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The result of the discussion was:delete. The strongest argument either way came from the last sentence of the nomination itself: It's pretty unlikely that someone looking for the Rocky, Michael Corleone, Scarlett O'Hara or Eric Cartman will look it up through fictional catholics. While true, these characters are fictional catholics, that is not what they are known for. And for those characters who religion is the main defining trait, as discussed, there are better categories that can be used. Kbdank7115:35, 3 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Religion is only very very rarely a defining characteristic of fictional characters. For example, Category:Fictional Catholics includes articles which are only marginally related. Sure, Rocky Balboa is a catholic, so is John Abruzzi and so is Adela Corinthos. But that common trait does not make these fictional characters significantly similar. (In fact, for Abruzzi and Rocky, the real common trait is that they are both Italian-Americans. Catholicism is more or less a by-product) We do have Category:Fictional characters by genre which can (and probably should) include something like Category:Christian fiction characters (as a subcat of Category:Christian fiction). Note that we also have Category:Fictional religious workers for vowed people of faith and Category:Fictional saints. Both of these should stay of course. Moreover, fictional characters that have significantly impacted the perception of a particular faith should go in categories such as Category:Christianity in popular culture and other subcats of Category:Religion in popular culture. The categorization guideline says "categories, which serve as classifications, should be the significant (useful) topics to which the subject of the article most closely belongs to as a member, and where users are most likely to look if they can't remember the name of the thing they are trying to look up." It's pretty unlikely that someone looking for the Rocky, Michael Corleone, Scarlett O'Hara or Eric Cartman will look it up through fictional catholics. Pichpich (talk) 17:49, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Confused - you're calling for the deletion of the parent category but not the subcats? Because you're saying that categories for fictional characters of a particular religion are useful, but the parent that gathers them isn't? But then you seem to be saying that the subcats aren't useful either? Otto4711 (talk) 22:21, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, I'm calling for the deletion of the subcategories (should I nominate them separately here?). But I think I understand what in the above explanations had you confused. So let me give it another try sticking solely to the subcategory Category:Fictional Catholics as an example. In short, I propose deleting it. Now some might say "but what about fictional catholic priests?" Well these should be categorized by their occupation, which is way more significant. Most likely, they're in fact already in the proper subcategory of Category:Fictional religious workers. The second objection to the deletion might be that there are a few fictional characters who arguably had a major role in shaping the image of catholics in fiction. I don't know of any, but I suppose they might exist and these could be added to Category:Christianity in popular culture. Finally, there's a lot of Christian literature (in the sense of Christian novels) out there (though it's usually not catholic but you get the idea). These should be categorized through an appropriate genre-related category, i.e. a subcat of Category:Fictional characters by genre. Is that a bit clearer? Pichpich (talk) 22:42, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it is clearer, and yes, you do need to tag each of the subcats but you can simply add them to this nomination rather than doing a separate one. As for the nom, I oppose it. I don't agree with the notion that a religion is a genre and if I were searching out fictional characters of a particular religion the by genre tree would probably never occur to me as a place to look. I think there are plenty of instances where a fictional character's religion is a defining characteristic. Wolfsbane for instance during the early part of her career was tormented by her religious beliefs and her inability to reconcile them with her mutant powers. Margaret White is clearly defined by her religious fanaticism. Categorizing them on this basis strikes me as entirely reasonable. I agree with you that a fictional Catholic priest should be in a fictional clergy category rather than one of these, but that fictional clergy category can then be parented in Category:Fictional Catholics. I am rather strongly opposed to the notion of putting them in the in popular culture tree at all, but I also admit that part of that opposition is based on my general antipathy for the IPC structure and probably 90% of its contents. Otto4711 (talk) 23:23, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think you misread. I'm not suggesting to move the category to a subcat of Fictional characters by genre. I'm saying that characters in Christian novels (and there are probably very few that have articles) should form a subcategory there. Note also that Margaret White is not categorized as a fictional Christian but in fact (and in my mind more correctly) in Category:Fictional characters with mental illness. Pichpich (talk) 23:41, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've added Maggie dear to the fictional Christians category. I guess I'm still confused as to what you hope to acheive by this nom or why the genre category is being brought into it, but I still find the categorization scheme useful and oppose its deletion. Otto4711 (talk) 23:54, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Let me go over the genre thing again. Christian novels form a genre. The main characters are usually Christian (though not exclusively). As it happens, this genre is fairly notable and is routinely the subject of scholarly work. Thus, I think that categorizing fictional characters as fictional characters occurring in that genre would be interesting. That, of course, is a side issue: it has no bearing on whether the nominated categories should or should not be deleted. Still, I thought it was worth mentioning. Pichpich (talk) 02:31, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that the category is large does not mean much. It includes every TV character that belongs to the mafia but I'm positive that there are no articles for individual characters of Graham Greene's novels. As it is being used now, the category is drowning in irrelevant content. Pichpich (talk) 23:41, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment There's an interesting option used for Mormons: Category:Portrayals of Mormons in popular media. Now the advantage here is that the name clearly stresses that the important thing is not the character's faith but rather the fact that the character is being specifically used to portray religion X. Again, my aim here is to delete categories which have grown useless because their scope is not sufficiently restricted. I find it hard to imagine that any scholarly work could be done on Catholics in fiction with its focus on Everybody Loves Raymond characters. By contrast, there is scholarly work done on the evolution of significant Catholic portrayals in fiction (which would exclude, easily, 90% of the current articles in the category). Pichpich (talk) 00:01, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
