision, for sure. If it was an attack by unkown people, labelling it as terrorism would still be wrong, but it would likely get by the guideline for redirects. In this case though, it's a certain individual who is still alive and is very heavily implicated in the shootings (almost beyond all doubt, though not yet officially confirmed). This redirect makes a transitive association, "terrorist attack" == "a terrorist committed it", and that is the bone of contention. As I said long ago, if the redirect were "Allegations of terrorism in the Fort Hood attack", everything would be fine. Franamax (talk) 18:50, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds like an article title. But it's not a commonly-used term. --William S. Saturn (talk) 18:52, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know. It's possible that fewer people would be concerned with the BLP implications in that case. Because we have here the human face of the person who is most likely to be harmed by this prejudicial label, it's possible that we are more acutely aware of the problem than we might otherwise be. I would argue that we should be just as aware and cautious for an as-yet-unidentified person, but the answer to your question "would we" is "definitely maybe." ~YellowFives 18:51, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Endorse. Valid reading of debate taking into account sensitivity of the subject matter. Quantpole (talk) 18:02, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn but If endorsed on BLP grounds, scrub all mention of Hassan from Fort Hood shooting. It's simply nonsensical to say that calling someone a "suspected murderer" is non-BLP, but calling that same person a "suspected terrorist" in the context of the same event is a BLP violation. This assumes for the sake of argument that redirects "call" anyone anything. As much as Black Kite's close was inappropriate on several levels, at least it articulated a valid reason to delete a redirect. Jclemens (talk) 19:45, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It's your logic that's not making sense. "Murderer" is a much more legally clear term than "terrorist." A murderer is someone who commits the act of murder, as Hassan undeniably did. However, because his motives have not yet been discovered, nor has any in-depth psychological examination been administered, "terrorist" is a POV label. Wikipedia is certainly not in the position to be deciding who is a terrorist and who is not. Further, Black Kite's close appears to be viewed as inappropriate largely only by you. Your claim that he is "involved" in this issue simply because you two have had interaction (however negative) before is tenuous at best, assuming bad faith at worst. As I said above, Black Kite's close was the correct judge of consensus of the discussion, as well as the best path to take for this project. I'd also like to note that your unilateral demands to strike all votes that you disagree with and make largescale changes that violate WP:POINT at venues like XFD and DRV are wildly inappropriate and misplaced. GlassCobra 21:18, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
1. Are redirects required to follow NPOV?
2. Who is responsible for deciding what is a terrorist attack and what is not? Jclemens (talk) 23:06, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The suspect has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder, therefor calling him a suspected murderer is legitimate. He has not been charged with being a terrorist, however. DCEdwards ¹⁹⁶⁶ 22:35, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Is "terrorism" a specific crime with which one can be charged, or an attribute of another crime? Jclemens (talk) 23:06, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, of course, one can be charged with terrorism and ancillary terrorism crimes, at least in the U.S. It's kind of been in the news of late. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is charged with, among other crimes, terrorism and providing material support for terrorism. See also this category. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 22:08, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So then, does usage in reliable sources mirror the technically accurate description? I would contend that it does not, based on no more than the reliable sources involved in the article targeted by this redirect. If there's a technically correct usage as well as a reliably sourced vernacular usage differs, on what basis does Wikipedia prefer one technical definition (and again, per WP:TERRORIST, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter) over other reliably sourced usages? By taking a single interpretation of the word "terrorist", Wikipedia would be becoming no more than a puppet of the U.S. Federal Government's view of what constitutes terrorism. Per NPOV, preferring that definition of terrorism over any other voids our impartiality. Jclemens (talk) 22:32, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you. Personally I think we should avoid usage of the term "terrorist" (including in categories) whenever possible because it is so fraught. The category "American people imprisoned on charges of terrorism" is acceptable because it is a simple statement of fact—those people are imprisoned on charges of terrorism. A general "terrorists" category is more problematic as this debate concluded. So I agree that we should