Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2005 November 2

November 2

Category:Campaigns of the Pacific Coast Theater of the American Civil War

empty and useless. Tedernst 23:36, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

should be ~~Speedy~~ Delete. --Monkbel 20:38, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Empty categories are not subject to speedy unless they have been proven empty for 72 hours. Also, listing empty categories may prompt population if they are useful categories. «»Who?¿?^meta 03:30, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - Ok, it seems you're right. Not so speedy... --Monkbel 05:58, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Battles of the Expedition from Camp Douglas, Utah, to Cache Valley, Idaho of the American Civil War

empty and useless Tedernst 23:34, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

should be Speedy Delete. --Monkbel 20:38, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:High school dropouts

This category is meaningless. There are people listed from the 19th century in a time when education wasn't valued to the extent is is now, like the Wright Brothers. Also, people who never attended formal high school are not included. Different countries and cultures, as well as different periods in history have different standards. Rogerd 23:04, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. (Edit based on below conversation: Keep and listify.) First: Keep the context of this category in mind at Category:People by educational degree; do you want the "College dropouts" category deleted too, or do you consider that one a different situation?

Second: Of course the function of "high school", and education in general, has changed over time, because everything changes over time. If anything, this category has less variance than most do, since "high school" has only really existed since the early 19th century, so there's infinitely less variance than, say, Category:Assassinated people or [[:Category:African Americans

Third: "in a time when education wasn't valued to the extent is is now"; so what? Plenty of people valued it then, and plenty of people don't value it today. The fact that more people value it today means nothing, and doesn't weaken the category at all. Times change, but over a mere 200 years, in many ways they also stay the same.

Fourth: "Also, people who never attended formal high school are not included." - Of course they're not concluded. Art thou mad? We would have to include everyone in all of human history prior to the early 19th century, and a huge number of people after that! A change like that really would make the category meaningless, contrary to its fairly meaningful status now. And even if we decided to make a category for people from the last century who never attended high school or something, we would certainly not put it in the exact same group as people who attended high school and dropped out; the two concepts are 100% different.

Last: If you think we should be more careful to distinguish between time periods of changing general attitudes towards education, why not suggest an alternative way to categorize people based on their secondary and higher educations, rather than removing valuable information altogether? Perhaps you'd be more comfortable with "20th century high school dropouts", "19th century high school dropouts", etc.? I've also been considering various additions to make to the current category system at Category talk:College dropouts, if you want to check out a few. Deletion isn't the answer, though. -Silence 23:52, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Listify and delete. What's next? Elementary school dropouts? Kindergarten dropouts? To be fair, Category:College dropouts should also be listified and deleted. Next, we'll start seeing by grade. Why categorize people by every little nuance? Dropping out of school is not an notable achievement. RedWolf 03:05, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Last I checked, something doesn't have to be a "notable achievement" to be worthy of categorization. Are the place or year you were born in or the color of your skin or the name you were given or a medical condition you have "notable achievements"? Categories aren't just for accomplishments or credentials, they're for any important part of a person's life that can easily allow different people to be grouped together in a certain way.

Question: What would be wrong with an elementary school dropout category or list? Slippery slope arguments are more effective when you specify what the problem is with the slope being gone down. :) I've seen plenty of noteworthy people who have dropped out of 8th grade, 7th grade, 6th grade, etc. as an interesting and significant part of their lives, especially in the 19th and early 20th centuries. I can see a couple of disadvantages such a category might have (though they may not outweigh the advantages), but what problem do you have with it?

