Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Allegations of American apartheid

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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 Wikipedia:Deletion review#Allegations of American apartheid). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Delete. Evidence of notability not established, and the topic appears to duplicate existing articles (specifically Racial segregation in the United States, which already has a section on apartheid comparisons). Editors are reminded that "other stuff exists" and "all or nothing" are not valid arguments to retain an article. Editors should also be aware that "It was only created for..." is not necessarily a valid argument for deletion, though I note the admission cited by User:Victor falk, which I believe merits further investigation. -- ChrisO 21:46, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Allegations of American apartheid

Allegations of American apartheid (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

This article’s subject is a certain class of rhetorical statement – an “allegation of apartheid” – of which it produces five or six instances, arranged in a small quote farm. The subject matter in which these five or six rhetorical statements arise is – in every instance – racial segregation in the United States. There are no secondary sources describing the allegation itself (giving its history, for example, or describing its political or rhetorical effects, or saying who uses it and who doesn’t, or contesting its legitimacy); indeed, no secondary sources indicating that the allegation or phrase or meme or whatever is itself even notable. There are prominent memes relating to contemporary American racism that have occasioned a great deal of secondary-source commentary – for example “institutional racism” and “de facto segregation” – but “American apartheid” isn’t one of them. There are only these five or six primary-source examples of its use, data-mined and gathered together by a Wikipedian who is interested in them for other reasons – namely, so that the resulting “article” built around them can be used as leverage in his ongoing efforts to secure the deletion of Allegations of Israeli apartheid, through a kind of unofficial horse-trading whereby he agrees to cease his disruptions upon satisfaction of his demands.

The primary sources consist of: two supreme court opinions; the title of a book and a review of the book (the book uses the word “apartheid” generically and doesn’t discuss South Africa, and the review appears never to mention either); and the title of a Harper’s article (again, which seems to mention neither apartheid nor South Africa), later expanded into a book. Each of these is a primary source; it uses the word “apartheid,” hence "alleging" it.

Wikipedia’s notability guidelines clearly require that “sources address the subject directly in detail." The subject here is the allegations, which none of the sources addresses directly. The notability guideline also stresses that sources are "defined on Wikipedia as secondary sources." WP:NOR stresses that "most articles should rely predominantly on secondary sources," while conceding that "there are rare occasions when they may rely on primary sources."

This is not one of those rare occasions, and no exception needs to be made. All of this subject matter will merge very nicely into Racial segregation in the United States, given that is in every case what the sources here are actually talking about.

The distinction between primary and secondary sources isn't some odd technicality. It is a crucial mechanism for establishing notability "objectively" (as WP:N and WP:NOR explain), and for leading hobby-horse articles like this one off the track and behind the stables, where they may be summarily shot. If a topic is important, there will be secondary-source commentary on the topic itself. The word "nigger" is a notable epithet. We know this not through primary-source materials in which it's used, but rather through secondary-source material in which it's discussed.