never describe someone as a terrorist just because the State Department or Department of Justice says they are, though of course we can say that a person or group has been accused of or charged with terrorism by various state entities. Similarly it is to at least some degree acceptable to mention accusations of terrorism in the Fort Hood shooting (one must tread very carefully of course), but it is not acceptable to use a category (as some editors have tried to do) or a redirect to classify the event as terrorist. All of this, however, is rather beside the point in the context of a deletion review. Some of your points here are either re-litigating the RfD or taking us off on a more general tangent when the issue at hand is whether the closing admin interpreted the debate incorrectly or not. It seems pretty obvious that there will not be a consensus that the admin was in error, which means we'll stay with the status quo. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 23:01, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Of all the things I've been accused of in connection with this, taking the DRV off track is among the mildest. I'd be happy to continue a philosophical discussion elsewhere. There are several venues where the discussion is continuing; I'd be supportive of any attempt to consolidate them in a format for greater community visibility and input. As you say, the votes to sustain the deletion appear to be winning on numbers. Jclemens (talk) 08:22, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Let's be realistic about the reason for the redirect and the challenge to it: there is an ongoing debate over whether this is murder not amounting to terrorism, or murder and terrorism, either as defined by US law, or in the common understanding of the word. to some extent this debate has a political polarization, and what some people consider the likely motivation of people of his religion. Using this as a redirect is in the circumstances a politically motivated BLP violation. If he should be charged, the question will remain, but the situation will alter. DGG ( talk ) 00:25, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- 98% of the time I agree with you, DGG, but I can't in this case unless you (and I trust that if anyone on Wikipedia is able to cut this Gordian knot, you could) can explain to me how the redirect was a BLP violation while the content at Fort Hood shooting#Possible motivation is not. Is it not enough that reliable sources have described experts, including a former U.S. Attorney General, calling the attack terrorism? Is not BLP about negative unsourced information? If so... how does a redirect violate BLP? Jclemens (talk) 18:36, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

that it is being discussed, does not mean it can be assumed. It is,as you say, treated in the article, as it certainly should. DGG ( talk ) 01:12, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So to be clear, you view any such redirect as a de facto assertion of the correctness of its title? If that, or something similar to that (and as always, feel free to clarify) is the community's consensus, then WP:R is seriously out of step with what you're advocating. Jclemens (talk) 08:18, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've made a proposal at WT:BLP to add something at WP:BLP to say that when we redirect from (disparaging? non-neutral? I don't know) terms to a page with BLP material, we require that the redirect go straight to a section in the article that discusses the widespread use of the disparaging term in reliable sources, in a way that complies with NPOV. As discussed there, the claim that redirects are harmless because the only people who see them are the people who type them in themselves is incorrect; type "latino s" into Wikipedia's search box, and the 4th option will be a redirect. If we restore this redirect, then it may become popular enough to show up in the search box, so that people typing "Fort Hood" would be presented with a non-neutral phrase that would appear to be, and would in fact be, a phrase selected by Wikipedians to refer to this incident. That's okay with me if the redirect goes directly to the section that discusses this POV term in an NPOV way; otherwise not. I'd rather leave it to others to make the case whether Fort Hood shooting#Possible motivation qualifies as such a section. On the general question of "how long should we keep discussing this", I'm in favor of additional discussion until the point where it looks like we're going around in circles. I'd like to hear more discussion at WT:BLP, and my next stop is probably WT:NPOV. - Dank (push to talk) 02:44, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- P.S. I'm aware I'm supposed to be endorsing or overturning here, but I think the more interesting question is why we have nothing on NPOV or BLP or in the talk archives for the last year that deals with the application to redirects, when so many people are citing NPOV and BLP. Something on a policy page would be helpful, and I'm invoking WP:BURO: my comments aren't automatically invalid, just because I'm saying them at the wrong place at the wrong time :) - Dank (push to talk) 03:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - I think your idea has merit, and if you have a newsletter, I would like to subscribe to it. Seriously though, that would certainly help deal with the BLP concerns discussed both here and in the original RFD. Umbralcorax (talk) 05:52, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    - Thanks. In my subjective opinion, there wasn't enough discussion generated at WT:BLP or WT:REDIR to justify a change to WP:BLP. Hopefully we can generate some discussion at WP:NPOV#Redirects and NPOV. - Dank (push to talk) 19:16, 24 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
