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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Merge back to the main article. Specifically, I find consensus below for a small sample of the comments to be included in the main article as examples, with all of them being added to Wikiquote (if they are not already there). Those arguing for the retention of the quotes did so largely due to their being potentially useful as a historic record, but did not address how they have encyclopaedic notability beyond there being other examples of lengthy lists of quotes on Wikipedia (a WP:OTHERSTUFF argument). The prose elements of this article should be merged back into the main article's aftermath section (something explicitly or implicitly recommended by most "delete" voters as well). There is nothing in this AfD that would preclude a separate, prose-based Aftermath of the 2016 Nice attack article if the main article needs to be split on size grounds. Thryduulf (talk) 12:06, 24 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Reactions to the 2016 Nice attack[edit]

Reactions to the 2016 Nice attack (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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Violates WP:INDISCRIMINATE and WP:NOTNEWS. Bloated and unmanageable WP:COATRACK collection of predictable and non-noteworthy responses, created less than 10 hours after the main article was created. These "Reactions to [tragedy du jour]" articles have got to stop, in my opinion. Softlavender (talk) 19:49, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS is not a valid AfD argument. Softlavender (talk) 19:59, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Please look at the "Keep" arguments in the other AfD discussions and say how they don't apply to this one. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:00, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, first the article has WP:POTENTIAL as I have shown below, a rename should be in order. Aside from that there is WP:GNG which these quotes would pass. Given that WP:AFDNOTCLEANUP this article should be expanded, and improved from its current state just as the others have. (Example: Before [1], and After [2]) - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:26, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
It has potential to store more quotes. So does my scrapbook. Which at this rate will soon be getting its own article. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 02:37, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree there are only so many countries out there, it has potential to have things added in prose which editors already have. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:10, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Im wondering if a WP:PRECEDENT is by now established. Yes every article is different but the same arguments are being used over and over when it comes to these types of articles. Can the article be expanded? Yes, retitle it to Reactions to the 2016 Nice attack, there are bound to be for example new terrorism protocols put into place. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:58, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep A universal consensus is being observed for condemnation of terrorism. One may see the censure made by countries and total number of countries of this globe, so the voice of different countries to a platform by their reaction must be catered for. Nannadeem (talk) 20:10, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
"so the voice of different countries to a platform by their reaction must be catered for". What? Since when does Wikipedia cater to anyone or anything? And since when is "condemnation of terrorism" anything new, unusual, or noteworthy? Softlavender (talk) 09:41, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The international community was unanimous in its condemnation to the attack, and expressed sympathy for the victims". Fewer than 20 words, and not too difficult to find a decent source for. Hardly justifies a stand-alone article.

    If you had significant numbers of world leaders saying "he should have gone faster" or "it was six of one and half a dozen of the other", then yes, a stand-alone article would be perfectly understandable. But for straightforward if high-profile situations like this, Wikiquote is the place to go if the quotations are as important as is argued. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 02:37, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Weak delete I agree that the mass of quotes is of little encyclopedic value, and am tentatively persuaded that notable reactions and aftermath will fit in the main article. FourViolas (talk) 16:18, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your introspection and humility, Four. I'm just an IP, but it appears to me that it's just the platitudenous reaction to the tragedy du jour. Thoughts and prayers. Outrage. Blah blah blah. But I'm just an IP and will remain so, so I don't have a vote. (But I have a voice.) 71.184.228.118 (talk) 05:01, 18 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • The fact that a terrorist attack has achieved global attention is notable, and deserves a prominent mention in the attack's article. Whether the content of that reaction warrants a stand-alone article depends on the diversity of the comments. Can any of the comments on this page be summarised as anything other than "this is terrible. Our deepest sympathies to the victims and their families."? StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 03:34, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Condense and merge back into the article in a section entitled "aftermath". It is unclear why this content was separated from the original article. Certainly having removed the content, editors are quite happy to have images added to the original attack article which are only related to the content forked off here. Although developments are hard to predict, I envisage the attack article being not very dissimilar from the article on the November 2015 Paris attacks, which has a long but terse section on the aftermath. There are significant differences, but I would expect a similar format to evolve as events unfold. Mathsci (talk) 21:58, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Condense and merge with 2016 Nice attack per WP:NOTNEWS. Most of the article consists of sound bites that are mere political rhetoric and of no great importance to the article in terms of the events or its investigation. The content can easily be pruned, and that which is relevant merged back to the parent article. Either way, a merger is unlikely to cause a breach of WP:SIZE. -- Ohc ¡digame! 22:19, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Trim heavily and merge back to the main article, per WP:INDISCRIMINATE and WP:NOTNEWS as explained above. ansh666 22:22, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
When you say "encyclopedia" by whose standards are you going by? By Wikipedia's standards. Softlavender (talk) 23:48, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. This article was created for one reason and one reason alone. Nobody had to guts to trim the section in the first place. The only possible justification for such an article is if there is a reason why we need to be comprehensive in our coverage of international reaction (i.e. do it for the whole world, which might be understandable when there is disagreement but not where there is consensus). We should instead aim to be representative – give a representative sample of the scale and extent of reaction from across the geopolitical spectrum. This can be achieved within the existing article.

