Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Support our troops


 * 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. John254 02:02, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Support our troops

 * - (|View AfD) (View log)

DELETE Completely POV and includes weasel words like "some people believe". Unless it's completely rewritten in a proper tone I don't think this article should be kept. It's just another phrase of the day that will soon disappear.MiltonP Ottawa (talk) 06:48, 16 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep. Hardly an award-winner in its current form, but when an article needs rewriting, the answer is to rewrite it, not delete it.  As for "phrase of the day", I'd say its historical significance is guaranteed, even if it falls into popular disuse... something along the lines of hearts and minds.  (Hmm, that article sucks even more -- but again, the way to fix it is to rewrite it.)--Father Goose (talk) 09:25, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * This AfD nomination was incomplete. It is listed now. DumbBOT (talk) 10:51, 16 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep I was inclined at first to view this as not much more than a dictionary definition, but I agree with Goose that this does show potential; the quote from Noam Chomsky is the beginning of a discussion of the phrase as "good propaganda", and one can find plenty of sources about the use of this rallying cry. A mess, sure, but not that much of a mess. Mandsford (talk) 13:00, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep Nomination states the article is capable of improvement through rewording to address POV issues. Deletion is not a first resort. Townlake (talk) 14:26, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep I was totally expecting to vote delete, but the article really isn't that bad. I do believe it is a notable slogan that wouldn't eaily be merged into any parent article.  The article does appear to have references to justify it's notability.  I didn't check to see if cleanup has been done since nom, but the only blatently objectional content was the opening weasel phrase, and it is at least attributed to a source. -Verdatum (talk) 17:58, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep, an unexpectedly decent short non-stub for a notable political term. --Dhartung | Talk 18:49, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep - I see no POV issues. Further the political/patriotic subtext, makes this go beyond a dictionary definition --T-rex 19:12, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete An entire article for a term? Absolutely not. NSR 77  T C  03:36, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete Not notable except to a small vocal audience of a specific political belief, better rolled into the articles on militarism, fascism, US foreign policy, and/or military-industrial complex. SmashTheState (talk) 04:47, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
 * That sounds like an idontlikeit if I ever heard one. I think the phrase -- or rather, its use as a celebration of all the things you linked above -- is abhorrent, but given that it was omnipresent in the US for several years, it's certainly notable in Wikipedia terms.  And we should document its association with all of those things (via Noam Chomsky's quote and others').--Father Goose (talk) 06:40, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Internet terms like "lol" and "jk" are ubiquitous, sometimes even spoken in person. Those don't have their own sub-articles, do they? NSR 77  T C  01:59, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * If "support our troops" survives, I plan to create articles for "Don't mourn, organize," and "An injury to one is an injury to all." SmashTheState (talk) 04:32, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Okay, but those are vastly more likely to be deleted. I'm not sure you yet understand the principle of WP:NPOV; Wikipedia isn't meant to be conservative or liberal (or anti-conservative or anti-liberal) -- our job is just to document what's out there.--Father Goose (talk) 07:30, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * As has been discussed in criticism of wikipedia, there is an inherent bias in the status quo. Let me give you a practical example.  Some time ago I stumbled across the Enemy of the People article.  I have no love for Bolsheviks, but the article was very plainly created as an anti-communist tract.  Historical uses of the term are briefly mentioned, but there are long, detailed, and cited sections on the Soviet use of the term.  I decided to make the article a little less POV by mentioning the use of the term as part of the McCarthyist "Red Scare" era, and began a months-long struggle against various "patriots" who objected to what they saw as moral equivalency between their nation-state of choice and the Evil Empire.  Even after finding citations, one of the patriots whined to a Wikipedia admin who quietly colluded with him on his user page, saying that if I persisted in editing the article, he'd "take administrative action" against me.  The only reason I even realized this is because I happened to check the edit history of the person edit warring with me.  This is far from the first time I have had to face a Wikipedia hierarchy consisting almost entirely of angry white privileged Amerikan males consumed by nerd-rage and OCD.  You are quite correct that a phrase like "Don't mourn, organize," is orders of magnitude more likely to get deleted; not because it's less notable than "support our troops," but because, despite its use for close to a hundred years, it falls outside the status quo.  And status quo is really what the wikinerds mean when they bang on about NPOV.  SmashTheState (talk) 20:36, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Even after finding citations,... he says. Except that--speaking slowly here--neither citation you provided says that "enemy of the people" was used commonly in America, in the McCarthy era or any other.  