Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Jewish superheroes

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 of the debate was keep. bainer (talk) 12:01, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] List of Jewish superheroes

Listcruft, too vauge also, how could you tell if the superhero is Jewish anyways, I dont trust the sources as they are geocitys etc and without substantial proof,Delete --Aranda ⁵⁶) 03:44, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep - I don't see the harm in it. Its not going to be an overly large list, since superheroes are not typically Jewish, and it is somewhat rare. As for the issues about proof, I think that that can be dealt with by citing sources and using other standard wikipolicies. Zordrac (talk) Wishy Washy Darwikinian Eventualist 03:55, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete short of hard proof that any of them actually exist. -Splash^talk 04:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep per Zordrac -Meegs 04:26, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • It is only reasonably to say that it "can be dealt with by citing sources" if such sources can be and are found. Geocities webpages aren't authoritative enough for me, by a long way. WP:RS, 'n all. -Splash^talk 04:31, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
    • I don't know much about any of these comics, but looking that the wp pages for the characters, it seems that for some of them, their religion is well established in the comics. For such characters, the comics themselves is a sufficient source (the whole series, no specific citation required). I do agree that many others, maybe exactly those whose WP articles don't reference the character being jewish, require sourcing (though possibly in the character's own page instead of the list). Nevertheless, the article itself is a good idea - and the list will be small and maintainable. As Zordrac mentions, there are other procedures to deal with articles that require verification. The history of the page shows a lot of interest in the topic, and indicates to me that the page will likely be improved, not just expanded. -Meegs 05:54, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
      • None of the heroes listed here are contentious. I don't have access to individual issues to be able to source any of them, but they can be sourced with reference to the actual texts. Steve block talk 10:40, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• Weak keep, IFF it is sourced. User:Zoe|^(talk) 04:49, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • I looked at the links in the article and three of the links I dont trust as they just accpeted any users opinion on whos a jewish superhero and whos not and the imdb link is irrelavent so its not properly sourced as I see it --Aranda ⁵⁶) 05:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure. Although I thought this was the one "List of Jewish people" that struck me as basically silly(unlike the ones that have actually been deleted which at worst were overly specific) if there are similar lists for other groups it should stay. There apparently is a List of black superheroes. Plus people who come to Wikipedia I think tend to be disproportionately dorky. (I am on the dorky side myself, though not about comics) Knowing which superhero was Jewish, African-American, gay, etc seems important to many dorky people. Cutting this list out might be slighting a group, I mean "the dorkish" not Jewish people, who have contributed a great deal to Wikipedia.--T. Anthony 05:32, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

We don't 'give out' sympathy to low standards articles as a reward for contributing. Knowing whether a superhero is black or not requires determining what colour the ink on the paper is, without need for any sources probably. Determining any of the things you mention, including Jewishness, requires proof beyond a Geocities page. We should not compromise our standards of verifiabily sourced articles for fear of a peculiar kind of offence of upsetting cartoon characters or those who like them. -Splash^talk 05:39, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Well my statement was not entirely serious as should have been in least somewhat clear. Although I was thinking that as this might be interesting enough to users who would come here deletion might become a waste of time as someone would try to recreate a list like this in short order. Although looking it up that interest is rather more minor then I may have thought.[1] So essentially I'd actually lean to delete. However there are a few comic characters I know of where they did have them say they were Jewish, or Christian or Armenian or whatever, explicitly. Possibly if limited to those cases, with the comic and page number cited, that'd be acceptable.--T. Anthony 05:49, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep. Encyclopedic. --Arcadian 05:56, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. I agree that the article is a little silly and somewhat inaccurate, but it is definitely encyclopedic. I'm voting to keep it. If you think the article is inaccurate then you should make a case for improving it. Deleting articles just because they are inaccurate is not a good idea. Aucaman 07:35, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• All those of you saying that it can be verified and the like: please do put your edits where your opinions are... -Splash^talk 07:38, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Listcruft. I hate listcruft. Reyk 08:02, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete for omitting the Diceman. Keep, pending cleanup and citation of reliable sources. — FREAK OF NUR_xTURE (TALK) 08:25, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Merge! to List of fictitious Jews. Why didn't I think of that before? — FREAK OF NUR_xTURE (TALK) 08:49, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
    • I go with that then Merge. (That said it should still be limited to comic characters where you can verify they are Jewish. As in the character said it and it was consistent. Arthur (The Tick), in least in the animated series, and the main character in Maus are the examples popping in my head at the moment. Although I imagine there are others.--T. Anthony 11:14, 4 December 2005 (UTC))
      • Comment You can't put Art Spiegelman's dad in a list of fictitious jews. That said, I agree with the Merge if done correctly. Steve block talk 14:34, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
        • Oops! I guess I was thinking the mice, weren't they supposed to in least represent Jewish people? To be honest I don't much like that name List of fictitious Jews, but I'm a Gentile/Goy so what do I know about it? Are there many other lists that use the word "fictitious" though?(I find only List of songs about fictitious bands or musicians)--T. Anthony 15:43, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
          • Well, yes, the mice do represent Jewish people, but the work isn't fictive. As to the lists, best bet is to see Archive of fictional things which should stagger you. It staggered me. Steve block talk 17:16, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, this is the sort of information the Comic Book Guy collects in his computer, it has no place whatsoever in Wikipedia. --Agamemnon2 08:44, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, I agree with Agamemnon2, and I also don't see the point of having a "List of Jewish foo" for every type of foo imaginable. Is this anti-Semitism? — JIP | Talk 09:53, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep I enjoyed reading and writing this page. It is useful information for comic lovers.MosheZadka 12:22, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, I agree that it's listcruft. JIP and Splash hit the nail on the head. Peeper 12:25, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. ^BlankVerse 13:25, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• This is just about the only list of Jews that I'm actually tempted to vote "keep" on, as it's actually likely that Jewish identity is likely to be a signficant aspect of a superhero's character in a way that it's unlikely to be significant that a given baker or dentist is Jewish. I'm dubious, however, because the list as it stands contains a lot of doubtful claims (how can Superman be Jewish when he's not even human?).

