Wikipedia:Discussions for discussion

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Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 August 29#Category:Association football people by prefecture in Japan

Another exceedingly-long discussion that has been open since June and listed at WP:CR since August 15. There's clearly not a consensus for the original proposal, and the participants seem to have acknowledged that fact. I don't think there's quite a consensus for the alt proposal either, with four people clearly in support, three people clearly opposed, and then a lot of participants who haven't explicitly commented on it despite being pinged. There's a second alt proposal of "People from country by county/province/state", which is much closer to a consensus with nobody (or maybe only one person) explicitly objecting to it, but given the complexity of the discussion, it's obscurity relative to the two main proposals, and the fact that it isn't fully-defined, it isn't really right to close it as a consensus that way either.

What all three sides come down to (except for a few participants who didn't explain their reasoning) is a question of what various words in the English language mean/how users will interpret them. And I don't feel as closer I have any overriding guidelines to rely on to draw a consensus out of this tangle. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:30, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

(As nom) this is pretty much why I wanted to close the discussion and start a new one for the alt proposal. Oh well. — Qwerfjkltalk 22:00, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

@Pppery, who are the three people opposed to the alt? I can see two, Happily and Paul. — Qwerfjkltalk 22:03, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

You missed Laurel Lodged. And yes, I agree with you - the longer and more complicated a discussion gets the less likely it is to produce an actionable consensus. I think if you had relisted with alt2 instead then that might have come to a consensus, but that's water under the bridge now. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 22:08, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps you could close this discussion, and then I could start a new nomination using alt2? I don't have a particular preference on alt1/2. — Qwerfjkltalk 22:16, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

I suppose that would have the unfortunate effect of pinging the same people again. — Qwerfjkltalk 22:17, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

I think that it is worth noting, as a metacommentary to the discussion, that Laurel Lodged is now indef-banned by ArbCom for certain conduct arising out of CfD discussions. I would therefore recommend striking or disregarding their contributions to the discussion.

On the substantive matter, I would agree with closing this CfD as "no consensus" for any specified resolution, and starting over. BD2412 T 23:42, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

I've closed it as no consensus. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:10, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

@Fayenatic london, I've finally gotten around to reopening this. I have the updated list at User:Qwerfjkl/sandbox/47. It looks good to me, what do you think? — Qwerfjkltalk 11:21, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

@Qwerfjkl: by all means, go ahead. I'm sorry my previous advice worked out as a waste of time. I suggest the fresh nomination should state that the target names follow the names of parent categories, but move the splitter "by X" to the end following recent precedents. Leave out the few marked in that list as "keep" or "defer". – Fayenatic London 07:31, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Although the more I look at that list, the more I'm still finding to change! There is a choice according to which parent category's pattern should predominate, e.g Category:Categories by administrative unit of Pakistan or Category:Pakistani people. We could nominate all the people categories to follow one pattern. But it's probably safer to leave some aside for later. Maybe nominate your list, then come back another time with the sub-cats of Category:People by country and city to see if there will be consensus to change those to follow the "Nationality people" parents instead. – Fayenatic London 07:51, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll nominate the list as is. — Qwerfjkltalk 11:16, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Well, including your modifications. — Qwerfjkltalk 11:19, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

• @Qwerfjkl: I have just come across Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2008_July_6#Sub_category_pages_of_Category:People_by_first-_(and_second-)_level_administrative_country_subdivision which was closed as rename all to "People by Foo in Country". I have not traced what has happened since. – Fayenatic London 15:55, 3 October 2023 (UTC)
  • @Fayenatic london, bizzare. It seems quite a few of them were deleted by the closing admin (not all), but the target cat4egories weren't created. — Qwerfjkltalk 16:20, 3 October 2023 (UTC)
    • Target categories appear to have been constructed in some manner, per the list at Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 October 1, currently under discussion. BD2412 T 19:05, 3 October 2023 (UTC)
  • The 2008 discussion was closed as an alt rename, which is why the proposed targets are red. The new targets were created using the bot account. And a lot of the rename proposals in the current discussion (which has been closed as snow rename - I personally would have let it run at least seven days before closing) are of categories created after the 2008 CfD. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 02:21, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
    • I traced this list of the renames processed by the closer in 2008. – Fayenatic London 20:49, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
• @Qwerfjkl: As you know, ClydeFranklin snowball-closed the 1 October nomination as Rename. I left it a few days in case of complaints, and am not aware of any being made. But I have just looked at the list again, and it has lots of targets "Bar from Foo by X" where the parents are "Fooian bar", so the target should be "Fooian bar by X". Sorry, evidently I didn't check the list as thoroughly as I thought. Rats… Well, as they are still tagged, how about we revise the list on the talk page and reopen the CFD? – Fayenatic London 13:34, 6 October 2023 (UTC)
  • @Fayenatic london, I think the rest of them can be processed and we can reopen the discussion with the ones that need revising. Though I don't have any particular issues with renominating all of them. — Qwerfjkltalk 13:39, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

