Talk:Stepney City Farm

Comments
-- S Philbrick (Talk)  19:05, 20 January 2014 (UTC)== Cleanup ==

This article is quite a mess, with editorial issues, content issues, and wikitext issues. There are bare url's, along with extensive discussion of what appears to be a minor issue. As someone who has worked on a farm, and had to put down cows, it is an extremely common occurrence, and hardly deserves the breathless coverage.

Editors need to understand that mentions in Reliable sources are a necessary, but not a sufficient rationale for inclusion. Not everything printed in every newspaper should be copied over, or Wikipedia would be nothing more than a mirror of the standard media.

I'm going to start a cleanup, please feel free to comment here if you think I'm missing why this minor event deserves more coverage.-- S Philbrick (Talk)  23:01, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Far too much coverage is given to a relatively minor event in this farm's history. The farm was no longer able to justify keeping a cow and a bull, looked into moving them elsewhere, but in what should be a different story about bureaucracy gone amok, was unable to move them so they were put down. That event comprises almost a third of the article, far more than it deserves. I opened up a discussion to see if editors would comment on how it should be handled, but no one has responded, so I am going to cut it down. Frankly, I'm not sure it deserves more than a sentence, or possibly even that much, but I'll make a caution cut and see how it goes.

Specific cleanup
The writing is abysmal. I'm trying to do some cleanup, but in some cases, it isn't easy. For example, this sentence: The site has been through several incarnations since the 17th century. "Incarnations" is clearly wrong (and not in source. I haven't yet identified a better word, partly because I'm not sure what is meant. Multiple owners? Changes in operation? Physical changes?-- S Philbrick (Talk)  23:20, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

recent edit
The inclusion of the statement that the cows were killed without warning leaves the impression that a warning was expected. Nothing supports this notion. Cows are killed without warning every day. That doesn't make it of encyclopedic interest.

I'll also note that the talk page is the place to discuss potentially contentious issues. If someone thinks some of the removed items are deserving of inclusion, please make your case here.-- S Philbrick (Talk)  19:54, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Characterizing the existence of a "slaughter policy" as significant is not supported by the reference. Furthermore, it sounds like an OR view of someone unfamiliar with standard farm policy. It would be sort of like editing the article about London every time they decide to add a traffic light.-- S Philbrick (Talk)  20:02, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Updates
Some updating is needed - there should be more recent financial accounts, and probably the Crossrail section, while the cattle are variously described as 'a bull and a cow' and 'cows.' Jackiespeel (talk) 10:52, 16 April 2019 (UTC)