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Article milestones Date Process Result July 13, 2005 Peer review Reviewed January 29, 2006 Featured article candidate Not promoted July 10, 2006 Good article nominee Listed August 1, 2007 Good article reassessment Delisted August 24, 2009 Peer review Reviewed August 25, 2009 Peer review Reviewed October 2, 2009 Good article nominee Listed November 3, 2009 Peer review Reviewed December 3, 2009 Peer review Reviewed December 13, 2009 Featured article candidate Not promoted August 27, 2011 Peer review Reviewed November 22, 2013 Peer review Reviewed Current status: Good article

Family Guy: It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One was nominated for deletion. The discussion was closed on 16 July 2014 with a consensus to merge. Its contents were merged into Family Guy. The original page is now a redirect to this page. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected article, please see its history; for its talk page, see here.

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To-do list for Family Guy: edit · history · watch · refresh · Updated 2011-06-27 Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Other : Address issues before bringing up to WP:FAC.

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Family Guy Aging

The rating is actually 14, which means that it's actually a teenagers animated sitcom. User talk:MattWorks 11:06, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I think this needs further discussion; could it not have different ratings by country? DonIago (talk) 17:17, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

The rating simply means it's not advised for children under the age of 14. It does not mean that it's targeted at 14-year-olds. Davejohnsan (talk) 17:33, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

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Changes to the lead

Earlier today the opening sentence was changed from "Family Guy is an American adult animated sitcom" to "Family Guy is an American animated sitcom", because the editor thought "this makes it sound like it's porn". If you automatically equate "adult" with "porn", that seems like a personal problem but the linked article makes it very clear that "adult" refers to "any type of animation work that is mainly targeted towards adults and sometimes also teenagers, acting as a contrast to most animated films and TV series being aimed at children." Since this seems appropriate I restored the content with the summary "I suggest you follow the link, which makes it clear that it is not". Without any attempt at discussion this was reverted with a direction to WP:EGG. However, WP:EGG doesn't apply unless you are one of the people who equate "adult" with "porn", which I doubt represents the majority. The program is very clearly adult animation and an animated sitcom, the former probably being a more significant aspect since it's clearly not aimed at children, but "Family Guy is an American adult animation animated sitcom" is not good English so this is a situation where we are forced to compromise since we can't split animation/animated. If we were to consider that WP:EGG did apply and removed the link to adult animation this would make the text ambiguous for the "adult=porn" readers so that would be counter-productive. Removing the text altogether is not appropriate because the fact that this is an adult (not porn) program is significant. For these reasons, unless we can find some way to reword the text that has been in this article for more than 4 years with no problems until now, I see no reason why it should be altered. --AussieLegend (✉) 08:13, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

I removed the wording "adult" from the opening sentence as it violates WP:EGG as "adult" can be read as "porn", and it would be unexpected that the single word "adult" would link to adult animation (said article even draws attention to the ambiguity with an opening message stating: "Not to be confused with cartoon pornography"). Links are for the convenience of readers who would like more information, not to clarify poor word choices.

AussieLegend has reverted twice now (which is editwarring—which AL asserts to have an issue with). Please explain yourself, AussieLegend. If your explanation is no more than WP:ILIKEIT, I'm afraid you'll have to undo your revert—we write for readers, not the preferences of editors, and ambiguous writing is poor writing. Please refrain from inanities such as "Your reason was that it reads like porn - that's your personal issue"—which is both a personal attack and an embarassing misunderstanding of my stated rationale. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 00:29, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

As demonstrated in the opening of this discussion, your initial reason for reversion was because you thought the word "adult" made the text look like it was porn. I didn't misunderstand that. That's what you wrote in your edit summary. WP:EGG was only mentioned after I directed you to the link. I have already explained the link, we can't write "adult animation animated sitcom". We have to compromise here. Your claim that Links are for the convenience of readers who would like more information, not to clarify poor word choices doesn't make sense here. The program is very clearly adult animation and the words used reflect that so they're not a poor choice. They're words we need to clearly describe the program for our readers and the link that you don't like clearly identifies the context in which "adult" is used here. As for edit warring, per WP:BRD and WP:STATUSQUO, when an edit is good-faith reverted you don't simply revert, you start a discussion. You did not do that at all, you just reverted, leading me to have to start a discussion. Now that's out of the way, can you offer an alternative wording that still identifies the program as both adult animation and an animated sitcom? --AussieLegend (✉) 07:02, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

