Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 28

Add links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
< May 27 May 29 >

May 28[edit]

Category:Flashdance[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete. Kbdank71 13:16, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Flashdance (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Nominator's rationale: Delete - absent the improperly categorized articles for people associated with the film, there are about three articles that would correctly belong to this category, making it a small category with little to no likelihood of expansion. Otto4711 (talk) 22:43, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Balkan tribes[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: merge to Category:Ancient tribes in the Balkans. Kbdank71 13:17, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Dacian tribes (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Category:Thracian tribes (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Thracian tribes or possibly or partly Thracian tribes.
Nominator's rationale: Delete. Speculative. Seems to be from a particular point of view. Some are simply wrongly categorized, as the one thing known (based on city names) is that Dacians and Thracians spoke significantly different languages, so Dacians shouldn't be a subcategory of Thracians (as they are currently). Moreover, they were not Ancient Greeks.
--William Allen Simpson (talk) 14:42, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge to Category:Ancient tribes in the Balkans that's what these were, indisputably. Although a few of these tribes are rather uniformly places among Dacians or Thracians by ancient authors, modern scholarship is less uniform. Some of the lack of uniformity has been assailed as contrived to present a (usually pro-Romanian) national perspective, but decent scholarship from non-Romanian advocates has drawn similar conclusions to the questionable scholarship - and there is even the great debate of whether Dacians were in any manner distinct from Thracians at all. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:44, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree to merge -- Good idea, as a "distinguished" category. Then, we don't worry about relationships, only locations. Much easier.
    --William Allen Simpson (talk) 04:21, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Pedal steel guitarists[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: keep. Kbdank71 13:21, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Suggest merging Category:Pedal steel guitarists to Category:Steel guitarists
Nominator's rationale: Category:Steel guitarists is a fairly small category on its own. I see no reason for pedal steel guitarists to be in their own subcat if the parent is fairly small, as most of the people listed in Category:Steel guitarists are pedal steel players anyway, and plenty more play both lap and steel. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Many otters • One hammer • HELP) 04:21, 12 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Well-defined and well-populated category with a corresponding parent article, and it's not clear that it makes sense to lump them all together in one category covering various styles of playing. Alansohn (talk) 04:54, 12 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Aervanath (talk) 14:34, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. After doing some digging, I'm not convinced that this should be upmerged. The problem is that it is a distinct type of guitar and I'm not sure that everyone who plays a steel guitar can play one of these. If there were to be an upmerge, it should be to a category that included the pedal steel guitar, console steel guitar and lap steel guitar. The fact that there is a Pedal Steel Hall of Fame, in my opinion, provides some additional support for the category. If someone wishes to add more subcategories, that does not need to be discussed here. Vegaswikian (talk) 23:26, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

People not by ethnicity[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: keep and please remember people, discuss the topic, not the commenter. Kbdank71 13:29, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming:
Nominator's rationale: Rename. The categories have become convoluted and this leads to overcategorization. In concert with #Category:People by race or ethnicity, distinguish the contents of these categories.
--William Allen Simpson (talk) 14:14, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose new scheme. The current system, built up over a long period, works quite well and the nominator has stated that he is one of the WP editors who wishes to eventually see our project free from all ethnic categorization, a fringe point of view that has little support at our project. Badagnani (talk) 16:48, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all if kept, Rename per nom. Ethnicity at WP is purely subjective - and is not of any real usefulness. Of what value is categorizing Nicolas Cage with Jenna Bush with Bo Derek as German Americans - there's nothing demonstrably German about anything that any of them did - just bloodlines and ethnicity - which essentially is useless as we are all Africans by descent if you go back far enough - part of the subjectivity - and many of the so-called German Americans' so-called German forebears never lived in "Germany", but in some principality or kingdom etc. and emigrated before German unification. So these people, by "national" descent would be "Prussian Americans", "Bavarian Americans" and "Saxe-Coburg Americans", etc. Lumping them together is purely an exercise in racializing their descent and is factually inaccurate. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:32, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. As per comments made by User:Badagnami. User:Carlossuarez continues to provide solidly reasoned criticism for having these pages, ones that most users wish to have despite problems and challenges in having them be accurate and indeed encyclopedically meaningful. Certainly German nationality did not exist at the time that many so-called "German Americans" ('Americans of German descent' is a better appellation than the commonly used misnomer, for there is indeed next to nothing German about Cage, Bush, Derek, and a host of others), but German ethnicity is also based on the common use of German language, or language close to Low German that could be described as "German", as well as other cultural ties. (Doing so does entail making 'judgment calls' however, and likely some commonly made ones are erroneous.) And this is exactly why 'ethnic or national descent (or origin)' is the apt phraseology, but the nominator, as pointed out by User:Badagnami, is not interested in discussing the matter of ethnicity. The comment that "ethnicities are rare" is utterly erroneous - we all have at least one. For most Americans, their sole ethnicity is "American", not German, etc., but that s not the focus here, where we are talking about "ethnic or national descent". Mayumashu (talk) 22:00, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ethnicities are rare in Wikipedia. There are very few ethnic subcategories scattered among the nationalities. And very few ethnicities pass the required two-part test: #1 self-identified, and #2 relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.
