Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of giant animals in fiction (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 delete. The debate was lengthy and well-contested at points on both sides, but consensus favors deletion, and it is correctly pointed out that there is no clear way to delineate the parameters of such a list. I do note, however, that it may be worthwhile to create an article on the topic of Giant animals in fiction, rather than merely pursuing a list. bd2412 T 04:00, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

List of giant animals in fiction
AfDs for this article: 
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Fails WP:INDISCRIMINATE, no clearly defined criteria for inclusion. Entirely original research. For the most part, better served by Category:Kaiju. ZXCVBNM (TALK) 07:48, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Oppose "Giant animals" seems fairly clear to me.  The rest is an issue for improvement, not deletion. Andy Dingley (talk) 08:52, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The threshold of "giant" is very unclear. Moby Dick is a slightly larger than real life sperm whale, and Mothra is a massive moth bigger than an airplane. And if dragons are "giant" does that mean "giant relative to real life animals" or "giant within a fictional universe"? Never mind the fact that many fictional dragons are small.ZXCVBNM (TALK) 09:59, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete - listcruft. —МандичкаYO 😜 09:30, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete. WP:LISTCRUFT. No clear inclusion policy. Ajf773 (talk) 11:04, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Fictional elements-related deletion discussions. GameInfirmary Talk 11:37, 8 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete. Per WP:LISTCRUFT and Gameinfirmary. The Duke of Nonsense What is necessary for thee? 13:47, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete an incoherent and unsourced disaster that would justifiably be deleted by WP:TNT; I see no good redirect target. power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 04:42, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete. TNT, TNT, TNT. Bondegezou (talk) 13:55, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep WP:LISTCRUFT is an essay.  WP:TNT is an essay.  Our actual policies and guidelines are WP:ATD, WP:PRESERVE, WP:CLN, and WP:LISTN.  This topic passes them because it is covered in sources such as The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters; Armageddon Films; The Kaiju Film: A Critical Study of Cinema's Biggest Monsters. Andrew D. (talk) 18:30, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * You are, as always, misrepresenting our actual policies, and wikilawyering over the fact that the pages that elaborate on what our policies actually say and provide the widely accepted (one might even say standard) interpretations thereof) are currently technically classified as "essays". Specifically, you are ignoring that the relevant policy, WP:DEL-REASON allows for this page's deletion or redirecting per reasons 5, 6 (probably), 7, 8 (kinda), 13 and 14. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:41, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Also, I would ask you please read articles before !voting on whether they should be deleted going forward. No rational editor could !vote to WP:PRESERVE the article in its current state, unless they were completely ignorant of what was actually in it. I don't think you are familiar with either Final Fantasy or Cardcaptor Sakura: if you were, you would know that what is in this list is incredibly arbitrary and ridiculous. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:43, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Atlantic306 (talk) 20:42, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete Arguments by keepists are garbage. Fails WP:LISTCRUFT, or if keepists really want a policy, WP:NOTDIR. &raquo; Shadowowl  &#124;  talk  21:57, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the Article Rescue Squadron's list of content for rescue consideration. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:15, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It might be worth adding that Andrew, as is his habit, violated ARS's rules by not giving a valid reason for keeping the article and instead just leaving a joke comment that can only be interpreted as "Inclusionist friends and allies! The deletionists are at it again -- you know what to do!" I've told him off for this multiple times and he just doesn't seem to be learning -- perhaps a TBAN is in order... Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:45, 19 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete. This is very obviously listcruft, and there really is no meaningful relationship between the entries that unifies them as a single group to be together on a list. It's like having a list of animals in fiction whose names start with L. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:15, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Listcruft is not a policy or guideline; just a hostile opinion. Gigantism is a real thing – see pages like megafauna or island gigantism.  It is therefore quite a reasonable basis for analysis and we have sources such as the The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters which do so with headings such as Gargantuan Animals and Monstrous Apes.  Tryptofish's !vote is thefeore neither based on policy nor the evidence.  