Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Atheism

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 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was:  delete. —&thinsp;JJMC89&thinsp; (T·C) 02:28, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Portal:Atheism

 * – (View MfD)

Six selected articles in rotation. One was created in April 2010, two were created in March 2009, three were created in June 2007 and updated in January 2009. Portal:Atheism/Selected article/4 was updated in March 2010 with an article that relates only marginally to atheism.

Of the bios in rotation, 11 were created in June / July 2007 and one was created in April 2010. Three of the former were updated in January 2009. The later was updated in May 2011 because Robert B. Spencer was, at the time, not an atheist but a Catholic. The bio for Christopher Hitchens was updated in December 2011 with his death. Mark Schierbecker (talk) 21:54, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Delete per the nom. This portal has been abandoned for a decade, save for some one-off updates by passing editors. Since late 2006, the lead of WP:POG has said "Do not expect other editors to maintain a portal you create" ... and this one has not been maintained by GeorgeTopouria, who dumped it less then an hour after creating it in May 2007, save three stray edits in July 2007, which were their last in portal space. They last touched main space in 2011. The portal clearly fails WP:POG's requirement that portals should be about subjects broad enough to attract large numbers of maintainers and readers. This portal has had a decade of no steady maintainers and it had a very low 27 views per day from January 1 to June 30 2019 (despite the head article Atheism having 2,262 views per day in the same period).
 * POG also states portals should be associated with a wikiproject, but WikiProject Atheism is labled semi-active (the last editor to editor conversation was in Sep. 2017) and the only two mentions of the portal on the talk page were a passing mention in June 2010 in a conversation about color use in templates, and a passing mention in a lengthy May 2011 conversation about if pink unicorn images in user-boxes were offensive to theists and what to do about it. Portals stand or fall on their merits in the now, not what could someday hypothetically happen with them, and this one falls flat. I oppose re-creation, as a decade of hard evidence shows Atheism is not a broad enough topic to attract readers or maintainers. Newshunter12 (talk) 00:46, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Atheism

 * Weak Delete as an unmaintained portal, although the viewing is better than for many portals, and although there appear to be many articles even after taking into account that some of them have been blanked for some reason. Neutral as to the possibility of re-creating this portal with a design that does not use content-forked subpages and with a maintenance plan.  Robert McClenon (talk) 15:22, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Note to closing admin. I don't want in any way to prejudge the outcome ... but if you close this discussion as delete, please can you not remove the backlinks?  I have an AWB setup which allows me to easily replace them with links to the next most specific portal(s), without creating duplicate entries.
 * However, I am unsure what alternative portal, if any, should be used. It seems to me that the options are Portal:Religion and/or Portal:Philosophy. I think that the religion is to poor a fit, so my inclination is to use only Portal:Philosophy as the least worst option.   any thoughts on that?  --  Brown HairedGirl  (talk) • (contribs) 23:39, 17 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment to User:BrownHairedGirl and others: Well, atheism is a religion, and its believers believe in it with the same passion as do Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists.  However, I agree that Portal:Religion is a poor fit.  It's a coin toss between Portal:Philosophy and deleting the backlink.  Robert McClenon (talk) 00:13, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * @Robert, my experience is that atheists don't like atheism being called a religion, so I am wary of unintentionally causing offence. I agree about the toss-up between P:Philosophy and deletion.
 * Delete all backlinks @Robert McClenon @ Brown HairedGirl  I agree that in practical terms, atheism can often be its own religion (some atheists gather in groups with hair dryers to de-baptize each other), but on the other hand, adherents are most likely to see it as just reality, not a philosophy, so I say just delete the backlinks. It's not our job to forcibly categorize the nature of all things. Newshunter12 (talk) 03:51, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The fact that atheists don't like having it called a religion is not important to me. We don't need to worry too much about a political correctness that one must never offend people who are easily offended.  I think that we can use common sense on what is and is not offense.  They are also likely to be offended at having their portal deleted, but rules are rules and common sense is common sense.  Robert McClenon (talk) 05:48, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I've surveyed the back links (there are only 156 that are not transclusions) and it appears most articles fall under the Religion portal, and some fall under both Philosophy and Religion (Daniel Dennett, Friedrich Nietzsche). Most of the back links are articles about people or organizations that are critical of religion. Many atheists are themselves religious, such as atheistic Buddhists, but that is besides the point. Mark Schierbecker (talk) 09:11, 18 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete. Another abandoned portal.--Darwinek (talk) 19:56, 23 September 2019 (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 page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.