      --William Allen Simpson (talk) 04:44, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
      • Okay, I see what you mean. I don t know if I agree, as the common definition of ethnicity allows for quite a number of groups to qualify, including all nationalities. I do agree though that few quality sources consider a person's ethnicity or ethnic origins (including even nationality often), either through self-identity or quality genealogy work, and this makes our reporting them difficult. Mayumashu (talk) 08:32, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per opposers. Carlos doesn't think (completely wrongly of course) there were any "Germans" before German re-unification, following which logic the number of people of Polish, Italian, Irish, Armenian, Czech etc etc descent in the world would be drasticly reduced. Not to mention Jews. The present names are much better. Johnbod (talk) 14:17, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Johnbod, you're wrong - the only Germans were an ethnicity not a nationality and ethnic categories are subjective and ultimately useless - and modern notions of nationalism didn't really come into the fore until the Enlightenment - so did what did people before think of themselves of? Chances are they didn't - just as today we probably don't think too much about who our storm god is - which was a big deal 3000 years ago. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 20:16, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose & Comment -- the regulars here at CfD along with some Wikipedia admins in general should definitely start to critically examine the blatant POV and seemingly extreme non-neutrality of User:William Allen Simpson as well as User:Carlossuarez46 in relation to these ethnic and racial categories. These two users are openly, clearly, and flagrantly violating the cornerstone WP policy of keeping a NPOV under all circumstances. User:WASimpson has already managed to wipe out numerous valid and fully factual ethnicity/race related categories in only the past few weeks, while User:Carlossuarez votes against ethnicity/race categories every single time they come up for discussion (regardless of their factual validity) because they apparently go against his personal POV. They also appear to be colluding together in an attempt to censor, delete, and/or otherwise completely wipe out as many ethnicity and race related categories that they possibly can. While Carlos is clearly much more blatant regarding his bias/POV (he makes no attempt whatsoever to hide his bias), WASimpson consistently engages in all kinds of obfuscation and pseudo-sophistry in a poor attempt to halfway veil his strongly slanted POV regarding these categories. Thus it is clear that these two users are not following the key Wikipedia policy of maintaining a neutral POV in any way, shape, or form when it comes to nominating and discussing categories which deal with ethnicity or race. As proof I offer a recent (extremely POV) exchange between those two users during a CfD nomination of Category:European Americans; the highly POV/shockingly biased exchange between them was as follows:
  • "Delete all OCAT by subjective criteria that is not defining. Race/Ethnicity + Nationality is not a defining intersection and we have no objective standards for inclusion even if it were. --Carlossuarez46 (talk) 20:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of flagrant POV bias mine -- race/ethnicity is obviously not "subjective" because the study of it is now an accepted part of the clearly objective field of the hard genetic and biological sciences; also, the pivotal role which race/ethnicity has played throughout human history completely contradicts CS's absurdly disingenuous notion that race/ethnicity is "not defining"]
  • You are correct. All you need to do is get all the editors to agree with you, and I'll be happy to help delete them! --William Allen Simpson (talk) 00:23, 12 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of flagrant POV bias mine]
  • Join with me - consensus can change. --Carlossuarez46 (talk) 23:26, 12 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of proposed collusion/cabal mine]"

I responded with the following comment [NOTE:some revisions added]:

  • Comment - Wow. Apparently both of you have completely forgotten about one of the cornerstone policies of Wikipedia...namely, the absolute necessity of keeping a NPOV in regards to Wikipedia content ("Neutral point of view is a fundamental Wikimedia principle and a cornerstone of Wikipedia"). It seems that both of you have personally scrapped this quintessential policy and as such both of you should be investigated and possibly even censured for blatantly disregarding/flaunting this cornerstone Wikipedia policy. I'm sure many of the regular users, commenters, and admins found here at CfD and elsewhere on WP would agree with me regarding this critical NPOV issue. We are here to gather and sort factual information of any and all kind, not to attempt to impose our biased personal views (POV) regarding race/ethnicity upon the entire encyclopedia; given that race/ethnicity has played and continues to play