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Allegations of Chinese apartheid

Allegations of Chinese apartheid (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (restore|cache|AfD)

This article and related articles has been subject to intense content disputes, replete with accusations, personal attacks, etc. It was nominated for deletion at 01:29, 1 August 2007 (UTC), and the nomination attracted at least as much controversy and discussion as the article itself.

^demon (who takes curious pride in deleting rather than creating things on Misplaced Pages) closed the nomination at a point where there were - by my rough count - 59 who wanted it deleted, and 45 who wanted it kept. Others counts showed slightly different results. demon justified the closure by determining that "consensus" was the side of the argument he/she found most persuasive, and later on his/her talk page that "It happens with every controversial AfD such as this, and nobody can deny it. I decided to read the debate, and close it, before any "impartial" admin could come in and pass judgment." It was also closed two days before the usual time had expired.

Clearly, there was no basis for consensus, and the closing admin misconstrued his/her role to be that of a judge in content disputes.

I'm not even going to get into the very tired content dispute here, but it's hard to see how anyone can back this deletion. --Leifern 02:08, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: Without any comment to the technical merits, the above nomination makes many assumptions of bad faith. I urge the nominator to re-write it without the insinuations or step back and ask someone else to write a DRV case for the article, a subject this controversial deserves better. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:23, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I have no opinion about the admin's motivations for closing, as the presented reasoning makes little sense. But I can go by what he/she wrote for the reasons. --Leifern 02:40, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Comment. I endorsed the deletion, as I would have done it myself had ^demon not beat me by a few minutes. If his reasoning isn't sufficient, use mine. --Hemlock Martinis 02:35, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

• I note that Leifern attempted to delete your endorsement/co-closure. An extraordinary thing to do, and completely inappropriate. -- ChrisO 07:26, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

• Chris, I don't think it is particularly appropriate for one person to publicize their own opinion at the top of a high-traffic page which is not supposed to be edited. There were many admins opposing the deletion, and evidently none of them decided to express their disapproval. The additional "endorsement" gives extra support to a controversial action, creating the illusion that demon had widespread support of respected administrators, while dissenting editors were by custom not permitted to express their own opinions. I don't blame Hemlock Martinis as it sounds like the endorsement was made in good faith (i.e., to avoid a messy DRV), but it is borderline propaganda whether intentional or not. --xDanielx 07:58, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

It wasn't made to avoid a messy DRV, it was made because he was simultaneously closing it and edit conflicted with the actual closer. It is unusual, but hardly a problem. Viridae 08:02, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

• Endorse; nominator doesn't explain why demon's reading of the debate is incorrect. The normal time, 5 days, does appear to have expired. Christopher Parham (talk) 03:54, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Overturn per Leifern. There was no consensus to delete, not even close. As for the above comment about "reading of the debate", I think it's very simple, there was no consensus. There was no basis for discounting any arguments of the "keep" side, so I don't see how this complies with policy. 6SJ7 04:28, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse the accusation of premature closure is clearly inaccurate; accusing the closing admin of "taking curious pride in deleting rather than creating things" have crossed the line on personal attack, IMHO. The decision taken accurately summarised the mood and arguments of the debate, and the application of wiki policies that basically the article was in breach of WP:SYN. So who cares if the votes were "nearly tied"? AfD is not a vote. Ohconfucius 04:43, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse - it's clear there's a more general issue here, but I do not find the closure unreasonable, given the ability admins have allowed to determine what consensus is in this case. --Haemo 04:46, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Overturn This is one of the easier calls I've seen. A clear majority of editors put forth cogent arguments that the article should stay. demon's reasoning for closing is--literally--incomprehensible. That a later editor added an opinion (which was merely a loosely reasoned assertion, rather than an argument) after the AfD had closed is irrelevant. If AfD's are to be decided by random admins who appear to lack experience actually writing articles (correct me if I'm wrong on that), let's have that be the policy. If not, not. IronDuke 04:57, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• This goes for both IronDuke and Leifern: If you have a problem with ^demon's position as an administrator, please take it up with him on his talk page. DRV is NOT the place to be sniping at the closing administrator for perceived bias because they choose to be involved in closing deletion debates. Viridae 05:52, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually this is exactly the place, nobody has a problem with Demon choosing "to be involved in closing deletion debates", but people do have a problem when he uses powers he is not supposed to possess then takes it upon himself to judge which side he thinks is "better".- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 07:24, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually this is not the place. DRV has no power over user conduct beyond the deletion debate in question. If you feel there's a larger problem at work here, an RfC is the best way to handle it. --Hemlock Martinis 07:28, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Nobody said it does, but it should be fairly obvious that the conduct goes to why the deletion should be overturned. Nobody is attempting to use DR to get demon sanctioned.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 07:33, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

