Talk:Incidents during the Hajj

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This is a major tragedy deserving its own article, no need to redirect to a general article about the stoning ritual. 24.63.125.78 18:02, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. The current article structure has redundant information in each one. I would suggest moving this to Incidents during the Hajj (or Incidents during the stoning of the devil) and merging in the details from Hajj (and stoning of the devil) violet/riga (t) 19:36, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
It is a tragedy, but it does not warrant its own article. Why don't we have articles on every tragic accident that occurs during the Hajj? We don't have one for the 2004 incident, nor the 2001 incident. I would however say keep this article as it is now and then once it dies down as a current event, redirect it and merge to the appropriate section in Hajj. Pepsidrinka 20:03, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
I have to agree with Pepsidrinka. The 1990 incident claimed over 1400 lives, but does not have its own article. I've put mergeto templates on the article, and I think that maybe once the death toll stops going up and it fades from news, we should merge it with one of the other articles covering Hajj incidents. Neldo 20:09, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
The details here are as relevant to Hajj as they are to stoning of the devil. I believe that all the incidents should be noted in a separate article, especially if this one grows. I have removed the merge tags until we have a firm decision and either go with that now or wait for the item to fade from the news. The reason is that it makes the article look ugly and unprofessional when it features so prominently on the main page. violet/riga (t) 20:19, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
I've done this now - I hope people agree that it's much better now. violet/riga (t) 20:51, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Just an aside, but I was thinking about this last night (ironically). Why is it that we have major articles on terrorist attacks or on air crashes, but we don't have similar quality work on stampedes or riots around the world, that can claim many more lives? Wikipedia prides itself on having a global perspective and I believe this stampede is of much more importance to those in Saudi Arabia than the London subway bombings or Hurricane Rita. I really hope we can create individual articles for all the stampedes at the Hajj as well as other major stampedes that may have happened worldwide, such as at sporting events, religious events, or those motivated out of fear (such as the one in Baghdad in 2005). BlueGoose 20:38, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Counting the revision before information starting being merged, there was only six sentences in the article that pertained to the current incident. And two of them mentioned the hotel incident of a week ago. Every single incident involving the hajj, or atleast those involving the stoning of the walls will include the exact same information; it is not neccessary to have 40 different pages for 40 different incidents, if the only distinguishing features would be the date, the number dead and the number wounded. I would agree with your point regarding riots though, as riots are alot more dynamic than these incidents during the hajj. Pepsidrinka 20:52, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't think each one could be expanded enough to warrant its own article, given the lack of details about them and due to the similarity between many of them. I'd love to be proven wrong though, as the deaths of so many is certainly notable. violet/riga (t) 20:51, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I stand by my initial argument, that the January 12, 2006 tregedy deserves its own article. Certainly in sheers numbers, it surpassed the causalties of most of the terrorist bombings that were featured as individual Wikipedia news articles during the past year. While you are correct in noting that most of the information was initially duplicated from other articles, that's why it was a stub. As more details become available, more contributors can edit new "dynamic" information into the article. By merging it you are crippling this process and in effect perpetuating the apparent similarity of all the hajj tragedies. 24.63.125.78 21:32, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

It has its own section which can continue to be expanded. If that section grows enough to deserve separating then that's great. Until then it is best off here. violet/riga (t) 21:35, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I was the one who originally redirected this article to Stoning of the Devil when it was called 2006 Hajj stampede, but I think the current setup where this article is called Incidents during the Hajj and contains all the stampede information is fine. Although it could be called something more helpful than "Incidents during the Hajj". And to 24.63.125.78, "rvv" means vandalism was reverted, just say "rv" to revert elsewise. silsor 21:48, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, I very much appreciated the context that this article provides, which an independent article wouldn't have given me. MattShepherd 22:01, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

"Why is it that we have major articles on terrorist attacks or on air crashes, but we don't have similar quality work on stampedes or riots around the world, that can claim many more lives?" Because those are serious events. This is a bunch of idiots who manage to kill themselves every year. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.30.183.157 (talk • contribs) .

Why is it that for every 99 people who want to actually use this project to create an encyclopedia, we have one person to use this project as their soapbox and add nothing productive to the conversation? Pepsidrinka 00:16, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
See Law of large numbers -- Maverick 04:55, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

66.30.183.157's attitude demonstrates to me why the latest stampede deserves its own article. "Idiots" routinely "manage to get themselves killed" at European soccer matches, yet each incident is a newsworthy tragedy. As to why the far-worse 1990 tragedy does not have its own article, for one Wikipedia was not around then, and I suspect the general interest among English-speaking contributors is not enough to initiate an article on this now-historical event. Neither is a good reason. So my $0.02 reamains to dedicate 2006 Hajj stampede to the subject. Barring that, I would propose that the present article (Incidents during the Hajj) be renamed to something less benign: "Tragedies during the Hajj" or at least "Fatal incidents during the Hajj." 24.63.125.78 16:14, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with maintaining a separate article and renaming this one to something like the above suggestions.--Cam 20:39, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
Two paragraphs plus one sentence hardly merits a separate article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.143.37.76 (talk • contribs) .
  • I would say it's unwise to suggest each stampede incident needs its own article on the basis that the London underground bombings has its own. There were perpetrators, investigations etc specific to the bombings that don't hold true for events at the Hajj, the causes of which, whilst tragic, are much simpler; too many people in too confined a space. As such, there will be great similarities between Hajj stampedes not present in individual terrorist acts taking place in disparate locations in different countries. I'm not saying, however, that there are NO reasons why each stampede should not have its own article; simply that that one reason seems flawed. --bodnotbod 01:18, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Death does not mean an "Incident"

If 2 million people visit an event for 4 weeks, then you expect that some of them will die. As a rough calculation, given an average life expectancy of 80 (which is very high) and an unbiased sample of the population, we would expect 2000000 people * 4 weeks / (52 weeks/year * 80 years) = 2000 people every Hajj. On this basis, I removed the section on deaths during the 2007 Hajj, as none of referenced articles mentioned any particular incident. Indeed, all the linked articles referred to most people dying from old age, heart attacks, etc. (Joelphillips (talk) 21:38, 17 December 2007 (UTC))

[edit] Repetitions

This article contains several repetitions (e.g. of the 2006 hostel collapse) which ought to be cleaned up. Ben Finn 23:05, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

That's been sorted now. violet/riga (t) 23:13, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sectioning

I'm wondering if the article should be ordered by date rather than the type of incident... violet/riga (t) 23:13, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, that would make more sense looking at objectively. However, considering that if someone were to come to this article and learn about one of the stampede accidents, they would probably be more inclined to care about the other related incidents in other years, as opposed to having to read through the lines to figure out when the other similar events occurred. Pepsidrinka 00:16, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
I concur. BlueGoose 01:31, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] November 1979 Masjid al-Haram takeover

It looks like the November 1979 violence took place after the Hajj had been over for some weeks (it was at the beginning of the month of Muharram). There is a connection with pilgrimage to Mecca, yes, but it did not occur "during the Hajj". --Cam 07:23, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "fatal tragedy of the Islamic month of Dhu al-Hijjah in 2006"

Well, if it didn't, then it really would not be be an "Incidents during the Hajj", would it?--67.173.142.168 07:10, 21 March 2007 (UTC)