  Instead of keeping this as it stands, why not move to something like Judaism in comics and write an encyclopedia article on the subject, making reference to only those characters who are actually explicitly and significantly Jewish, and doing so in prose instead of as a list? That would be a strong keep. This is just a weak keep and strong cleanup. — Haeleth Talk 14:52, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep and clean-up per Haeleth. This is one occasion where a character's ethnicity and/or religion is notable because of their relative rarity. Traditionally, superheroes have been either WASP or something close to it. 23skidoo 16:22, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep and prune unsourced entries. I don't like the amount of lists on Jewish people, but if the fact is well-established in their comics I see no good reason to delete it. As of yet there's no lists on Hindu superheroes or Roman-Catholic superheroes... - Mgm|^(talk) 18:52, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete Has it occured to anyone yet that superheroes aren't real? Just as fictional characters cannot be American citizens, so fictional characters cannot be Jewish (or any other religion for that matter). Kill as listcruft. --Bachrach44 19:12, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Of course it has, there's no need to patronize. We have a whole category though of Category:Lists of fictional characters. I'm not entirely comfortable with how much pop-culture minutiae is on Wikipedia, but if a fictional character is noteworthy enough I could see him/her as an article. That's why I was for merging to List of fictitious Jews. A section for comic book characters could easily be made there and a general sectioning by media could also be done.(Like sections for Jewish characters in literature, television, etc.)--T. Anthony 00:38, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep Quite informative and shows that Comic books and the such and super heroes are not automatically Christian. Cobra 20:27, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I've never seen the superheroes as overwhelmingly Christian. Was Batman a real churchgoer? Weren't several of the X-Men into some kind of Animism?(For example Storm was some kind of goddess in Africa I think) On ethnicity there might've been very Gentile, but as the vast majority of the world are Gentiles(In the Jewish sense, also in the Mormon sense too) I'm not sure that means much--T. Anthony 00:38, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep: entirely valid for an encyclopedia. I'm afraid that use of the term "listcruft" simply speaks to me of "list of things I can't be bothered with", and I'm getting tired of people nominating articles for deletion simply because they aren't familiar with the subject. You don't come to an encyclopedia expecting to know everything you're going to read: you expect to find stuff out. —Phil | Talk 09:06, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I think this is slightly silly, and I would feel the same with a List of superheroes with disabilities or List of Catholic superheroes. That said I would go keep before delete. Too many lists are getting deleted almost for no reason except "I don't like lists" or "we have too many." In just Wikipedia:List of lists/uncategorized there are in least 3600 lists. You'd have to delete a hundred a day for five weeks, without any new ones coming, to get it down to a hundred. It's just a fool's errand. Eventually people will just accept lists are unlikely to disappear unless they are somehow summarily destroyed all at once. Then again I agree with removing the silliest or most trivial ones. This strikes me as borderline to that so I went with merge instead of keep.--T. Anthony 12:10, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• Keep. I usually vote 'delete' on List of Jewish (something) articles, but this one makes sense to me. Youngamerican 17:51, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete haha and delete List of fictitious Jews while you're at it --- both jokes EscapeArtistsNeverDie 01:34, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

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.