an integral and factually verifiable role in the history of humanity, as well as the fact that race/ethnicity is now routinely and extensively studied by the hard biological and genetic sciences, it only makes sense that an encyclopedia such as Wikipedia (which purports to be a repository for all human knowledge) would include information dealing with the very ancient, broad, and nowadays scientific (e.g., the Human Genome Project, The Genographic Project, etc) - and thus clearly encyclopedic - topic of race/ethnicity. --Wassermann (talk) 09:31, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I would've been here to expose and oppose their blatant POV in the past few weeks if I could have but I've been very busy in RL lately and didn't notice the extensive damage they have already caused these categories until browsing the CfD records of the recent past earlier today. I am unfortunately not familiar with the process of filing a report regarding these matters with Wikipedia admins because I've always attempted to avoid dragging the bureaucracy in to disputes in the past -- however, the POV abuses by these two users have progressively become far too blatant and egregious to continue to ignore or merely glance over. As a result of this, could someone please explain to me the process of reporting flagrant policy violations to the appropriate Wiki-authorities and/or help me out in this regard? Thank you for your assistance. --Wassermann (talk) 18:18, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep all - these categories contain both ethnicities and nationalities, and 'X by ethnic or national origin' is the longstanding Wikipedia convention for such categories. Robofish (talk) 01:55, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as is. Nominator seems to have problems with the subject of ethnicity, as has been shown in several discussions already. Debresser (talk) 19:37, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep descent - we had a long series of discussions a few months back in which we generally settled on the form "Booians of Fooian descent". I am not sure that the "origin" tree has any merit to justify it being distinct. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:35, 31 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep as is *keep all Since the underlying articles and the intermediate subcats are not being deleted, these higher level categories should be kept to provide navigation to them. The purpose of WP categories is to provide good navigation, which is a discussable subject here. The purpose of such discussions is not to serve as a springboard for POV arguments from people who do not like the content. Hmains (talk) 02:31, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:People by race or ethnicity[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename all per nominator.--Aervanath (talk) 15:20, 9 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming or deleting:
Nominator's rationale: Rename or delete. The categories have become convoluted and this leads to overcategorization. Also, some folks have recently objected my use of the traditional term "racist" applied to ethnicities. Distinguish the contents of these categories.
--William Allen Simpson (talk) 13:36, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Category:People by XXX is a subcat scheme for Category:People, main article People. I have no idea what the difference between 'race' and 'ethnicity' might be and so have no objection to the clumsy 'race or ethnicity' being replaced throughout by 'ethnicity'. (Anyone who even tries to de-convolute these tangled trees deserves a multiplicity of barnstars.) Occuli (talk) 14:12, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose new scheme. Nominator has stated that he wishes to eliminate all ethnic categories and this seems to be his primary motivation at WP. The current system works quite well. Badagnani (talk) 16:41, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Perhaps you could supply a reference on which your ad hominem personal attack is based?
      • For the record, Badagnani appears to be one of those editors that frequently adds ethnicity (and sometimes religion).
      • For example, and probably the reason he's here today, he just re-added a Tamil ethnicity to George Alagiah. There are currently four (4) references listed, more than many biographical articles. Not a single source has the word Tamil in it! He's certainly not notable for being of Tamil descent, nor is there a reference showing that he works on Tamil issues.
      • Proof by assertion is not a good argument.
      • Looking at it some more, there's no reference saying he's a Sri Lankan Roman Catholic, nor a Sri Lankan Tamil journalist either. He was born in Sri Lanka, he didn't grow up there (apparently in Ghana). His education was in Britain and he's most notable for BBC work in South Africa (and then Britain again). "The place of birth is rarely notable."
      • I've plenty of other examples.
    • Note that this nomination does not "eliminate all ethnic categories" from Wikipedia, as this is a nomination about removing "race" from the ethnicity category names.
