Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Denmark–Philippines relations

Since a question has been raised, this is a more detailed discussion of reasons: The arguments to speedy keep, by several respected and long-time editors and admins, convinced me. Your results may differ, but you can't win every time -- Wikipedia is not a democracy. The community elected me to make sometimes difficult decisions, similar to which I make every day in my two jobs off-line as a college professor and an attorney. For the past few years, a strong consensus has emerged that certain types of articles are always kept, while other are not. No, WP:OUTCOMES does not explicitly say that Yaks live Tibet, and neither does it say the two propositions that were part of the basis of my closing to keep the article. Often an arbitrary line must be drawn. For example, high schools are generally kept, as are IR (international relations) between two large or medium-sized nation-states. The Bilateral relations debate, in particular, has gone on, and a consensus has been clearly fixed. This is not the place, nor is AfD, to make a long discourse on the particulars of the arguments over the recent past, about which IR has engaged the WP community. Perhaps you are not aware of the fact that this has been "hashed out" already in many deletion discussions. Now to answer what I think are some specific disagreements: The Philippines is a nation of over 90 million persons (the 12th largest country in the world), and while a state of only 65 years, was a tribal nation for about 24,000 years. Denmark is 109th in rank by population among nation-states, placing it virtually in the middle of all sovereign countries, and is about 1200 years old. As the article shows, the two nations have had extensive political, economic, and treaty relationships over the years, attested to by reliable sources. It is attested that the Danes have given significant financial aid to the other nation, and that many Filipinos live in the former nation. Both are also allies of the United States and are primarily Christian nations. Both fought on the same side in World War II, and thus have been allies. There are no conflicts that were raised between this article and any guideline, rule, or policy. Although WP is an encyclopedia that relies mostly on secondary sources, primary sources from government web sites are always considered reliable and acceptable. The article has those good sources, and in sufficient quality and quantity to meet our basic notability requirements. That having been said, articles are a speedy keep at AfD when a consensus of the community agrees that an article is, or could be, and their arguments rule, when further debate would be unproductive. In this particular case, DGG and other users whom I respect made good arguments. AfD is not for getting rid of poorly written or sourced articles. The article was listed for more than eight days, was re-listed, and still the consensus was moving towards keeping it. I am both an inclusionist and an eventualist; I err on the side of keeping, and having been here for over three years, I know that WP is not going away tomorrow. On a final note, I am suspicious of nominations for deletion about unpopular subjects - the Philippines being one such category for some odd reason. The nomination made, and makes, little sense to me, unless one assumes that all brown people are the same, and thus articles about them not worthy of inclusion in an Encyclopedia. The arguments on the losing side seemed to focus on marginal issues - that Muslims exist in the country, that the article had too much trivia, that the sources were merely primary or government websites, and the like. Bearian (talk) 21:27, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Please see also from WP:RS: "Primary sources are often difficult to use appropriately. While they can be both reliable and useful in certain situations, they must be used with caution in order to avoid original research." Bearian (talk) 23:16, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

[Repeated from User talk:Bearian ] To be bluntly honest, this is one of the most biased, partisan AfD closures I've seen in some time. I would suggest, at minimum, you redact your illegitimate "speedy" and your editorialising. Better yet, recuse yourself from it altogether. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 05:01, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) If you were not claiming WP:OUTCOMES as the authority for your "According to past discussions here at AfD", then you should not have piped that phrase to that page. As "WP:OUTCOMES does not explicitly say that Yaks live Tibet", it would be wise not to pipe that claim to that page.
 * 2) Your ludicrous claim that "the two nations have had extensive political, economic, and treaty relationships over the years" makes it appear that you have not read the article. The treaty/political relations contained therein would be better described as sporadic and low-level. Trade between the two nations is tiny in comparison to either's GDP (not surprising, given the distance between them, lacking significant products that either can't get closer).
 * 3) It is NOT "attested that the Danes have given significant financial aid to the other nation, and that many Filipinos live in the former nation." The first was a mistaken claim made by DreamFocus in the AfD. The second is an exaggeration of a few thousand Philippinoes working as (temporary worker) au pairs in Denmark.
 * 4) As to the following claims:
 * 5) "Both are also allies of the United States and are primarily Christian nations." Those same two claims can be made of dozens of nations -- it is therefore grants no particular significance to their bilateral relationship (and Denmark is mainly Protestant, the Philippines mainly Catholic, and neither is part of the same defence alliance with the US).
 * 6) "Both fought on the same side in World War II, and thus have been allies." They 'fought' (only nominally) in completely separate theatres of the war, and neither played a significant part in it (the German invasion of Denmark lasted 6 hours, the Philippines being defended mainly by the US, with the Philippine Army only experiencing a handful of casualties).
 * 7) "Although WP is an encyclopedia that relies mostly on secondary sources, primary sources from government web sites are always considered reliable and acceptable. The article has those good sources, and in sufficient quality and quantity to meet our basic notability requirements." This is rubbish! WP:GNG explicitly demands "reliable sources that are independent of the subject" (my emphasis).
 * 8) Your "speedy keep" closure met none of the requirements of WP:SPEEDYKEEP, and so is illegitimate.
 * 9) "DGG ... made good arguments." ROFLMAO! DGG made one dogmatic argument by assertion (which just happens to be an assertion you clearly agree with).
 * 10) The pattern has in fact been of AfDing bilateral relations of Denmark, with a grabbag of countries it has no substantive historical, cultural, defence or trade ties with. The nomination makes perfect sense in this context.
 * 11) Being of the view that "coverage relat[ing] to Philippine Muslims being upset about the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy" is irrelevant to the topic is perfectly correct, as the Philippines government is Catholic-dominated and as the article does not and (AFAIK) never did mention this incident. Your closure claim that "the nomination smacks of disliking one part of the article, focusing on incendiary religious controversy" is thus a gross violation of WP:AGF.


 * I'm actually going to support Hrafn here. The AfD ran almost the full length of time, and was really just an ordinary keep, though closed a little early. I think the term was used to indicate that you were quite sure you were right, or that you meant your close to establish a principle, but  that should have been said without using the term. Speedy keep has  a specific meaning, and it did not apply here. what you would possibly have meant is  snow keep, but I would be very reluctant to close a keep or delete as snow over responsible opposition. Anything likely to be challenged should run the full time in the customary way--as this did. I'd have waited the full 10 days.
 * Needless to say, though, I think you did use the right basis for closing. The more we can decide on the basis of fixed rules, the less we have to argue about. Sometimes an AfD  close does in fact establish a principle, but the only real way to be sure it does is to see if it is challenged. The rules are what we do here. But I do not reasonably see appealing this, since the consensus was pretty clear.  If it is, I'll argue this further in the usual place. I did not give much of an argument here, because I did think it fairly obvious.    DGG ( talk ) 19:18, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. A simple "The result was keep" would have sufficed.  No need to beat down the nominator with assumptions of bad faith.  Snotty Wong   spill the beans 19:32, 9 December 2010 (UTC)