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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Johnpacklambert (talk | contribs) at 21:24, 27 July 2013 (→Category:Recipients of Campaign Finance from Monsanto). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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July 22

Category:Jets

Nominator's rationale: Delete. Without a clear introduction and a main article, what is included here appears random. Maybe someone can suggest a rename that makes the contents clearer. Vegaswikian (talk) 23:48, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Songs written by David M. Bellamy

Nominator's rationale: David Bellamy of The Bellamy Brothers is usually credited only as "David Bellamy", no middle initial. Suggest using (singer) suffix instead, as David Bellamy by itself is about an unrelated person, and David Bellamy (singer) redirects to The Bellamy Brothers. Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 22:05, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Murderers and serial killers? Or both?

Nominator's rationale: At first I thought this was an example of a duplication of a category (the same category by different names). On investigation, I see that there is a tenuous distinction made between mass murderers and serial killers that is contained on the Category:Fictional serial killers and Category:Fictional mass murderers pages but this distinction is not observed in practice. There is duplicate appellation of categories and some Wiki pages that have one category that should fall in the other.
I propose that either a clean-up is done (it's not a huge number of pages) and the right category applied (with no applications of both categories) OR that the two categories be combined into one. I think only crime buffs see a distinction between a "mass" murderer and a "serial" murderer. I could be wrong though so that's why I first proposed a clean-up.
I should also point out again that these are fictional characters, not real killers. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 15:43, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • cleanup is fine but oppose merge, these are different things. I also think that almost any fictional villain I can think of has committed mass murder, so we should really consider whether it is defining for that villain, whatever that may mean in the context of fictional characters. For a diff example, take Liam Neeson's character in Taken - he's not in battle, and doesn't always kill in self defense - much of it is revenge killing, and sometimes multiple at a time - but does that make him a mass murderer? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:03, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment there's a fine distinction, but as is often the case in fiction, the lines can be purposely blurred. Recurring characters in slasher films seem to fit both categories. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 02:27, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In which case, they could be put in both (say Michael Meyers from Halloween).--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:27, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This is exactly the case that prompted me to refer this confusion of categories to this page.
On the category page, "Mass murderers" are (rather randomly) defined as characters who kill 4 or more individuals in ONE incident. "Serial killers" are defined as characters who kill more than 1 person in separate incidents.
So, it's not clear, with fiction if "one incident" refers to an event, a movie, a television episode, a novel, a chapter, a comic or an entire series. Myers (or Jason or Krueger) kill more than 4 people over the course of ONE movie but in separate incidents and it occurs separately in each movie installment. If you consider an incident an event, then clearly they fit "serial killers"...but if you consider an incident an entire movie, then, I guess "mass murderer" is a better fit for them.
It's my interpretation that, given the definition, "mass murderers", as it is used here, are actually "spree killers", like school shooters, who commit violence in one outburst. The common sense understanding of "mass murderer" is simply a person who has killed more than one person (in one incident or dozens).
No doubt the person who originally came up with these definitions thought it was a clear distinction. But in the world of fiction, there isn't a clear understanding of what an incident is. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 16:13, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm. I would say one incident is a single episode without a significant break. So if Mike Meyers kills a kid in the evening, kills another one later that night, then a 3rd in the morning, that's a single incident. If they get a break for a week, then that makes it two incidents. Again, while there are a few slashers who may technically be considered serial killers, I'm not sure if that's really DEFINING for them - mass murderers is probably good enough - as opposed to the real serial killers from series like Dexter. Yes it's fuzzy, but we're talking about categorization of fictional characters, so it's not like lots hangs in the balance here... if you think some are misplaced or dual categorized, please clean up as you see fit. Do we have Category:Fictional spree killers? That still somehow seems different than a mass murderer - a spree killer is somehow different, but I can't quite put my finger on it.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:26, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Wow, somehow this is getting even MORE complicated and less clear. I agree that this is not a life and death issue. But I'm just looking for some clear criteria to evaluate which categories to place pages in and I don't think the ones that exist are adequate. And, now a third category has been suggested that could muddy the waters further.