      --William Allen Simpson (talk) 20:03, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • The article on George Alagiah has Tamil in it, so he is evidently British of Tamil descent (his parents are Tamil - how much more descent can there be?). It is very easy to find sources if you think this is a problem (bbc, Guardian). I am surprised that these uncontroversial categories are being removed, not that Badagnani is re-instating them. Facts should be disputed by tags, not by removing categories based on them. This is immediately found re his catholicism, and supports much else that is in the article. Occuli (talk) 21:03, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
--William Allen Simpson (talk) 04:36, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all if kept, Rename per nom. Ethnicity at WP is purely subjective - and is not of any real usefulness. Of what value is categorizing Nicolas Cage with Jenna Bush with Bo Derek as German Americans - there's nothing demonstrably German about anything that any of them did - just bloodlines and ethnicity - which essentially is useless as we are all Africans by descent if you go back far enough - part of the subjectivity - and many of the so-called German Americans' so-called German forebears never lived in "Germany", but in some principality or kingdom etc. and emigrated before German unification. So these people, by "national" descent would be "Prussian Americans", "Bavarian Americans" and "Saxe-Coburg Americans", etc. Lumping them together is purely an exercise in racializing their descent and is factually inaccurate. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:32, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rename as per nom. Categories based solely on race have been largely removed so keeping this name as is seems obsolescent. I am neutral on whether we should have cats based on race, overall, as it is an existing social phenomenom, but one we, as a world collective, could do without. For the record, I see race and ethnicity as two very different things, although the later can be and quite often is, at least in part, based on the former. Mayumashu (talk) 22:11, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question Can someone explain the principle behind "People by prior race or ethnicity" or "People by historical ethnicity"? For an ethnic group, either there's living people who identify with it, or there are dead people who identified with it; the fact that eventually there's no one left who identifies as a member of a certain ethnic group doesn't mean that historical figures who identified with it in the past suddenly become members of another ethnic group (except maybe in a few extremely specific historical instances in which a bunch of tribes explicitly chose to amalgamate themselves and declare themselves a new ethnic group). This is something I might expect to see in a work of nationalist-revisionist historiography, but not a mainstream encyclopedia. cab (talk) 08:24, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Good point. It's nominated for deletion. As you can see by the category history, it was a recent creation by Mayumashu. I merely suggested an alternative name, just in case folks wanted to keep it around. But we already have Category:Ancient people and Category:Ancient peoples. It makes no sense to me to also categorize them as "races" or "ethnicities".
      --William Allen Simpson (talk) 14:06, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all, or if kept, rename. For the vast majority of individuals, ethnicity is not a defining characteristic. older ≠ wiser 16:40, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose & Comment -- the regulars here at CfD along with some Wikipedia admins in general should definitely start to critically examine the blatant POV and seemingly extreme non-neutrality of User:William Allen Simpson as well as User:Carlossuarez46 in relation to these ethnic and racial categories. These two users are openly, clearly, and flagrantly violating the cornerstone WP policy of keeping a NPOV under all circumstances. User:WASimpson has already managed to wipe out numerous valid and fully factual ethnicity/race related categories in only the past few weeks, while User:Carlossuarez votes against ethnicity/race categories every single time they come up for discussion (regardless of their factual validity) because they apparently go against his personal POV. They also appear to be colluding together in an attempt to censor, delete, and/or otherwise completely wipe out as many ethnicity and race related categories that they possibly can. While Carlos is clearly much more blatant regarding his bias/POV (he makes no attempt whatsoever to hide his bias), WASimpson consistently engages in all kinds of obfuscation and pseudo-sophistry in a poor attempt to halfway veil his strongly slanted POV regarding these categories. Thus it is clear that these two users are not following the key Wikipedia policy of maintaining a neutral POV in any way, shape, or form when it comes to nominating and discussing categories which deal with ethnicity or race. As proof I offer a recent (extremely POV) exchange between those two users during a CfD nomination of Category:European Americans; the highly POV/shockingly biased exchange between them was as follows:
  • "Delete all OCAT by subjective criteria that is not defining. Race/Ethnicity + Nationality is not a defining intersection and we have no objective standards for inclusion even if it were. --Carlossuarez46 (talk) 20:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of flagrant POV bias mine -- race/ethnicity is obviously not "subjective" because the study of it is now an accepted part of the clearly objective field of the hard genetic and biological sciences; also, the pivotal role which race/ethnicity has played throughout human history completely contradicts CS's absurdly disingenuous notion that race/ethnicity is "not defining"]
  • You are correct. All you need to do is get all the editors to agree with you, and I'll be happy to help delete them! --William Allen Simpson (talk) 00:23, 12 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of flagrant POV bias mine]