    If we are aiming to be comprehensive, I will seek to counter systemic bias by ensuring that the views of the dozens of countries we routinely ignore are for once given appropriate weight. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 22:45, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Well, actually I created it because User:InedibleHulk had done so, User:Mardus objected, and I (not being aware of this longstanding debate) thought such subpages were a more or less standard solution. FourViolas (talk) 23:02, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Burn them all This and similar articles are mostly filled with hot air, and are generally kept because the other ones weren't deleted. It's not a vicious cycle, but it's a silly cycle. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:08, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete None of these "reactions" have been particularity noteworthy. These are just statements from whatever head of states that can be found. How much value does a list of dozens of pretty flags bring when its content can be summarized as "Several international organizations and heads of state have expressed their condolences for the attack."? In the coming weeks, we can summarize actual action that has taken place in an "Aftermath" section.
Many similar articles made over the years should also be reexamined and dealt with. First off, for the first two "examples" listed above that I guess are somehow supposed to show widespread consensus are misleading. The first Norway nomination has several "delete" and "merges" and the second one shouldn't have been labeled a "Snow Keep" since there were valid deleted opinions. The Orlando nomination closed as no consensus. There does not seem to be any sort of precedent or widespread consensus to keep these type of articles at this time. ZN3ukct (talk) 23:43, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • That explains why the history should be retained should consensus be to keep or merge - that's a condition of the CC BY-SA 3.0 attribution licence and therefore mandatory for all content on this site. It does not explain why we should keep or merge the article in the first place. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 03:30, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Snow keep. This is an editing dispute, not a deletion dispute. Even if the page is eventually merged there's no need to delete this page and its history, it can simply be redirected back to the main article. And there's no sense in keeping this discussion open for a whole week either. It's clear from many previous discussions that the page won't be deleted. Do we really have to go through this process every time? Cmeiqnj (talk) 03:40, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
That makes no sense. Of course this is a deletion dispute. Many people believe this article should not exist, and have given extensive policy-based reasons why not. You recognize that yourself by your acknowledgement that it could or should be merged. If you want to !vote "Merge" then do so. For more information on how AfD works and what the possible outcomes or !votes can be, see WP:DISCUSSAFD. -- Softlavender (talk) 08:11, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Actually Nannadeem's so-called rationale was pretty much gibberish and didn't make much sense, at least not to me. Lugnuts, since you are native speaker of English, can you clarify your precise rationale? Softlavender (talk) 13:36, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Prior to negating my observation, please read the Definitions of terrorism. Nannadeem (talk) 07:21, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question I am indifferent as to the fate of this article. I wonder though, what will be left of it once all the inappropriate quotations are removed? Do those arguing to keep it still think it will be worth keeping? --John (talk) 11:21, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
IMO: the platitudes should be cut to what secondary sources say, something like Wow, literally everyone from the King of the Netherlands to Hezbollah issued statements condemning the attack and expressing sympathy, with none opposed or abstaining. Details on notable and non-routine responses, such as ISIS's shifty claims, public debate over video surveillance and the state of emergency, saber-rattling and analysis, etc., can be treated as concise prose. FourViolas (talk) 12:30, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
All of which can obviously fit easily into 2016 Nice attacks, and should go there instead. If it were kept, this coatracky article, even if trimmed, would always still be a nightmare babysitting job because people will keep adding to it no matter how many times it is trimmed. Softlavender (talk) 13:11, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Peru is still sitting this one out. Just saying. InedibleHulk (talk) 15:11, 16 July 2016 (UTC) [reply]
Terrorists. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 16:09, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
So I hear. FourViolas (talk) 16:18, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Either that, or they're waiting to swoop in and save the day at the last minute. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:58, 17 July 2016 (UTC) [reply]
Turns out they're good guys. Phew! InedibleHulk (talk) 18:28, 20 July 2016 (UTC) [reply]
  • Merge and Redirect to main article but trim to the most relevant and prominent quotes. This should be done for all these kinds of "Reactions to ..." type articles. This shouldn't become a class of article on its own. There will always be reactions to every major event. If this precedent continues, every major event will always be inherently two articles instead of one. -- œ™ 11:59, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Trim and Merge - We do not want to have two articles for every single major event... Ceosad (talk) 12:44, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete along with all other similar "articles". A random collection of predictable statements with no encyclopedic value whatsoever. This isn't Facebook. User2534 (talk) 13:19, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