The issue for this AfD is only the lack of sourced notability of the analogy itself – not any supposed "outrageousness" of it. Indeed, the half-dozen examples of the phrase gather by our original researcher do not appear to have occasioned any outrage at all; what commentary and controversy they generated had to do with American segregation itself, not the phrase "American apartheid." America's own legacy of racial oppression – slavery, sharecropping, Jim Crow, lynchings, the KKK, segregation defacto and dejure, schoolgirls being spit on and old ladies sent to the back of the bus, firehoses and police beatings – has left it with an enormously rich native vocabulary for current discrimination; we no more need to import our metaphors from South Africa than Brazil needs thence to import its mangoes. Which is probably why when these four or five sources used the term "apartheid," no one noticed. This article should be deleted as part of a disingenuous campaign that has had a profoundly disruptive effect on other parts of Wikipedia; its salvageable content will move seamlessly into Racial segregation in the United States. G-Dett 22:05, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete POV fork. Titles must be as neutral as possible, but this one doesn't even try to appear neutral. The title throws mud, and some it it will lodge in the mind of the reader. Any relevant material belongs in articles about racism, segregation and slavery. Golfcam 22:38, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. This is a synthesis of primary sources which is quite redundant with other articles we already have. Closing admin, please don't be swayed by votes that this should be linked to other articles - the only thing they have in common are the word "apartheid" in the title.--Cúchullain t/c 22:55, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
  • comment judged by itself, the article seems rescuable, & I am reluctant to vote for a delete on the basis of allegations about a cabal. Could the nom substantiate? DGG (talk) 23:14, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
    • How much do you expect a nom to write for heaven's sake? Abberley2 01:38, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Well, first of all DGG the motives of this article's creator is really a secondary issue; substantiated or unsubstantiated, it is not a reason in itself to delete. The reason to delete is that the article has no secondary sources, no objective evidence of its topic's notability, and is clearly nothing more than an odd, exotic POV-fork from Racial segregation in the United States. Your vote to keep or delete shouldn't hinge on the motives of those cultivating this hothouse-plant-miniature-quote-farm-POV-fork; that said, I will answer your question. First of all, there's no "cabal." A cabal is a secret organization full of intrigue, usually up to no good. What we have here, by contrast, are openly affiliated editors up to no good in broad daylight. Have a look at the edit histories of Allegations of Chinese apartheid, Allegations of American apartheid, Allegations of tourist apartheid in Cuba, etc.; see who creates these articles, who sustains them with substantive edits, who defends them in AfDs, etc. Then go look at any of the six AfD's for Allegations of Israeli apartheid; the very editors who have objected vehemently to that article because of the word "apartheid" in its title have created and sustained seven or eight "allegations of apartheid" articles, as well as the "allegations of apartheid" template and of course Allegations of apartheid. If you object to any of these on WP:UNDUE, WP:NOR, or WP:N grounds, these editors will wave the policy issues aside and make clear that the problem for them is an Israel article with the word "apartheid" in its title, plain and simple, and that if their demand for the deletion of that article is satisfied, they'll agree to delete the seven or eight badly sourced "allegations of apartheid" articles they've created and heretofore defended through block-voting at AfDs. Again, no cabal; the demands are more or less open and candid, even if the delivery is slightly oblique and euphemistic in a Corleone-ish kind of way. See the recent AfD discussion for Allegations of French apartheid, which survived because of block-voting from the non-cabal. See also Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Apartheid, which is a collective attempt to deal with the disruption caused by all this. Let me know if you have any other questions.--G-Dett 15:44, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete, POV fork, synthesis, original research. Realkyhick 23:20, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. Another WP:POINT violation, created for political reasons having to do with the Allegations of Israeli Apartheid page. (Btw, if anyone's curious, there was a legitimate American apartheid page created as a redirect some time ago.) CJCurrie 23:20, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete - seems to be a rather pointy POV fork article. Yeah, there probably could be an article written on the subject - but this isn't even close. --Haemo 01:29, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete A strained collection of slurs assembled for a purpose that cannot comply with Wikipedia:Neutrality, whatever it may have been. Abberley2 01:38, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Merge and Redirect to Racial segregation in the United States#Comparisons with apartheid. Apartheid is de jure segregation, not de facto segregation. The instances cited in the article are suggestions of the latter. As with South Africa prior to 1989, there was "apartheid" in parts of the U.S.A. until the 1960s. If it happens now, it's in defiance of the law. However, if someone wants to argue that it still exists because the law isn't enforced, and if they have sources, they can do that in the segregation article. Mandsford 02:04, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete use of "apartheid" outside of the South African context is akin to use of "cult" outside of ancient ritual. We shouldn't use it in titles. As for "allegations" articles, they tend not be encyclopedic. Carlossuarez46 03:35, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete—while the comparisons to apartheid are made by notable people, the comparisons themselves are not notable (or noted). So, these comparisons are not suitable as the subject of an article. Allegations of American apartheid is an example of synthesis more appropriate for a term paper than a general encyclopedia. GracenotesT § 04:28, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete per the lack of secondary sources on the issue. While we all know segregation existed, no expert (to my knowledge) considers this apartheid. Pats Sox Princess 22:49, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep: William O. Douglas, Douglas Massey, Nancy Denton, and Nathan Glazer all are experts. Who is, if not judges and sociologists? ...and how could the assessment by an U.S. Supreme Court Justice not be notable? Provided the allegations series is encyclopaedic, and most think so, this article is, too. --tickle me 00:01, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Not every utterance of a notable person is itself notable; notability is established by secondary sources, of which this article has none.--G-Dett 00:29, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
