Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Anti-communist mass killings (2nd nomination)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Yes, it's a mess, but AfD is (inevitably) not for cleanup. There is consensus that it's a notable topic, and its title and content are ... content issues. Black Kite (talk) 21:40, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Anti-communist mass killings
AfDs for this article: 
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The article is a SYNTH based OR COATRACK. The subject of the article, a purported common cause to the killing of communists across multiple societies, does not exist in any scholarly literature. The only literature I know of, from wide reading over 15 years, is the citation added recently: a "unique" claim in psychosexual history based off a single country study. This does not make a scholarly discourse regarding a theoretical, structural or process across multiple societies. The response to Courtois "Blackbook" was to reject the domain of large scale causes. And if there isn't a discourse on a common cause, then all we have is a list produced by wikipedian editors as an original synthesis of a coatrack Fifelfoo (talk) 20:35, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete. Yes, many communists were killed in a number of countries. The person who killed the largest number of communists was probably Joseph Stalin, maybe Mao, maybe Hitler. However, we need at least a couple of good books which covers this topic as a coherent subject. I do not see them. Google books search returns this result (i.e. the killings by communist governments and a single anticommunist killing in Indonesia). Yes, this subject only exists in connection to mass killings by the communists. Only this latter subject (mass killings by the communists) has indeed every right to exist - based on the books immediately retrieved by the google search. My very best wishes (talk) 21:59, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete As WP:OR in esse.   Not even a close call. Collect (talk) 00:09, 22 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep. This is a major topic that absolutely does exist in scholarly literature on anti-communism. Of course the sources don't necessarily use the phrase "anti-communist mass killings" in talking about it, so doing a simple search for that phrase isn't going to be very helpful in finding relevant information. But there are many sources that talk about the general phenomenon of anti-communist forces killing real or suspected communists across multiple countries - which is the topic of the article. Probably the best source on this subject right now is the book Revolutionaries for the Right: Anticommunist Internationalism and Paramilitary Warfare in the Cold War. It focuses precisely on anti-communist violence and mass killings across multiple countries over an extended period of time.
 * It's also easy to find chapters or sections dealing with anti-communist mass killings within books and articles that talk about international anti-communism more broadly. Here are just a few examples of sources that dedicate some significant space to this topic. The key to finding them is to use a variety of search terms related to anti-communism and large-scale killings, not merely the phrase "anti-communist mass killings".
 * Revolutionaries for the Right: Anticommunist Internationalism and Paramilitary Warfare in the Cold War
 * Death Squads (journal article)
 * When States Kill (book)
 * State Violence in East Asia (talks about both communist and anti-communist mass killings, labeling them as such)
 * The Condor Years: How Pinochet and His Allies Brought Terror to Three Continents
 * Predatory States: Operation Condor and Covert War in Latin America
 * Argentina, the U.S., and the Anti-Communist Crusade in Central America, 1977–1984
 * Spider Web: The Birth of American Anticommunism
 * A Century of Revolution: Insurgent and Counterinsurgent Violence during Latin America’s Long Cold War
 * International Anticommunism before the Cold War: Success and Failure in the Building of a Transnational Right (in "New Perspectives on the Transnational Right")
 * School of the Americas: Military Training and Political Violence in the Americas
 * Las guerrillas blancas: anticomunismo transnacional e imaginarios de derechas en Argentina y México, 1954–1972


 * Just because there aren't any books out there with the phrase "anti-communist mass killings" in the title, that doesn't mean there are no books or articles that talk about the topic of mass killings carried out by anti-communists across multiple countries. There are.


 * The article is not inherently a Synthesis or a Coatrack. The topic exists in reliable sources. Of course, the article as it stands right now may be a Coatrack - I can see it has very serious problems - but that just means it should be improved.


 * Finally, I don't understand the argument that the article should be deleted because there are no sources talking about "a purported common cause to the killing of communists across multiple societies". The name of the article is anti-communist mass killings, not causes of anti-communist mass killings. And there are sources talking about such killings as an international phenomenon. What does it matter if the sources adequately address the causes or not? If there are reliable sources talking about multiple anti-communist mass killings across multiple countries, then the topic exists in scholarship. It doesn't matter precisely what the sources say about it, as long as they cover the topic. -- Damoclus (talk) 02:55, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
 * None of these books actually covers the general subject of anti-communist repressions in all countries. Also, you made only 34 edits in the project and came back after a year of inactivity, specifically to vote here. My very best wishes (talk) 23:11, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
 * They do cover the general subject of anti-communist repressions in multiple countries, including most of the ones currently mentioned in the article. I'm not sure what would qualify as all countries. Obviously anti-communist repressions didn't happen in every country. And of course we can disagree about which countries and which repressions fall under this topic (which killings are "mass" killings, for example). Maybe some need to be removed from the article, and others need to be added. The article certainly needs to be improved to follow the sources more closely. But the fact that sources don't necessarily talk about all possible examples doesn't mean the topic doesn't exist. -- Damoclus (talk) 08:36, 25 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I don't understand, My very best wishes, how the number of previous edits by a contributor or their sudden reappearance can have any bearing on an AfD. Perhaps there's a policy of which I'm not aware. Could you, please, elaborate? -The Gnome (talk) 17:07, 25 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep (conditionally), although I am not too happy about that article, when I looked at some sources presented above, I have to concede the topic does exist. Although one may argue that Stalin, probably, killed more communists than everybody else (except Hitler), that is hardly a relevant argument. If we compare this article with its twin (MKuCR), this article's topic is crystal clear: "What this article is telling about?" About killings of communists by anti-communists. "Why communists were being killed?" Because they were communists. "Who were perpetrators?" The people who declared their anti-communism. In other words, all these events followed more or less uniform pattern, were motivated by the same factor, and both perpetrators and victims were clearly defined. In this article: Helen Fein. Revolutionary and Antirevolutionary Genocides: A Comparison of State Murders in Democratic Kampuchea, 1975 to 1979, and in Indonesia, 1965 to 1966. Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Oct., 1993), pp. 796-823 Stable URL: . The author clearly describes Indonesian genocide as an instance of an broader phenomenon, an ideologically motivated anti-communist genocide.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:54, 23 June 2018 (UTC)


