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Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Downsizing masculinity

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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 delete. Yes, it would have been helpful if more editors would have elaborated upon their opinion that this fails WP:OR, but consensus seems quite clear that it does all the same. Shereth 16:16, 26 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Downsizing masculinity

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Downsizing masculinity (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Non-notable. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 00:22, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps the article isn't especially difficult to read or edit, but I do see aspects of its fundamental tone that are opinionated, even persuasive, in nature. Many of the conclusions that it forms aren't based in hard fact. I'd rather not cite particular pieces of the text here, as that strikes me as being sort of overkill, but these are my reasonings for the vote that I gave. HTH. :) —Switchercat talkcont 19:39, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The article starts by referencing the work of Nicholas Townsend which it repeatedly cites in support of the points made. Subsequent passages are based upon other reliable sources. The article thus repeatedly demonstrates that it is not original. Your comment fails to address this in any way and provides no evidence of any kind that the article is original. Empty assertions of this sort, which are not based upon the article's content, should be discounted. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:13, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Blatant disruption is a reason to SK and that's all I'm seeing here. You yourself struggle to come up with any real reason to delete this and have to resort to facile arguments about ducks which are straight out of Monty Python. If just one of you would address the multiple sources cited by this article then you might have a point. But since none of you will address the actual content and sources, all we have is disruption. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:41, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I could cite sources for almost anything. Yes, the article cites sources. But that doesn't make it inherently notable. If I create an article on my house and use Google Maps to prove that it exists, does that mean that my house is notable? No. If the article were about "downsizing masculinity" in an encyclopedic tone, it might warrant keeping it. But putting citations in your personal essay doesn't make it worthy of inclusion on Wikipedia. I have some personal essays with citations. Would you accept them on Wikipedia, Colonel Warden? Bart133 (t) (c) 16:25, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • This article is not a personal essay in the sense that you mean. It does not express a personal opinion as it is written in an objective tone using the third person. It does not advance a position in that it does not say that the effect described is wrong or that political changes should be made to address the issue. The tone is perhaps a little journalistic but it does not go too far in that direction with mawkish anecdotes or case studies, as a journalist would. The tone is therefore as reasonably encyclopedic as we might expect from an early draft. The title of the article comes from a scholarly article in a journal and we can find other articles in other journals with similar titles. I really can't see what more you can expect. And my impression is that the nay-sayers can't put their finger of what they don't like about the article - that's why they give no specifics. All you and they seem to have is a gut feel. But that's just WP:IDONTLIKEIT and so not admissable. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:46, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete obvious WP:OR which utterly fails the duck test despite inclusionists' assertions of the contrary. JuJube (talk) 13:00, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOT#OR and WP:NEO YrPolishUncle (talk) 13:18, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOT#OR. Masterpiece2000 (talk) 13:42, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment All the comments above of the form "Delete per WP:OR" all fail WP:VAGUEWAVE which states "While this gives editors a clue as to what your reason is, it does not explain any specifics. This does not actually tell us whether the policy is being violated or not. This can be avoided by quoting the specific parts of policy that an article needs to meet, and why you think it succeeds/fails to meet them. Also, keep in mind that articles can often be improved, and may not need to be deleted at all, if the specific problems can be identified and corrected.". The original nomination was for notability which was an obvious nonsense as the article already cited 3 good sources and there are many more available. No-one who has subsequently switched to another reason such as OR has provided any evidence or justification as to why they think the policy/guideline is being violated and why the article cannot be improved to address this. This won't do. If you want to justify the extreme measure of deleting such a substantial article then you have to do a little work like reading the article, checking out its sources and then forming a cogent argument based upon them. A vague wave at a policy is not enough. