Wikipedia talk:Deletion review/Log/2007 May 3


 * Comment. Having read the above comments, I thought it might be helpful to share my thoughts to the discussion, to date, in one place.  Some of this is unfortunately repetitive of prior comments in the original discussion and on individuals talk pages.  I apologize for that, but felt this was necessitated by the fact that some of the above comments on this page suggest that some commentators have limited their analysis only to comments that made their way to this page.

1. Rationale Given for Deletion.  The rationale given by Radiant for his deletion of the category was:  "The result of the debate was delete.  Most of the debate boils down to WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS vs. non-defining intersection.  The former is not a valid argument, and vote stacking is inappropriate."


 * Radiant's failure to consider arguments presented. First, contrary to Radiant's glib dismissal, the underlying debate that he was charged with reviewing reveals that in their analysis those supporting non-deletion went far beyond WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS.  Yet that is the only substantive point presented by those supporting non-deletion that Radiant indicates he considered.


 * WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS -- what it actually says. Second, in fact, WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS deals primarily with instances that are inapposite.  Such as where other articles existed that were not the subject of a failed deletion review.  That is clearly not the case here.  Considering facts closer to our facts, the article says that: "Sometimes arguments are made that other articles have been put forward for AfD and survived/deleted ... but even here caution should be used."  Fine, this is only an admonition to be cautious -- not, as Radiant wrote, an indication that it is "not a valid argument."  But lets go on to look at what encourages caution.  "Deletion debates can sometimes be faulty, and even if the debate was correct it can be hard to draw comparisons:  does the fact that there is an article on every Pokémon character mean there necessarily should be an article on every character in Super Mario Bros?"  Well, this is distinguishable.  We are speaking here of deletion of a subcategory, were the parent category survived an attempt to delete it.  Those circumstances are much stronger, and parallel, than the Pokemon example.  The same holds for survival of direct sister categories after a deletion review.  So Radiant's suggestion that this falls into Otherstuffexists is not a valid one -- and even if it were to fall under that umbrella, the guidance would only call for caution at most, and not as Radiant indicated be an invalid argument.


 * Non-defining intersection? Third, Radiant then went on to cite, as his only substantive reason for supporting deletion, "non-defining intersection."  WP:OCAT), in "Non-defining or trivial characteristic," says "We should categorize by what is actually important in a person's life, such as their career, origin and major accomplishments.  In contrast, someone's tastes in food, their favorite holiday destination, or the amount of tattoos they have are trivial—it may be interesting to put in the article, but is not useful categorization."  Well, Judaism is closer to origin than it is to taste in foods, for example, so this does not appear to be terribly supportive of Radiant's deletion decision.  In addition, clearly Wiki does not consider the fact that someone is Jewish to be a non-defining characteristic.  For example, see Manual of Style (biographies), which in giving an example of a model, acceptable bio, states the fact that Isaac Asimov was "a Russian-born American Jewish author and biochemist."


 * While I do not suggest that the arguments of people who supported deletion were as simple as Radiant suggested, that was the only substantive basis he cited for his decision. And, it is not applicable.


 * Lack of Consensus. Further, Radiant did not address the fact that there was a lack of consensus.  Such lack of consensus is a proper basis for not deleting the category, and in fact was the basis relied upon in the non-deletion decisions in the parent and sister categories.

2. Notability. Wiki policy calls for sensitivity towards "notability."

To determine what notability means here, one must go to Wikipedia:Notability (people), the notability criteria guideline for Wikipedia. That guideline states, inter alia, that "Notability on Wikipedia for people is based on the following criterion: The person has been a primary subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the person.   This criterion includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, magazine articles, books, scholarly papers, and television documentaries ...."

Thus, where one is noted as being a Jew in multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the person, such as newspaper articles, magazine articles, books, and the like, they meet the notability requirement.

