Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Copts (ethnic group)


 * 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   merge to Copts. Nakon 01:28, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Copts (ethnic group)

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This article is based on the false premise that the Copts are an ethnic minority. In fact Copts is the general term for Egyptian Christians. There is no racial or ethnic distinction between Egyptian Christians and Egyptian Muslims. The Copts are the descendants of those Egyptians who remained Christian when the majority of the population converted to Islam after the Arab conquest. The article makes no attempt to justify the assertion that the Copts are an ethnic minority. It is also badly written and organised, but that is a secondary consideration to the fact that the existence of the article cannot be justified. There is already a perfectly good article on the Copts. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 10:14, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete This seems like a fringe view. Borock (talk) 11:27, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Keep or Merge into Copts – The genetic information here is valuable and supports the notion of Copts as a distinct ethnic group. However, this could be merged into Copts if necessary. WikkanWitch (talk) 15:46, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Ethnic groups-related deletion discussions. N ORTH A MERICA 1000 16:20, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Egypt-related deletion discussions. N ORTH A MERICA 1000 16:21, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Islam-related deletion discussions. N ORTH A MERICA 1000 16:22, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions. N ORTH A MERICA 1000 16:22, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

It does no such thing. It argues that Egyptians are a distinct ethnic group, which may well be so. But the terms Copt and Egyptian are not synonymous. The Copts are s subset of the Egyptians, defined by religion. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 23:30, 15 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment The argument in the article, that "Copt" refers to native Egyptians as an ethnic group, isn't exactly well-referenced, but it's not exactly unreferenced either, but it's hard to make head or tail of it. Could someone who is in favour of keeping the article please present some WP:RS which explicitly supports the argument? Please put references in this AfD so we can easily find them. De Guerre (talk) 01:41, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
 * No, the article's central assertion, that the term Copts includes all the "native Egyptians," is not referenced at all. In fact one of the references given directly contradicts that assertion: "The people of Egypt before the Arab conquest in the 7th century identified themselves and their language in Greek as Aigyptios (Arabic qibt, Westernized as Copt); when Egyptian Muslims later ceased to call themselves Aigyptioi, the term became the distinctive name of the Christian minority." The great majority of Egyptians are Arabic-speaking Muslims, and they have never identified themselves as Copts. There is nothing in the article which supports the assertion that the Copts are an ethnic group. The entire last section on genetic studies, impressive-looking as it is, is completely irrelevant to that question. It belongs in an article called Demographics of Egypt. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 03:00, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The reference is an paper from the Chatham House journal International Affairs circa 1946, which I managed to dig out. It does talk about Egyptians who avoided Arab influence, but it doesn't really describe them in terms of a distinct ethnic group and doesn't use the word "Copt" or any variant thereof. That's why I used the carefully-worded phrase "not exactly unreferenced".
 * Knowing nothing about this issue, I strongly suspect that you're correct, but I'd like to give supporters a (small) chance to produce some RS which supports the claim, or establishes notability as a (WP:FRINGE?) theory. If the clock runs out and no evidence is presented, then delete. De Guerre (talk) 06:27, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

Decision? So, when and by what process do we come to a decision about this? Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 13:16, 20 February 2015 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
 * Merge or redirect to Copts. The present article has two aspects.  One is much better covered by that article.  The rest of it is a rescription of genetic research into Egyptian ethnic background.  None of it asserts that the Christian Copts are ethnically distinct from their Muslim neighbours.  That part of the article is thus not specifically about the subject of the article title; if a genetic distinction was provable, surely we would have heard of it.  If we do not have this somewhere else, it needs to be merged elsewhare or to become a freestanding article (with a differnet title) on the Genetics of Egypt.  Peterkingiron (talk) 20:40, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- Sam Sing! 09:30, 22 February 2015 (UTC) Comment: That's an absurd definition. On that definition Catholics and Protestants are ethnic groups, and so are gays and lesbians, and so are rich people and poor people. Ethnic comes from ethnos, a nation, and is clearly meant to refer to differences in national origin or race. In any case, that is not the sense in which the author of the article is using the term "ethnic group." He wants to suggest that the Copts (by which he means all "native Egyptians") are racially different to other people (specifically the Arabs), as shown by the genetic evidence he produces. He is not arguing merely that they are socially or culturally different. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 00:24, 23 February 2015 (UTC) In January 2015, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi visited the Orthodox Cathedral in Cairo during the Christmas mass, the first time ever an Egyptian head of state participated in a Christmas ceremony. Al-Sisi delivered a speech in which he emphasized that “It’s very important to tell the world during the ongoing circumstances that we are united Egyptians, without any classifications” (http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2015/01/07/al-sisi-gives-speech-christmas-mass-abasseya-cathedral). He said that both of Egypt's Muslims and Christians are celebrating this occasion, asserting that they are "one entity" in the world's eyes (http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/119667/Egypt/Politics-/UPDATED-Sisi-first-Egyptian-President-to-attend-Co.aspx).Hatem El-Nashar (talk) 14:50, 25 February 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.191.80.4 (talk)
 * Keep/merge The Copts are clearly an ethnic group as we use the term, "An ethnic group or ethnicity is a socially defined category of people who identify with each other based on common ancestral, social, cultural or national experience." I'm not sure there's much point in having this page separate from the main page, Copts, but that's a matter of ordinary editing not deletion, per WP:REDUNDANTFORK. Andrew D. (talk) 11:50, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete- This article is based on the false idea that the Copts are an ethnic minority. There is no ethnic distinction between Egyptian Christians and Egyptian Muslims. We are one entity.

Decision? This discussion has been open for two weeks. No-one has made any serious defence of the article, and its author has not put in an appearance. Once again I ask, when and by what process do we come to a decision about this? Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 12:02, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete No need of a separate article from the current article about Copts. MaronitePride (talk) 21:58, 28 February 2015 (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.