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:07, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Reply First sentence of OR states: "Wikipedia does not publish original research or original thought." The citation to WP:DUCK above is apt: This article is nominally sourced, but is fundamentally an essay of observations and musings vis-a-vis the male's multiple roles as father, worker, etc. which is arranged in such a way as to make the article a work of original research. Townlake (talk) 15:34, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The main AfD nomination agrument and the detele !votes never back up their original claims of not notable or later ones of OR, since neither article's references nor its context have been considered. Nomination argument is just WP:JNN and WP:JUSTAPOLICY. Following policy and guidelines, AfD can and should be closed as Speedy Keep. --Firefly322 (talk) 16:22, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks to Townlake for taking the time to expand upon his comments and so giving us something to discuss. His main point seems to be that he sees the sources as nominal. But surely the real issue is whether there is a substantive topic which provides a solid core for the article? The text which we build upon this core is open to editing in the usual way and any digressions or musings can simply be amended or removed. I have surveyed the potential sources and consider that there is such a core. For example, please consider a source not yet used by the article: No Direction Home : The American Family And The Fear Of National Decline. This seems to be discussing much the same topic in much the same tone: "accounts of plant closings and corporate downsizing offered alarming descriptions of a defeated masculinity, descriptions that celebrated the figure of the male breadwinner even as they mourned him.". And there seem to be hundreds, perhaps thousands more sources like this. So we seem to have a solid topic but perhaps this is already covered by another article? I've looked around but can't find it a good alternative. And, in any case, we would just merge if we found one. Moreover note that the existence of these many sources must surely remove the issue of original research which concerns others above. If anyone still thinks that there is something original here, please let them quote the text. I fancy that I can soon produce another source to substantiate this. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:56, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Good back at you for the thoughtful response. As you see it, is the core you've identified in this article mergeable into masculinity? (And to clarify, I don't see the sources themselves as nominal, I see their integration into the article's content as nominal... can expand on this thought if you're interested, don't want to digress too far here tho.) Townlake (talk) 21:01, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have no particular opinion on merger. A merge is a keep and so is much the same for our purpose here. The issue of the usage of sources is more interesting. Note the furore at ANI where another editor is pilloried for sticking too closely to sources. In order to avoid such accusations of plagiarism and copyright violation, our article editors have to provide their own words and just use sources to back up their general import and the specific facts. This article seems to have been constructed in this way and so seems quite proper. Criticising such writing as OR requires that you demonstrate that the editor is going too far beyond the sources and I've not seen this done here yet. What is supposed to be the editor's original thesis? Colonel Warden (talk) 21:17, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Reply I'm not sure why you're asking about the "thesis"; the essay's topical emphases are not difficult to identify. And, with respect, seems to me discussion of copyright violation concerns here would be a needless tangent. Townlake (talk) 00:20, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • People keep suggesting that something original is being said here. I'm not seeing it so a concrete example is required. My point about copyright is that our expression of the text about the topic must be orginal otherwise we risk violating the copyright of the sources that we copy. Colonel Warden (talk) 08:15, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • But this article fails the duck test. Not only that, but even policies and guidelines, not to mention essays, are not hard-and-fast literal rules. Finding some minutiae in an essay that is often mentioned in Wikipedia to support keeping an article is not enough to warrant keeping it. Something with citations can still be original research. Bart133 (t) (c) 19:26, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The supposed duck test is just a feeble resort when one lacks evidence or a coherent argument. It's like saying that someone is guilty because they look like a criminal. The essay containing that nonsense is a better subject for AFD than this one. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:57, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • But the duck test is just as much a Wikipedia policy as is WP:VAGUEWAVE. Neither is policy, but you can't arbitrarily ignore essays because you don't agree with them. Also, read the second paragraph from the top on the WP:VAGUEWAVE page you cite. "As this essay tries to stimulate people to use sound arguments in deletion discussions, it is important to realize that countering the keep or delete arguments of other people by simply referring them to this essay is not encouraged." Just the fact that someone's argument is a bad argument isn't enough to prove the argument wrong. Continuing the trend of analogies, it's like someone saying that two plus two is four because Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania and you saying that, since the reason given was irrelevant, the argument is automatically invalidated. You've said that your vote was not a knee-jerk reaction. There isn't really any sign that it wasn't though.