Articles. Such is the case with Jewish figure skaters. The media abounds with articles about Jewish figure skaters, and ones that mention that such figure skaters are Jewish. See, for example, "Results in for Jewish Figure Skaters","Jews on Ice; World Jewry controls women's figure skating", "Jewish skater earns a silver," 3/2/06, "Jewish Figure Skater Hopes to Ice Spot in '98 Olympic Games," 1/19/96, "Oksana’s New Spin; Gold medal figure skater now embracing her recently discovered Jewish roots, with the help of an ex-chasidic fashion designer," 2/16/07, "How Gold Medalist Sarah Hughes Skated under the 'Jewish Radar'", "Feisty Figure Skater Sasha Cohen Heads Off to the Olympics, Magen David in Tow," 1/25/02, "The Tribe goes to Torino: Sketches of Jewish Olympic-Bound Athletes," 2/16/06, "Jewish Life at the Olympics", International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame - Lili Kronberger, Jewish Sports Hall of Fame bio, Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, "Louis Rubenstein's story recounted on film," The Canadian Jewish News, 6/3/04.

Halls of Fame, etc. And, importantly, there are a number of Halls of Fame, and lists, relating to Jewish athletes. "Jewish Sports Legends" is a book that one can find at. The International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame Jewishsports.net bios can be found at. Jews in Sports bios can be found at. National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame bios can be found at. Jews in the Olympics can be found at and medalists can be found at. The Baltimore Jewish Times runs articles on Jewish athletes:. The Holocaust Museum runs articles on Jewish athletes in the Holocaust: and. "From the Ghetto To The Games: Jewish Athletes in Hungary" focuses on certain Jewish athletes.

It is mentions such as these that demonstrate the importance and notability of this classification -- which is what Wiki policy focuses on.

In addition, as is indicated in the Wiki articles of some of the more prominent examples, e.g., those of Louis Rubenstein and Michael Shmerkin, anti-semitism played a role in the careers of some Jewish figure skaters, who were often treated differently from non-Jewish figure skaters. This was especially common with Jewish athletes in the former Iron Curtain countries, and as you can see from their bios, a number of these skaters finally emigrated from those countries when they were able to. In addition, there are many examples of Jewish athletes in anti-semitic countries such as those in Nazi Europe facing the same, and greater, difficulties.

3. Heritage.  Naming conventions (categories) Categorization of people (3.3 Heritage),  demonstrates that a category such as "Jewish figure skaters" is clearly contemplated by Wiki policy. It says: Heritage ... People are sometimes categorized by notable ancestry, culture, or ethnicity, depending upon the common conventions of speech for each nationality. A hyphen is used to distinguish the word order: ....  The heritage should be combined with the occupation, replacing the nationality alone (for example, Category:African-American actors). ... Concurrent citizenship may be reflected by duplicating the occupation (for example, Category:Jewish American actors and Category:Israeli actors)."

4. Nationality. Also, as an additional point, given that the Jews are a nation, and not solely a religion, it is clearly not appropriate to delete.

The Wikipedia entry for "Jew" indicates, inter alia, that Jews are "members of the Jewish people (also known as the Jewish nation ...)." The Wiki definition of "nationality" states, inter alia: "Generally, nationality is established at birth by a child's place of birth (jus soli) and/or bloodline (jus sanguinis)." Thus, in the (unusual) case of Jews, who consist of a nation that was largely dispersed 2,000 years ago from its homeland and geographic borders, it is not appropriate to delete. The Jewish nation lives largely, though now not wholly, in the diaspora. Under Israel's Law of Return, all members of the Jewish nation are automatically entitled, by virtue of being members of the Jewish nation, to return to the geographic borders of Israel, and become Israeli citizens.

Other religions are, in the "normal case," distinct from the nation. In other words, there was not a Protestant, or Buddhist, or Christian, or Hindu, or Aethiest nation per se. Those who are members of these religions are not members of a nation or "people." Jews, peculiarly, are not just a religion. but are also a nation.