  • Join with me - consensus can change. --Carlossuarez46 (talk) 23:26, 12 May 2009 (UTC) [NOTE: bolding of proposed collusion/cabal mine]"

I responded with the following comment [NOTE:some revisions added]:

  • Comment - Wow. Apparently both of you have completely forgotten about one of the cornerstone policies of Wikipedia...namely, the absolute necessity of keeping a NPOV in regards to Wikipedia content ("Neutral point of view is a fundamental Wikimedia principle and a cornerstone of Wikipedia"). It seems that both of you have personally scrapped this quintessential policy and as such both of you should be investigated and possibly even censured for blatantly disregarding/flaunting this cornerstone Wikipedia policy. I'm sure many of the regular users, commenters, and admins found here at CfD and elsewhere on WP would agree with me regarding this critical NPOV issue. We are here to gather and sort factual information of any and all kind, not to attempt to impose our biased personal views (POV) regarding race/ethnicity upon the entire encyclopedia; given that race/ethnicity has played and continues to play an integral and factually verifiable role in the history of humanity, as well as the fact that race/ethnicity is now routinely and extensively studied by the hard biological and genetic sciences, it only makes sense that an encyclopedia such as Wikipedia (which purports to be a repository for all human knowledge) would include information dealing with the very ancient, broad, and nowadays scientific (e.g., the Human Genome Project, The Genographic Project, etc) - and thus clearly encyclopedic - topic of race/ethnicity. --Wassermann (talk) 09:31, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I would've been here to expose and oppose their blatant POV in the past few weeks if I could have but I've been very busy in RL lately and didn't notice the extensive damage they have already caused these categories until browsing the CfD records of the recent past earlier today. I am unfortunately not familiar with the process of filing a report regarding these matters with Wikipedia admins because I've always attempted to avoid dragging the bureaucracy in to disputes in the past -- however, the POV abuses by these two users have progressively become far too blatant and egregious to continue to ignore or merely glance over. As a result of this, could someone please explain to me the process of reporting flagrant policy violations to the appropriate Wiki-authorities and/or help me out in this regard? Thank you for your assistance. --Wassermann (talk) 18:19, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Rename all per nom. I'm not entirely sure these categories are needed, but looking through their subcategories, they do seem to make sense; when we have categories like Category:Arab people by occupation, we should have a supercategory to put them in. However, they should all be renamed, as 'race' is not appropriate in category names. Robofish (talk) 01:53, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Category:People by race or ethnicity, but Delete the others. The others are irrelevant intersections, but the first is very relevant. Nominator seems to have problems with the subject of ethnicity, as has been shown in several discussions already. Debresser (talk) 19:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep descent - we had a long series of discussions a few months back in which we generally settled on the form "Booians of Fooian descent". I am not sure that the "origin" tree has any merit to justify it being distinct. The "prior" group might usefully be renamed to "descent". Ethnicity should be retained, as some nations contain people of several ethnicities: e.g. English, Welsh, Scots, and Northern Irish" are separate British ethnicities, but all have British nationality. Many countries have native ethnic minorities, which can properly form the basis of categories. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:41, 31 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep all Since the underlying articles and the intermediate subcats are not being deleted, these higher level categories should be kept to provide navigation to them. The purpose of WP categories is to provide good navigation, which is a discussable subject here. The purpose of such discussions is not to serve as a springboard for POV arguments from people who do not like the content. Hmains (talk) 02:27, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep all per Hmains and others. Another half-baked nom in this area with huge implications. Johnbod (talk) 18:34, 6 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep All Now we have gone from pruning twigs to clear-cutting entire forests. These are categories that productively organize and allow navigation across race and ethnicity, a rather genuine means in which people are characterized, identified and categorized in reliable and verifiable sources. If there are genuine issues with particular entries, deal with the problem in the article in question and discuss the issue on the individual talk page. That there are possible borderline or questionable cases, or ones where additional sourcing is required, has nothing to do with dumping the entires series of category structures. Alansohn (talk) 03:39, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Youth broadcasters[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename to Category:Children's television networks.--Aervanath (talk) 15:24, 9 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming Category:Youth broadcasters to Category:Youth television networks
