Talk:Policide

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This article was nominated for deletion on October 24, 2006. The result of the discussion was Speedy keep.

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Policide article.
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Contents 1 Merge with Politicide? 2 Amorouso's changes 3 Appropos of nothing 4 In favor of merger

[edit] Merge with Politicide?

I suggest merging this article to politicide. To judge by results from Google scholar searches [1] [2], policide is primarily an engineering term, and politicide is the more common form as a term in political science or history; and it looks as if both policide and politicide are used primarily to refer to politically-motivated mass killings, not to either the destruction of cities or of political structures or communities or states. Palmiro | Talk 21:21, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose for now. I don't think a merge would be a good idea at this point, but maybe after the politicide article is cleaned up and expanded it might make sense.

1. Most importantly, per WP:NEO, articles on neologisms need to have reliable citations discussing the usage of the term. I can't tell from the politicide article when politicide was coined, what its roots are, or whether the term really is the same as the usage of policide here.
2. Second, the politicide article is currently very poorly sourced, to the point that politicide is currently vulnerable to deletion for failure to meet WP:NEO. Merging policide with it would damage the policide article.
3. Third, glancing at the google books citations to politicide, it looks to me as if the current article focuses exclusively on an extreme secondary meaning of the term. Kirshman's use is probably notable, but it looks as if the term was coined earlier and used much more frequently, to discuss the mass murder of a class of people, rather than a race or ethnicity, particularly Stalin's mass murder of his political opponents. I'm not at all convinced that they're the same thing, but maybe once politicide is improved, the case will be more clear.
4. If "policide" is used primarly to mean the destruction of a political entity such as a state or city, and "politicide" is used primarily to mean the mass murder of a class of people (and I think that's true), I think cross-references would be vastly preferable to a merger.
5. Lastly, although google scholar points largely to the engineering use, google books and amazon search inside point largely to the political use of "policide."

Thanks, TheronJ 21:31, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

The politicide article is certainly poorly referenced. But -

• while it is true that Google books shows results for 'policide' with a political meaning and not with an engineering meaning, google websearch as well as google scholar shows massive preponderance of the engineering meaning;
• The Google Books search for "politicide" does indeed show up far more results in the "mass killing" sense than in the "destruction of political community sense" but politicide nevertheless seems to be the more popular term for this than "policide", which turns up only 5 or perhaps 7 results with that meaning (out of 11 altogether). This is almost vanishingly small. Also, 11 results for "policide" on the book search compared with 893 for politicide
• It seems like - leaving aside the engineering use of "policide" - that we are dealing with two versions of one term here, rather than two discrete terms. In summary, we are dealing with two neologisms formed in slightly different ways from the same root for, it would appear, the same purpose; one of them (this one) seems to be barely used, the other slightly more common; and both of them can be used to refer to either of two quite different concepts. The case for a merge seems overwhelming to me. Finally, while I think they should be merged to title of the more common version, that doesn't mean that the material on this page shouldn't be the basis for the merged article; it is better. Palmiro | Talk 21:51, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

I guess that's the rub -- I can't even evaluate the case for the merge without some reliably sourced info identifying the origins and developments of politicide. I'm not criticizing your idea, except to say that I don't think we have the data to evaluate it. I think your links and references across the two pages are a good idea, and enough to let readers poke around and try to figure it out. Thanks, TheronJ 21:55, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose per TheronJ, specifically the fourth argument, which I understand is the case, it's two compltely differnet things : "If "policide" is used primarly to mean the destruction of a political entity such as a state or city, and "politicide" is used primarily to mean the mass murder of a class of people". Amoruso 10:35, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Are you arguing that the uses of policide to refer to the destruction of a state, and the destruction of a city, are substantially the same usage? I wouldn't have thought so at all. And I don't think the reference to the destruction of a city, in the cases cited, means the destruction of its political institutions or of it as a political entity, but to the physical annihilation of the city or its inhabitants. Palmiro | Talk 20:59, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Amorouso's changes

Amouroso, a couple thoughts:

1. I haven't had time to read the sources for your Israel cites, but IMHO, if the citations don't use the word policide, then including them in this article is probably not necessary or helpful -- Israel's enemies' intentions towards it belong in some of the articles about Israel, its enemies, and the various conflicts, but probably not here.
2. I think the "politicide" paragraph is fine -- it makes clear that it's a similar term, and it's used in a very similar way, plus Palmiro added a paragraph on Netanyahu's use of "policide" to the politicide article, so at the very least, it's fair, and I think it's relevant and interesting to readers.

Thanks, TheronJ 10:45, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

As to the second point, I removed both. A "see also" should be enough, no ? I don't see the point of trying to effectively merge the articles this way. For this exact reason, the "see also" section exists. As to the first, if policide is the intention to destory a nation, and we have quotes saying that certain groups wish so, then I think it's very relevant. It will be pretty far fetched to need someone to actually use the term, thinking of the languages differences, while it's obviously the meaning of the term that would be important to the readers. Amoruso 11:12, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, to be fair, it was Amoruso who added "policide" to the politicide article (cf [3]); I merely refined the wording and replaced a vague claim with a specific case. Though that being the case, I find it intriguing that he would wish to remove "politicide" from the "policide" article. I see that he has now removed "policide" from the politicide page as well, though without any reasoning as to why it was right then and wrong now. The only factor that I can see having changed in the meantime is precisely that of my having made the linkage commutative. It's really all quite mysterious!

Regarding the material Amoruso re-added here, not one of them referred to policide or politicide, so I really don't see what they are doing here. Of course if relevant material can be found, it can be used. Palmiro | Talk 20:50, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Have a look at the definition of policide and then see why it's relevant per my previous explanation. Obviously, I added policide when this article didn't exist yet. Now there's a see also section and it's enough. Your 'argument' above is peculiar to say the least. Amoruso 22:07, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Appropos of nothing

• Amoruso and Palmiro, I apologize for misspelling both your names.
• Amoruso, I really agree with Palmiro on this one quite strongly, which is something that I am not in the habit of doing. Is there anything we can do to try to work it out? I'm always game for dispute resolution . . .

Thanks, TheronJ 21:23, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, at least you were being evenhanded in your mis-spellings. Perhaps this excellent start qualifies you to be the dispute-resolver yourself. Now you see what not paying attention to the keyboard can let you in for.

Do we have a habit of disagreeing? I honestly don't remember any previous meetings!

In any case, I do not think this is an issue important enough to go to dispute resolution. To be blunt, Amoruso has been up to much worse. Palmiro | Talk 21:33, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I find your last comment to follow your general behaviour which stands in contrast to WP:AGF and all other wikipedia conventions. Amoruso 22:07, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Merge Policide with Politicide?

Merge Policide with Politicide?

I dont think Policide should be merged with politicide because they appear to be two different topics. Policide refers to the loss of a nations' independence as a whole, unlike politicide which refers to the destruction of a race, religon, etc. of people. They are two different topics.

MAP

[edit] In favor of merger

I've never heard of the word "Policide" until the last 5 minutes, but have heard "Politicide" used in this sense a number of times... AnonMoos 23:59, 8 December 2006 (UTC)