There is no responding to such a slew of non sequiturs and bizarre accusations of bad faith. I'm opening an RfC and bypassing your bull. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:12, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

RfCs are usually opened after reasonable discussion, not almost immediately discussion has opened. In fact, under the section titled "Before starting the process" it says "Before using the RfC process to get opinions from outside editors, it's often faster and more effective to thoroughly discuss the matter with any other parties on the related talk page. Editors are normally expected to make a reasonable attempt at working out their disputes before seeking help from others." Here you have made no attempt to do that. A single post, most of which was attacking me, does not constitute making a reasonable attempt. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:49, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

RfC: Remove "adult" as a descriptor from the opening sentence

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I propose removing the word "adult" as a descriptor from the opening sentence, which now reads:

Family Guy is an American adult animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company.

—Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:14, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Poll

• Support as proposer for the reasons I give below—it is ambiguous, unnecessary, and WP:UNDUE. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:14, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose "Animation" is generally presumed to be targeted for children, hence why "adult animation" is a term where it doesn't exist in other types of media. (But we do have "childrens' book", "family film", "children's television", etc. because those mediums presume the work is for adults unless otherwise denoted. As long as the "adult animation" term is linked as one to that article, readers aren't going to mistake it for adult=pornographic as suggested. --MASEM (t) 13:39, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Masem: your last statement would seem to justify any WP:EGG. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:44, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
    • Hrm. Our article on animated sitcom is terrible and barely justifies it as a notable genre - but turning to google, it's clearly used more frequently than "adult animation". I was going to suggest that one could link the terms as "(adult animated)/(sitcom)" rather than how it is now as "(adult)/(animated sitcom)" but in terms of genre value, "animated sitcom" appears more accurate (barring the problem with that article). And given that "animated sitcom" is considered a subset of the general "sitcom" which is generally part of non-children's television, that could be valid reason to remove the adult tag. --MASEM (t) 13:58, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
      • Or just move adult animation elsewhere in the article, where it can be worked in and contextualized in a way that's not ambiguous and awkward. It's hardly NOPV that "adult" is such a defining aspect of the show that it requires drawing attention to it in the opening sentence, anyways—nothing essential is lost by cutting it. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 14:10, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
        • I can understand why some have high value in including "adult animation", but I can see why it's a problem. I would suggest (supporting the RFC) that the lede can start: "Family Guy is an American animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The adult animation series centers on the Griffins..." which keeps that high value term there but avoids the other points of concern. --MASEM (t) 14:18, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
          • Ironically, the last thing I wrote before Curly Turkey shot off to open an RfC was can you offer an alternative wording that still identifies the program as both adult animation and an animated sitcom?. Had he participated in the discussion we could have had this out of the way by now without any need for an RfC. --AussieLegend (✉) 16:18, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - As explained above in the discussion that Curly Turkey barely participated in before opening this RfC, I explained why we are forced to compromise with the wording unless a better set of words can be found. The program is clearly adult animation and an animated sitcom but we can't write "adult animation animated sitcom" so we are forced to compromise slightly. The fact that this is adult animation and not traditional animation is a significant point and we should be writing for our readers. --AussieLegend (✉) 15:55, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Why not say "animated sitcom for adults", which would make more sense to readers and avoid all of that awkwardness? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:43, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - Pointing out the demographic a program is aimed at is information we should provide, as long as it's properly referenced. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:54, 16 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Beyond My Ken: given that most articles do no such thing in the lead sentence, why make an exception with Family Guy? Especially when the wording is ambiguous? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 02:58, 16 August 2017 (UTC)
    • WP:OTHERTHINGSEXIST. That other articles do not do so is irrelevant, since I can go right now and add it to them, if you like. The question here is about this article, and this consensus discussion. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:08, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Discussion

Using "adult" in this context is poor writing because it is:

