Talk:Druids (Shannara)

Ahren Elessedil
The link that says "main article" links back to this page. Is there a main Ahren article?

Second Druid Council
The article says that the Druids, for unknown reasons, reformed into the Second Druid Council, which contained Athabasca, Bremen, and basically everyone killed when Brona attacked in First King of Shannara. I was wondering where in the books it mentions that? I've been trying to find some mention of the Second Druid Council for some time but don't remember ever seeing anything... Einmonim 17:04, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Same here--I don't remember either...  the_ed 17  13:46, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the proposal was move. JPG-GR (talk) 18:13, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Shannara Druids → Druids (Shannara) — In the Shannara novels, the Druids are referred to as just that--the Druids. The term "Shannara Druids" is never used. —  the_ed 17  15:32, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Survey

 * Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with  or  , then sign your comment with  . Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.


 * Support per my own requested move.  the_ed 17  15:37, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Support, we should not invent terms. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:03, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Any additional comments:
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

BRD on recent large addition of text
I have reverted a recent large addition of unsourced statements to the article.

On 4 November 2013, User:The ed17 added over 12,000 characters of data to the article, with no sources to support the addition, and nothing that indicates notability for any of these fictional character druids that he added.

So, per WP:BRD, let’s discuss it here.

User:The ed17's edit comment on the edit summary was: "2013-11-04T17:51:50‎ The ed17 (talk | contribs)‎ . . (14,571 bytes) (+12,766)‎ . . (rv removal of content, we've been over this)", implying that this was a simple revert of some sort. It was not. The article had been unchanged at a character count of approx. 2,000 bytes for nearly five months, since June, and had been less than 5,000 characters from roughly Dec 2012 through May 2013.

The only recent change to the article, in the previous four months, was that I had tagged a deadlink source on 4 Nov 2013. Cheers. N2e (talk) 04:15, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Regardless on your feelings on unsourced text, your long-term demolition of articles isn't welcome. It's unfortunate that no one noticed your edits at the time. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 06:35, 10 November 2013 (UTC)


 * Ed, please assume good faith, and please do not try to change the subject. This is a BRD about recent edits to THIS article.  If you want to challenge my behavior as an editor of Wikipedia over some longer period of time or broader swath of articles, there are places to do that.  Put your story together and go for it; but please don't change the subject of this BRD on this article.  An attack on me here—either for disagreements about edits I've made nearly a year ago on this article (or five months ago), or for content disputes on other articles we've had in the past—is merely a way to attempt to deflect the subject from the WP:BRD at hand.


 * Moreover, I do believe that the re-addition, your second addition of the large amount of unsourced text to this article is starting an edit war. I'm sure you are familiar with WP:BRD and know that.  But I refuse to get into an edit war with you, so I have left your text in the article following your reversion of my edit while we are trying to discuss it here.  I think you should consider showing good faith and leave that very large edit out of the article while this discussion is onging.  N2e (talk) 13:37, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I disagree, I think your wholesale removal of gobs of unsourced text from multiple articles certainly comes into play here. You're violating WP:PRESERVE with your edits, which is an English Wikipedia policy. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 21:32, 12 November 2013 (UTC)


 * I think you are making this more complex than it should be, Ed, but then perhaps that serves your purpose. I don't know.  But given you will not abide by WP:BRD, and leave the article in the long-term-stable state during this discussion—a state in which it was in for four months prior to your edit—I will (by necessity of your intransigence) put that issue aside for now, and go to the specific issue you are insisting on discussing: the WP:PRESERVE argument.  N2e (talk) 03:00, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Ed, I do not believe your position is supported by the policy you linked to. WP:PRESERVE links to a section in Editing Policy, the first paragraph of which says: "Fix problems if you can, flag or remove them if you can't. Preserve appropriate content. As long as any of the facts or ideas added to the article would belong in a "finished" article, they should be retained if they meet the requirements of the three core content policies: Neutral point of view (which doesn't mean No point of view), Verifiability and No original research. Either clean up the writing on the spot, or tag it as necessary. If you think a page needs to be rewritten or changed substantially, go ahead and do so, but preserve any reasonable content on the article's talk page, along with a comment about why you made the change. Do not remove information solely because it is poorly presented; instead, improve the presentation by rewriting the passage. The editing process tends to guide articles through ever-higher levels of quality over time. Great Wikipedia articles can come from a succession of editors' efforts."

I don't have any idea whatsover how to fix the serious deficiencies in this article. The policy you quoted says to "Fix problems if you can, flag or remove them if you can't." Apparently, other editors have not chosen to fix them either, or perhaps they cannot, because those sources don't exist. I'm not saying the sources don't exist; but if noone has found sources for years, and no one has added sources for many months while many claims were specifically challenged, then perhaps we might infer that the reliable sources are not to be found. The problems with lack of sources in this article were flaged a long time ago, and only after many months, some of those non-sourced statements were removed, per standard policy, a policy that I will note here is directly a part of the WP:V core policy. Then, and only after five more months, even more of the flagged material that had remained unsourced for all that time, was removed. That is what then became the long-term stable position of this article, which remained in place for five additional months before I tagged a deadlink (removing nothing), and then you came along and added back all of that unsourced material (approx. 12,000 bytes worth), 'without adding a single source citation that would demonstrate verifiability outside of original research within the Shannara fictional genre''.

