Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sexuality in Star Trek

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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 keep. Coredesat 04:19, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sexuality in Star Trek

Sexuality in Star Trek (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Plenty of original research issues and balance issues. First of all, the topic "sexuality in Star Trek" doesn't deserve an article because there are no reliable sources that discuss "sexuality in Star Trek" as its own topic. As for balance issues, instead of talking about sexuality as a whole the article is mostly speculation about which characters might be LGBT and what moments might be considered "LGBT moments". Literally hundreds of unsourced statements, most of which are baseless weasel words. Chardish 18:00, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sexuality and gender-related deletions. —Becksguy 11:38, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Don't they? There are sources for depictions of race in Star Trek and for a franchise that has run for decades, it's entirely possible for there to be reliable sources for this - and what we're considering is not the rejection of the article in its current state but the categorical rejection of the entire topic, so per The RulesTM what's important isn't as much what the article is but what it can become. --Kizor 21:26, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
    • Ooh! I found this in another Star Trek article's reference section: "Constance Penley (1997). NASA/Trek: Popular Science and Sex in America. Verso, 130. ISBN 0860916170." --Kizor 21:28, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
    • No, you are wrong. From the deletion policy: The Wikipedia deletion policy describes how material which does not meet the relevant content criteria is identified and removed from Wikipedia. Reasons for deletion include but are not limited to violation of copyright, content that does not belong in an encyclopedia, content not verifiable in a reliable source, and unreferenced negative content in biographies of living persons. AfD in general discusses whether the article in its current form should be deleted and is not a referendum on the topic itself, though if the article is deleted for notability concerns, no such future article should exist that does not rectify the concerns. Chardish 22:09, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
      • Hmm? My experience is completely the opposite. See this AfD about a then-horrible article on a sex act. --Kizor 23:03, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
      • But lack of references is not a reason for deletion; it's a reason to clean-up, if it can be shown that the references for the topic exist thus demonstrating notability & RS/V-ability. --Lquilter 14:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete as original research with a tad of synthesis. Majoreditor 04:50, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete major WP:SYNTH and original research issues, amongst other problems. RFerreira 08:33, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. Serious WP:NOR and WP:NPOV problems. Wikipedia is not the place for this kind of thing. Xihr 09:00, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep - no sources that discuss sexuality in Star Trek? You mean other than the sources which quote the creator of Star Trek on the topic, the sources that quote others involved in the creation of Star Trek on the topic, the sources that discuss the efforts of people within ST production and fandom to convince TPTB to include an unambiguously LGBT character and so on? Otto4711 13:11, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep: This is a totally notable topic. If you find that sources are missing or there's OR, that's a reason for cleanup, not deletion. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 15:32, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep as AfD is not for cleanup. Sexual orientation issues for Star Trek have been widely discussed both in the media by sociologists. The topic is notable - we should not delete an article simply because coming up with a satisfactory title for it is difficult. Tag for cleanup, remove OR but keep the article. WjBscribe 16:19, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep: Needs a clean-up and a lot more sources, but it's definitely a notable topic. --Brian Olsen 19:14, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep There are already plenty of sources in the article establishing notability. Fireplace 22:37, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep: Lots of secondary sources, and such weighty subjects to be covered, as one of the first inter-racial kisses (some say, *the* first) on broadcast television. -- Cimon Avaro; on a pogostick. 05:12, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • That's covered in Trekkies, I can downl check that. --Kizor 12:19, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep No acceptable deletion rationale has been given. Article may require cleanup, but this isn't the place for that. faithless (speak) 06:34, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Delete per WP:NN, WP:NOR, WP:SYNTH, WP:NPOV as well as this article being out on the extreme end of fancruft. At the absolute very most this deserves two lines on the show's main page saying words to the effect of "some sexual encounters occur, they can be inter-species but are very rarely gay" although to be honest if each individual LGBT or quasi-LGBT sexual encounter in question is notable then it's going to get covered in the episode's article anyway. A1octopus 13:46, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • You're mistaking sexual activity with sexual orientation. Otto4711 14:06, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