 * P.S. Upon meditation, I came to conclusion that, if we will use a really strict NOR standards, this article may be considered a synthesis. However, these standards should be applied globally, which means "Mass killings under communist regimes" article should be deleted too, because only few books cover the topic. These books are Red Holocaust, Black Book of Communism and one chapter in the Valentino's "Final solution". However, we already have separate articles for the first two books, so, if strict NOR standard will be applied to this article, MKuCR artcile should go too (and, by the way, no loss of content will occur, because each separate subject discussed in that article already has its own article).--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:03, 23 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep AfD is not cleanup — the topic easily meets WP:GNG, the issues of how to present a complex topic in the article within policy guidelines should be discussed on the article's talk page. Seraphim System ( talk ) 23:13, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Weak delete. Yes, there are sources that treat this as a topic. Yes, AfD is not for cleanup. But this article is godawful: it's a morass of SYNTH and OR, and in my opinion, the best course is to blow it up and start over. As an aside; this is not the counterpart to Mass killings under Communist regimes. That documents government killings by a certain (possibly artificial) category of government; this documents targeted killings of members of a certain ideology. The counterpart to this article would be "Mass killings of anti-communists" (yes, I know that's confusing). Vanamonde (talk) 05:30, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep/Rename -- This is certainly not a pleasant subject, but that does not mean that we should not have an article. We have "main articles" on a number of these, which means that the entries here should be kept modest in length (as most are).  However, I would suggest Mass Killings of Communists as the title.  The circumstances differ: some were clearly anti-insurgency operations; others may have been like genocides, though they cannot be classified as genocide, since the criterion was political belief, not ethnicity.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:02, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
 * The problem with that title is that the victims of such killings weren't all communists. Plenty of them were socialists, suspected communists, bystanders, witnesses, suspected sympathizers, etc. Vanamonde (talk) 04:50, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Point accepted, but I suspect there ought to be a title along those lines that would deal with your point: perhaps Mass Killings of Communists and suspects. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:13, 27 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep (conditionally) per Paul Siebert.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 14:03, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep the article. This is dangerous ground. We have to ignore politics (for some people, such an article, might look like support for communism!) and focus on policy and the encyclopaedic objective.
 * Clearly, as there have been mass killings by communists against their opponents of whatever persuasion, even apolitical people, there have also been mass killings of communists and sympathizers by anticommunists. This is all trivially, widely, and in-depth presented in historical texts of impeccable credentials. The cases provided above by Damoclus, in the form of already extant Wikipedis articles, are only indicative of the historical references. Propaganda by all sides will always use, of course, an opposite side's killings; but the decision here should not be taken under some kind of fear we'd be "engaging in propaganda." Wikipedia rejects censorship and is unafraid of controversies. -The Gnome (talk) 17:07, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * P.S. : Vanamonde raises an interesting point: When those killed are not all communists, how can we name the killings as "anticommunist"? Well, the same sources that describe such events make quite clear that the incentive behind the killings was the violent repression and elimination of communists, plus anyone deemed to be a "fellow traveler," a "sympathizer," an "ally," etc. In ideological wars, we know that personal differences were also sometimes settled under the guise of ideology. Again, example abound. This, however, does not change the fact the war was based on and conducted on the basis of ideology. The obvious, common title, then, is "communist" and "anticommunist" this or that. -The Gnome (talk) 17:07, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * P.P.S. The text needs improvement. This by itself is not a reason for deletion, however. -The Gnome (talk) 17:07, 25 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep This article is a good collection of information about Anti-communist purges, and I don't see any reason to delete either this or the Mass killings under Communist regimes article. -- Pedro8790 (talk) 01:29, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep. By definition, a minority of scholars discussing these events in relation to one another is all that is required for the topic to exist. Also, what Seraphim System said.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 08:53, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep. Notable and verifiable subject, even if the article as it stands today isn't great – but AfD is not cleanup, as mentioned above. /Julle (talk) 10:51, 26 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep Notable article. Warm Regards, ZI Jony (talk) 21:18, 27 June 2018 (UTC)


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