as for some other questions I had--I totally agree with G-Dett that the article must be judged by itself, and so I did. AGF, I prefer to interpret the introduction of some of the other articles as a reasonable attempt to avoid singling out Israel, which would be political POV as it is hardly the only offender. But, I had not realised there was a community discussion. since there is, this AfD can be seen as a well-intentioned but incorrect attempt to assume the result of that discussion. if we're discussing the general question of how to handle these articles, the discussion of how to deal with an individual one should wait on that. If its decided to do it differently in general, this discussion becomes moot.DGG (talk) 00:17, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Whatever direction the free-form community discussion takes or doesn't take, individual articles will need to comply with policy. The question for the "allegations" articles is not who the "offenders" are – we are not a tribunal – but rather where the allegations have become a notable topic in themselves, as established by secondary sources, per policy.--G-Dett 00:29, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Merge back into the parent article, Allegations of apartheid. This sub-article doesn't really have enough sources to stand on its own yet. Jayjg (talk) 01:06, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Merge into Allegations of apartheid (1st choice) or Keep (2nd choice - as long as we keep other Allegations of apartheid in X articles). FYI, I've added more content about the book Medical Apartheid. The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans From Colonial Times to the Present. ←Humus sapiens ну? 01:41, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete or merge the article into Racial segregation in the United States since the focus on the term apartheid is too narrow. There are lots of examples of modern social, economic and political segregation in the US that have not necessarily been called "apartheid" while, on the other hand, everthing mentioned in "Allegations of American apartheid" can easily fit in the racial segregation article. This means Racial segregation in the United States is the more appropriate destination. - LOTHAR
  • Delete Per nom, WP:SYNTH and Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#POV_forks ("The generally accepted policy is that all facts and major Points of View on a certain subject are treated in one article"). Mackan79 05:35, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Merge into Allegations of apartheid until further sourcing. However opposing merge into Racial segregation in the United States#Comparisons with apartheid.--Cerejota 06:14, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment As G-Dett already wrote it, I'd like to point out to another AfD : Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Allegations of French apartheid. A lot of the arguments here have already been discussed overthere. I did not had the opportunity to express my opinion overthere, but i do think that all the Allegations of... are NPOV articles, mainly an unliked list of quotes where apartheid appears in without any relations inbetween them, and that they should be deleted. BUT if no more reasons are given here to delete this article than there were overthere to delete the french article, i would see no particular reason to delete this one, and to keep the french one. NicDumZ ~ 13:31, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • You can't establish the legitimacy of one article based on its superficial resemblance to another article; that's what got us into this whole mess. There are eight "allegations of apartheid" articles, seven of which have no secondary sources establishing the notability of the allegations they describe. Each of these has mimicked the phraseology and format of the sourced article, in the hopes of tricking editors into evaluating them collectively. See for example the comment by Urthogie (author of six of the dummy articles) below.--G-Dett 14:39, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep or Merge-- it's not NPOV to keep some countries with sources and remove other countries with sources.--Urthogie 14:23, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep or Merge. --Shamir1 14:39, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment. Please note that various bad faith appeals to motive and proofs by assertion are not relevant to AfDs. Also, red herrings regarding "secondary sources" are just that, red herrings. Jayjg (talk) 15:50, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Reply. Nor are strawman arguments relevant to AfDs. As I said above, votes "to keep or delete shouldn't hinge on the motives of those cultivating this hothouse-plant-miniature-quote-farm-POV-fork." They should hinge on the mere fact that this is a hothouse-plant-miniature-quote-farm-POV-fork, and one lacking secondary sources on its subject, thereby failing WP:N and WP:NOR.--G-Dett 16:02, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment: I oppose this nomination based on the un-civil manner in which it has been proposed and defended on this page, with accusations of "disruption" and "openly affiliated editors up to no good in broad daylight." As I said in response to one of the same editor's other nominations, I don't think this sort of thing should be tolerated, much less encouraged. She explained on another AfD page that, basically, this is how she has fun -- whistling while she works, she called it -- in other words, spreading toxic and vicious accusations against other editors. I thought that was the sort of thing that would draw a block or ban on Wikipedia. Regardless of what I think about the article, I don't want any part of this nomination. 6SJ7 15:50, 27 July 2007 (UTC) However, given the realities of the situation I will express my opinion anyway:
  • Merge into Allegations of apartheid. 6SJ7 03:33, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
  • 6SJ7, accusing another editor of "spreading toxic and vicious accusations" is a personal attack, and I have never seen G-Dett level either. If you disagree with her comments, I would think there are much better ways to address this. I understand people make heated comments, and that people are often misunderstood, but I think this is something we should all work to keep in mind. Mackan79 06:51, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
  • 6SJ7, I am sorry to read of your distress. Please know that when I wrote of "whistling while I work," the reference was to salty ironies and straight talk, not to "toxic and vicious accusations." Given the level of organized disruption, trolling, and disingenuousness in this whole affair, my remarks have been quite moderate. Please also recognize that we all have different temperaments. For me the greatest affront is the constant evasiveness and unwillingness to discuss policy; which is why, no matter how saucy my remarks can be, they are always detailed, direct, and policy-oriented. Reciprocation in this regard would be appreciated; I note with some regret that – notwithstanding DDG's fair point about the comprehensive discussion – not one of the keep votes has addressed the sourcing, notability, and original-research issues I took the time to explain at some length.--G-Dett 16:45, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
  • G-Dett, you can call your comments what you think they are, and I will call them what I think they are. And other people can decide for themselves what to think of accusations of "organized disruption, trolling and disingenuousness" made in the same breath as a denial of "toxic and vicious accusations." 6SJ7 00:20, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Sure, 6SJ7, but take care that your concern about "toxic and vicious accusations" doesn't become a pretext for same. When editors closely aligned with regards to POV argue passionately about the intrinsic illegitimacy of WP covering "allegations of apartheid," and just as passionately nourish, sustain, support, and defend an extensive series of article about "allegations of apartheid," it looks a heck of a lot like WP:POINT-making. Your heat and zeal might be better directed towards countering that conclusion, not to mention answering the questions of notability that arise when article after article in this vexatious series is devoid of secondary sources. Those questions won't go away.--G-Dett 15:10, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