Andrew D. (talk) 08:17, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * --In case, you choose to resort to disruptively redirect a much-cited essay, per your whims, an AN Trip will be in short order. &#x222F; WBG converse 12:08, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * That is basically vandalism &raquo; Shadowowl  &#124;  talk  13:38, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * That attempted redirect is pretty amazing. Andrew, I realize that you have decided that you don't like me, but the fact is that you listed this AfD at the Article Rescue Squad without remembering to note it here, so I noted it. Anyway, I'm quite aware that gigantism exists in biology. But if editors want me to spell out policy some more, no problem. I think that WP:LISTN certainly requires, by implication, that the list comply with WP:NOR. If the list is created by observing that one source lists a certain number of giant fictional animals, and then another source lists another group of such animals, with some overlap between the two but not complete congruence, and then a third source does likewise – and then editors create the list page by combining together all of the giant fictional animals from all of those sources plus some other giant fictional animals, then that is WP:SYNTH, particularly if one source is about giant animals in mythology, another is about giant animals in more recent literature, another about children's stories, and another about cinema. That problem does not arise in Megafauna (mythology) because that page is about the subject. But making a standalone list page requires secondary sourcing that supports inclusion of all members of the list as members of a single list group, or else a combination of such groups based on editor selection ends up being original research. That's why WP:LISTN says: a list topic is considered notable is if it has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources – it goes on to say that not every member of the list need be notable on its own, but that's not the same thing as saying that not every member need be part of the "group or set" without violating SYNTH. And I see in this discussion that some editors who should know better are saying that, because there is enough sourcing to conclude that "giant fictional animals" is a subject that passes WP:GNG, then that's that, and we must keep the page. However, we also have WP:What Wikipedia is not. Therefore, being "notable" means that we may keep a page, but it does not mean that we must keep a page. The SYNTH inherent in this list page is what makes it "cruft". --Tryptofish (talk) 21:58, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * In all fairness, that essay should be redirected on grounds that it is "cruft cruft" ie basically redundant to umpteen other essays on the same subject. And there is a list in the Armaggedon Films book. James500 (talk) 08:07, 20 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete per WP:NOTEVERYTHING — JFG talk 13:56, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete per above. AmericanAir88 (talk) 17:26, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep. As Andrew correctly notes, WP:LISTCRUFT isn't policy, and nobody has yet made an argument for delete that references WP:CLN or WP:LISTN. I would also point out that we do have an article on giant animals in mythology, megafauna (mythology), and it seems to me that the topic of fictional megafauna is undoubtedly notable and has received academic attention in a variety of reputable sources. The absence of an appropriate main article is not a compelling reason to conclude that the topic such an article would consider is not notable - and so even the non-policy WP:LISTCRUFT leaves open the possibility of this list being notable. Kilopylae (talk) 18:22, 16 August 2018 (UTC) — Kilopylae (talk&#32;• contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * What does WP:CLN have to do with this? --Tryptofish (talk) 21:58, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The material in WP:DOAL, while relating primarily to technical considerations, might reasonably be referenced in an argument in favour of deleting the article. Kilopylae (talk) 17:52, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I've replaced the tag you put on the above !vote, since Kilopylae has never edited the article in question, and the account was apparently created specifically for this AFD. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:51, 20 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment there are too many problems with this incoherent list. Many of these will be from films on List of films featuring giant monsters, others (such as Moby-Dick) are simply about large animals, and some (Jabberwock) may not be large at all.  Megafauna (mythology) may be a merge target, if it's acceptable to mention King Kong, Babe the Blue Ox and the like there. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 20:25, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I appear to have !voted twice, changing this to a comment. power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 23:59, 30 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep. based on the sourcing Andrew and Drm1 specifies above. ILooking at delete comments after those comments, I don't see the problems mentioned.  The  one substantive reply seems to misunderstand:  Moby Dick is exactly the sort of giant animal whose role in a famous fiction can be exhaustively sourced, That fact that's he's larger than other whales in central  and what everyone remembers about it. And tho he's central to the book, the book is about a great deal morre than "simply about large animals"  )  . King Kong is not mythological...he's a deliberate fictional creation invented in 1923,  a film where he's central, and where his size is his key characteristic.     