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User:Robofish/Thoughts on inclusionism and deletionism

This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

Originally taken from User talk:FeydHuxtable/AfD is not a war zone.

Thoughts on this essay[edit]

This is a good essay, and should hopefully do something to cool down the hot tempers at AfD; but I worry that in a way, while trying to defuse the 'inclusionist-deletionist conflict', it is in its own way perpetuating it. While this essay states 'AfD is not a war zone', from the way it describes it, one gets the sense that AfD is a war zone, a neverending war between two diametrically opposing fronts. I admit it can feel that way at times, but I don't think it's helpful to think about things in this way. This is a bit of a truism, but part of the reason the 'battleground approach' to AfD persists is because so many people think it is one.

I think we need to move away from labels like 'inclusionist' and 'deletionist' entirely. Those descriptions don't help anyone; they give the impression of a conflict based on ideology, rather than evidence and reasoned argument. In my view, calling someone a 'deletionist' or 'inclusionist' (unless they have self-described as such) is a failure to assume good faith, as it implies they are arguing for their position for grand wikipolitical reasons rather than because of a careful consideration of the article in question. Of course, sometimes that is the case, but telling people so isn't likely to improve matters.

It's worth remembering that the vast majority of editors participating at AfD are not part of any formal 'inclusionist' or 'deletionist' groups, and probably can't be fitted into any simple category; any given editor will want to delete some articles and keep others, but exactly which articles differs from one editor to another, and very few indeed subscribe to a strict creed like 'all articles on fictional subjects must be deleted!' or 'all articles on real things must be kept!'. Most of us aren't part of any 'inclusionist-deletionist war', and have no wish to be.

AfD (and the other deletion discussion pages) should not be characterised as a war, but as a series of evidence-based discussions over what is best for the encyclopaedia. (That is always what is most important, and some editors would do well to keep it in mind.) If this view was more widely adopted, then surely the stress level at AfD would fall, and it would be a better editing environment for everyone.

In the meantime, editors who see themselves as inclusionists or deletionists - or worse, describe others as such - should take a good look at themselves, and ask: am I here to fight a war, or am I here to improve the encyclopaedia? Robofish (talk) 23:21, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Hi, it was good to read your thoughts, interesting perspective. I started the essay as Id become aware of an RFC that had arisen out of the AfD conflict, where several were calling for a very excellent and veteran editor to be perma – banned! So youre right, a premise of the essay is that AfD is actually a war zone for some. Its aimed not at the moderate and neutral like your good self but at those who do see AfD as a kind of battle- in the hope that if both extremes could recognise that their counterparts have the good of the encyclopaedia in mind , in might reduce some hostility.

I personally find the words inclusionists & deletionists useful descriptive terms- I think the hostility would still be there if we stopped using them, and might even be worse at it would be more formless. But thats just me. Please modify the essay if you like and youd be welcome to move it to your own user space if youre interested in progressing it to a mainspace essay. FeydHuxtable (talk) 20:38, 25 November 2009 (UTC)