The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Nominator's rationale: Overcategorization per WP:OCEPON and numerous precedent. The single subcategory keeps all related articles in one category without need of this parent. StarcheerspeaksnewslostwarsTalk to me 22:23, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Nominator's rationale: This newly created category is inherently POV. What is considered a smear campaign will always be subjective as it is a matter of opinion which campaign tactics are negative or 'unfair'. I fear this category's existence will only invite edit-warring on articles where it is placed. gobonobo+c 20:38, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep - Perhaps change name to "Targets of smear campaigns"; the issue is not whether the accusation have merit or not, the issue is that this is a political tactics and discrediting tactics used by all political parties as well as corporations; the category assists readers understand how frequently this tactic is used. This is not POV because the definition of smear campaign is not about whether the alleged misconduct is true or not, the focus is that there was an the attack on the character of the individual rather than the issues (government policies, product safety, product quality). Providing examples of the tactic enhances readers' understanding. Also, quick deletion (the category was just created in October 2016) doesn't allow Wiki editors to contribute. Interesting comment about LGBT being target of smear campaigns; this should be added to the category WSDavitt (talk) 20:00, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete -- subjective and would lead to OR, i.e. who decides what's a smear campaign and what is not? K.e.coffman (talk) 20:41, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Anything that is an effort to damage or call into question someone's reputation and character is a smear campaign. I think your focus is on the accuracy of the misconduct allegations (which I agree are often POV and usually not verifiable) ; the issue here however is that the reputations of people and corporations are being targeted. No one would say that negative comments about the defective Samsung Note 7 is a smear campaignWSDavitt (talk) 20:15, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep -- factual category to denote tactic used to stymie free speech in (post-)modern liberal societies.Zigzig20s (talk) 21:16, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Lean toward delete - tough one. I think we could, reasonably, categorize some pages under this per the description by RS, but I am not sure how useful it would be and it is certainly subject to major POV. It's also a value-laden label. A category like Category:Political controversies would equally cover these pages without the value label and without the POV issues. EvergreenFir(talk) 22:27, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
User:Doug Weller: Comment: Smear campaigns are not only political. They occur in all kinds of professional environments. Please ping me if you reply. Thank you.Zigzig20s (talk) 14:17, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Zigzig20s: Good point. Just delete. I don't think I interpret the word "factual" the way you do. Accusations may be called smear campaigns when in fact they are accurate. Doug Wellertalk 14:26, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I think "smear campaign" often comes with sexual allegations. Dictionary.com has a slightly different definition though. (I think they're partly wrong; one doesn't need to be a "public figure" to be smeared.)Zigzig20s (talk) 14:29, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Would it be OK to leave a note at WikiProject LGBT studies? I think smear campaigns are part and parcel of the LGBTQ experience, and we may find this category very useful indeed.Zigzig20s (talk) 14:32, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Who would decide whether accusations are merited or constitute a smear campaign? Inherently non-neutral (WP:SUBJECTIVECAT); POV and edit-war magnet. -- Rrburke (talk) 18:38, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Per WP:CAT: "Categorization must also maintain a neutral point of view. Categorizations appear on article pages without annotations or referencing to justify or explain their addition; editors should be conscious of the need to maintain a neutral point of view when creating categories or adding them to articles. Categorizations should generally be uncontroversial; if the category's topic is likely to spark controversy, then a list article (which can be annotated and referenced) is probably more appropriate."--agr (talk) 19:48, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Neutrality is achieved by presenting both points of view. Is Julian Assange a rapist or the target of a smear campaign? According to Wikipedia, Assange says it's a smear campaign. 76.64.14.238 (talk) 05:43, 17 October 2016 (UTC) WSDavitt (talk) 05:44, 17 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
And Donald Trump and Bill Cosby say they're being subjected to a smear campaign by their accusers, too. So what; we don't take self-serving statements as self-evident proclamations of absolute truth. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:47, 17 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete purely subjective; impossible to articulate in an NPOV manner what is legitimate criticism, what is coverage of an historical process, what is criticism that may be unfair or just wrong but within the bounds of free speech, from what one later calls a smear campaign. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:47, 17 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom. 'Smear' is inherently POV per WP:TERRORIST, and any article included in such a category would inherent the POV taint of the category name. That is not an appropriate use of Wikipedia's Voice. Mathglot (talk) 18:57, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Strong delete Calling anything here a smear campaign is taking one point of view, and often in the cases presented there are two points of view. In one case the person who was allegedly a victim of a smear campaign got removed from his professional because he had clearly engaged in illegal behavior, so even the rational here is not clear. This is a very POV-pushing category name.John Pack Lambert (talk) 03:21, 21 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Nominator's rationale:delete per WP:NONDEF and WP:SUBJECTIVECAT, this is a random collection of articles that have already been categorized more adequately elsewhere in the tree of Category:Labor. None of the articles is specifically about terminology. Marcocapelle (talk) 12:52, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
cmt saying "None of the articles is specifically about terminology" entirely misses the point of all terminology categories. Each of the articles is a term so the category is a collection of terms ('terminology') for reader navigation purposes. Hmains (talk) 20:09, 22 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Numerous terminology categories have been deleted before because they are not about terminology (about language), see for example this discussion. Marcocapelle (talk) 19:41, 23 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
whether named 'terms' or 'terminology', they are terms collected together into a category for ease of navigation--the purpose of categories. Categories are not 'about' fine points of the English language. Hmains (talk) 20:20, 23 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't aid navigation as it's just a random collection of articles from the tree of the parent category. Marcocapelle (talk) 06:06, 24 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Nominator's rationale: I have abandoned the project, two contributors expressed explicitly they want it gone, nobody else is interested, has attracted vandalism requiring protection = no yield except unproductive maintenance. Nothing to merge into or redirect to due to incompatible scope, therefore deletion. Paradoctor (talk) 12:22, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete -- this is mostly categorising templates relating to citations of particular works. If properly implemented, this would become enormous, far too big to be useful, so that it is much better not to have it at all. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:18, 16 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Nominator's rationale: Contains only the article Thomas Parran Jr. and a file image of the person. I can't find any other content, so the category is unnecessary. Good Ol’factory(talk) 11:23, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nominator....William, is the complaint department really on the roof? 18:05, 14 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Support deletion Too small for a category.TessT (talk) 18:12, 15 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete such categories are deprecated in all cases, but for one article are not needed at all.John Pack Lambert (talk) 03:23, 21 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
Relisted at 2016 OCT 27 CFD. Good Ol’factory (talk) 00:48, 27 October 2016 (UTC)