My close of Talk:The Expendables 4#Requested move 25 September 2023

I recently closed the WP:RM at Talk:The Expendables 4#Requested move 25 September 2023. I don't think anyone disputes that the outcome was no consensus, but there is a post-discussion dispute as to what constitutes the status quo ante to which the title should default absence such a consensus. The move history of the article, in short, is:

• Moved from draft to mainspace at The Expendables 4 in October 2021.
• Brief back-and-forth in early May 2022 with an editor trying to move the page to Expend4bles, and another moving it back to The Expendables 4
• Unsuccessful RM in May 2022 (closed early because the nom was a sock)
• Boldly moved in June 2023 to Expend4bles
• Bold move reverted in September 2023, taking the title back to The Expendables 4
• WP:RM in September 2023 proposing to move the title back to Expend4bles

Am I correct in finding that in the absence of consensus, the title defaults to The Expendables 4? I won't be bruised if I'm told I have gotten it wrong, I just want to be sure my reasoning is sound. Cheers! BD2412 T 20:42, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Agree that The Expendables 4 is the status quo ante. June 23 to September 23 is not a long enough timeframe to consider it the default title, especially when there have been moves/RMs in the past. Jenks24 (talk) 21:01, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 October 23#Category:Historical revisionism of comfort women

A tricky CfD that has been open since October 5. The basic outlines of the discussion are clear - there's a consensus to rename somewhere, but no clear consensus on where and a lengthy back-and-forth has failed to clarify matters. This unfortunately leaves which name to give the category unclear. I'm personally inclined to close with the original rename as it received slightly more support (3 users vs. two), but I'm interested in hearing what others here think. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 01:18, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

It seems clear that the original rename is preferable to the status quo, but with regards to broadening the category scope it seems unclear. I would close it as you suggested, especially since the proposed broadening of the category very likely would involve Category:Nanjing Massacre deniers and Category:Kantō Massacre deniers which hasn't been discussed properly. --Trialpears (talk) 07:21, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

@Pppery, looks like a tricky case to me. I'm not sure there's really a stronger argument one way or the other, both rename targets have problems but are probably preferable to the status quo. What I would say is to go with the nom's target by default, but note that the category can be CfD'd again i.e. it might need another discussion. — Qwerfjkltalk 09:16, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, both of you. I've closed it that way. There are a few other old CfDs at WP:CR that need attention and but at this point I'm involved in all but one of them. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 17:33, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Post-close endorsement of the above evaluation. This is a correct close. BD2412 T 17:51, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Pppery, feel free to ping me if there are any discussions I'm not involved in that need closing. I'm happy to do so. — Qwerfjkltalk 19:56, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 November 11#Untitled nobility

The last unclosed CfD from October I'm not involved in. This is an example of a phenomenon I've seen in plenty of other occasions: a proposal gets lots of support, and then a late opposition argument comes in making a point nobody else considered, and then despite the discussion remaining open for weeks there are no further comments. Neither a "no consensus" closure (since in the abstract there is a consensus) nor a "merge" closure (which would amount to practically discrediting Andejons' input solely because they arrived a day late) really feels right, and we can't really relist either since that was tried two weeks ago without getting anywhere. Thoughts? * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 20:56, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

This has now received a late comment that pushed it into clearly "no consensus" territory, but I'd still be interested in seeing how people would have closed it yesterday. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 17:02, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Pppery, in that situation I would first of all consider relisting, given it's only been relisted once, and the point of contention could do with more discussion. Failing that, I think it would fall somewhere between no consensus and merge/split as nominated. There is more support for it, and the arguments n favour seem stronger, so I would likely close it that way, but a no consensus close would also be reasonable.