Both of them are exactly what this list should be about.  Babe the Blue Ox is folklore, not mythology. but is important to njmerous fictions about Paul Bunyan.  In all these the act that the animal is giant is central to the fiction. The Jaberwock is described in the poem as a large animal--see the poem. I agree that it's unclear whether it's giant or merely vicious.  The other commen tthat gives a reason,gives one that does not apply. . "Not Everything" -- this isn't about every animal or or even every giant animal ever existing or conceived --it's a list of those animals reasonably central to notable fiction. If there are some listed in non-notable fiction they should be removed.  DGG ( talk ) 21:11, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * DGG, Drm310 actually doesn't provide any sources above. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:58, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Of Andrew's three sources, one (the kaijuu one) if anything demonstrates the notability of a separate article that has already been redirected, one (the Ashgate one) is useless for a list but might theoretically be good if we were writing an unrelated article on the history of giant animals in fiction, and one has a GBooks preview that is currently unavailable to me. It's obvious Andrew hasn't read the two that I have access to and I highly doubt he's read the other one either, rather just Googling them up and linking them here in the hopes that others, such as DGG and Drm310, would just say "keep per Andrew". Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 07:30, 19 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete Total bullshit written by someone who apparently likes Final Fantasy even more than I do, but has never actually thought about it all that much. "Chocobos", for example, are only "giant" if one considers them to be chickens rather than ostriches. Nothing in the article worth keeping, no reason given to assume it could ever be any different, given the number of other articles on essentially this same topic. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:38, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep per the reasoning of DGG and the sources (Ashgate and Armaggedon certainly, and probably the other since the book says Kaiju generally denotes "epic size") provided by Andrew Davidson, which demonstrate a clear pass of LISTN, inasmuch as giant animals satisfy GNG as a group, being discussed as a group in sources. James500 (talk) 08:00, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, per my response to DGG, the sources appear to demonstrate the notability of a separate article detailing the history of giant animals in fiction, which this ain't. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:43, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
 * If "giant animals in fiction" satisfies GNG, then "list of giant animals in fiction" automatically satisfies LISTN, because that is how LISTN works. If X satisfies GNG, then list of X automatically satisfies LISTN. If this seems odd, bear in mind that I did not write the guideline and am not to blame for it. James500 (talk) 08:55, 20 August 2018 (UTC) That said, a page move to "giant animals in fiction" with an option to spin out the list later if the page becomes to long, would not be completely unreasonable at this point, there being no main article at this point. James500 (talk) 09:01, 20 August 2018 (UTC)


 * That doesn't matter. If the only way we can build a list is by violating NOR, we are not allowed have a list. The sources do not allow for this. Use of the Ashcroft source for a list like this one is OR; breaking down the content of the Ashcroft source to only list individual giant animals would completely miss the point. If you want to make a swamp monster of this and turn the article that is currently there into a completely different kind of article based on the sources that are available, fire ahead. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 09:05, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
 * BTW, if a book says the Japanese word kaijū "generally denotes epic size", then it can promptly be dismissed as unreliable, as even "laymen" in this "field" know that that is dai-kaijū ("big monsters"), not kaijū which says nothing in particular of size. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 20:18, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It is entirely possible to create a list of giant animals in fiction without original research, using the sources available. James500 (talk) 07:20, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Maybe, but it would be pointless and would miss the point of the sources to such an extent as to seem to violate the spirit, if not the letter, of NOR, to remove all the historical discussion given in, say, the Ashcroft source and turn it into an alphabetical list of monster names. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 12:45, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The third source is clearly relevant because its subtitle is A Critical Study of Cinema's Biggest Monsters. Another similar work is Giant Creatures in Our World: Essays on Kaiju and American Popular Culture.  This spends a lot of time discussing the scope and meaning of words like kaiju in its introduction.  These are works of hundreds of pages and amply satisfy WP:LISTN. Andrew D. (talk) 13:03, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