5. Inconsistent with Prior Decisions.  As mentioned, I think the delete decision was inconsistent with the prior decisions. The instant discussion mirrors the discussions on the other two subjects. See Jewish sportspeople discussion in 9/06, and Jewish fencers discussion in 2/07. One is the parent category. One is a sister category.

Farther afield, admittedly, but with many of the same arguments and the same "keep" result, are the very recently concluded discussion on Jewish businesspeople and Jewish Musicians. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_April_16#Category:Jewish_musicians. In all of those instances, as a result of the discussion review the subjects were not deleted as categories.

Where the past and instant votes are parallel, and the arguments are parallel, and the votes are close in time, the decision should be parallel. This is not a case here of consensus changing -- if you look at the prior two discussions and compare them to the instant one. Nor is it a case of the arguments changing. It might also be noted as well that many of those seeking deletion of this category were those who presented arguments, without success, seeking the deletion of the aforementioned categories.

The decision here should be the same as the decisions were in both of those categories. The action sought in the instant matter --KEEP-- is precisely the action that was taken in the other 2 instances. That the basis for the action taken is that there was no consensus is fine. There was certainly no greater consensus here, so the result, to keep the category, should be the same.

Clearly, we are trying to build a Wiki that has a degree of standards, and consistency in the application of those standards. This flies in the face of that effort, which is at the core of all Wiki policies and guidelines.

Radiant, in endorsing himself above, writes: "we don't do binding precedents." His reason? "Wikipedia is not a system of law." I followed his internal link. Frankly, I do not see anything in Wiki to suggest that, as he puts it, Wiki does not "do" precedents. Despite assertions above to the contrary, precedent is indeed something that Wiki looks at. As just one example, see WP:OCAT "based on ... WP:CFD precedent."

And Xtifr, while supporting deletion in the above discussion, himself relies on his understanding of applicable precedent.

Disruptive Behavior. As I communicated to Prove It on my talk page, "this issue was already covered, as I pointed out, ad nauseum.  Unless you can point to a reason for it to be discussed again, it is innapropriate to put a cfd tag on an issue that is already discussed." He failed to respond. I then, in the interest of forward movement, wrote, "I am going to let this stand, but I think ProveIt is abusing Wikipedia. He has already suggested that another category of Jewish athlete be deleted.  Jewish Fencers.  His suggestion was not accepted.  He raises no new arguments here.  It is a waste of everyone's time to therefore have to go through the same process, to reach the same conclusion.  This discussion also took place with the category Jewish sportspeople."

This deletion effort appears to be at least in part a part of a continued effort by a number of editors to delete categories that relate to "Jewish __." As noted, few of the editors in this discussion formerly tried to delete the categories "Jewish sportspeople," and/or "Jewish Fencers" in the past. Their efforts were rejected. And yet, they are trying to do the same here. Editors such as ProveIt and coelacan and Abberley2 were all involved, for example, in the recent failed attempt to have jewish fencers removed as a category.

6. '''Categorization. ''' As Wiki states, "Categorization is a useful tool for finding and correlating articles.WP:OCAT)

We already have a parent category, Jewish sportspeople, which has undergone and withstood proposed deletion review. Deletion of this subcategory would have the opposite effect. The subcategorization -- one of many -- allows one ot break down the members of the partent category into smaller groups for easy comparison and/or location, rather than wade through the larger category. As has been pointed out, if all Jewish sportspeople subcategories were deleted, they would be upmerged into Jewish sportspeople, and if that were to be deleted with other sister categories, they would be upmerged to Jews. Not only would all of this be anything but subcategorization, it would be contrary to the above indicated Wiki principles.

