Talk:Médecins Sans Frontières

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was no consensus. JPG-GR (talk) 01:03, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation, then sign your vote with ~~~~

[edit] Support

1. English Subtitle (talk) 03:42, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
2. Support. See rationale below. — AjaxSmack 02:35, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Oppose

• Oppose for many of the reasons given in the previous debates and !votes, and in particular because the English translation is not commonly used in English-speaking countries besides the United States and Canada. -- Avenue (talk) 06:54, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose. I don't see any new arguments in this proposal, and while consensus can change my arguments are unchanged too, see previous move requests. Andrewa (talk) 07:37, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose; see below Knepflerle (talk) 22:14, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose; msf is their official name so we should use it. besides many organisations have their names in french anyway. imagine if they tried to turn fifa into International Federation of Association Football) Binks (talk) 13:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose. Médecins Sans Frontières is used extensively in many English-speaking countries, and where it is, Doctors without Borders never appears. Where DWB is used (e.g. America), MSF also prominently appears. Chocolatechaos9508 (talk) 06:20, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

• I think that shuffling all the previous debates off to an archive immediately before requesting this move sends an interesting signal, and does not help the debate. I'll bring back the relevant threads while this discussion is underway. -- Avenue (talk) 06:54, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
• You would be wrong. The archived proposals are there for all to see. English Subtitle (talk) 13:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not going to edit war over it. Here are links to the previous !votes: Talk:Médecins_Sans_Frontières/archive1#Requested_move, Talk:Médecins_Sans_Frontières/archive1#Requested_move_redux. In both cases, more people opposed the move than supported it, but there was no consensus. -- Avenue (talk) 13:17, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the archiving is a good idea, and thank you Avenue for the links. Note also that nearly all of the archive is on this topic, not just the two previous WP:RM polls.

And I would hope that if this poll also closes without consensus to move, it would then not be re-proposed unless there were some new development or argument to discuss. Specifically, the next step in working towards consensus is to broaden the discussion, not just to repeat it. So has there been subsequent, relevant discussion on the talk pages of Wikipedia:naming conventions or other members of Category:Wikipedia naming conventions, or at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy), or similar? If so, links should be provided to it. If not, then English Subtitle might even consider withdrawing this nomination to allow for this other discussion, in the interests of minimum waste of time. Andrewa (talk) 20:56, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

This has been extensively discussed before and absolutely no new arguments or evidence has been proposed. Indeed the nominator nominated the move, archived all previous discussion, then placed "retired" tags on their talk and user pages [1] - it doesn't look like this nomination is going to lead to active discussion (or more importantly any novel discussion). In this case, I feel we should respect the previous decision until such time new thoughts come to light, rather than lighting the touchpaper to a lengthy and repetitious discussion that will yield nothing new. Knepflerle (talk) 22:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Quite right, they have indeed retired. In view of that, I think we should just close this nomination. Andrewa (talk) 01:08, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

As there has now been support expressed for the nomination, I now think it should go the full five days. Andrewa (talk) 09:34, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Support rationale

(Some copied from previous RM) It is abundantly clear that the English name is perfectly acceptable and copiously used by the organisation itself. This is not US-centric as it seems this is true at other countries' websites as well. The US website, located at http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/, uses "Doctors Without Borders." The Australian and Canadian websites feature "Doctors Without Borders" on the logo at the top of the page so it is not only an Americanism. Though English usage may be less common outside the USA, this is no reason to ignore English usage and suspend WP:NC (WP:UE) in this case.

(In the previous RM I cited a promotional world map from the US section of Doctors Without Borders. The top corner features a logo with "MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES/DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS" beside it. At the top of the map is a quote attributed to "Nicolas de Torrenté, Executive Director, Doctors Without Borders." On the reverse of the map is text with the heading "Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)." In the text, "Doctors Without Borders" is mentioned 16 times, "Médecins Sans Frontières" once, and "MSF" once. Certainly this is only one example but it is clear that the English name is acceptable to the organisation itself.)

User:Knepflerle might be correct that "no new arguments or evidence [have] been proposed" but the interpretation of that evidence might have changed if there are more Anglophone and/or fewer Francophile readers of English Wikipedia. — AjaxSmack 02:35, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

It illustrates how little new is to be added here when the above makes a critical error barely six words into your statement. DWB is not the English name at all. It is an English name, just as MSF is an English name for the organisation because it is used by English-speakers writing in English-language publications. Nothing is more English than what English-speakers actually use and they also use MSF. You don't have to be Francophile to use it, it's just English. Anglophones use it because it is use in English. And suppositions that Francophilia swayed the vote and that that Francophile demographics of en.wiki have changed are merely baseless suppositions and unlikely ones at that.

Let it rest unless evidence of a shift in usage from previous time is clear. The benefit of rehashing months-long arguments every calendar year is only to those who enjoy these discussions and not for the benefit of the article itself; with all the necessary redirects, the practical difference to the reader experience is nigh on zero. Knepflerle (talk) 06:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Your participation is not required so please don't feel too burdened. — AjaxSmack 01:18, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

In a way that's true, in that I expect that the closing admin will look at the previous debates. It would be ridiculous for this move to succeed unless some new argument is presented, or unless some of those who previously opposed the proposal now support it. Or to put that another way, failure to comment at all when proposals are so close together is best taken as no change of vote. But on the other hand, it makes it easier for the closing admin to have it here explicitly. Andrewa (talk) 18:49, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

All of that rationale seems to be copied from the previous RMs. Andrewa (talk) 18:49, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.