As stated before, these articles still "only" contain about 50 random countries. So those in favour of these articles have a job to do lest it be seen as there's almost 150 possibly terror-supporting countries in the world. User2534 (talk) 13:53, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 14:34, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of News media-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 14:34, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Terrorism-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 14:34, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of France-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 14:34, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete As I have argued elsewhere, we don't need to inventory the generic "thoughts and prayers" comments produced by every world leader in response to events like this. I can't imagine anyone actually consulting this page because they need to know the exact wording of the president of Finland's condemnation of this attack. If President Niinistö had come out and condoned it (which doesn't sound like him), that might be worth mentioning, but failing that, it's not. Tigercompanion25 (talk) 16:00, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, since we have a lot of these articles, and they're usually fashioned into something constructive once the editing slows down. This is Paul (talk) 16:32, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Why exactly would it be "very bloated and long otherwise"? Please enlighten me. Parsley Man (talk) 04:07, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Well take a look at Reactions to the November 2015 Paris attacks, someone tried in vain to copy all of the info in the article over to November 2015 Paris attacks and as a result the latter page is over half filled with the "aftermath" section bloating the article beyond 130kb. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:13, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep – It is important that an encyclopedic record is kept of reactions by elected world leaders to these events. While reactions to these continuous terrorist attacks may seem predictable, history shows that international reactions to world events can help shape the domino effect of decisions taken by those world leaders, for example, whether to go to war or not, peace, the forming of alliances, political elections, public reactions such as protests, etc. Wikipedia needs to keep up with the modern day environment where reactions can be delivered by governments within hours if not minutes. Just because we didn't have this in the past doesn't mean we scrap it. IrishSpook (talk) 22:50, 16 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think you and many others misunderstand the difference between Wikipedia and the Wikimedia umbrella. No one is suggesting that there is zero value in collating reactions to historic events. Plenty are suggesting that a collection of quotes belongs on a Wikimedia site dedicated to the collection of quotes; a representative sample of which should be used within the main article to give the reader a representative sample of what has been said and the opportunity to visit the Wikiquote page if so inclined. Of historical significance? Debateably. Of encyclopaedic merit? Unambiguously not. A closing admin – regardless of the final action they take or recommend when evaluating consensus, would need to take this into account in their closing rationale. Thus it would help your cause to explain why I'm wrong. StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 13:42, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep – As this emphasizes the extensive political reaction from important leaders. Though some sections have way too many reactions from different leaders in one country, it should be kept. Both the Orlando and Paris attacks have their own reaction page, I don't see why this page should be deleted. The issue has received extensive media coverage and has once again directed attention towards` France. De88 (talk) 04:27, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. It's all so totally predictable and repetitive, almost exactly the same for every recent Western (e.g. not Iraq, whose recent 300-dead bombing apparently did not deserve a reactions article) tragedy. Why not just create an article Standard reactions to a Western tragedy and link to that every time? — Rwxrwxrwx (talk) 07:52, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Rwxrwxrwx: We do have WP:REACTIONS. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 01:05, 18 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
That's sarcastic, but seriously not a bad idea. InedibleHulk (talk) 18:29, 20 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Can we keep WP:CIVIL in place? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:10, 17 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep I was on the fence about this AfD ever since the article was nominated. However, due to the enormous amount of reactions, especially internationally, the standalone article is necessary. -- LuK3 (Talk) 00:40, 18 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. If the sources write about it, and editors document it, then it needs to be preserved. Wikipedia wants to make "the sum total of all human knowledge" available to everyone, not just the stuff so-and-so thinks is interesting enough to bother with. If enough people didn't write this stuff, we would never have needed a separate article, but since they do, we most assuredly need an out of the way place to stuff it. Wnt (talk) 13:47, 18 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep There is an article in French Wikipedia and it is too much for the main article (2016 Nice attack), so I do not think that deletion is right. It just needs more authorities and personalties' reactions. --Humberto del Torrejón (talk) 00:46, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Can we stop the WP:POINTy nominations every time one of these comes up? There's never been any consensus to delete them, and I don't see that changing any time soon. Keep it and stop with these nominations. It's just wasting everyone's time. Ample reasons have been presented here and elsewhere for a standalone article. You're not getting anywhere with these deletion nominations. It's not going to change. Stop. Smartyllama (talk) 16:43, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Keep per WP:RAPID There are a number of substantive reactions beyond the boilerplate condemnations and condolences such as cancellations, impact on financial markets, deployment of security personal and emergency plans, some criticism over security policy, ect. That being said, the reactions are not nearly as numerous or substantive as those listed in other reaction articles such as Reactions to the November 2015 Paris attacks. I believe it would be desirable to discuss whether a merge should occur in a few months, but doing this less than a week after the attack is pointless since coverage is still occurring and the more substantive reactions tend to occur after the boilerplate condolences. Spirit of Eagle (talk) 23:27, 20 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, which says not to have excessive listings. This is needless repetition of the same basic "this was a horrible event" message. Nothing particularly noteworthy about that. WP:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a newspaper also notes that being mentioned in the news doesn't necessarily warrant inclusion within articles. Snuggums (talk / edits) 02:44, 21 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't say that, it says: "Long and sprawling lists of statistics may be confusing to readers and reduce the readability and neatness of the articles." You are taking the policy and interpreting it. As for WP:NOTNEWS this cant be considered routine coverage. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:13, 21 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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