User:Geo Swan/opinions/My concerns with DRV

In a recent DRV I was asked to explain a comment. I am going to put a short explanation in that DRV. My longer, more detailed explanation is here.

Two basic kinds of arguments go on in DRVs -- arguments that the closing administrator made an error in policy or procedure in their closure; and "once more with feeling" arguments, that are basically re-hashes to the arguments that would have or should have occurred in the original afd.

In my opinion discussing errors in following the policies and procedures are more important than those re-hashes of whether or not some particular article should be kept or deleted. But, in the DRV I have participated in the serious procedureal discussions are routinely drowned out.

There are important things to learn from discussion of lapses, or apparent lapses, in administrator's closures of articles. I regard it as extremely unfortunate that the serious discussions of administrator's interpretations of policy are routinely drowned out by arguments over the merits of keeping or deleting particular articles. We already have a discussion fora for discussing the merits of keeping or deleting particular articles -- afd. There are instances where there are important things to learn from the procedural flaws, or apparent procedural flaws in administrators' closures, even when the community's consensus agreed with the deletion or retention of the article.

I think it would be best if the all participants in all DRVs avoided dragging in the merits of keeping or deleting the article from the DRV, and stuck to a discussion of whether or not their were flaws in how the afd was conducted. I understand there can be a great temptation for those who feel strongly about whether a specific article whose afd is being reviewed, to state, or re-state, their specific concern. But doing so seriously damages the wikipedia, because it leaves the more important policy problems, or perceived policy problems, essentially unaddressed.

I suggest dragging in the merits of keeping or deleting the article is also potentially a waste of time. If the result of the DRV is the keep or delete result one favors there is no need to restate one's position on the merits of the article. What if the DRV overturns the administrator's conclusion, on procedural grounds, and a contributor thinks the article merits the opposite result? I thik the wikipedia would be best served if it were only then that arguments for the retenetion or deletion of the article

were disciplined

The first article for which I requested a DRV was Allegations that Tablighi Jamaat has ties to terrorism. After the administrator who closed the DRV restored it to article space, they promptly nominated it for what they called a "procedural afd". I wasn't particularly happy with having to defend the article, all over again, but, from the phrase "procedural afd" I assumed this was routine. It had been nominated for speedy deletion within minutes of my saving the first draft. And it was deleted even though I had put a hangon on it before I had a chance to finish The DRV is here. The afd is here.