7.  The skaters in the category. The Jewish figure skaters in the category, btw, included Sarah Abitbol, Benjamin Agosto, Ilya Averbukh, Oksana Baiul, Alexei Beletski, Judy Blumberg, Cindy Bortz, Fritzi Burger, Alain Calmat, Galit Chait, Sasha Cohen, Amber Corwin, Loren Galler-Rabinowitz, Aleksandr Gorelik, Melissa Gregory, Natalia Gudina, Emily Hughes, Sarah Hughes, Ronald Joseph, Vivian Joseph, Gennadi Karponossov, Tamar Katz, Lily Kronberger, Irina Rodnina, Emilia Rotter, Louis Rubenstein, Sergei Sakhnovsky, Michael Seibert, Julia Shapiro, Michael Shmerkin, Jamie Silverstein, Irina Slutskaya, Maxim Staviski, László Szollás, Alexandra Zaretski, and Roman Zaretski.

8. Vote stacking?  As to the charge of "vote stacking," all that I did was alert some of the people who had voted in the "Jewish fencers" and "Jewish sportspeople" votes that there was another vote pending on the same subject. This is not wholly dissimilar, as I indicated to Radiant, from the directly prior comment on his discussion page, in which he was alerted to something that related to his own prior vote.

The only Wiki policy that I saw that was close to bearing on this issue, which was not applicable here, was that: "It is considered inappropriate to ask people outside of Wikipedia to come to the debate in order to sway its outcome.  Such comments ... may be tagged ... noting that a user "has made few or no other edits"." I did not ask anyone outside of Wikipedia to vote.

Further, I did not do anything anything disruptive. See WP:CANVASS).  As the arbitrator in the article mentioned was "fine," I engaged simply in "a reasonable amount of communication about issues [and did not contact] a number of people who do not ordinarily edit the disputed article."  In fact, as a number of editors who had voiced the opposite opinion in the parallel debates had (somehow) been aware of this vote and voted their past feelings yet again, I think that it would have been more disruptive if the people on the non-delete side of the vote were not aware of the vote.  All that I did was engage in what the Arbitration Committee has ruled is part of Wikipedia's common practice: "[t]he occasional light use of cross-posting to talk pages."

I would also point out, in passing, that among those users whom I contacted, as you can see from my talk page and his, was Kolindigo, the fellow who nominated this for deletion -- i.e., the main person on the opposite side of this issue. Just as I alerted Radiant that his decision to delete was up for review, though his views were clearly contrary to mine. And I notified the theWub, who had deleted all of the individual categories. These contacts, though few in number, were not even one-sided.

True, someone (it is not apparent who) put an eye-catching notice on the top of the deletion discussion page that started with "ATTENTION!" It may have some nice graphics, but the suggestion is unfounded. It may well not have been appropriate, but I noticed that all that the notice said as a substantive matter was that deletion decisions are made on the merits of the arguments, not by counting votes. While I felt -- and communicated quite clearly to Radiant and others -- that there was no "vote stacking" here, but only behavior clearly acceptable under Wiki guidelines, I also noted that the notice itself pointed out that there would not be any effect if there were vote stacking -- given that rather it is the arguments, not the number of votes, that is of moment.

That Radiant (and others) should: 1) accept the unfounded assertion, which was incorrect, and then 2) suggest that their acceptance of the assertion is a basis for deleting the category, is wrong-headed. The number of votes did not matter, as the notice states. It would be non-sensical in any event to, where the arguments presented otherwise would not result in a deletion decision, to delete the category because some arguments only came to the attention of the decision maker as a result of such a communication -- appropriate or not. In short, there was no vote stacking, and had there been any it would not have influenced anything, so it should not lead to deletion where the result would otherwise be non-deletion.

And not only did Radiant in making his decision point to alleged vote stacking, but even in this review discussion Rockstar points to it as a basis for his conclusion that deletion is proper here. ("I don't like the fact, furthermore, that the DRV nom is also accused of votestacking and canvassing.") Similarly, Xtifr writes above in his delete vote explanation that "the suggestions of canvassing are troubling." I note that both Rockstar and Xtifr are careful to say not that I vote stacked, but that I was accused of such. Well, that accusation was unfounded, and the fact that it influenced Radiant, Rockstar, and Xtifr indicates that their decision were based in part on incorrect accusations.--Epeefleche 01:01, 7 May 2007 (UTC)