Nominator's rationale: Rename - the majority of categories including the word "broadcasters" are for people, not corporate entities or networks. That usage is I believe correct and so this category should be renamed to reflect that it's for networks. There is a subcat for Canadian networks that uses the word "children's" so Category:Children's television networks is another possible rename, although I think I prefer "youth" as being somewhat more encompassing (The N hardly seems like "children's television" but it is definitely youth-oriented, for example). Otto4711 (talk) 15:28, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rename - per nom. Occuli (talk) 16:55, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete youth is undefined and non-defining - all broadcasters aim at "youth" 15-30 year olds who have money and no kids to beef up advertising. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 20:43, 11 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete or rename to make the focus very clear. I looked at XHGC-TV and they carry the CSI shows among others. Is that youth programming? This gets into what percentage of programming qualifies. That makes inclusive POV and subjective. Vegaswikian1 (talk) 00:57, 18 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Aervanath (talk) 13:33, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • The parent covers the general topic of children's television. The sub-cat pertains specifically to networks. It is reasonable to keep the networks in a subcat for those interested in the topic of networks without making them slog through general-topic articles. The networks in the parent should be moved to the subcat. Otto4711 (talk) 17:35, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • But the parent category also includes the networks. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:48, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Which is why the networks should be moved to the subcat, so that people interested in articles about the phenomenon of childrens' broadcasting don't have to search through a jillion network articles and those interested in networks need peruse just the one category. The parent should have articles like Australian Children's Television Foundation, LGBT children's programming, Saturday morning cartoon and such. The rest should be moved to the subcat and/or a network-specific category (all the Jetix networks in Category:Jetix and such). What looks to have happened is that lazy editors have been dumping networks, shows and the like into the parent instead of investigating whetehr a better and more precise category exists. Otto4711 (talk) 23:20, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • As I said above, I prefer "youth" to "children" because it's more encompassing, but have little issue with "childrens". Otto4711 (talk) 19:33, 31 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Georgian culture[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename. Kbdank71 13:34, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming Category:Georgian culture to Category:Culture of Georgia (country)
Nominator's rationale: not only to better disambiguate from Category:Georgia (U.S. state) culture but also from the culture of Georgian era England. Should there be support for this nomination, a handful of sub-cat pages Category:Georgian music, Category:Georgian literature, Category:Georgian dances etc. should likewise be renamed too. Mayumashu (talk) 11:14, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Iranian porn stars[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename. Kbdank71 13:34, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming Category:Iranian porn stars to Category:Iranian pornographic film actors
Nominator's rationale: Rename. All "porn star" categories were changed to "pornographic film actors" in a 2009 MAR 5 CfD. This is a new one that should likewise be changed. (I'm not entirely convinced that the one article in the category is properly there. The person appears to be of Iranian ethnicity but not necessarily of Iranian nationality. But what do I know. As long as the category's going to exist, it should be properly named.) Good Ol’factory (talk) 09:47, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rename per nom. She was born in Tehran, which I suppose is enough. Johnbod (talk) 17:55, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree the name "stars" is too subjective. Debresser (talk) 19:42, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Synagogues by century[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Renaming per creator's request. Good Ol’factory (talk) 22:09, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming Category:Nineteenth Century Synagogues to Category:19th-century synagogues
Propose renaming Category:Eighteenth Century Synagogues to Category:18th-century synagogues
Propose renaming Category:Seventeenth Century Synagogues to Category:17th-century synagogues
Propose renaming Category:Sixteenth Century Synagogues to Category:16th-century synagogues
Nominator's rationale: Rename. These are probably speediable changes, but they don't seem to quite fit in any of the criteria there. Changing the spelled-out century names to the ordinal century names to match all other categories, and specifically the parent categories for 19th-, 18th-, 17th- and Category:16th-century architecture. Good Ol’factory (talk) 09:38, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Just do it. I created all four categories (after discussion with other people who edit on synagogues) We didn't discuss naming style. I didn't even think about naming style. If this is the standard format, please do just go ahead and make the changes. It's hardly significant enough to warrant discussion.Historicist (talk) 12:58, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Chinese family names[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename. Kbdank71 13:35, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Propose renaming Category:Chinese family names to Category:Chinese surnames
Nominator's rationale: For consistency. Either naming is correct, but the whole rest of subcats of Category:Surnames by country uses 'Fooian surnames' naming pattern, and the article page is Chinese surname Mayumashu (talk) 07:49, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Nazi medical atrocities[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: renameto Category:Nazi human experimentation. Kbdank71 13:36, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Nazi medical atrocities (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Nominator's rationale: Delete. The term "atrocities" is obviously POV and is thus an unsuitable component of a category. Gilliam (talk) 05:36, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Fooian names[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Delete all. The arguments for deletion are far more compelling here: unlike the individuals who bear them, names are not bounded by ethnicity or nationality or culture, so it's irrelevant which of those three the categories are basing their criteria upon. POST-CLOSE ADDENDUM: Category:Hebrew names relisted 2009 JUNE 7 to reach clarity on that individual category. Good Ol’factory (talk) 01:18, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Basque names to Category:Basque people's names or merge with Category:Basque culture and Category:Basque people