      - Heads up: discussion is continuing at WT:NPOV. If there's a change in policy, obviously it could affect the outcomes of future redirects that are determined or claimed to violate NPOV. Please join us. - Dank (push to talk) 04:00, 25 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
overturn This is simply ridiculous. It is an obvious search term. While saying the attack was a terrorist attack is a POV statement, we have common POVs for redirects all the time. Claims of a BLP problem to override the lack of consensus is not persuasive because the majority of people didn't by into that. There's no BLP problem. An attack occurred. We don't know whether the individual in question was motivated to engage in terrorism but the possibility is discussed in the article. Given that discussion not having such a redirect is simply off the wall. Indeed, this deletion seems to be directly pushing a specific POV (one I greatly sympathize with but that's not relevant). JoshuaZ (talk) 04:39, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Is the POV you sympathize with "innocent until proven guilty" by any chance? We have here a circumstance of which the facts are pretty definitely known (bullets were fired, people died, many people saw the alleged shooter and have no doubt in their recollection), and a media storm where opinions are exalted as proof. This calls for caution. Side note: It is an obvious search term - for citizens of the USA? Franamax (talk) 06:04, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, that comment really didn't have much to do with things. The POV in question was that I think that there's a fair bit of evidence this wasn't a terrorist attack. Note however, that Wikipedia is not a court of law. We obviously need to be careful to keep up with verifiability but and act with appropriate restraint but that has zero to do with this redirect. That's an editorial issue for the exact details of the main article on this subject. None of that has anything to do with this redirect. JoshuaZ (talk) 06:08, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'll take that as a guarded yes to the first, and maybe second, question. :) There is certainly a fair bit of evidence, and lots of speculation. You're right though that it has nothing to do with this DRV, rather it's more of a policy question which is already being discussed elsewhere, so I shall drop the topic here. The crux is the search function, which is less than a year old. I believe it has a huge effect on en:wiki's editorial presentation, but that's beyond the scope of this DRV. Franamax (talk) 06:29, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry and just to answer your other question, yes it is an obvious search term for people in the US. I could easily seem someone typing this in, especially if they aren't familiar with our naming conventions. JoshuaZ (talk) 06:32, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

comment I just realized that Fort Hood terror attack is currently a blue link. If this is endorsed we may want to nominate that one as well. JoshuaZ (talk) 06:34, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I tagged it with a G4 speedy, let's see if that gets it done. While not technically a recreation, since it was created during this one's RfD, I've asked for this on WP:BURO and if needed WP:IAR (which I am usually loathe to invoke) grounds to avoid yet another contentious shitstorm. Tarc (talk) 13:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Eh, it's not technically G4, but the term isn't particularly different than the one under discussion in the RfD, so that's a reasonable IAR. Consequently, I expect that the final fate of the second redirect is also thereby linked to/decided by this same DRV. Jclemens (talk) 19:40, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
New York Times editorial labels event terrorist attack, more usage of the term. --William S. Saturn (talk) 22:49, 24 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
A swing and a miss, as op-ed pages are not used to establish notability, and this isn't rfD Round Two anyways. Tarc (talk) 00:09, 25 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- A change in status is a reason to overturn a *fD. Moreover, we don't need notability for a redirect, just evidence that the term is in use. Use in an op-ed in the paper of record is pretty compelling evidence. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:53, 25 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Endorse closure. This was a reasonable interpretation of the discussion at RFD, and within the closing admin's discretion. There has been no change in status, the argument in favor of the BLP violation was always based on opinions. Consensus has been to wait for the determination of the FBI or other investigating authorities. ~YellowFives 11:48, 27 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above is an archive of the deletion review of the page listed in the heading. Please do not modify it.