Given the current situation, I would suggest relisting it, maybe waiting a few days to see if Andejons responds. Barring that, probably a no consensus close. — Qwerfjkltalk 20:02, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I've just closed as no consensus. I consider the idea of relisting a discussion that has already been open for 29 days ridiculous. The implied rule to not relist discussions more than twice should really be interpreted as to not relist discussions that have already been open for more than two weeks - the length of time a discussion has been open is more important then how many times someone has pushed a button. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 02:26, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Off on a tangent here, but: as someone normally opposed to relisting in agreement with you, I think placing strict limits on how a long a discussion should be open / how many relists it should go for is unhelpful. If there's a discussion that would benefit from a 6th relist, or whatever, then that should be done. If I had my way, basically every discussion with a late-but-strong point raised would get relisted for further input – often such a discussion just grows older and older for a week anyway before being closed in some frustrating fashion; a relist might as well happen. But in general, the right balance for non-AfD XfDs is somewhere around 1 relist. J947 ‡ ^edits 02:41, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

For example, even the very first discussion for discussion, though it was resolved amicably, took a week from my very very late comment to closure. (and apparently I said then it should have been relisted too, rather presumptuously) – gosh, was that 3 years ago already? It's as a clear as a bell to me... J947 ‡ ^edits 02:45, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Pppery, my view is that discussions on old CfD pages like this one are much less liklier to get further comments than one on a more recent discussion page. — Qwerfjkltalk 16:44, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

I think relists aren't really used in the same way at AfD where the expectation is that all discussions are closed or relisted within a day. There a relist is always used when a discussion shouldn't be closed at that time since they otherwise would be reviewed by multiple potential closers wasting time. At TfD, CfD and possibly other forums I'm not as familiar with leaving a discussion open without relisting is an option it will still get input, perhaps even more than if it was relisted since it's in the backlog of old discussions. If the discussion has been sitting for this long I don't think a relist is helpful with the except if the discussion is advertised elsewhere (usually WikiProjects) or additional pages are tagged at the same time as the relist.

In this specific case I would probably have pinged the two support per nom people, asked if their opinion has changed based on the points brought up by Andejons, which probably would make the outcome clearer. --Trialpears (talk) 07:19, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Well at CfD, the current practice when relisting is to copy/paste the entire discussion to today's (the current) CfD page. So it gets immediate view along with every new discussion. So relisting isn't necessarily a bad idea in this case. - jc37 07:52, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Dealing with alleged canvassing

Talk:Israel#Request for Comment on apartheid charges has come up on WP:CR. At the top of that discussion, there are warnings that editors may have been inappropriately canvassed to the discussion; one editor says that it is specifically those prone to opposing the proposition. How should a closer deal with such a situation? I tried looking at WP:CANVASS but it didn't have much advice. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 15:51, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

I usually take a notice of canvassing as more of a reason to scrutinize participation (are there a lot of WP:SPA participants, are they offering cookie-cutter regurgitations of the same argument, are they grounding their arguments in encyclopedic policy). With a high-profile subject like this one, I am not terribly worried that canvassing will result in a substantial shift of the outcome. BD2412 T 16:05, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Standard Chinese ⇥ Chinese language merger

Talk:Chinese language#Change "dialects" wording? Just realized I have a good one to break the DfD ice. :)
Basically, there were originally two contemporaneous, interrelated merge discussions, the one in the title and another regarding other Chinese varieties that has since been closed with consensus not to merge. This one seems pretty cut and dry to me as consensus not to merge also, and there's been no discussion for a while, and even longer specifically about the merger in question, so it seems no one is actively suggesting it. Remsense留 20:32, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The thing with discussions like this is that they lack a focused proposal, and therefore meander around to a lot of points and possibilities. I do not see a consensus in this discussion for any specific action. BD2412 T 03:22, 2 December 2023 (UTC)