First reference:, Hannity saying "enemy of the state."  Not relevant (but could be to the other article as an example).  Second reference:  a reference to Ayn Rand using the phrase once, ironically, in The Fountainhead.  The fact that the user uses false references to make a point should be taken into consideration. A2Kafir (and...?) 02:25, 19 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, the Russians never used the term "enemy of the people" either. What they used was probably something like "враг людей."  It doesn't even use the same character set.  I can find literally hundreds of uses of "enemy of the state" and "enemy of america" in the US.  Their meaning is as close to "enemy of the people" as "враг людей" is.  But of course, this really has nothing to do with logic or reason.  It has to do with your patriotism and your personal offence at any kind of moral equivalency between Amerika and the USSR.  And the Wikipedia admin will support you because Amerikan patriotism is the status quo, aka NPOV. And anyone who disagrees gets banhammered, forever and ever, amen.  Which brings us back to this article.  It will get preserved while a hundred other phrases and slogans of equal or greater notoriety do not, simply because Wikipedia is overwhelmingly male and middle class and Amerikan, and the status quo of male middle-class Amerikans is patriotic fervour. SmashTheState (talk) 03:40, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The editor makes my case for me; for him, NPOV is his opinion, because he's right, dammit! And the German placename spelling really helps, too. A2Kafir (and...?) 03:45, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * And, by the way, Khruschev disagrees with our friend: . (Search for "enemy".)  Of course, it is a translation, so our friend will say it isn't relevant.  Y'all be the judge.  I have to go see "Red Dawn" again.  (Kidding.  Actually, never seen it.  Except for the scene of Soviet soldiers ambushed by teenagers outside a US national park.  Kinda silly, so I flipped the channel again.)  A2Kafir (and...?) 03:53, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * SmashTheState, I think you raise an interesting point. What is the Notability inclusion criteria for slogans?  I'm of the opinion that a small article on a slogan is acceptable unless it can be fully and appropriately addressed in some parent article.  So I did a search on your examples. "An injury to one..." on en.wikipedia.org yields as its first hit Labor slogans, which seems like a good place to fully address the topic.  Whereas "Support our troops" on wikipedia yields no appropriate parent or umbrella article where the topic is currently addressed.  So I say, since it is independently notable from verifiable sources, the solution is to give it an article. -Verdatum (talk) 15:25, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * LOL! (Seriously, I actually laughed out loud while posting this ;-) --Father Goose (talk) 07:30, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment There's so much more that can be written about this, with sources. Another aspect of "Support our troops" is its malleability; it's used by both conservatives and liberals.  Support our troops-- bring them home from Iraq now!  Support our troops while they're risking their lives in Iraq!  The rest of the Chomsky quote is that slogans of this nature really don't mean anything, but to use it sounds very patriotic.  At the same time, it's a shift in attitude from the Vietnam War era, when there were people that labelled American soliders as baby killers, and people that supported the war but didn't worry much about the returning veteran.  Yes, that's a ton of generalizations; no, I have no intention of personally looking for sources; no, I don't care what you think.  Suffice to say that it's more than just the phrase of the day, and has been for more than that for many years, and I think that there's enough notability demonstrated to keep the article and make it better.  But either way, support our troops! Mandsford (talk) 13:06, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Whoa. Liberals AND Conservatives. There's hardly a distinction between the two in the United States. Try thinking outside your white privileged suburban home for once. It's not a shift in thinking. The support out troops motto was specifically created by the Pentagon to stop the legitimate feelings of anger towards soldiers that occurred in the past (Vietnam). Of course the public bought it completely and now most people believe that it was a grassroots movement by military families. There are many people who disagree. Wikipedia is supposed to be worldly, not USA-centric. If 'Support our troops' belongs here then surely so does every radical anti-american/imperialist motto. I'll go get started on that. Oh, and FUCK THE TROOPS.MiltonP Ottawa (talk) 04:27, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Eh? Mandsford (talk) 23:23, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * This reply underscores the fact that the nomination of this article has been undertaken for deeply biased reasons. However, I wouldn't mind the creation of additional articles on any number of other famous propagandistic or anti-propagandistic slogans, provided they can be written about factually.--Father Goose (talk) 19:47, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep the article will always have a tendency to be POV, but the Chompsky quote provides a succinct criticism of the support the troops mantra. As long as no one uses this as a WP:COATRACK, it should be fine. Protonk (talk) 20:25, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think your deliberate misspelling of Chomsky constitutes a personal attack. Please stop.MiltonP Ottawa (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 22:00, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Don't make fun of the basis for a functioning community here. Protonk (talk) 22:54, 19 July 2008 (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.