• ambiguous—as every adult knows, "adult" is a common euphemism for "pornographic", as in "adult book" and "adult film" (the latter of which redirects to Pornographic film). The Adult animation article reinforces this perception by opening with the message: "Not to be confused with cartoon pornography." Avoiding ambiguity is a goal of formal writing—especially encyclopaedic writing.
• unnecessary—we don't refer to Ulysses as an "adult novel", The Human Centipede as an "adult horror film", or Game of Thrones as an "adult fantasy drama television series", nor other animated works such as Ghost in the Shell.
• surprising—such strangely conspicuous use of the word draws undue attention to it, a mere half-dozen words into the article, giving readers pause to wonder why the word is being used at all.
• in violation of WP:EGG—the word "adult" unexpectedly links to Adult animation. Worse, this makes the assumption that the reader will have to read the linked-to article to understand the context the word was presented in—this is not what links are for. Links are for curious readers to find more to read, not to figure out what context a word is being used in. The way the word is shoehorned into the lead suggests the editor is more interested in the proliferation of links than in the clarity of the writing or the appropriateness of the terms linked.

Let's write for the benefit of the reader, and not to satisfy our hobbyhorses. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:14, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

@Curly Turkey: You don't have to make a proposal just to remove a single word from a sentence in an article. Be bold, and make the edit yourself. Philroc 14:09, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Philroc: I did—see the discussion immediately above, where I'm accused of bizarre ulterior motives for having removed this single word. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 14:13, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

I'd address Curly Turkey's claims here but I already did, in the opening of the discussion above, before he had even participated. Curley Turkey's main point seems to be that he believes adult=porn. This was his original reason for deleting the content. That was even his reason for chasing me on my talk page. Even though nobody else has ever indicated a problem with use of "adult" in the four years in which the text has been in the article, it seems prudent to link "adult" to adult animation to make sure that even one person isn't misguided. I would have been happy to continue discussion of this above but he chose not to. --16:13, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Well, adult does mean "porn" – in some contexts. Curly's correct that this is ambiguous, and a person who knows nothing about the show would have no idea if that means "sexual animated sitcom" or "animated sitcom for an older audience". So how about making it clear? We could write something like, "Family Guy is an American animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The main audience is adults" or "Family Guy is an American animated sitcom for adults. It was created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company" and remove any possible confusion.

While we're at it, someone could also re-write the line "immediately generated controversy regarding its adult content" to be clearer. I have no idea whether the controversy is about sex or about swearing or about actual adult life, which seems to involve a lot more things like paying the bills and washing the laundry than things that get labeled with the euphemism "adult". I think we can do better than this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:41, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Maybe it's me. I don't see "adult" and immediately think "bow chicka bow wow". I followed the link to see in what context the word was used. --AussieLegend (✉) 17:02, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

• Family Guy is an American animated sitcom for adults, as suggested by WhatamIdoing, is unambiguous and an improvement over "adult animated sitcom" which to many readers will suggest porn or thereabouts. PamD 17:04, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

"Curley Turkey's main point seems to be that he believes adult=porn"—my only point has been that the wording is ambiguous, and thus poor writing. I've been awfully explicit about that, but you appear to be as poor a reader as you are a writer. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:38, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

That's a blatant personal attack and you should know better. --AussieLegend (✉) 07:05, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

• • I'd argue that if some people see "adult animated sitcom" as meaning porn, the same people are probably going to have the same problem with that wording, which doesn't lend itself to linking to adult animation at all. --AussieLegend (✉) 17:20, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
    • I don't think it has the same risk of confusion. But if you want to eliminate all risk that this will be confused with the euphemism, then why not get some sources and write a detailed description of the audience? Then you could describe it as an "animated sitcom mostly watched by young white men aged 20 to 35", or whatever the main demographic is. This news article says that the median age of viewers was 28 years, and this newer one says age 31. This one includes some information on teen viewers. This one says it's particularly popular with younger men, which draws advertising dollars. I'm sure that a good search would turn up better ones. But the bottom line is that if you don't want to include the word 'adult' at all, then it could be eliminated and still communicate that this is not a children's show. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:39, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
      • We don't have to worry about "risking confusion" if we drop the non-essential word "adult" from the lead sentence. Adult animation can be linked elsewhere in a non-awkward, non-ambiguous context, as I suggested to Masem above—assuming there's any pressing reason to mention it at all. I mean, most people assume fantasy's for children, but we don't go out of our way to call Game of Thrones "adult fantasy", do we? How is Family Guy such a special case that we have to highlight it only six words into the article? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:45, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

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