I also really wish you would explain why you want this put on a list, since that's actually an interesting proposal. Especially since it'll just be put up for VfD again if it becomes listified, because almost every list gets attacked repeatedly by the anti-listites on Wikipedia. :) But what would be the point of the list? Lists are mainly more useful than categories when it's important to specify something about each item listed, but that's more of a big deal with contentious lists or things that need citations, not something as simple as whether you dropped out of a school. If you imagine that such a list would have details such as the school the person attended, why he dropped out, when he lived, etc., then I'd be perfectly fine with such a move (though I don't see the point of eliminating the category, whether we add a list or not; the category has the advantage of providing a link from each individual's page with which interested parties might see other dropouts, whereas the list has the advantage of being more centralized and observable to be careful that noone gets added or removed without permission (which is easier to prevent from happening when you have, say, a list to compare the category to and see the discrepencies :)), so having both would get the best of each world, as far as I can see), I'm just confused as to why you want a list. You act like your suggestions are obvious, pure common sense, and thus don't explain your motivations or what problems you really have with the current situation. If you think that we shouldn't be categorizing people by every little nuance (under the assumption that dropping out of college or high school is a "nuance"), then why do you think we should be listing people by every little nuance? Doesn't that raise all the same problems, and then some? Still, an interesting recommendation. -Silence 13:05, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, dropping out of high school is a very significant event in someone's life, and users should be able to find people who did this but still achieved fame or notoriety. Kappa 15:10, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Kappa. Useful for readers who are looking for famous and/or successful people who dropped out secondary school. — Insta ntnood 20:07, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. "High school dropout" is not a universally used expression. To me as a Briton it sounds specifically American, although it may be used in other countries / dialects of English as well. It is certainly not regularly used in the UK where it is basically impossible to drop out of school or fail to graduate high school in the American sense (and indeed the term high school is not universally used in the UK). People currently in the category - e.g. Cary Grant, John Major who did not attend school in the US (or other countries were the term has meaning) should therefore not be included under this label. Alternatively the category should be renamed Category:People who did not complete secondary education (or similar) so that it can be applied more internationally. (In fact I'm removing John Major from this cat now as he left school at 16 with 3 O-levels. 16 is the normal school leaving age in the UK!). Valiantis 15:58, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Music by nation to Category:Music by nationality

And also

Category:Heavy metal by nation → Category:Heavy metal by nationality

Category:Hip hop by nation → Category:Hip hop by nationality

Category:Folk music by nation → Category:Folk music by nationality

Category:Classical music by nation → Category:Classical music by nationality

Category:Opera by nation → Category:Opera by nationality

Category:Jazz by nation → Category:Jazz by nationality

Category:Rock music by nation → Category:Rock music by nationality

"by nation" is an oddball; all other cultural categories use "by nationality" in category names. -The Tom 21:34, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Support renames. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:14, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename all --Monkbel 20:38, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename Category:_____ by country. Category:Film, e.g., uses Category:Films by country, not nation *or* nationality. 12.73.194.215 01:36, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Film is one of a few residual non-standard ones, it's up for relocation shortly, too. I'm trying to keep the flow reasonable. -The Tom 19:11, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - Music, especially folk, traditional and classical, is deep rooted within different cultures. Films can be classified by places of production, or background or funding of the production companies. — Insta ntnood 10:10, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Executed revolutionaries to Category:Revolutionaries

merge with revolutionaries, although they should be added to Category:Executed people (unless people think that cat should be deleted). Arniep 15:04, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

note it's parent category, Category:Murdered revolutionaries was nominated yesterday. Arniep 15:16, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. I see no arguments in support of merging. --Monkbel 20:22, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Listify. Excessive categorization; trivia: what next, Category:Suicided revolutionaries, Category:Fatal heart-attacked revolutionaries, Category:Pneumonified revolutionaries, Category:Paretic revolutionaries, ad nauseum?
Keep. Group these people under one category rather than two categories. — Instantnood 20:09, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- comment The way I work out whether categories are sensible is if anyone is likely have a school assignment on a category. I can see students being set an assignment on revolutionaries, but just executed revolutionaries...imo no. It is pretty obvious that being a revolutionary is risky, and that many revolutionaries would have been killed in some way. Arniep 00:47, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - Guess executed ones are much more notable than heart-attacked or pneumonified. Execution is not like simply being killed by their opponent(s). — Instantnood 10:08, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    - Was Trotsky executed or Assassinated? Do we include people executed by their own side (Robespierre) or only those executed by their opponents, wait! perhaps we could divide it into 2 more categories (see ...). Arniep 14:13, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Jewish American actors

Over-categorization and a bad precedent; the possibilities for similar sub-cats are endless, Italian-American actors, German-American actors, British actors of Irish origin, Jewish Australian actors etc. JW 12:35, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Merge with American actors, if we are to be consistent. Arniep 15:12, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, good point. Many are already categorised under "American actors" as well, but a merge would ensure none are left behind. JW 11:16, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Listify and delete. Over-categorization. RedWolf 03:07, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. One's ethnic and cultural background is of encyclopædic interests. If this is voted to be deleted, make sure they're all categorised under category:American actors and category:Jewish Americans. — Insta ntnood 20:12, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. It s well-populated and refines overpopulated American actors and Jewish Americans cats -Mayumashu 19:13, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per User:Mayumashu. RMoloney (talk) 22:46, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