It was created to make a point; in WP:POINT#Examples, one can read:

If someone creates an article on what you believe to be a silly topic, and the community disagrees with your assessment on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion (AfD)...
    • do make your case clearly on AfD, pointing to examples of articles that would be allowable under the rules the community is applying.
    • don't create an article on an entirely silly topic just to get it listed on AfD.

This has been explicitly admitted on several occasions; one of them:

“ (...) why we created other apartheid articles. All allegations of apartheid articles are meant to antagonize people of that culture; the Israel one included. They are all POV forks. Their existance on wikipedia is proof that WP:NPOV does not apply to article titles or afd's. Since these articles cannot be balanced on their own, the only way to balance them is to create similar articles about other countries, thus making the attack page have less effect since country X isn't the only one being alleged of being an apartheid state. There is nothing encyclopediac about accusing somebody or some culture/country/religion of apartheid. It is all an attempt to push a POV. Anything legitimate belongs in an article like Criticism of Israel, or Human rights in Israel. --Sefringle 02:00, 21 July 2007 (UTC) [1] ”

It also fails several other policies, notably WP:SYNTH, WP:N, WP:SOAP, WP:UNDUE, and others mentioned upthread, but each one of the two reasons above is more than sufficient to justify deletion in and by itself.--Victor falk 14:40, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I am not sure what relevance Sefringle's comment has here, seeing as how he did not create this article, nor has he ever edited it. 6SJ7 00:25, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. In fact, Sefringle doesn't appear to have created any of these articles, nor does he appear to have edited any of them aside from Allegations of Israeli apartheid, which he edited 21 times, and Allegations of apartheid, which he edited 3 times. I guess User:Victor falk is saying that Allegations of Israeli apartheid is a WP:POINT article "on an entirely silly topic". I'd love to see his other examples of whatever he is claiming being "explicitly admitted on several occasions". Jayjg (talk) 03:48, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Sefringle didn't create the article. However, it's just a simple fact that these articles were created and expanded by the same group of people, in reaction to the Israel article. Like most of the others, this article was created by Urthogie, who has used very similar reasoning to that in the above quote from Sefringle, including in this AfD.--Cúchullain t/c 08:01, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete per nominator, Mansford, and many others. While some of the information may be useful to articles on segregation, the article as it is is just a random collection of instances where apartheid has been used to refer to segregation in the US. Tiamat 00:27, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep, the article makes it clear that both the concept and the phrase itself have significant currency, and there is certainly enough to say to warrant an article. Everyking 05:22, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep - the article has sourced content from notable and relevant commentators, and has recently been improved, adding even more of these. Isarig 05:25, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
Comment It has not seen significant improvement since it was nominated for deletion.
That's false. A new section, "medical experiments" has been added, fully sourced. Isarig 10:51, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
"Fully sourced" in the special lingo of supporters of the "allegations of apartheid" series means giving the name of a book or article that uses the word "apartheid" once or twice according to its dictionary definition. It doesn't mean and shouldn't be confused with a sourced discussion of the nominal topic of this article, "allegations" that "draw a parallel between the current situation of blacks in America today and the situation of blacks under South Africa's white minority rule." This article has no such sources and certainly none have been added. In this case, an author used the word apartheid in the title of a book on medical experiments, then a Wikipediana wrote a sentence about that book and inserted it in this article, then created a section heading to house that sentence. That's the "significant improvement" Isarig is talking about: a section containing a sentence about a book whose title contains the word "apartheid," used in its regular dictionary sense to mean state-sanctioned separate and unequal treatment (the book doesn't discuss South Africa, even for the purposes of comparison). What Isarig calls "significant improvement" I call "added crap."--G-Dett 13:48, 29 July 2007 (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.