Wikipedia:Deletion review/Allegations of Chinese apartheid/Analysis by Leifern

Analysis of the Articles for deletion/Allegations of Chinese apartheid
(Please comment on this on the Talk page).

Background
At 01:29, 1 August 2007, G-Dett nominated Allegations of Chinese apartheid for deletion.

After much debate, ^demon closed the nomination on 19:00, August 6, 2007. 31 minutes later, Hemlock Martinis added his endorsement to the nomination on the basis that he was closing the same nomination but ran into an edit conflict.

^demon summarized his decision this way:


 * Essentially, it comes down to whether or not this article constitutes original research and a particular point of view, both of which are policies which we hold in the highest regard, and that we always fall back to, when dealing with articles that may or may not be appropriate for Wikipedia. Reading this discussion has lead me to believe consensus agrees that the article in and of itself is not neutral and thus should be removed from Wikipedia.

Hemlock Martinis wrote in his endorsement:


 * Now, the actual article. It is true, as many editors have pointed out, that it is well-sourced and well-written. However, this does not automatically excuse an article; WP:SYNTH's existence logically infers that even the best of articles can advance a viewpoint. The NPOV/POV of this article is what is at the heart of the matter, but even so, few arguments have been made that can effectively dispute the synthesis. This leads me to the technical aspects. Sure, as I've said, it's well-sourced and well-written, but this article is not well planned. There is little to no cohesion between the subjects discussed in the article. There is no flow between the sections. In other words, there's a lack of the big picture. As such, the concerns about WP:SYNTH are vaild.

The point of an AFD is to see if a consensus can be found for deleting an article. While it is clear that this is not a vote, a consensus is a higher standard than a majority. If there is no consensus to delete or keep, a "no consensus" decision is entered, and the article stays.

^demon and Hemlock Martinis make different arguments for their determination. ^demon's view is that there is a consensus that the article violates NPOV because it fails to policies about Original Research and NPOV. Hemlock Martinis concedes that the article is well-sourced and well-written, doesn't raise the issue of consensus, and feels that "concerns about WP:SYNTH" are valid.

Both these admins - who acted independently of each other - must base their determination on the preponderance of views expressed in the discussion.

Analysis
To arrive at a more exact determination of the sense of those involved in the discussion, I summarized their argument in a tabular form. (A note on methodology: I only relied on expressed views, but where someone referred to another view, I credited them with the same arguments.)

Here are the two tables:

Findings
There were 54 who wanted the article deleted, merged, or split; and 47 who wanted it kept. This is about an even split.

As for the reasons:

Among those who wanted to delete the article:
 * 17 said the quotes were "cherry-picked," "data-mined," etc.
 * 16 said it violated WP:NOR
 * 14 said it was written in violation of WP:POINT
 * 10 felt the topics would be better covered in other articles
 * 8 said the article was a result of pro-Israeli activism
 * 8 said the article violates WP:SYNTH
 * 5 cited violation of WP:NPOV
 * 3 said there should be no articles about allegations
 * 3 said "apartheid" is a specific phenomenon limited to the Republic of South Africa

Among those who wanted to keep the article:
 * 25 said the article was well-sourced
 * 12 said this article is just as notable as any other "allegations of apartheid" articles
 * 8 said the article is nominated for deletion to resolve a content dispute
 * 7 said the article was written with a neutral point of view
 * 6 said the article was well-written
 * 5 said the nomination is a violation of WP:NPOV
 * 4 entered a general keep vote

Implications
Now, WP:DP does not provide for articles to be deleted because they violate WP:NPOV or WP:SYNTH. There is one provision for deleting articles based on "information that cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources," (my emphasis) and this links to WP:NOR. This point was never made in any of the arguments, so there can't be any consensus for this.

As for the view that the article violates WP:NPOV, WP:SYNTH, etc., the remedy for this is and always has been to edit the article to improve it.

Among those 54 who wanted the article deleted, the most common argument - cited by 17 - was that the quotes were cherrypicked or mined. That's less than a third of that group and about a sixth of everyone who weighed in. This does not constitute a consensus.

But even if there were a consensus that the article violated WP:NPOV or WP:SYNTH, deletion would be the wrong course of action. The only possible cause for deleting the article would be that it failed notability (a point only 2 detractors made) or could only be sustained with original research (which is a very high standard to meet, since all quotes are from reliable sources).

I don't expect this will change the course of this DRV. And I'm inclined to believe that the closing admins, while misguided about several things, acted in good faith, trying to put an end to a very unpleasant discussion.

But I want it in the record that this was a deletion without any reasonable basis.