I thought I would get more feedback and I fear that editors who want to weigh in on categorization will just go to the current day's page and not wander back here in the past. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 21:24, 24 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You can always post a neutral notification at the wiki films project or something. If you want criteria, I'd go by sources. If the sources describing the killer in question call him a "serial killer", then classify him accordingly. Otherwise, just stick him in mass murderer.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:58, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'd agree with you but I don't think most fiction writers are concerned with labeling the villains they write. And also, in cases like "The Joker", there are many different authors writing the same character. There isn't a single author defining what archetype a character fits. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 22:59, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That's a decision I could live with. From what I can see, the distinctions between mass/spree/serial murder is of most interest to those who study "true crime" and criminology. I think most casual readers will know that Hannibal Lecter is a mass/multiple murderer and it doesn't matter whether he killed a lot of people at one time or a few spread out over time.
I hope when people consider merging categories, they can understand that many of these FICTIONAL murderers (from Michael Myers to the Joker to "the miniature killer" on CSI to the latest long-arc villain on Bones or Criminal Minds) appear over multiple episodes--movies, comic books, TV episodes, etc.--but kill many people. If it's not clear whether they are a "mass murderer", a "serial murderer" or a "spree murderer", then we should probably just have one, straight-forward "multiple murderer" category. Personally, if it was my choice, I'd use "mass murderer" as the all-encompassing, umbrella category for all of them and do away with subcategories. 69.125.134.86 (talk) 22:54, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Again, we're talking about fiction, so should expect some fuzziness. I don't think we need spree murderer cats (it's a redirect), and we only ahve around 600 articles in these two, + around 500 in "Fictional murderers". I do think that for, whoever is looking at these, a distinction should be made from a serial killer from Dexter, a slasher like Mike Meyers, and someone who committed one murder in an Agatha Christie novel. I think there is a clear definition of what makes a serial killer, and most super villians, even though they might kill people one at a time, would not fit within that definition.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 17:40, 26 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Could you offer a definition then of what differentiates a serial killer from Dexter from a slasher like Mike Meyers or a mass murderer like The Joker? They all kill multiple people over time. It seems like the only distinction is finesse and planning which shouldn't be a criteria in assigning a category.
There are already unnecessary categories of "murdered by method" for real people, I don't think they need to be duplicated for fictional characters.
As I see it, there should only be two categories: "Fictional murderers" (one victim) and "Fictional mass murderers" (more than one victim). The number of victims is an easily determined number, other "aspects" of how the killing was done or how murders were spaced over time involve judgment calls which is what this proposal was an attempt to address. Newjerseyliz (talk) 17:39, 27 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
right which is where we go back to reliable sources, if the book itself or the commentary about the book calls them a serial killer, they should be there; otherwise put them in mass murderers. There is a standard def of serial killer I'm sure we could also try to apply, we could use the same criteria used for the real page.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:16, 27 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge per Peterkingiron's proposal. The distinction makes some sense when dealing with fact, but when we area dealing with fiction, I really do not see the usefulness of the distinction, and we are going to run into many cases where what counts as an "incdent" will be too hard to tell.John Pack Lambert (talk) 20:20, 27 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Chicago, Illinois

Nominator's rationale: The name of the article is Chicago. The city is the third-largest in the United States and there aren't really any other categories. This discussion also includes all subcategories pbp 15:00, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: previous related CFDs:

Note: I notified all of the past participants in the April 12 Los Angeles discussion of this one who have not yet weighed in here. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 12:57, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Partial list of subcategories
Current vote –
the confusion argument is very weak. Are editors or users really confused as to what Chicago, Illinois means? I'd suggest closing this argument and re-opening it at us-names talkpage, as if we do this it's a major shift in status quo and would affect things way beyond Chicago.