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In my opinion, this page provides more service than merely to remove ambiguity from the term "mock combat". This page gives examples of different types of mock combat, which can help the reader compare and contrast familiar forms vs. unfamiliar forms of mock combat.
Most disambiguation pages serve merely to remove ambiguity from among articles with similar names but having little or no relationship to each other, such as a list notable people in diverse fields who just so happen to have very similar names.
This article is just the opposite, and for two reasons:
Instead of referencing other articles with very similar names (and therefore easily confused with each other), it references other articles which have very dissimilar names.
Instead of referencing other articles with perhaps no relationship to each other (aside from easily confused names), it references other articles which are all similar forms of "mock combat".
How I stumbled upon this page was in seeing that a wikilink to it had been deleted from Professional wrestling, which happens to be on my watchlist. The edit summary was "Repairing link to disambiguation page". (Personally, I didn't consider "repairing" a link as possibly including "deleting" the link altogether. That would be like a doctor saying "I cured the patient" after having euthanized him. Yes, problem solved, but hardly a repair in my opinion.) So I was curious as to what was repaired and why that repair was needed.
Reading this mock combat article was informative, because I could see relationships (i.e., choreographed vs. unchoreographed) between several forms of mock combat with which I was familiar. The page also enlightened me to other forms of which I was completely unaware. I found that information helpful, and I would rather not see the helpful link to this page remain deleted from Professional wrestling.
I suggest the following:
Remove the "disambig" tag from this page, so that it is no longer considered a disambiguation page.
Add to the top of this page a brief overall definition of the term "mock combat".
InProfessional wrestling, add back the wikilink to this article, and do likewise to any other deleted wikilinks to this article.
I could do most of the above myself, but I prefer to defer to others who are directly involved in the Disambiguation pages with links project. Those project participants may already have considered the above issues and may have good reasons of which I am unaware.
Furthermore, there may be a significant number of other disambiguation pages which, likewise, do not remove ambiguity from among similarly-named articles. So if the above suggestions are adopted, then similar revisions would be necessary regarding those other disambiguation pages as well.
More information: The first sentence of Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links reads,『Disambiguation pages exist to clarify confusion in which two or more similarly named articles exist – for example, if two famous people have the same name.』 Obviously, this article does not meet that criterion. I am now inclined to remove the "disambig" tag myself, and to restore the wikilink in Professional wrestling. However, there may be other "repairs" that will also need to be undone. Before I embark on this task, I wanted to give any interested editors a chance to voice their opinions. Please advise. Thanks. --Art Smart (talk) 16:37, 22 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
After Abtract concurred by removing the "disambig" tag, I thought that was a good opportunity to add an "SIA" tag in its place, per Russ's suggestion, above. Unfortunately, the SIA tag results in the following notice: "This set index article page lists articles that share the same (or similar) name." No similarity in the names, but that's another matter. --Art Smart (talk) 00:47, 23 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I made it a disambiguation page just so there is something to put at the top of Category:Mock combat. If you want to turn it into a full article, by all means feel free. I suppose it will be a WP:SS article roughly along the lines of the links already listed. dab(𒁳)11:25, 23 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I removed the "SIA" tag from the article per the above discussion. I think a concise definition at the top of the article would be useful. I searched Google using "mock combat" -wikipedia, which turns up lots of info I don't have time right now to search. Anyone have a nice concise definition we could use? Please advise, anyone. Thanks. --Art Smart (talk) 03:33, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How about: "Mock combat is the enactment of combat or combative actions without intent to harm. It is practiced for ritual, training, or performance." A potential problem is that the most concise definition would also cover things such as military simulation (war games), but everything currently listed on the page is about face-to-face fighting. Do war games fall under mock combat? (Also, there's probably a better verb that could be used. 'Enactment' might be better if replaced with 'imitation'. Enactment links to a legislative term, but I feel imitation has connotations of inferiority, maybe...?)