 * You clearly have not actually read the kaiju book, since if you had either (a) you would come to the conclusion that it is a completely unusable source filled with errors or (b) you would realize that the Japanese term 怪獣 is problematic here since, even if it is using the term as a synonym for 大怪獣 (and explicitly justified this nonstandard terminology in the text), it refers to a broad range of monsters, some completely imaginary (i.e., not giant versions of real-world animals), and whether it covers humanoid monsters like Sanda and Gaiga is a matter of debate (since 怪獣 as opposed to 大怪獣 says nothing about size in Japanese, there's no reason why Frankenstein's original monster is not called a 怪獣 in Japanese but his children are). It is definitely not coterminous with the present article's "giant animals", and in fact a separate "list of kaiju" was already redirected as a result of a previous discussion, so attempting to use this AFD to turn a separate article into a content fork of that one (which would engage in blatant OR by conflating the terms 怪獣 and 大怪獣 with "giant animals") is ... pretty disruptive, and comes across as the same type of behaviour for which several editors including myself called you out in a recent AN discussion. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 13:26, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
 * In short, it is OR to take a set of sources that describe a category of creatures they call kaijū, and extrapolate from that your own subcategory of kaijū that is only the "giant animals", and especially to add to this subcategory other giant animals that are not referred to as kaijū. You simply are not allowed do this. If you want to argue with about unredirecting the separate list of kaiju creatures article, fire ahead, but don't pretend the two are actually the same topic and use sources on the already redirected page to prop up this one. And definitely don't try to argue the definitions of common Japanese words based on your own misreadings of various sources (some specialist and assuming prior knowledge on the reader's part, others simply wrong). Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 13:46, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't read Japanese, but I would add that taking a source about Kaijū, and another about large animals in English-language cinema, and combining them into a single list can involve WP:SYNTH unless the sources specify that these are entirely the same thing. Cultural differences may make these things into not-really-overlapping categories. (Perhaps monsters that attack cities are not the same thing as friendly giant creatures in children's stories.) No problem with comparing those in a regular article, but this is a list page. Also, I've noticed at the list page talk page that editors have had disagreements over inclusion criteria, something that invites further WP:OR without sourcing that defines useful criteria for all list members. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:31, 21 August 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Keep These things are famous for their size, so perfectly valid list article. Some things of course don't need to be on the list.  We have Megafauna (mythology) for all the giant animals in mythology to be listed at.  Leviathan and Behemoth link to the biblical creatures, not the ones in the Final Fantasy games.  I don't think every giant character in every video game ever should be listed since that'd be quite a large pointless list.  A valid list would contain giant dogs who have articles about their characters, films, or bestselling book series of course.  Fictional things that are not a major part of the fictional series they are part of, that get no mention of their own can be purged.  The list is perfectly valid, just needs specific inclusion criteria.  Does anyone doubt that Clifford the Big Red Dog or King Kong are notable because of their size?   D r e a m Focus  21:16, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Delete per WP:INDISCRIMINATE, which states that "merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia." Is a list of animals that are "large" in size in all of fiction really discriminate and focused as a topic?  I'd be more inclined to see this as a category than a list article.  The subject is not focused enough to ever be truly complete, nor could it be developed into a list article of any level of quality until parameters on what is "giant" are set - and given that fictional universes don't have data for the most part, that would mean using WP:SYNTH to do so.  This just screams problematic all over.   Red Phoenix  <sup style="color: #FFA500">talk  00:31, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — Alpha3031 (t • c) 02:20, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment. We could merge all content to Megafauna (mythology) and List of giants in mythology and folklore and redirect to one of these pages. My very best wishes (talk) 21:10, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I feel like I've said this in at least four AFDs in the last seven months, starting with Articles for deletion/Swamp monster and most recently Articles for deletion/List of fictional swords (4th nomination), but mythology (or folklore) and fiction are not the same thing, and almost nothing in this list could be called "mythology" by any definition. Had you said redirect and highly selective merge to ensure no OR or fancruft I would have no problem, but you can't say "merge all content" and not expect to be told that chocobos are neither mythological nor folkoric. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 07:20, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