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:07, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The confusion is not in questions about what the title might mean — it's in what form the category name is expected to take by editors in the process of trying to use it. It's in the fact that people will routinely add their new article to Category:Chicago instead of Category:Chicago, Illinois, or to Category:Buildings and structures in Chicago instead of Category:Buildings and structures in Chicago, Illinois, or to Category:People from Chicago instead of Category:People from Chicago, Illinois, because they're making the perfectly reasonable and rational assumption that if the article is at Chicago then the categories will be named that way too. The confusion is in the fact that you can't just act logically, but rather have to make a special effort to discover that Chicago's categories don't follow the same "category name matches article title" rule that pertains to Category:New York City and Category:London and Category:Toronto and Category:Tokyo and Category:Moscow and Category:Paris and Category:Rome and Category:Budapest and Category:Melbourne and on and so forth. Bearcat (talk) 21:09, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Then, as I suggested, why not take this to the USNames board, and discuss there, as many other cities would have to be moved. Recall that such a move will cause edits to thousands of articles and hundreds of categories. Have you ever, once, ever, seen, any single editor, anywhere, complain about this? I haven't. Show me a diff. I think this alleged confusion is imaginary. What would be confusing is, when an editor is adding topics to categories for US cities, that the vast majority of cities are city,state, while a very small subset, aren't. That's an exception to the rule. We have thousands of categories for US cities, and you are proposing to make an exception for a few big ones. An exception for the article name is fine, whatever, but I don't see any value in an exception for the category name. It also means that if someone decides that "Carmel-on-the-sea, California" should be moved to "Carmel-on-the-sea" as it's unambiguous, boom now you have to move *all* the categories and hundreds of articles. The whole thing is a waste of time, space, energy, and smacks of bureaucratism. Show me a user who is confused. Just one.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:39, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There's no rule anywhere on Wikipedia that category names have to be consistent with the naming format of sibling categories; there is a rule that they have to be consistent with the naming format of their own head articles. There is no inconsistency in having Category:Chicago sitting next to Category:Springfield, Illinois in Category:Cities in Illinois, because both Category:Chicago and Category:Springfield, Illinois are in complete accordance with the only rule that actually applies to category names: match to its own head article. "Match to head article" creates no confusion whatsoever; "match to a sibling even if that causes one of them to contradict its own head article" does. Even I regularly get tripped up on this whenever I go anywhere near Chicago-related categories — and I'm pretty well-known as one of the biggest category geeks around. Bearcat (talk) 22:07, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support rename. Categories, subtopics, etc., should follow the names of established primary topics. bd2412 T 16:08, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support rename. Categories should never be at a different level of disambiguation status than their associated head articles are, as doing so creates more problems than it solves. Bearcat (talk) 21:09, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment Now digging through the CFD history, I've realized that we've been down this path before, on dozens of cities. I added a few related CFDs above, but there are many others. Do we really have nothing better to do? Apparently, these categories have been moved back and forth several times already. The recent attempt to de-state Los Angeles was not successful (I actually !voted for it, but in hindsight I think I !voted the wrong way). Seriously, there is now a long-established consensus that cats in the US match city,state - with one exception - New York. Moving Chicago would open up the gates for Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and scores of others - resulting in the need to move hundreds of category pages and thousands of articles. With what benefit to the wiki? Do you have any proof whatsoever that some poor editor is quivering in their boots and unable to find the right category for something? Redlinked categories are easily found and fixed. I really think this is a bad path to go down - we have a choice between two forms of consistency (1) Consistency with the (current) article title (which could move) or (2) consistency with the long-standing consensus for all US city categories to be so-named, which has the additional advantage of NEVER NEEDING TO CHANGE. I'd much rather go with (2) than (1).--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:57, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There's never been any consensus that all US city categories had to be "City, State" with no exceptions, even if the article title wasn't. There used to be a consensus, which has wisely been eased off somewhat, that all US cities' articles had to be at "City, State" with no exceptions — and the naming of the categories was not an independent consensus of its own, but simply a secondary byproduct of following the "match to head article" rule while a "head article has to be at City, State" naming convention was in place. There has never been any consensus that cities' head articles could be moved to just "City" but their categories still had to stay at "City, State" anyway — the convention has always been that if the city's article moved then the categories went with it, but some categories just didn't actually get dealt with. Bearcat (talk) 22:14, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Neither "this is the way it is, and has been for a while" nor "We'd have to move a lot of cats" is a particularly valid argument. Consensus can change; there's no need to rubber-stamp it and a discussion that was closed as no-consensus can and should be revisited after a few months. What is a valid argument is having as short a title as possible. PRIMARYTOPIC and naming conventions will dictate that the article stays where it is, and the category should be with it. If it's ever moved, that's another story. But predicting that it will be is almost crystal-balling. pbp 03:29, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support rename. Category names