The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was Delete per WP:SNOW and Andreas's comment that the Signpost no longer needs the page. 28bytes (talk) 13:58, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2010-03-17/News and notes[edit]

Obvious BLP violation in the name of humor. CSD tag as G3 denied twice. ~ Rob^Talk 19:41, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as currently a hoax, but could be just WP:TOOSOON Legacypac (talk) 21:02, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep this is hitting pointy territory. I don't see it as a BLP violdation, and there's a ((humorous)) tag on this for a reason. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 21:08, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

meh. A day for humor maybe. The humor is based on body shaming. We usually have a dim view of shaming being included in articles referencing living people. In fact, adding "small hands" (feet, breasts, penis, head, etc, etc) to any article would be reverted as BLP vandalism. --DHeyward (talk) 23:49, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Adam Cuerden said it quite well on the talk page: "This page should not be speedy deleted as pure vandalism or a blatant hoax, because the issue it was written for is still up. Perhaps it would have been better to have had only one fake page everything links to - but breaking a currently-live Signpost article is a blatantly terrible way of going about things." This is part of a live article and deleting this would break a template in that live article. Gamaliel (talk) 21:10, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't it just turn a blue link into a red link? Does signpost crash or something if it gets a red link? Nothing bad seems to have happened when backdated articles were created. --DHeyward (talk) 23:55, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Am I missing something? Do the keep votes have actual sources for such statements? Arkon (talk) 21:16, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

What specific statements need sources? Gamaliel (talk) 21:18, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

A source that such a claim is anything but a hoax and BLP violation. No one gives a shit if it's part of a "live article" or what template it may break. What "is still up"? Arkon (talk) 21:23, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Are you actually claiming a joke needs a source? Gamaliel (talk) 21:47, 6 April 2016 (UTC)\[reply]

Are you actually claiming saying something is a joke makes it not a BLP vio? That would be incredibly moronic. Arkon (talk) 21:48, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

So why are you asking for a source? Gamaliel (talk) 21:53, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

So why are you arguing to keep a blatant BLP vio? Actually, you know, let's see how this goes. Arkon (talk) 21:58, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Because it's not actually a BLP vio, blatant or otherwise. It's a clear, obvious, not serious joke. So why did you ask for a source for a joke? Gamaliel (talk) 22:00, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Claiming something is a joke does not make it any less of a BLP vio, I asked for sources because I thought you weren't quite so malicious. My bad. Arkon (talk) 22:01, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

So you thought Donald Trump really did sue Wikipedia in 2010? Gamaliel (talk) 22:05, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Good lord, now this is actually funny. Arkon (talk) 22:08, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Good lord. I protected this. Let the AfD play out. Happy if another administrator wants to modify my protection, given that I !voted above. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 22:34, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yay, you protected a BLP violation. Nicely done. Arkon (talk) 22:40, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Blatant_BLP_violation_and_subsequent_protection_by_involved_Admin Arkon (talk) 22:46, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Keep and speedy close as a waste of time There is a place for humour in Wikipedia space. I've been quoted above, so I'll just add: Humourlessness is a terrible attribute to have on a collaborative website. Pick your battles a bit more cleverly, maybe, and not something that no-one for a second would mistake as real? Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 21:56, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I might actually be able to somewhat agree if this was actually funny in any way. It's shitting on your POV opponents under the guise of humor, on a site that's suppose be an encyclopedia. There are all sorts of fun pointy things we can go in to if you believe "oh it was a joke!! lululul" is an excuse. Let's not go there. Arkon (talk) 22:07, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