 * First of all, we do have Lists of fictional animals. Having also List of fictional giant animals looks a little "forkish" and subjective. Second, Dragon, Leviathan and Behemoth (on this page) belong to mythology. Saying that, I think this page might be kept, the discussion above looks like "no consensus" to me. My very best wishes (talk) 15:42, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
 * "Dragon", "behemoth" and "leviathan" are not here because they come from mythology; they are specifically listed because of the appearance of entirely imaginary fictional creatures that share their names appearing in various pop culture properties. Strictly speaking "behemoth" and "leviathan" are not "mythological" anyway; they are names appearing in the bible, whose referents are uncertain, but probably refer to elephants and whales respectively, both of which actually exist and so are not "fictional" in any sense, and are only mythological in the same way human beings are. The discussion above looks like "no consensus" only if you ignore the fact that all of the "keep" !votes are based on ridiculous arguments that have been thoroughly discredited, and mostly come from "keepist" editors who never !vote delete. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 01:15, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Lists of fictional animals is a list of lists and the list in question is one of its many sub-lists. There are huge numbers of notable fictional animals from Akela to  Zapdos.  Because there are so many, they have been organised into sensible sublists like this one of giant animals. Andrew D. (talk) 21:41, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh, is that what happened here? That's not what the page creator's edit summary said. BTW, your new argument contradicts your previous argument that the subject is "notable" because of various sources you Googled up but didn't read, but you haven't retracted that one or even attempted to defend it. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 01:15, 25 August 2018 (UTC)


 * So, is anyone gonna close this? There's clear consensus to delete; with maybe one exception (but which one?), all of the "keep" !votes are from serial "keepists" who never !vote "delete", and all of them are based on misreading of sources or bogus arguments about hypothetical inclusion criteria that simply wouldn't work and make this an OR magnet or the like, and have been discredited without even making an attempt to argue in their own favour. And even if this were just about counting votes in which a nonsense argument from an SPA is worth the same as a policy-based argument from an experienced contributor, it would be 13-6 in favour of deletion (or 12-5, if you discount the !vote from the editor who only showed up here as part of a hounding campaign against me). Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:10, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It will be closed by an admin seven days after the most recent relisting. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:01, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but that was several hours before I posted the above, and the last relist was about the worst and most blatant example of WP:RELISTBIAS I've seen in recent memory. If we're being completely fair, the first relist was not great either; Andrew's !votes seem to be given more weight the more disruptive and less coherent they are. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 07:21, 31 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete An indiscriminate collection of information - are there any sources that describe the list as a whole? <b style="color:#7F007F">Ritchie333</b> <sup style="color:#7F007F">(talk) <sup style="color:#7F007F">(cont)  10:57, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * A list of this sort isn't going to be exact. WP:LISTN states specifically that "The entirety of the list does not need to be documented in sources for notability...". There are clearly sources which cover this in a general way such as The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters which has a section headed "Gargantuan Animals" which lists examples such as Shelob and the giant ants of Them!.  The list concept is therefore notable and so not indiscriminate.  Andrew D. (talk) 11:09, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Andrew, this is getting to the point where I can't believe you haven't been TBANned yet: I already pointed out to you above that the Ashgate article is not a list, and if anything demonstrates notability for an article discussing the history, etc. of giant animals in fiction, not a list. Your claiming, despite my having already rebutted you weeks ago, that has a section headed "Gargantuan Animals" which lists [emphasis added] examples ... [t]he list concept is therefore notable and so not indiscriminate comes across as deliberate disruption, and at best is engaging in somewhat "creative" tricks of language. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 11:41, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * WP:LISTN does not require the source to present the information in list form, like we do. It states, "a list topic is considered notable if it has been discussed as a group or set".  That's what the Ashgate Encyclopedia does.  