Nominator's rationale: unnecessary, as each only collects two sub-cats - 'Category:Fooian surnames' and 'Category:Fooian given names' (, and not 'Category:Fooian place names', as I at first suspected they would). Either rename for clarity, or, my preference, given their very limited function, upmerge. Mayumashu (talk) 05:05, 28 May 2009 (UTC) }}[reply]
  • Comment. What exactly makes a name American? I have to wonder if some of these are really deletes. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:34, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • The tree is somewhat problematic for countries like the States, Canada, Australia etc. with citizens from any number of cultures in the sense that the lists will be very long. As for surnames, which is what I was working on when I encountered this tree, it is/should be merely (proof of) the presence of there having been a citizen of a particular country with that particular surname - if there has ever been a citizen of the U.S. with the surname 'Gurpoaoafafer', and this can be proven, or claiming that is so is not at all controversial, then that makes the surname 'Gurpoaoafafer' American. And I suppose the same is true with given names, although saying that a given name is or is not American becomes even more problematic, I d say, given that given names in countries like the U.S. can (legally) be just about any combination of letters of the alphabet. Mayumashu (talk) 05:49, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
      • But that would be OCAT and clearly not defining, in my opinion. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:04, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
        • It certainly loses definition when applied to the U.S., Canada etc. I would rather have a long, less significant list for the U.S. however then none at all for any number of countries with distinct people's names based on their having their own language, firstly(, although there are now so many countries now with a minority of citizens bearing names from other languages and cultures). I still think, however, it (at least for surnames) is a useful set of lists Mayumashu (talk) 06:15, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep or rename – and consider the chidren. This is indeed 'only' inoffensively collecting together a category of surnames and one of Christian names and is beyond reproach (and one for place names if such exists). The 2 subcats are the ones which are perhaps OCAT. A surname is not a person so it should not be a subcat of the list category 'Fooian people'. (Deleting a parent category merely leaves the children adrift - just as OCATed as ever but harder to find.) Occuli (talk) 10:36, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think this is going to wind up as a keep given the complexity of the problem here. If you looks at Category:Spanish names, the introduction states This category lists Spanish names. That is, names used in the country of Spain. For other spanish language names, please see Category:Hispanic names. Can anyone clearly tell the difference between a Spanish name and a Hispanic name? What exactly makes them different? Is someone going to take the position that there is no one in Spain with a surname of Smith or Lee? Clearly if those are used, then they get included in the category. Vegaswikian (talk) 17:10, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don t see this as complex. As long as at the top of each cat page, what is meant is spelled out, particularly when we are differentiating between a nationality and a language that share the same name. And for me, for instance, when an American basketball player like (one, if not two of the) Mike Smith (basketball) gains Spanish citizenship, then 'Smith' becomes a surname of Spain (ie. a Spanish but not an Hispanic) name. Mayumashu (talk) 22:31, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all as pure subjectivity - is Suarez a Spanish name? I'm not Spanish. If we were talking about Spanish-language name, perhaps it is. But alas, we're working on races/ethnicities again instead of language. Suarez is a surname of many non-Spaniards, all over Latin America, and in the US. And, you know what - if one of us Suarezes was to marry some non-Latina Fooian woman, she too may be a Suarez and her race/ethnicity hasn't changed - and their kids who proudly bear the Suarez name will be quickly classified at WP to be Fooians, so Suarez would also be a Fooian name. And take names that are multilinguistic; lots of Lees in China and Korea - Robert E. Lee must bear a Chinese or Korean name, right? Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:40, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all -- leaving the original tracking Category:Surnames. What part of "Heritage categories should not be used to record people based on deduction, inference, residence, surname, nor any partial derivation from one or more ancestors" do folks not understand? This subcategory scheme seems arbitrary. My surname is classified as British Isles, English, and Scottish. But the Scottish isn't a subcategory of British Isles, for some odd reason? And it's not an American name? (Some of my Simpson relatives have been American since the early 1800s. And the Allens another 100+ years, but they aren't American, either?) Or a Canadian name? (My great-grandfather Simpson originally emigrated to Canada, and I've relatives there, too.) Also, the definition is wrong for a Scot, especially for the Simpson sept of Clan Fraser. Finally, I'd guess that O. J. Simpson, listed as a notable on the name page, isn't even remotely from the British Isles.... Although, considering that I've both mixed Black and Jewish relatives by inter-marriage, anything's possible.