BLP applies to all namespaces, and a BLP violation masked as political satire is especially galling because political satire itself has no place on a neutral encyclopedia. If someone added "Hillary Clinton seeks miracle solution to cankles," I'd nom that too. Let's have some perspective. We're mocking the physical appearance of a presidential candidate. Really? ~ Rob^Talk
Weak delete as per BU Rob13, a lawsuit might just happen if the subject gets wind of this. Humor is wonderful, but I fear this is not really the right place for it. GAB^Hello! 22:59, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete It's beyond April 1. We could make up various funny and fake articles but beyond April 1, they become offensive. Backdating fake articles as if they ran earlier misses the April 1 aspect of the joke. If it were anyone other than Trump, it would be a no brainer as body shaming is frowned upon (which I thought a newly elected member of ArbCom that ran on anti-harassment would understand). What body parts of Hillary Clinton are okay to shame in the name of April 1? Sorry but play time is over and adults should return the encyclopedia back into one. --DHeyward (talk) 23:36, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Strong keep This is project space, this is part of a community newspaper, this was part of an article, and this MFD is disruptive. Go Phightins! 23:39, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Strong delete' Wikipedia is a damn encyclopedia. This is no place for games. -- Netoholic @ 23:41, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as a plausible hoax. Not funny, and not obviously a joke. Geogene (talk) 23:56, 6 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Humor, acceptable given its location, not mainspace, Signpost, the material is prominent real-world stuff. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:49, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Even if it is agreed in theory that humorous content is allowed to violate BLP, there is not much funny here. -Starke Hathaway (talk) 01:55, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Commenting rather than !voting because the page itself, tagged with ((humorous)), is less problematic than the link to the page from News & Notes, which has no indication of being a joke other than the meaning of the headline for those who understand it as a joke (those familiar enough with the language and with American current events) and the tiny "April Fools" link in the main story. So I don't feel very strongly about the page, and recognize the link is outside the scope of this MfD, but have to say that in general I don't think it's good practice to for Wikipedia to make up insulting lawsuits about living people (even the Trumpiest of living people). And I don't think that means I don't have a sense of humor (argumentum ad shockjockum). Look, ultimately, it doesn't actually matter if it's funny or not because we have an international audience/community and jokes are dependent on culture and a particular familiarity with the language. This particular joke is dependent upon knowledge of American pop culture/current events (granted, it's an element of pop culture that has been covered widely), and most certainly not something that everybody will get such that we can consider it an obvious exception to BLP (again, I'm talking primarily about the link to this page and about the general idea of jokes mitigating BLP issues, rather than this page itself). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 01:58, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Had this been an April fools joke then yeah I'd let it slide ... However it's not!, It's not remotely funny and serves no purpose to the project, I could create a subpage saying "Obama has a small (Redacted)" and stick a humour tag it ... Would that kept ? ... Obvious answer is no... so nor should this. –Davey2010^Talk 02:04, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
This seems to me to be a rip-off of Last Week Tonight. It's not about making fun of Trump for having small hands but of his reaction to being told he has small hands - that he'd go as far as to censor images of his own hands. It's a clever meta-joke, I suppose, though 'it's not us doing the body shaming' as an excuse might not hold up to scrutiny. In short, delete. 87.228.171.124 (talk) 02:11, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know. Keep because it's funny? Or maybe delete because it's not as obviously funny? I'm leaning delete, but only because we don't want that (Redacted) suing us for real. epicgenius 02:31, 7 April 2016 (UTC) (talk) 02:31, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete This has nothing to do with building an encyclopedia. April Fools day is long over. The Master ---)Vote Saxon(--- 02:49, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Not even that funny, no reason this needs to be on Wikipedia. kcowolf (talk) 04:08, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete – totally inappropriate to make fun of aspects of a living person in the name of humor. Violates the WP:NPOV policy. SSTflyer 04:51, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete – Wikipedia shame for the embarrassing wp:administrator action from User:The ed17 and for the wp:edit warring three reverts one two three repeatedly replacing WP:BLP disputed content and accusing users of WP:VANDALISM as he did it,(Reverted to revision 713976866 by Gamaliel: Please stop vandalizing the current issue of the Signpost) by User:Gamaliel, a wp:arbitration committee member Govindaharihari (talk) 05:52, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy delete (G3) as graceless and an embarrassment to the project: Wikipedia isn't a late night talk show. Also, I'd like to point out that, per WP:BLP § Applicability of the policy, "BLP applies to all material about living persons anywhere on Wikipedia, including talk pages, edit summaries, user pages, images, categories, lists, article titles and drafts." Rebb ing 07:24, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: A page that only falsely claims someone made a legal threat isn't very funny, and is a BLP violation. In my view it's a more serious BLP violation than the small hands thing. Also, why is this listed in "news and notes" for March 17, 2010? —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 07:34, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete or userfy, this is a joke but it's in a location where readers would not expect one, so needs to go from there. Guy (Help!) 09:26, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Gamaliel should be sanctioned under American Politics 2 arbcom remedies.--MONGO 12:46, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Only at Wikipedia is there a concept of "April Fool's Week" (well, not quite; look at how the professionals handle it). The April 1 editon of Signpost should be a special daily edition, not just another routine weekly edition. Revert to the previous serious edition after the day is over. This thing about Trump's hands is not funny, and it's disconcerting to see an Arbitration Committee member promoting such nonsense. wbm1058 (talk) 13:21, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: On behalf of the Signpost: this dummy page is no longer needed; we have no objection to its deletion. --Andreas JN 466 13:29, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) Delete this article, and the associated 2016 April 1st The Signpost hoax articles. These articles are clearly what Wikipedia is WP:NOT. Satire as it is traditionally used on Wikipedia is both amusing and an important restraint on our propensity for collective hubris; it is also, most importantly, self-satire. We should be utterly ruthless in our acceptance of such self-deprecating humour. We should not, however, accept that this implies that satirical writings about living persons are acceptable. That these articles seemed amusing to sections of the community is a signifier of our diversity of political opinion; that they seemed appropriate for publication is as strong a signifier of how far we have yet to come. To be clear, the use of Wikipedia to publish political satire targeting a candidate for the President of the United States, or of any other nation, is not acceptable. Finally, this particular article fails the Golden Rule of comedy, that it must, above all else, be funny. - Ryk72 ^'c.s.n.s.' 14:05, 7 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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 page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.