Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Moonbat (3rd 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. (non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:17, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Moonbat
AfDs for this article: 
 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

Neologism kgrr  talk 08:34, 26 March 2009 (UTC) Urban dictionary has six entries for this neologism. Take your pick of which meaning to assign to this epithet. No way to write an Npov article on it. kgrr talk 10:10, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Not only was the assertion that this is a neologism refuted by Geogre in the first AFD discussion for this article, back in 2004, this discussion being the third, but the article itself even cites a source that supports this. It's the very first source cited, in fact.  Inspired (by us, ironically) to do the proper research, William Safire, an identifiable expert in this field who has a reputation for accuracy to defend, did his own legwork, checked the facts, and published the result.  (There's more on this subject than was in the column in his 2008 Political Dictionary, by the way.)   You didn't read the sources to see what they said about the subject, or even the prior AFD discussions, did you? Personally, since the sources (c.f. Safire's dictionary, and this and this) treat them both as one and discuss them together, often in a wider context of epithets on web logs as a whole, I'd merge this with Wingnut and do the same, on the principle that Wikipedia should address subjects as sources do. But that's a matter of merger, not deletion.  Even an editor without an account has all of the tools necessary to enact that.  This is Articles for deletion, and repeatedly nominating an article for deletion on grounds that were shown to be wrong almost five years ago, and also shown to be wrong by the sources in the article, in the expectation of a different result the third time around, is not (shall we say?) the best of approaches.  Uncle G (talk) 10:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep: Look, I don't like the term.  It's slippery, as the nominator says.  It's just a generalized pejorative.  The only concrete definitions have to go back to "looney" and "lunatic" and combine those with "funny" comments on 1960's teenagers (and they're all retirees now).  Oh, it's culture war.  It's dumb.  It's best left elsewhere.  It is, however, neither neologism nor impossible to write properly.  A proper article treats the term as a slippery term, as a term used, I believe, by Hunter S. Thompson, as incorporated into general apolitical discourse, and as a particularized term of opprobrium appropriated specifically by Rush Limbaugh.  However, he and his usage will pass away like dry leaves in winter, and the term will likely remain in its light form ("amusing lunatic; an antic, usually young, pursuer of attractive ideas").  Geogre (talk) 11:19, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Pretty much agree with what George said; it seems to be used widely enough to justify having an article on it. The fact that it's pejorative isn't reason enough to have it deleted. Interestingly, Wikipedia's current definition of the term is quoted in this book. I do think that we need to expand our sourcing on the term and find a solid definition, though. It seems that a specific mode of usage, "barking moonbat", was coined by Perry de Havilland on his blog, Samizdata. A cursory google search reveals 104,000 results. ←  Spidern  →  12:20, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * keep sufficiently stable for an article. Artw (talk) 17:27, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep, not a neologism but needs more research. The 1940s experimental aircraft XP-67 Bat has also been called the "Moonbat", but I haven't found when that alternate name was first applied. The term, in any case, is more than fifty years old. 21:42, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep as per most of the above —  MapsMan  [  talk  |  cont  ] — 00:56, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Merge the content is all WP:DICDEF so the title should take us to a more general article such as Pejorative. We really shouldn't have separate articles for every insulting word as they are all much the same topic. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:17, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * It's not a dicdef. A dictionary definition contains multiple definitions for the term. There's only one definition of moonbat here. You could merge though; but the argument that it is dicdef is wrong; and you don't need to do an AFD to merge.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 01:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * What do you call it if there's only one definition, then, if not a definition? Powers T 12:39, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Basically all articles have to include a definition; they have to define what they mean by the title, and this is covered by WP:ISNOT. Then it would be a 'stub article'.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 14:10, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * But not every article that consists solely of a single definition is a valid stub. Powers T 01:48, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

"Delete"
 * Keep this is a perfectly proper article.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 01:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * delete, this word is a politically motivated perjorative. It's OK to borrow a word from a science fiction author, and twist it to a new context, but the addition to wikipedia helps to give it official support. I'm from Boston, where this word is used every day on a station which actively employs republican politicians who lose elections, or are ejected from the local legislators as a result of convictions in court. Keep or delete it's a political attack word. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.160.160.101 (talk) 14:28, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Probably. However the wikipedia is not censored, even though it may be an offensive term.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 22:18, 30 March 2009 (UTC)


 * keep - feh. a notable stupid political pejorative.  --Rocksanddirt (talk) 20:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep and make Wingnut (politics) a redirect. Digestible (talk) 20:53, 30 March 2009 (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.