Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Van Cat Naming Controversy


 * 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   no consensus. Consider discussing a merge on the appropriate talk pages. Shereth 16:44, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Van_Cat_Naming_Controversy
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This entry has been created as a pov fork to contain unsourced OR material of dubious quality that had been previously been removed from the Turkish Van entry. The entry's creator was quite open about that being the sole reason (quote: "started page as resolution to dispute on Turkish Van page") for creating the entry. Meowy 00:49, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment: well I've hacked it down to the sourced content and cleaned out the rubbish. Will this now merge back into Turkish Van?Elen of the Roads (talk) 08:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Merge I think, HOWEVER I also believe the article Turkish Van should be renamed as Van (cat), and that both Turkish Van and Kurdish Van should redirect to Van (cat).Tris2000 (talk) 10:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I would disagree slightly with the rename - it was members of the US and UK cat fancies, not the Turkish government, that called the cats Turkish Van (originally they were registered just as Turkish cats in the UK), to distinguish them from the Turkish Cat or Angora . Although if it keeps the peace....--Elen of the Roads (talk) 11:37, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * A "Van cat" and a "Turkish Van" are two different things: A "Turkish Van" is a specific breed of domestic cat found in the Americas and Europe, whose name was coined in the 1970s by cat fanciers, and whose quite precise breed standards and required pedigree are set by those fanciers. The "Van cat" is a domestic cat found in the Van region of present-day eastern Turkey and that has existed in that region for centuries. That is the true "naming controversy", not the fabricated content of the current article. I don't think there is anything in the current Naming Controversy article that is possible to merge with another article - even in its hacked-down state it's all low-grade, unsourced, OR, POV material. Meowy 16:59, 15 July 2009 (UTC)


 * I do see what you mean, however the article Turkish Van already confounds the two. It would perhaps be better to have one article on the Van cat, which references the "Turkish Van" and also discusses the current situation of the cat in its native region.  And mentions the relationship between the native Van and the native Angora.Elen of the Roads (talk) 17:05, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * The obvious flaws withing the two articles are not a reason to make the situation worse by merging them - a "Van cat" and a "Turkish Van" are two different things, so will continue to require two separate articles. Anyway, this is off-topic for this discussion. Returning to on-topic stuff, what content do you think is valid for a merge (be it into the Van Kedisi or the Turkish Van article)? The "some Kurds have referred to the Van as a "Kurdish cat", a symbol of Kurdistan, and even referred to it as the "Kurdish Van" rather than the officially endorsed name" claim is not valid content because it just comes from a blog. Nothing else in the article is actually about a "naming controversy". Opinions on the evolution of the domestic cat are off-topic for either article, and "The Van cat may therefore have a much more ancient origin than any of the current populations in the area" is just a pov claim made by a Wikipedia editor. Meowy 18:58, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Now I've hacked it and read the other articles, here's pretty much nothing in this article that's worth keeping. The German cat rescue piece is from 2000, there's a blog, and the others are just statements of the blinding obvious, and fairly irrelevant at that.  Somewhere it ought to make the point that the native breed is an old one and may go back to the Stone Age, but that's a different story. Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Turkey-related deletion discussions.  -- TexasAndroid (talk) 12:15, 15 July 2009 (UTC)


 * First of all, I'd really like to say that there's NO reason to DELETE an article simply because of personal opinions. The blog quoted is, of course, a Kurdish nationalist blog, and its not as if its the only blog mentioning that either, frankly, there may be hundreds (I've found at least as much...). At least teh Kurdish internet culture is rather into the argument, and that is proven already. That's ALREADY enough for the article to be valid. On top of that, I'm well aware of the debate OUTSIDE the internet, not that you guys really care. Either merge or delete, whatever. If I remember correctly, this article was created as a compromise, and the info, as part of the Kurds vs. Turks conflict, is valid. And as the article mentions, its not only Kurds and Turks in on the debate, as Europeans also pipe in.

The article can be IMPROVED, yes. A lot. HOWEVER, simply deleting it is pointless, as if you don't want the information on a valid issue that is important with regards to the Van cat on the wiki. And yes, there is POV, its a debate, of course. The three POVs are supposed to be all portrayed in the article, so you can edit it to make it so if you feel necessary. However, as I stated before, THERE IS NO POINT IN SIMPLY DELETING IT, AS IT IS A VALID ISSUE.

As for the merge issue, frankly, I think its really more of a political article, and as certain people have their own... objections towards politics and cat fancy being mentioned together on an important page, I don't think the merge will really be very popular, though I could be wrong... --Yalens (talk) 19:44, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete, appears to be badly sourced, non-neutral, original research. I do not think that any of the current content of the page belongs in the encyclopaedia, the whole thing seems to be based around a blog post (not a reliable source) and the rest is effectively linked by synthesis. Guest9999 (talk) 23:17, 15 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Merge: Having now had a long look at Turkish Van, I think Tris2000 is right, that article should be renamed to Van (cat) in line with Persian (cat) and Siamese (cat) (the other old breeds) and any information from here that meets WP:V should be merged into it. The idea of a cat becoming a political icon is of itself quite interesting, and there is (if Meowy hasn't deleted it again) already a section on the current status of the cat in its native land.  I have suggested same on talk page of Turkish VanElen of the Roads (talk) 23:42, 16 July 2009 (UTC)


 * mmm... if people will support ElenoftheRoads' idea, I will back it too... (i.e., Meowy not taking initiative and simply deleting everything w/o any negotiation at all as usual). Better than nothing. --Yalens (talk) 18:22, 17 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment Note Van Kedisi article created by nominator. Anarchangel (talk) 03:02, 18 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment the above editor is mistaken. I created an article titled "Van Cat", which was then hijacked and misused by another editor and renamed Van Kedisi. It seems Elen of the Roads aspires to do the same with the "Turkish Van" article. Meowy  00:47, 21 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Van Cat was created in January 2005 by Mu5ti
 * Van Kedisi was created by Meowy at 21:00 on 4 December 2006.
 * Van Cat was redirected by Meowy to Van Kedisi at 21:13 on 4 December 2006. Anarchangel (talk) 07:36, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
 * False implications are being made by the above editor. The Van Cat as created by Mu5ti was simply a POV redirect, a redirect to the "Turkish Van" article. I created the Van cat article but initially had to call it Van Kedisi because of the pre-existing redirect (and being a new editor I didnt know how to remove the redirect). The article's name was later changed to Van cat, but at an even later date changed back to Van Kedisi by a Turkish Van-owning administrator. If you examine the talk page, and edit summaries, I have on a number of occasions argued for the article to be called "Van cat" and attempted to get it changed to "Van cat", never once did I argue for it to be called "Van Kedisi". Meowy 15:40, 24 July 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.