Its overall topic is "Literary and Cinematic Monsters" and it discusses "Gargantuan Animals" in a distinct section. Q.E.D. Andrew D. (talk) 11:56, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * To paraphrase the Merchant of Venice, "Mark you this Bassanio, the Devil can cite WP:LISTN for his own purpose". In this case, what I don't understand is why has nobody managed to write a good lead that clearly and unambiguously explains the importance of the list. I would venture that's because it isn't possible. <b style="color:#7F007F">Ritchie333</b> <sup style="color:#7F007F">(talk) <sup style="color:#7F007F">(cont)  12:01, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The edit notice for this discussion states that "...valid arguments citing relevant guidelines will be given more weight ... commenting on other users rather than the article is also considered disruptive." So, I cite WP:LISTN because that is a relevant guideline.  The Merchant of Venice seems less relevant and so may be given less weight. Andrew D. (talk) 12:35, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The reason LISTN is called a guideline is because it needs to be interpreted according to circumstances. If a topic would be better covered in a prose article than a list like this one, and the list option would be a bullshit OR magnet, then we don't have a list. If you want to write a separate article discussing the history Giant animals in fiction, fire ahead, but the page under discussion now needs to go. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 13:36, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * If we decided to restructure the content, the relevant policies would be WP:ATD and WP:PRESERVE which indicate that we would build upon the existing page rather than deleting and starting from nothing. In the recent similar case of List of fictional swords and Swords in fiction, it was decided to stick with the list title and format. Andrew D. (talk) 17:41, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, and I would opt to see that list deleted as well. There's nothing to rebuild here because the notion of the topic is flawed.  Again, is all of fiction discriminate enough as a focus to meet WP:NOTINDISCRIMINATE?  I would argue that it does not.   Red Phoenix  <sup style="color: #FFA500">talk  22:12, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Andrew, please stop speaking in ridiculous hypotheticals. PRESERVE doesn't apply here because literally nothing in this list is worth preserving (even entries that might merit discussion in a good article are unsourced and poorly written, and most are complete bullshit). Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 23:58, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I would certainly want to preserve the entries for King Kong, which is vital for this topic, and the Giant Rat of Sumatra, which is especially entertaining and notable. To delete such valid entries would be disruptive and that's why our policy is to build on such key elements. Andrew D. (talk) 06:49, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * The claim that the "Giant Rat of Sumatra" is an example of a fictional giant animal is questionable when it originates a throwaway fictional allusion in a work by Conan Doyle that apparently didn't specify its size (lots of real-world animals are called "giant" just because they are larger than what the speaker might be used to, so Doyle might have been imagining something that was still significantly smaller that the ROUSes in The Princess Bride), and the source attached to it is actually about a newly-discovered real-life giant rat in kinda-sorta neighbouring New Guinea, clearly unrelated to the fictional creature (but using a source that claims the animal in question is not fictional afterall kinda goes against the stated purpose of the list). As for King Kong, abundant sources could be found identifying him as a kaijū, which would make his listing here redundant if the other article hadn't already been redirected due to persistent vandalism (not notability, so you're free to recreate the list). Neither entry includes any useful information that isn't already stated better elsewhere in the encyclopedia, so WP:PRESERVE doesn't actually apply. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 07:34, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * And I just checked the page history. You're the one who misinterpreted the source as talking about an actual fictional animal appearing in stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, rather than a throwaway fake allusion interpreted variously by later authors. If you don't know how giant "giant" is, and if various writers of both fiction and non-fiction have interpreted it as referring to "above average, but not entirely out of the ordinary, so that a real animal could actually be given the same name", you are violating NOR (the spirit if not the letter) to list it here. By doing so, you added to the reasons to delete this article, even if your intent was clearly the opposite.Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 07:42, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Please let me suggest to both of you that it probably is not useful to continue discussing this here. It's pretty obvious that you disagree with each other and that neither one of you is likely to change the other's mind. To some extent, this is a disagreement about deletion criteria, and to some extent it's a disagreement over personal conduct, and the latter should be addressed via dispute resolution, but not here. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:44, 1 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete - pretty much an unnecessary list, should be deleted. It's too broad as well, and is not well defined. Kirbanzo (talk) 01:17, 1 September 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.