comment I really think this should be deleted as many people in it have only one parent (in some cases one grandparent) who was jewish, do not even identify themselves as Jewish American and are in other (ethnicity)-American categories. Arniep 00:16, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Shalom! - Darwinek 13:26, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

if this category is to be kept I am moving out anyone who has not been shown to describe themselves as jewish, otherwise it is totally unencyclopedic. Arniep 15:17, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I will move the above people to category people of jewish descent which will be much more accurate. We cannot call people xxx american if they do not describe themselves as such. Arniep 15:20, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"We can't categorize Chris Rock as a black person if he doesn't call himself a black person! In fact, I hear the other day he called himself a white guy, let's move him there!" -Silence 18:39, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

People may be of mixed ancestry, part jewish, part something else, we can't apply an xxx-American label to them just because they have a forebear who identified as xxx unless we know for certain they identify as that, i.e. Robert De Niro identifies as Italian American but he only has one grandparent who is Italian. Arniep 22:45, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Washington Metro stops to Category:Washington Metro stations

This renaming will correct the category name to more properly reflect what the contents of the category are. This category holds the articles for Washington Metro stations, and should be named as such. SchuminWeb (Talk) 11:57, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Rename. --Monkbel 20:14, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename as Category:Washington, D.C., subway stations and standardize as such for all other subway listings. Not all subways are called "Metro"; this is mixed corporate name and slanguage. 12.73.194.215 01:33, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: True, not all subways are called "Metro", but in this case, the intent of the name is the stations of the "Washington Metro". In other words, "Metro" is being used as part of the title of the system, and not as a generic term. SchuminWeb (Talk) 00:19, 5 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Football culture to Category:Football (soccer) culture

Most soccer related cats (which apply worldwide, not to the specific countries) have Football (soccer) in their names to decrease ambiguity. The same question about Category:Soccer computer games, Category:Football songs and chants, Category:Footballers by club (Category:Football (soccer) players by club?).

Rename to maintain one common style. Monkbel 11:43, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename. The fact is that the sport is known by different names in different places, and simialrly that the word football refers to different sports in different places. Not everyone likes this, but it is the way it is. This suggestions will decrease ambiguity and increase effecient searching for information. Cheers, --Daveb 23:18, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Xian rugby league

Rename: Change format to Rugby league in X, this seem to be more consistent with current wiki policy. The affected categories are:

Grinner 10:09, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Support all. Grutness...wha? 01:09, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Category:British rugby league should probably be renamed Category:Rugby league in Great Britain instead, as the UK does not ever operate as a unit in the rugby world—Northern Ireland has always had an integrated rugby system with the Republic. Other than this minor catch, rename all -The Tom 06:47, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename, with Tom's note. --Monkbel 20:14, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Cities on U.S. Highway 66

Rename to Category:Communities on U.S. Highway 66. "City" is a legal designation for a particular class of municipality in the United States, and this category by its description and contents includes communities of all sorts whether incorporated or not (and limiting it to literal cities just to conform to its current name would be silly). I honestly don't see much value in the category under any name, but as long as someone can promise that this type of category is only going to be used for such culturally significant roads, I won't suggest deleting it outright. Postdlf 01:55, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. No offense, but it seems to me pedantic to rename the category for this reason. Common usage of "cities" includes communities that aren't officially incorporated municipalities. --Russ Blau (talk) 16:11, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Pedantic? Perhaps. But accurate, and in line with our category system for American communities that maintains separate categories for different classes of municipalities, CDPs, and other unincorporated communities. That the public commonly uses a term imprecisely is no argument for us to do the same, particularly when state law and the local governments themselves observe the difference. And particularly when a simple one-word change would make the category name consistent with both the common and the "pedantic" meanings and avoid any ambiguity. Postdlf 18:08, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename. Pedantry is important in encyclopedic writing. I'm sure that many (most?) of the settlements in the category are not commonly called cities. Grinner 16:17, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename. I have to agree with postdlf — I shudder to think of the notion of every highway having such a category, although Route 66 probably should have one since the song lists some of them in the lyrics anyway. Bearcat 01:38, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Rename. The word "city" has multiple meanings. (It was exactly for the same reason I have been getting into trouble with another user over whether some certain places are cities.) — Insta ntnood 20:18, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]