should not be unnecessarily disambiguated. And, yes, this argument applies to all related category names. --B2C 22:06, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. It is not worth the effort involved in moving the category. The name is adequate to describe the category, and does not need to exactly match the underlying article. I would rather see us make necessary corrections instead of just "make work" projects. Apteva (talk) 22:17, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose – there has certainly been consensus at cfd for some years that category names for US cities should include the state, regardless of the naming and renaming of the underlying article. Oculi (talk) 00:42, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I agree, consensus can change. But here we're talking about longstanding consensus, through multiple CFDs, over several years, all ending up at the same place. This is not an article title, this is a category title, and when you change a category title, hundreds of articles must be edited. For the 30 or so cities on the AP list that aren't disambiguated with a state, do we really need to make an exception to the general category naming consensus here for hundreds of categories? Because if we do Chicago, we will have to do 30 or so other cities, and all of their hundreds of subcategories. What for?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 01:40, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And that's not altogether accurate. Many of the more recent discussions have ended in "no consensus" rather than affirming that they should stay where they are. There's never been an overwhelming majority for the Illinois in the Chicago cat or the California in the Los Angeles cat or any of the other ones. Not that it matters if there was, by the by pbp 03:29, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Again, my main argument is consistency in category naming with all other US cities. To me it's perfectly reasonable to have this exception to what is, at the end of the day, only a guideline. Per IAR, and to stop these time-wasting discussions, we should just keep a standard - US cities categories are city,state. End of story. Do you realize how many bytes have been expended to date on this topic and the numerous CFDs that preceded it? You can't just keep coming back to the well until you get the answer you want.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:37, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The argument that consistency across US city categories should be the primary consideration simply isn't a compelling one — because there simply isn't any reason, besides I like it better that way, why that needs to trump consistency on the "category name matches article title" criterion. Just to use the example that I'm most familiar with, the naming convention for Canadian cities and their related categories is consistent with that in place for nearly all world countries: disambiguate the article only when necessary, and always match category name to article title. As a result, we have Category:Toronto coexisting with Category:Hamilton, Ontario, Category:Vancouver coexisting with Category:Victoria, British Columbia, Category:Regina, Saskatchewan coexisting with Category:Saskatoon, and on and so forth — and not one single solitary problem has ever been created by this "inconsistency", because the categories follow the perfectly predictable and logical and consistent pattern of matching the name of their head article. All of the categorization problems Canada has ever actually had stemmed from cases where that rule was not followed, where an article got moved but its associated categories were delayed in following for some reason, and thus the category name was for some length of time not rationally predictable in relation to the article title. Problems frequently arise when an article and its associated categories are not at the same level of disambiguation as each other — but as long as both categories are correctly matched to their own head article titles, problems do not arise from a category not being at the same level of disambiguation as a sibling category for a different city. Bearcat (talk) 05:12, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose categories are purposefully named is a less ambiguous manner than articles, because categories require maintenance -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 02:49, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment @Bearcat, these cats HAVE been moved, even once the city articles had been stripped of their state. Search the CFD archives. This discussion has been had, and consensus WAS to move the cats to City,state, to avoid ambiguity, esp in cases where you're dealing with metro areas, etc. Are there any categories besides NY that HAVE been dealt with? I can't find ANY - so your assertion that some cats haven't been dealt with is simply not true. In fact, it's the opposite - every CFD I've found so far has found a consensus to append the state, or no-consensus to strip it. If you think consensus has changed, fine, but do you have different arguments this time?
Plus, the guidance on cat names matching article names is flexible - it states: "Names of topic categories should be singular, normally corresponding to the name of a Wikipedia article" (my bold) - this is not a hard and fast rule.
A further guidance states: "Choose category names that are able to stand alone, independent of the way a category is connected to other categories." - when you have a head article and an eponymous category, this is normally not a problem - but when you have multiple sub-categories, disambiguation can become important - which is why previous consensus has held that more specification of the state at all levels is necessary, as the head article is not present in all sub-categories. See Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2008_May_6#Category:US_city_buildings_categories, Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_March_26#San_Francisco for other CFDs on this matter. I see Bearcat was making the same arguments in 2009.