"^demon (who takes curious pride in deleting rather than creating things on Misplaced Pages)" - Leifern and "If AfD's are to be decided by random admins who appear to lack experience actually writing articles" - IronDuke. Both of those people took shots at ^demoon's overall position as an administrator, which is immaterial to this deletion unless there are allegations of gross administrative misconduct. Viridae 07:48, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

• Endorse That was a good thoughtful close of a tough afd. ^demon used his administrative discretion to determine the consensus on the issues of policy rather than counting the votes. Viridae 06:03, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse. Close was explicitly reasoned, and unlike the American apartheid article, there is no credible claim of a conflict of interest. Cool Hand Luke 07:16, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Overturn, I really don't have any problem with the vast majority of administrators, but this situation is just one more example of an admin that has either forgotten or just never knew that they are not supposed to have any more power that any other run-of-the-mill wikipedia editor, they just possess a couple more tools to help wikipedia maintain order. Demon seems to believe that he is supposed to be some kind of judge.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 07:17, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse per Viridae. I closed the AfD for Allegations of American apartheid on virtually identical grounds, and I agree with Viridae's comments above. Admins are not robots; we're supposed to close AfDs on the basis of policy arguments, not headcounts, and policy trumps consensus. I should also note that Hemlock Martinis effectively co-closed the AfD with the same reasoning (he and ^demon closed simultaneously and got into an edit conflict in doing so). This accidental but fortuitous circumstance makes it clear that ^demon's decision wasn't an arbitrary personal choice but a policy-based decision which two admins simultaneously and independently reached. As for Moshe's comment: yes, admins are "some kind of judge" - judges of policy. That's why we close AfDs. -- ChrisO 07:19, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually this "policy" you are so fond of quoting states just what I wrote, administrators do not have any more power than other wikipedia editors. Maybe if you understood that you would stop making inappropriate "judgements" which you have no power to make. In fact this whole situation can be thrown in with many of your own recent actions to show exactly why admins should not be "judges".- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 07:27, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Please go and read Misplaced Pages:Deletion guidelines for administrators#Rough consensus. I'd like to draw your attention to this line in particular (emphasis added): "Note also that the three key policies, which warrant that articles and information be verifiable, avoid being original research, and be written from a neutral point of view are held to be non-negotiable, and cannot be superseded by any other guidelines or by editors' consensus. A closing admin must determine whether any article violates these policies, and where it is very unlikely that an article on the topic can exist without breaching these three policies, these policies must be respected above other opinions.". ^demon and Hemlock (and myself, in that earlier AfD) have quite properly followed this rule. -- ChrisO 07:36, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I might also add that I think the hostility being shown by Leifern, IronDuke and Moshe is inappropriate and unhelpful. Like it or not, the community has delegated responsibility to admins to close difficult AfDs. By all means disagree with our decisions and tell us if you think we get things wrong, but please don't cast aspersions on our integrity. -- ChrisO 08:03, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

ChrisO, you would be the last person to teach others about "integrity". ←Humus sapiens 08:07, 7 August 2007 (UTC)