Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Virginia's 2nd House of Delegates district election, 2017

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 merge to Virginia House of Delegates election, 2017. (non-admin closure) CAPTAIN RAJU (✉) 18:15, 10 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Virginia's 2nd House of Delegates district election, 2017[edit]

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

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Merge all to Virginia House of Delegates election, 2017. This is a statewide election of all houses in the House of Delegates, so we do not need a separate standalone article for each individual district -- we do this in the case of individual special elections that are not part of a larger statewide or national event, and thus have no parent article that they can be discussed in, but in a statewide general election we do not create a comprehensive series of 100 separate election-in-district articles for each individual district -- we create one article about the statewide election, and include the local results in the district's base article. Bearcat (talk) 19:08, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

~~Keep~~ Merge the small articles, keep the big articles (if any). I think that it's reasonable to have a separate article for each House of Delegates election in which there are at least two major party candidates, as there will tend to be enough media coverage in those cases to meet the WP:GNG. I don't think there will be space in Virginia House of Delegates election, 2017 for all the information, especially for some of the more detailed election articles. For example, where an incumbent is stepping down, there are often a number of candidates from both parties competing in the primaries, leading to a lot of coverage there, and then there will be additional stories as the election moves into the general election stage. Democrats will also be pouring a lot of resources into several Delegate races this year that they think they can flip to their side, or where they are trying to unseat a candidate they particularly dislike (as in Virginia's 13th House of Delegates district), so that too is already generating a lot of coverage in some cases. The other option would be to merge content into the main article for each district, but there's not enough space there, either, because these districts have electoral histories going back for dozens of elections. N I H I L I S T I C (talk) 19:27, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

50 US states. Generally at least 100 districts per state house, with more than 400 house districts in a couple of the New England states. Elections every two to four years. State senates too. Add 435 federal House districts, elections every two years. Then do the same thing for Canada's 10 provincial and three territorial legislatures and its 338 seats in the House of Commons. Pace the United Kingdom (Westminster + Scotland + Wales + Northern Ireland!), Australia (federal plus six states), Ireland, Germany (federal plus states), France, Italy, India (federal plus states), Poland, New Zealand, South Africa and every other country on earth with democratic elections — resulting in several hundred thousand of these existing within one election cycle. That's not sustainable or maintainable in any way, shape or form, which is why we don't do it. Bearcat (talk) 19:34, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Virginia-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 19:59, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's not totally unheard of to have separate articles about Congressional district elections, as in the case of Texas's 22nd congressional district election, 2008, which wasn't a special election. It's not the norm, but it can happen, if someone wants to add enough enough information on the topic, that it reaches a point where it needs to be spun out. At the federal level, it's theoretically totally doable to have a separate article about every contested U.S. House race, every two years. The only reason it isn't done is that not enough editors have stepped forward to put in that work of article-writing, to flesh out those sections to the point that they could stand alone as separate articles.

At the state level, it could be done as well, because the sources are probably there to support separate articles for each of the contested seats. But again, there's usually a lack of editors to actually add the content, so that's the only reason it hasn't happened yet. But it probably should happen, in those instances where there are editors available. 2,500 articles a year ( ( 100 contested elections / state ) * ( 1 election / 2 years ) * ( 50 states / union ) ) for U.S. state legislative elections isn't really that many.

In thinking about it, maybe a merger is in order for the shorter articles, but I think it should be without prejudice against spinning out some of the articles later if the sections get too big. N I H I L I S T I C (talk) 20:01, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, it is too many. You forgot the part about how that number also has to be multiplied by Canada and Germany and Australia and New Zealand and South Africa and France and the United Kingdom and dozens of other countries which also have contested democratic elections at multiple layers of government. Bearcat (talk) 20:05, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well, yeah, but the French are probably just going to add stuff about French elections to the French Wikipedia. How many species are there? 2 million to 10¹², according to global biodiversity? But Wikipedia has undertaken to write articles about all of them, if possible, to the extent enough information about them is available to give each their own article. They even created a whole wiki for it. I think the rationale is, eventually editors will get to covering all of them, because there's a finite number of species, and editors just find that kind of content really fascinating to write about. How many editor-hours will that take, though, to complete that project; and how easy will it be to maintain all those pages? It boggles the mind, but we can do it! Or, at any rate, they can do it (since I'm not getting involved in that project).

The only reason we can't aspire to have an article about every state legislative election that ever happened, is that we know that no one cares about Virginia's 1st House of Delegates district election, 1924, and chances are, no one ever will. But what if they did care! Heh. N I H I L I S T I C (talk) 20:13, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think you may be surprised to learn that (a) there are anglophones living in France, and (b) people who don't live in France care about French elections too. Things are not notable only in the primary language of their own home country; if a topic is notable enough to have an article on wiki-fr then it's automatically notable enough to have an article on wiki-en too. Bearcat (talk) 20:20, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It is true that major French elections, like the French Presidential election, get coverage on all the Wikipedias. However, it's also common that an article that exists on, say, the French Wikipedia won't exist on the English Wikipedia, if it's of little interest in the anglosphere. And vice versa; many topics on the English Wikipedia don't exist on the French Wikipedia because, for example, hardly anyone in the French-speaking world cares about Bob Marshall. N I H I L I S T I C (talk) 20:29, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Merge all These are totally unnecessary and it's not reasonable under in any sense of the word to keep them. Detailed results can still be presented in Virginia House of Delegates election, 2017, or if that gets too big Results of the Virginia House of Delegates election, 2017, as well as the articles on the individual constituencies. This is how it's done elsewhere on Wikipedia. Number 5 7 21:37, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's not so much about the results being detailed, as it is all the other stuff involved, like debates, fundraising, endorsements, issues, candidate background, etc., which would, with successive elections, eventually make the articles on the individual constituencies get too big. But, if it's desired to wait till if/when they actually do get too big before breaking them out, I guess it's not a major problem, since we can still have a redirect for convenient linking from other articles and templates, if needed. N I H I L I S T I C (talk) 21:59, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Another option would be to simply give a summary result of elections table with suitable links to the relevant page. 69.165.196.103 (talk) 00:40, 4 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Merge per above, there's not much to add. 69.165.196.103 (talk) 21:42, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Merge per the conversation above. Detailed articles about specific races can always be spun out, if an editor care to develop those article. Otherwise, it makes sense to have one main article to cover the election cycle.--Mojo Hand (talk) 14:06, 4 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Merge as per nom and above editors. It actually makes more sense, and is easier on anyone researching the subject, to have all the information in a single article. If, at some point the article becomes too lengthy, then an article split would be warranted. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 18:37, 4 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 03:26, 10 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 03:26, 10 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Merge as per nom and above edit. Curated some of these pages when created and don't see any reason the little info each contained if/any couldn't all be consolidated in one page. Phil (talk) 04:45, 10 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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.