Also, the article has issues with WP:SYN and WP:NEO. Is there any reason to believe that it isn't a synthesis of OR from otherwise reliable sources? Is there any reason why the term "downsizing masculinity" isn't a neologism? It looks like one to me. See the below comment. Bart133 (t) (c) 13:33, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I have done a lot more than vaguely wave at a policy. In particular, I have referred to the sources and established that there are many sources to back up the article's content. I have edited the article to improve its structure and format and so have had the opportunity to study its text close-up. I don't find the slightest trace of original thought there. I'm still waiting for any of the WP:OR wavers to quote a single piece of text from the article to back up their position. It's quite simple - if there's OR there then show me a piece. Showing me a duck instead is no substitute. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:00, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • quote: "While the dominant man in the family may occasionally engage in some light housework and carry some of the responsibilities that are regarded as feminine, the main male ___domain remains in labor and breadwinner. This patriarchal reliance on the male as the wage earner in the family creates a tension and when the father loses his ability to provide for the family the mother, or even the children, must take initiative to find work to ensure stability and survival of the family. When the family must face the challenge of unemployment, several of the distinct culturally accepted gender and familial roles are breached in order for survival. As the mother may have to go out of her domestic ___domain to find work, the father takes on several responsibilities that previously had only been carried out by the woman. When the man must pick up the slack and cross over to the more domestic tasks, not only does the father start to question his identity as a man but also the children are confronted with trying to understand how their unemployed father is transforming."
That looks like WP:OR to me, or possibly WP:SYN. Difficult to tell, when all three references are inaccessible online. That's not in contravention of policy, but it makes it very difficult to work out whether this and other similarly unreferenced passages are original research or not. Does one of the very few references in the long article covers that passage? If so, then perhaps this is a referencing problem rather than an OR problem, but it seems fair to assume that it's OR until evidence is shown to the contrary. YrPolishUncle (talk) 21:54, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Consider the first sentence from that passage to start with. I plug this into Google scholar and get back hundreds of sources. Skimming these I soon find one which says much the same. The general point of the passage is made here: Men, Gender Divisions and Welfare. So, it seems apparent that our article is not original. All that is needed is some improvements to the article per WP:IMPERFECT. I have already started this and now I have more good sources will add these too. Colonel Warden (talk) 23:02, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Google is nowhere near an authoritative source for AFD information, but of the 14 results in a Google search for "downsizing masculinity", only six are unrelated to Wikipedia. Bart133 (t) (c) 19:29, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please see the article's talk page for a more detailed links to sources. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:46, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Those links don't really help you, as most of those sources aren't relevant to anything in this article. WillOakland (talk) 22:47, 21 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I beg to differ. Irrelevant sources are just that. What matters are the numerous sources which are relevant. For example, consider the first hit from Google Scholar. This source has yet to be referenced in the article but talks about the same subject using the same language. This source alone disposes of both the NN and OR complaints together.
  • Reply The first source is a number of paragraphs down, and seems to be a direct quotation. Most paragraphs without sources (and there loads, including the opening paragraph) are written in an essay style without citations. This sugggests an essay built around quoted sources, rather than an article in its own right. This violates the spirit, if not the letter, of WP:OR doktorb wordsdeeds 05:56, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Editors such as yourself have made repeated reference to this as an essay as if you are making a substantial point. You seem to be mistaken in that the essay is the preferred form for a Wikipedia article. By this I mean that our articles are best written as paragraphs of text upon a single topic. Such a format is an essay. To support the points made in the essay, citations should be made to support specific facts and the general points made. Sources are required in proportion to the extent to which the material is debatable or controversial. We have an good number of citations already but I do agree that the lede could use a citation to establish the topic. The original author failed to do this but that's ok since this is a Wiki and it is expected that other editors willl assist as needed. I shall add not one but two citations to the lede to establish the notability and unoriginality of the topic. Colonel Warden (talk) 06:36, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I've tagged the article requesting some expert attention, and created an AFD section at WP:WikiProject Sociology#Articles listed for deletion. It would be useful for more sociologists to join in here to address the questions of notability and original research. YrPolishUncle (talk) 08:11, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comment Good idea. I'm still for deletion, but if closing admin wants to extend this AfD an additional five days to improve the odds of getting comments from Sociology Project participants, I'd support that. Townlake (talk) 16:17, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge the directly cited portions into masculinity. The sources provided generally seem to generally support the overall topic of the effects of downsizing on masculinity, but it's not clear to me that this is the preferred term for discussing this topic. Although the lack of thorough inline sources makes it difficult to separate sourced statements from original research and synthesis, I think there's a good amount of cited content that could be useful elsewhere, and a merge would leave the history visible for expansion down the road. And in the interest of full disclosure, I'll add that I was alerted to this AfD by a message on my talk page from User:Colonel Warden, but considering that the good Colonel and I rarely see eye-to-eye on deletion matters, I certainly don't consider this canvassing. --jonny-mt 14:55, 26 June 2008 (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.
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