The very policy paragraph you link to says that material "should be retained if [the material] meets the requirements of the three core content policies: Neutral point of view (which doesn't mean No point of view), Verifiability and No original research." The material you added does not meet two of the three requirements listed:
 * I totally concede neutrality; I do not believe the material in this article violates neutrality policy. ✅
 * However, the material that I removed (half a year to a year ago) does not meet either of the other two core content policies: WP:V nor WP:NOR.
 * There is no support whatsoever for the statements being verifiable.❌
 * There is no source cited for most of the statements that would show they are anything but original research.❌

The final sentence in the WP:PRESERVE policy you link to says: "The editing process tends to guide articles through ever-higher levels of quality over time. Great Wikipedia articles can come from a succession of editors' efforts."  I have done my level best to do exactly what one does when one tries, through a succession of editor efforts, to improve the encyclopedia. I looked to see if I could fix the deficiencies; I could not. Because WP:THEREISNODEADLINE, I flaged the shortcomings so other editors, who might know more about where to find such sources than I do, might fix the article. I left the article in that state for many months. Only then, after months of being flagged with no sources found, did I remove the unsourced original research. If the sources don't exist, and noone has found them after months, it is precisely by removing such unverified statements that we improve the encyclopedia, and we do so at a very slow and measured pace, so that other editors might add the sources if they do exist. N2e (talk) 03:15, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

RfC: should a large amount of unsourced statements about these fictional characters in literature remain in the article?
It seems we have a content dispute between two editors, and are currently making no progress toward article improvement. So I have opened up an WP:RfC on the topic, so we might get some other editors to weigh in. Please see the content discussion over the past week in the above Talk-page section, and provide opinions, with rationale, below. Thanks. N2e (talk) 00:23, 16 November 2013 (UTC)


 * SUPPORT proposal to remove the unsourced text that had originally been challenged over a year ago, and had then been removed from the article five to ten months ago after no sources were provided, which text has recently been added back into the article (but still with no sources)—as nom. There is no support whatsoever for the challenged statements being verifiable, nor is there any source cited for the vast majority of the statements that would show they are not original research.  I explicitly assume good faith on the part of the other editor, User:The ed17, who argues that the text should not be removed from this article per WP:PRESERVE.  N2e (talk) 00:23, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Support removal. The material showed that citations were needed since June 2012.  Apparently no one has found any (or looked).  There have been plenty of time to find references in that period of time, so the material should be removed and only added back on finding proper references.   GregJackP   Boomer!   03:53, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment while I work on more pressing issues; this RfC should be moved to the WP:PRESERVE talk page to explore the broader implications of your content removal. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 03:54, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Nah, the material sat there for over 16 months without anyone working on it, it is now appropriate for it to be removed.  GregJackP   Boomer!   04:09, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Regarding the Comment left by Ed, aka "The ed17", above: Ed, while I obviously agree with the comment of GregJackP on the content dispute on this article, I have invited you before to feel free to start some sort of action to review my editing if you think I am doing something egregious or outside of policy.  If you do that, fine, I'll respond to the inquiry at that time and in that place.  Otherwise, your deflecting of the issue to some nefarious broader implications of my editing when we have a content dispute on a particular Shannara article is either pointy or trollish.
 * Best to you, and to your continued efforts to make Wikipedia a better encyclopedia. I do ask that you assume the same relative to my efforts to improve Wikipedia.  In this particular case, we rather obviously just have a difference of opinion on how much unverified original research should remain in Wikipedia about non-notable aspects of fictional characters, themes and locations.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 16:46, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Honestly, most of them could be merged and redirected. Removing content, tagged or not, is never the way to go (IMHO). Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 05:01, 22 November 2013 (UTC)


 * Strongly Support removal of unsourced material. Wikipedia's policies concerning sources and properly supported material have become more strict, in recent years, and this has clearly helped to further improve article quality. In matters such as this one, which are esoteric, highly specialized, and of obvious passionate interest to some people, editors should avoid more than in other, more typical entries to put up material that is not sourced per Wiki rules. Otherwise, we'll  have edits wars and disputes all the time.-The Gnome (talk) 11:40, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Support removal Have to agree with The Gnome (and others) on this.  If proper sourcing can be found, material can be reinstated.  Edit warring, as displayed here, is not the way to go.  Tvoz / talk 05:15, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
 * Support removal - 16 months tagged is enough. The argument that this is covered by WP:PRESERVE is noted, but it would seem to be trumped by WP:OR especially with the notice being given well over a year ago. Jus  da  fax   08:31, 19 November 2013 (UTC)