    • My apologies, that was a bit ambiguous of me because I missed a couple of words out. Now corrected. A1octopus 18:57, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Uh huh, see the thing is, you're mistaking sexual activity with sexual orientation. Otto4711 02:33, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • And even more to the point, Aloctopus is mistaking what is or isn't addressed in a work of fiction with critical commentary about it. Star Trek could have all gay characters or no gay characters, and it would be irrelevant to this CFD if there are a lot of publications discussion sexuality on Star Trek -- which there are. It's kind of ironic that in one of the few places in Wikipedia's coverage of fictional topics where the subject of the article isn't the majority of the source for the article, that someone would argue WP:OR, WP:SYNTH, WP:NPOV, and WP:Fancruft ... We need more articles that rely on the published literature about fictional workers; not fewer such articles. This sort of deletion will strip Wikipedia of academic relevance and leave only the articles that include plot summaries. --Lquilter 14:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Infinitely Strong Keep — clean it up; don't delete it. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 15:55, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep I found this to be a very interesting article. In fact, articles such as these are why Wikipedia is better than the EB - and it has more references than a typical EB article too. Certainly one that should kept, not deleted. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:51, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep - First time I have ever put "strong" into a keep vote. I am amazed that this is even being considered for deletion. It is well written, well referenced, and and shows (as Dev920 points out) why we are better than a paper encyclopedia. If there are concerns about original research, then people should look for cites rather than nominating for deletion. Jeffpw 10:54, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment:This article has just been made WP:LGBT's Collaboration of the Month. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:24, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep per above. Clean it up (there seem to be sources and topic is notable), don't delete it. Raystorm (¿Sí?) 11:34, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong keep. Article needs help but who amongst us doesn't. Per WP:AfD if an article can be improved through regular editing it's not a good candidate for AfD. This article needs better writing and possibly some structure work but hardly a reason for deletion. Benjiboi 11:48, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep - Nominator is incorrect in asserting there are no reliable sources that discuss "sexuality in Star Trek" as its own topic; I've read a lot with my own two eyes -- and I'm talking about academic literature not fanzines. Will work on refs section. --Lquilter 14:43, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
    • I just added 9 cites from the academic literature to assist with the rewrite. These 9 were pulled from MLA Bibliography; probably film studies & cultural studies DBs will be even more fruitful but I was in MLA Bib at the time. --Lquilter 17:52, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep I don't think I've ever seen Infinitely used as a qualifier for a AfD !vote. Keep per other keep rationale. The article is basically notable and has references to establish that notability, however, it does need additional references. Lacking intrinsic notability is the one problem that can't be fixed (and that's not the case here), the rest (RS, COI, POV, etc), if they exist, can be dealt with by improving the article. I agree with Benjiboi that WP:AFD says that fixing or tagging is preferred to deletion for an article than be improved. In Deletion policy it also says as one of the reasons to delete: ...content not verifiable in a reliable source.... It doesn't say unverified, meaning currently not verified, it says unverifiable, which means it can't be verified. Not the same thing at all. All this boils down to a couple of concepts: AfD is not for cleanup, needs improvement != needs deletion, and deletion should be the last resort, not the first. I might also point out that this article is a B class article in LGBT Studies, which means it's received project assessment. — Becksguy 16:10, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep - Sourced and notable. — TAnthonyTalk 16:11, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep, looks to have 16 sources right now. Don't know if they are reliable, but still, that is up to the nominator to point out.--Rayc 16:14, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep but Rewrite - this article does not need deletion it needs a serious rewrite. The lead is awful and there are far too many unsourced statements. But once again these are not reasons for deletion, since (as pointed out a number of times above) the article is sourced and notable. I would also suggest the article be retitled as: 'depictions of sexuality in Star Trek'--Cailil talk 16:40, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep per WP:HEY. This article is about a major theme in a major cultural artifact, per WP:OUTCOMES. Bearian 20:37, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep for now. The article seems to contain a lot of wishful thinking. It is rather long considering the amount of sourcing (shortening by 50% might be considered). The references ought to be formatted using WP:CITE. I'm not sure that everything included under External Links would pass WP:EL. EdJohnston (talk) 22:56, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Almost all of the problems with the article are better solved by editing than by deletion. Rray (talk) 23:36, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong keep -- it was well-sourced before a bunch of other references were added. Rewrite as necessary, don't delete.--uɐɔlnʌɟoʞǝɹɐs 21:29, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep. Wow. Amazed this was even nominated. It needs work but it is definitely an encyclopedic topic. --Fang Aili talk 00:59, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep -- As social issues are the core of what Star Trek was originally based one, human sexuality - both in the Star Trek universe and the real world - are of vital importance to the series as a whole. Esprix (talk) 04:05, 6 December 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.