But don't you think it makes more sense to have these in Category:Portrayals of Mormons in popular media? I think it's way more relevant, precisely because Big Love, for better or worse, has had a considerable impact on the general public's perception of mormons. By contrast, the articles on Cypher (comics) and Ben Hollander don't even say a word about the character's faith. The last one in the category which isn't a Big Love character is Seldom Seen Smith and from what I understand of the article, he's not even an actual member of that faith. Pichpich (talk) 03:03, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: SSS is a Jack Mormon, I believe, which can be a Latter Day Saint of dubious "faithfulness" to the religion, but a Latter Day Saint nonetheless. To me this seems like a simple matter of the "defining-ness" of a category. Simply stated, the nominator's rationale appears to be that the categories are being applied to fictional persons for whom religious status is not defining. If this is the case, the answer to me then seems to be to manage the categories better and weed out those for whom it is not defining. Yes, it's a pain to do so, but to me it's a better solution than scrapping the entire idea outright. Good Ol’factory(talk)23:24, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I just ran an interesting test on the first 50 or so articles in Category:Fictional Catholics. As in turns out, in over 75% of the cases, the word Catholic doesn't even appear in the article. And the remaining 25% includes mostly fictional Catholic priests. This category is being used to classify characters through a completely tangential part of their story. Pichpich (talk) 03:29, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom. A problem with many of these groupings is determining if the characteristic is in fact defining and or notable. A category like Category:Portrayals of Mormons in popular media could be a better choice is some aspects, but if does not address the notability problems. Given that there is no verifiability that we have for being in a category, classification can be abused as it likely is in some based on the research done by Pichpich. Vegaswikian (talk) 02:57, 26 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On the other hand, it's safe to say that the religion of fictional characters is almost always unimportant. Like I said above, in the rare cases where this is truly a central focus, it would be best to stress this through something like Portrayal of members of religion X. The current content of the category is in my mind undeniably trivial and those in favor of keeping these categories have not addressed that problem. Pichpich (talk) 14:20, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Comment. Most bots cannot handle categories populated by templates. Wikipedia search, AfD, etc., can't handle it because the category should be in <includeonly> tags, and so is not directly associated with the category. — Arthur Rubin | (talk)21:45, 26 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Since American can describe the nationality of players, and/or the type of football being played, I think these categories should be renamed. Renaming the first one in the list would make it match all of its current member articles. Renaming the other two would follow as a logical extension up the category tree. Neier (talk) 13:18, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - There may be amateur players who meet the notability requirements and who are notable for playing the sport who are currently in this tree without playing professionally. Tim Tebow is one example, even though his status will change soon after the NFL season starts. The discussion about whether to split the category by professional and amateur should be taken up elsewhere. Neier (talk) 22:52, 26 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Category:Football (soccer) players by country[edit]
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Strong oppose - I understand that a soccer player for example could be a French national, but play for Germany if his grandfather or grandmother was born in Germany. A soccer player's nationality is not necessarily the country they play for. See Mark Lawrenson and Frédéric Kanouté. 172.206.99.72 (talk) 19:04, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - There are likely to be amateur players who meet the notability requirements (Olympics, etc) who are currently in this tree without playing professionally. The discussion about whether to split the category by professional and amateur should be taken up elsewhere. Neier (talk) 22:45, 26 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Rename if - As long as we're talking about our Solar System, which we homo-centristically named, we should be first caps per nom. My perusal of the category suggests that we are talking about "our" Solar System, so the proper name is proper, I believe. --Lquilter (talk) 15:43, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Nominator's rationale:Rename. The category lists municipalities from the Jura department in France and not, e.g. communes of the Swiss Canton of Jura. As the current name is too generic, I suggest renaming it to "Communes of the Jura department". -- User:Docu
Maybe instead a disambiguation bracket such as "Communes of Jura (French départment)"? I guess the main article Communes of the Jura deparment would also need renaming to Communes of Jura (French départment). (Suggest using『départment』with the e-acute as "department" pretty general - there was a French department at my school.) Otherwise I wonder if the "the" is needed in "Communes of the [somewhere] department". Sardanaphalus (talk) 12:16, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some time ago all articles with『département』in the title were changed to "department". The above proposal has the advantage that it's consistent with the main article's title (Communes of the Jura department). -- User:Docu
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Nominator's rationale:Delete - overcategorization for a toy line. The articles about individual doll characters are already in the subcat and anything else can appropriately be linked through the main article. Otto4711 (talk) 01:18, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Appreciate it's currently underpopulated but I believe that's due to the fledgling status of the articles to which the category relates and the underlying subject is ripe for expansion. It's not just a toy line, it's a comicbook series too, one that was highly popular in Europe in the 1980s and early 1990s. Moreover, the G.I. Joe series (to which this is related), has an established category that has obvious synergies. With the G.I Joe movie coming out next year the whole worldwide scope of G.I. Joe and therefore Action Force may became more high profile. Indeed, Action Force has undergone a partial revival already in the G.I. Joe universe. Finally, while other categories (in toys and comicbooks) might attach to this field, at least Action Force is specific and isolates those characters, and sub-groups within one single theme and is specific. Dick G (talk) 07:57, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If there is suddenly an explosion of Action Force-related articles that can't be appropriately interlinked through the main article and the comprehensive template, then there is no bar to re-creating the category. We should not keep the category based on the possibility that it might someday have more stuff in it. Otto4711 (talk) 17:30, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Nominator's rationale:Delete - not a defining characteristic of the shows so categorized. The list in the main article more than suffices for those interested in the information. Otto4711 (talk) 01:03, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete yikes, posthaste. Categorizing things by the libraries, archives, and museums that hold them, digitize them, or display them, is bad, bad, bad. Seriously. Let's just imagine Harry Potter for one moment. --Lquilter (talk) 15:41, 24 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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