Finally, given that the participants here are well aware of previous consensus in spite of their denials, I again assert this is the wrong place to discuss such a broad-ranging change. It would be better off to close this discussion down, move it over to Wikipedia_talk:Category_names where it can live a bit longer, set up an RFC, and enshrine a new consensus in the guideline, one way or the other (e.g. "Cities w/o states can have cats w/o states OR Cities w/o states still get cats with states"). If you really care about this issue, you'll do it that way, rather than here in CFD.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:03, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Tim. I think I'd buy this argument if we were just talking about one category - but we're not - we're talking about dozens, maybe more, categories that can be deeply nested - categories in which the head category is not a member. In this case, someone deep down in the category tree may not know that the "head" article is one of the 30 "special" cities. To me, this is a good reason to over-disambiguate as you state.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 13:33, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. It's a good thing we have the City, State convention. Otherwise we might argue over this. --BDD (talk) 16:05, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's a category speedy naming criteria to change a category's name to match its article. Since the article is at Chicago, the category should logically be at Category:Chicago. --BDD (talk) 16:50, 26 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, C.2.D, not C=Categories, 2=to, D=Discuss. A speedy move can not be done if there is opposition to the move. There is no reason for categories to always exactly match the article title. Apteva (talk) 17:03, 26 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
BDD, you're right in theory. however, practice and past consensus (linked above) has found otherwise - perhaps this is an example of IAR. The guidance says "normally", not "always must" match the title.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 17:13, 26 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: A number of the oppose votes are predicted solely on "it would take too much effort to move the cats". That in and of itself isn't a valid reason for supporting or opposing a proposal. I also agree with BDD's oligarchy comment above, i.e. that this proposal is being stonewalled by only a handful of elite editors 16:33, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
It's up to us to decide what is valid reason to oppose, and repeatedly bringing up an issue already decided by consensus is time-wasting, thus effort counts. I'm not sure if you include me in the elite (blushes), but I haven't participated in any of the other ones besides the recent LA, where I !voted to move, but have now changed my mind. My point remains, PBP, that you keep coming back to the well hoping for a different answer - each time trying a different city - and that is IMHO disruptive. If you really want this changed, I assume you want it changed for all ~30 or so cities that don't require the state dab. If so, let's just close this discussion, open a broader RFC on the matter at the category naming page, enshrine the results in the guidance, and then speedy the outcome. Otherwise, each new move request will lead to the same back and forth which has been hashed out, as you can see, across at least ~15 CFDs in years past. The worst case would be if Chicago passes, then Pittsburgh fails, etc - then you'd have REAL inconsistency. for now, it is consistent, at least in one sense.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:40, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If you think it's disruptive, start a noticeboard discussion about it. If something is closed as no consensus, it can be revisited at any time. And to say I've come to this well 15 times is a bit of a stretch. I think it's maybe 3-4, each with a different article as the main move candidate and each separated by 3 or more months. And, yes, I do. Each of the titles violates naming conventions and primary topic, both of which say shorter is better pbp 04:06, 24 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't say you came here 15 times. But if you've already tried and failed 4 times, what makes you think it will work this time? Why not try a different venue? Also, if something is closed as "no consensus", it does not mean you can re-open it the next day - I do think that would be disruptive. Rather, you should wait, and see if new arguments or changes present themselves, or if something happens that may lead you to believe consensus has changed. CFD isn't really ideal for such a wide-ranging change that conflicts with current consensus, and ultimately requires a change to the guidance. A longer, slower RFC with more participation on the matter would be better, and would give us a definitive answer that can be put into policy rather than your piece-meal approach. Either that, or take the time now to nominate all categories in all 30 cities. Otherwise, who knows what result you might get. As you can see from the CFDs above, this was previously done piece-meal, instead of enshrining the result in a policy and speedying it. Do your really want to repeat that?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 16:35, 24 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Category:List of educational institutions in Vellore

Nominator's rationale: Delete. The category is a redundant one, as there is already a category named 'Education in Vellore'. not the world (talk) 09:22, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Recipients of Campaign Finance from Monsanto

Nominator's rationale: Receiving a campaign donation from Monsanto is not a notable characteristic of a person. --Hirolovesswords (talk) 02:31, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
we will cover all campaign finance in wikipedia one day. It is not to tar people, just the start of total coverage of political influence, will be working on this more in the future. I dont have the energy to fight Hirolovesswords, he has a lot of energy to remove all the work I have done recently, and he does not respond or want to discuss with me at all. James Michael DuPont (talk)
I do not want to even think about how many categories we could but Obama, Romney or any other recent presidential candidate in. Or what about John Dingell with his 55+ years in congress. If he accepted a donation from some group in 1960, and not since, would it really be defining of him?John Pack Lambert (talk) 21:24, 27 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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