    --William Allen Simpson (talk) 19:06, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • These are not heritage categories, or at least they should not be. They should be based solely on that someone of a particular name has a particular nationality, irregardless of how they got that name. This of course would make the list of the States, Canada etc. enormously long, even for surnames, and infinite, really, for given names. And your name most certainly, in my opinion, should be listed as an English, Scottish, American, and Canadian name - the links in this tree are not all correct yet. I don t get though your O.J. comment - these pages are strictly about names, not the ethnic origins or ethnicity of people with particular names Mayumashu (talk) 22:23, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
      • African, Afrikaans, Arabic, Asian, etc, are not a nationality. Jewish, Oceanic, etc, are not a country. Many/most of these are "Heritage" categories, not "Nationality". They are largely not sourced, and we've already noted serious verification errors. There's nothing "notable" about these. It's against policy to have such categories, according to several policies, including Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. It may be useful to have the name articles to catch disambiguation, but these categories are simply wrong.
        --William Allen Simpson (talk) 15:04, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - if kept, the "Oceanic" one should be renamed to "Oceanian" - and if upmerged it should be to Category:Oceanian people and Category:Oceanian culture. "Oceanic" relates to the ocean, not to Oceania. (I've sent the surnames equivalent to speedy-renaming). There is, on the other hand, the remote possibility it refers to the language group - in which case it should be split between Polynesian, Melanesian, +c, and not by country as it is split. Grutness...wha? 23:46, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • Will change it, under the assumption that what is being referred to is the place.) Mayumashu (talk) 03:53, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all - these might be decent list articles, assuming proper sources, but without sources, it's essentially subjective ethnic "flag-planting". Studerby (talk) 22:52, 29 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep all The original nom doesn't work - these are not people, and very often not the names of people in the stated country, especially for Americans, Australians etc. Though obviously there are issues here, I don't see a wholesale massacre as an improvement. These are the primary cats for almost all these disam pages, & I'm always more reluctant to tinker with those. Obviously Suarez is a Spanish name, and Lee an English, Chinese and Korean one. I don't see any benefit in winding up with one huge surnames category. We might well be able to do without "American" names etc. Johnbod (talk) 17:57, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
and for the given names? Cat Surnames is not imo the primary category in the sense of the most important one for most of these. I can't imagine anyone ever looking at it frankly. Johnbod (talk) 20:05, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all - names are not and cannot be bounded by language, ethnicity, culture or heritage in any meaningful way. As soon as one Fooian person is given or adopts a name, it becomes a "Fooian name". This simply doesn't work as a categorization scheme. Otto4711 (talk) 23:03, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep many. America is a melting pot, so that there are probably no truely American names (except perhaps Native American), but there will be a wealth of surnames pointing to British, French, Hispanic, etc origin. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:48, 31 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • To take just one example, Howe (surname) lists Italian, English, American, Australian, Chinese and Canadian people. So does that make this a name from or "pointing to" all of those nationalities, because in some instances as few as one person bore the name? That's a good way to get 200 categories on every single human name. Otto4711 (talk) 00:00, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all. After reading the discussion and the answers to my questions, I don't see a convincing argument being made for keeping. What we would be left with if these were kept is an arbitrary, POV and OR based collection of articles. While there may be some basis for having some categories, that is defeated when you realize that every name in that country would qualify for inclusion if there is an article! Since the inclusion criteria is so broad, the categories are not the solution. Vegaswikian (talk) 00:13, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Binational solution proponents[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Delete. (Am I still allowed to close discussions if it's unanimous based on two user comments, or are people gonna freak that I didn't relist this?) Good Ol’factory (talk) 01:11, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Binational solution proponents (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Nominator's rationale: This is a category for supporters of the 'Binational solution' to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We don't usually categorise people by opinion - at least, not with respect to one specific issue. I don't think there exist similar categories for other positions on this matter (is there are Category:Two-state solution proponents?). Robofish (talk) 03:54, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nominator. Apart from that, the name of this category is unclear. Debresser (talk) 19:45, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Atlantic cyclones in December[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Delete (merged to Category:Off-season Atlantic tropical cyclones to avoid losing anything). Good Ol’factory (talk) 01:08, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Atlantic cyclones in December (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Nominator's rationale: Delete. Redundant with Category:Off-season Atlantic tropical cyclones. ♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:06, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom Jason Rees (talk) 02:14, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Albums produced by Michael Kamen[edit]

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete. Kbdank71 13:37, 5 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Albums produced by Michael Kamen (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
Nominator's rationale: Precedent is that producers have to have multiple solo credits to warrant a "produced by" category. That is not the case here. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • (Many otters • One bat • One hammer) 01:35, 28 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_May_28&oldid=1074803022"