Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cthulhu Mythos in popular culture (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   based upon the arguments regarding original research ans synthesis. Several contributors noted that this was not covered in the sources provided as a unified concept. While additional sources were provided during this discussion, the existing material was not covered by those sources. Delete as it exists now, with no prejudice against a new article written from these sources. Aaron Brenneman (talk) 02:43, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Article restored. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 10:33, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Cthulhu Mythos in popular culture
AfDs for this article: 
 * – ( View AfD View log )

The previous attempt took place in 2007, and Wikipedia is a great deal more informed now as to what is and is not suitable. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 04:26, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete: Should be deleted as relevant, SOURCED information is now at main page (Cthulhu). The remainder here is trivia and therefore WP:NOT, and fails WP:V.

*I created this page as a result of a malformed AfD.  Them From  Space  05:03, 16 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete per nom. This is an unneeded dumping ground for trivia lists and original research. A cited, prose summary of this is acceptable on the main Cthulhu page, but we don't need a list of everytime every work of fiction has ever mentioned Cthulhu.  Them  From  Space  05:03, 16 July 2011 (UTC)


 * keep Normally I am against pages like this and other "in popular culture" things. But in this case the Cthulu mythos has become almost MORE popular recently than it was originally.  There are ample sources discussing its significance in popular culture, and more than one on the "fuzzification" of the mythos and how it has become something of a pop culture phenomenon.  I would argue given the tepid reaction to H.P. Lovecraft's original work, combined with the sheer number of people who are familiar with the entire mythos but have never read an original Lovecraft work, the works of follow-up writers like Derleth and the ample modern re-interpretation, that the popular culture reaction to the mythos is more notable than The Call of Cthulhu ever was. HominidMachinae (talk) 06:15, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions.  — I, Jethrobot drop me a line 06:41, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Popular culture-related deletion discussions.  — I, Jethrobot drop me a line 06:42, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Fictional elements-related deletion discussions.  — I, Jethrobot drop me a line 06:43, 16 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep The topic is notable - see H.P. Lovecraft in popular culture, for example.  The rest is a matter of ordinary editing per our editing policy. Warden (talk) 08:01, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Huge thanks for that book ref. That looks like a perfect source for framing material discussing Cthulhu and the Mythos's pop culture influence as such, instead of asking the reader to infer it through a list of examples, that I've been wanting for Cthulhu for ages. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:10, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * That book doesn't excuse (or source) any of the content of the article, which goes against our trivia guidelines as well as our summary style of writing. This is why a prose section in the Cthulu article is relevant but the list of every single appearance of Cthulu in any source of media (which is the contents of this article) is inappropriate. Notability of the topic isn't the issue, its the broad open scope and triviality of the contents that is problematic. (WP:TRIVIA, WP:INDISCRIMINATE, etc). Editing this material in accordance with those guidelines would leave a small, cited, prose section that would function better in the main article than as a spinout.  Them From  Space  23:15, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay. I'm glad to have it established that you don't consider notability at issue, but hopefully we can be forgiven for defending the article in those terms, since several delete opinions have made negative assertions about notability (based on argumentation from factually incorrect statements as they may be).  The thing is, deleting this particular article on the basis of IINFO is basically saying, "yeah, I know the topic is notable, and I know that there are sourcably significant entries in the article, but the article is a big mess so just delete it all".  This is, at best, using deletion as cleanup, which I hope we can agree is not okay.  Why wouldn't the correct procedure be to cut the article to sourcably significant entries, as has recently been done at Cthulhu, possibly then proposing a merge with Cthulhu Mythos that would be properly noted at that article and draw the attention of editors interested in it? —chaos5023 (talk) 03:40, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete While a lot of work went into the page and it is interesting and maybe even useful it really doesn't belong in an encyclopedia. Items are put on the list according to the opinion of editors. In many cases another story (video game, etc.) with a god and/or alien that looks like an octopus is cited as an example of the Cthulhu Mythos. If the list was trimmed down to only the items where some secondary source made the connection it would be short enough to merge to the main article on the topic.  However in that case the inclusion of items would be somewhat random, as it would depend on a reviewer mentioning the Lovecraft connection in his review -- not on the importance of the item.  I think the best thing is to take the whole list and move it to a Lovecraft fan wiki. Kitfoxxe (talk) 13:55, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * P.S. I grew up reading stories from the Golden Age of science fiction, and in most cases when an alien didn't look like a mammal it most often looked like either a giant insect or else an octopus. So everything is not necessarily Cthulhu. Kitfoxxe (talk) 14:00, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * FYI, there actually are inclusion criteria for the article that those of us who try to keep an eye on it use to keep it from ballooning with every cartoon character who ever looked like a squid. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:15, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Keep but (a) insert a warning at the top of the page that more references are needed and (b) remove entries which aren't about a notable work / collection / creator. Stuartyeates (talk) 05:14, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. Clearly notable topic, article content issues are article content issues and not relevant here.  "SOURCED information is now at main page (Cthulhu)" is a specifically dysfunctional part of the nomination because Cthulhu and this article have different scopes; Cthulhu is about the specific character Cthulhu, with general Cthulhu Mythos material (for example, concerning Yog-Sothoth or the Deep Ones) excluded, which the nominator does not seem to have understood.  Again, Cthulhu is not the "main page" for this topic; Cthulhu Mythos, the place that this list is a WP:SPINOUT from in the first place, is. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:03, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * To clarify, the reason this damages the nomination is that that part of the nominator's argument can be stated as "we can safely blow away this article because everything that should be covered about its topic already is covered at Cthulhu", but the difference in scopes between the articles means that that cannot ever be the case. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:55, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete original research by synthesis. Sources are individual TV episodes and text. Wikipedia isn't supposed to be the only place where original research is published. It's supposed to be a tertiary source, covering accepted knowledge in other areas. Also fails the general notability guideline because there are no sources to WP:verify notability of this list. There might be sources for a smaller overview in the main article but not as a pretext for a list of every possible appearance. Wikipedia is not a directory. Shooterwalker (talk) 17:13, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * No sources for notability of the list? Colonel Warden noted one above that seems to do very well for the purpose.  Please take a look. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:22, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Merge to Cthulhu Mythos since that is what this is about.  Nipson anomhmata   (Talk) 18:09, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * This article was created as a WP:SPINOUT from Cthulhu Mythos, I believe because of size and due weight concerns. If they were merged as-is, the resulting article would be 77209 bytes long, which is above the 50K-ish region where we usually start looking at splitting articles.  It's entirely possible that the right thing to do is a massive cull of the article to items demonstrated significant by sourcing, followed by a merge back to Cthulhu Mythos, but if so I strongly think the culling should happen first. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:43, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. Legitimate spinout demonstrating the breadth of impact, would overwhelm the primary article if merged back. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 19:38, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete/merge back per guidelines at WP:TRIVIA. This article is essentially a raw list of mentions of concepts from the Cthulhu mythos (see WP:INDISCRIMINATE). Most mentions are are also trivial and unsourced. We should only be mentioning references that are notable. Remaining mentions could be easily merged back into the parent article. See also the essay WP:POPCULTURE.  elektrik SHOOS  (talk) 20:44, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete: No reliable secondary sources cover this topic to presume that it meets the general notability guideline and the content of the article relies on original research by synthesis, taking information from different media and creating information that does not exist outside of the article. In my opinion this topic falls into what Wikipedia is not because it is an indiscriminate collection of information and a directory. Tertiary sources are not objective evidence of notability, particularly when they are not independent of the subject. Jfgslo (talk) 02:08, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Please take a look at Colonel Warden's source for notability of the list above. It may affect your evaluation of the notability of the topic. —chaos5023 (talk) 04:27, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The problem with the otherwise fabulous source listed by Warden is that it focuses on Lovecraft. I am all for a Wikipedia article on this subject, but the issue here is Cthulhu. The character appears in the flesh all of once, and is only mentioned in passing on a few other occasions. Over 95% of what is listed at the article in dispute is unfortunately inference and irrelevant trivia. That's the sticking point. The Cthulhu Mythos can be canvassed - properly - at the aforementioned page discussing Lovecraft. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 03:23, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * You seem to be still operating on the belief that you wrote an AfD for an article "Cthulhu in popular culture". This is not the case.  The article is Cthulhu Mythos in popular culture, the Cthulhu Mythos being an extremely broad term that encompasses large chunks of Lovecraft's writing (you'll find that that book is, in fact, largely about the overall Cthulhu Mythos as it appears in popular culture) and significant bits of other people's, and is surprisingly little to do with Cthulhu as such.  The Cthulhu Mythos is not "the mythos which is about Cthulhu", it is "the extremely broad and far-ranging mythos for which Cthulhu is used as a sort of figurehead or mascot".  The whole nomination is based on lines of thinking that are completely mistaken. —chaos5023 (talk) 03:30, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep The nominator claim that sourced information is now at Cthulhu article. However, this article is about Cthulhu Mythos, not just Cthulhu. L-Zwei (talk) 16:53, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * See my comments above. We just need the correct article created, and this deleted. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 03:23, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I say keep this and remove In popular culture section from other article is better idea. Look at the mess I removed from Great Old One article, where many examples just take something with similar concept to GOO (like those from World of Warcraft) and claim it's GOO referrence. But in this article, it's clear that it's about Cthulhu Mythos not "something similar". L-Zwei (talk) 05:48, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Your comments above are based on stark incomprehension of the subject matter. —chaos5023 (talk) 03:42, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Hey! Let's not make this personal. Yes, I do understand the difference between Cthulhu and the Cthulhu mythos. The fact remains, however, that much of the content in the disputed article contains inferences and assumptions about Cthulhu, and yes, that should not be the focus. It would easier and help avoid continued confusion, if this page was deleted and a new and improved version was created called Lovecraft in popular culture. That article then leads with a sourced paragraph or two about the Cthulhu mythos: origins, development, relevance etc. Two articles with Cthulhu in the header, however, is going to continue to be problematic. So, what I am proposed is a simple cosmetic change, as opposed to just wiping what relevant information currently exists. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 03:59, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * And further to this, it would help in streamling all the Lovecraftian content. One quick look at this template shows duplication of the same themes many times over. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 04:11, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * You're kinda just going farther and farther afield here. I think you do understand the difference between Cthulhu and the Cthulhu Mythos now, but it's clear you didn't when you opened the nomination, or there's no way you could've argued that the article was redundant with Cthulhu (I can WP:AGF all day long, and in case it matters I totally believe you were trying to fix something you thought was a problem, but I can't assume that you grasp facts after you demonstrate otherwise).  I totally get being embarrassed by that, but it's not possible to hide it at this point so you may as well own it.  You go on to raise an array of concerns that are unrelated to anything you started out the nom with, and reach a point where what you seem to be actually proposing isn't a deletion of this article, it's a move of it to the title "Lovecraft in popular culture", along with cleanup.  If that's really what you think should happen here, now, you should withdraw the nomination (though it would still have to run its course as there have been other opinions to delete) and open a WP:MOVE proposal (preferably after this AfD closes; running the proposals in parallel just introduces confusion).  I think that would be a terrible rename for several reasons, but we can burn that bridge when we come to it. —chaos5023 (talk) 04:25, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, I honestly have no idea what you're talking about in regard to duplicate "themes" in the Lovecraft nav template. That's one of the many ways that this discussion is becoming increasingly irrelevant to Articles for Deletion, though, so if you'd be so kind as to clarify at my talk page that'd be lovely. —chaos5023 (talk) 04:27, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. Claims made in the Colonel's source convince that this is a notable topic. The problem is the article: everything that doesn't have a reliable secondary source needs to go. A quick look at the References suggests a blanking, really. Drmies (talk) 04:36, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep Several of the delete !voters appear to have a dearth of background on the topic. "Cthulhu Mythos" is the amalgamation of Lovecraft's own work of science fiction/horror--not just limited to Cthulhu himself--and those additional stories written by others like August Derleth and Alan Dean Foster, set in essentially the same universe. To that end, this is an inclusively broad topic, which the above WP:NIME anti-IPC !voters do not seem to grasp.  I'll be commenting on additional sources after a do a quick search myself. Jclemens (talk) 05:39, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * So, here's four sources that I don't believe I've seen above, all from academic press in the last 10 years, all of which I've accessed the full text and at least skimmed it to verify that they apply to the topic:
 * Janicker, R 2006, 'Myth Maker', Science Fiction Studies, 33, 3, pp. 553-554, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 18 July 2011.
 * Hoppenstand, G 2010, 'Editorial: The Lost Books of Kane', Journal of Popular Culture, June, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 18 July 2011.
 * Adam Michel, P 2002, 'Cultural Consumption of History and Popular Culture in Alternative Spiritualities', Journal of Consumer Culture, 2, 2, pp. 197-218, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 18 July 2011.
 * Alves, A 2008, 'Humanity's Place in Nature, 1863 - 1928: Horror, Curiosity and the Expeditions of Huxley, Wallace, Blavatsky and Lovecraft', Theology & Science, 6, 1, pp. 73-88, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 18 July 2011.
 * Mind you, this took all of 5 minutes. I'm certain more sources are out there, but these conclusively demonstrate the notability of the topic. Jclemens (talk) 05:51, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Again, I have no argument with the sources per se, but at present the entire body of Lovecraft is a mess. There are something like four different articles that are essentially versions of the same thing. The one in question is by far the weakest. Thebladesofchaos (talk) 07:47, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * What do you mean by "essentially versions of the same thing"? Cthulhu is article about character Cthulhu, Cthulhu Mythos is article about the setting and works, I'm not sure what is the third article you refer to, but this is article about how modern works made reference to Cthulhu mythos. The scope of each article are differrent and if you found it overlapse, I say remove them and add it here is better idea. That's how it have been done with The Lesser Key of Solomon and Goetic demons in popular culture, remove "popular culture" section from each demon articles and combine them to single list. L-Zwei (talk) 12:11, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The Colonel likes to say "The rest is a matter of ordinary editing", and in this case they are certainly right. The article is a mess, the other articles aren't much better, but we're discussing the subject here rather than the article. Good work, Jclemens--my students should take a page out of your book. (Is your book available as a PDF download?) Drmies (talk) 15:15, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep A very major influence on popular culture, very appropriate for an article, with enough sourced examples. I agree with the other observations that our overall coverage of Lovecraft and related topics is quite a mess, but we won't solve it by removing what are clearly supportable articles. What we rather need is work from a few editors who care about the genre, & I suppose I should make it clear that I am not one.     DGG ( talk ) 00:07, 23 July 2011 (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.