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List of fictional Scots

List of fictional Scots (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log • AfD statistics)

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Indiscriminate list, there are thousands of Scots appearing in books, films, TV etc etc. and I can't see this becoming a useful page. Category:Fictional Scottish people is a more suitable method of collecting such people. Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 11:58, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Scotland-related deletion discussions. —Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 11:58, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
• Delete per nom, per lack of WP:NOTE of the concept, per WP:NOTDIR and WP:SALAT. Nom is right that categories also always better than such lists. Verbal chat 12:10, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
• Delete per nom. Category more viable. --Deskford (talk) 12:41, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
• Keep The relevant guideline, WP:CLS, tells us that there is no preference for categories over lists as they each have their good points and so complement each other. Size is not a significant issue because Misplaced Pages is not paper. The list is nowhere near the size of our larger lists such as List of minor planets which, with its numerous sublists, has about 250000 entries. Furthermore, the list before us here contains good sources which reference the notable topic of Scots in fiction. Provision of such sources is one of the advantages which lists have over categories and so our core policy of verification is better served. Removal of sourced information is not our editing policy and the nomination is purely negative, contrary to this policy. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:00, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
• Delete per WP:NOTDIR, WP:SALAT and WP:IINFO. We've had AFD debates on the List of fictional New Zealanders and List of fictional Armenians, both which resulted in a strong consensus to delete (links are to the debates). This is clearly a pointy creation in an attempt to legitimise your opinion on the matter. This isn't a useful navigational list, and could be adequately replaced by a category.Claritas § 13:05, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

• List of fictional Jews seems to be doing fine at AFD - heading for a snow keep. I have not looked into Armenians or Kiwis - it might be that some national stereotypes work better in fiction than others. The Scots seem highly distinctive in this respect and the lack of a corresponding list seemed a significant omission. Characters such as Dr. Finlay are national treasures and merit good attention. Providing an index to our articles of this sort is my point and it seems a good one. Lists are entirely legitimate for this purpose and are well-supported by practise and policy. Your attempt to suggest otherwise is counterfactual. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:18, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The difference here seems to be that being Jewish is an ethnicity, a religion and a nationality, whereas being Scottish is just a nationality, and there's less coverage of Scots in fiction than Jews in fiction. Claritas § 13:38, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Just a nationality!? You are suggesting that the Jews are the chosen people and so all other nations are unimportant? Anyway, getting back to actual policy, please note that WP:NOTDIR is irrelevant as that is concerned with commercial directories not Misplaced Pages lists. WP:SALAT explicitly supports lists of this sort with its specific examples such as List of Albanians and its guidance that lists which are too general in scope should be split into sections or sublists. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:45, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

You're just not hearing the consensus concerning the application of WP:NOTDIR - it applies to any sort of directory, not purely "commercial ones". Claritas § 14:00, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The meaning of our policies is ascertained by reading them. In this case, the relevant section is directed at "Directories, directory entries, electronic program guide, or a resource for conducting business." and the accompanying text clearly indicates the commercial focus of this policy which is directed at things like Yellow Pages. This is obviously not a general prohibition of navigational lists which are considered a different sort of object here, explicitly governed by different policies. Misplaced Pages has hundreds of thousands of Lists and so your attempt to extend an irrelevant policy to them is obviously not our consensus. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:27, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

• Delete per WP:NOTDIR, which clearly applies to more than lists about commercial products. The meaning of WP:NOTDIR can indeed be ascertained by reading it, which some people have obviously not done, or done in an overly selective manner. Specifically, I'm referring to items 1 and 6 of WP:NOTDIR:

Misplaced Pages articles are NOT:
1. Lists or repositories of loosely associated topics such as (but not limited to) quotations, aphorisms, or persons (real or fictional)...Of course, there is nothing wrong with having lists if their entries are famous because they are associated with or significantly contribute to the list topic (for example, Nixon's Enemies List).
6. Non-encyclopedic cross-categorizations, such as "People from ethnic/cultural/religious group X employed by organization Y" or "Restaurants specializing in food type X in city Y". Cross-categories like these are not considered sufficient basis to create an article, unless the intersection of those categories is in some way a culturally significant phenomenon.

This article clearly fits item 1, in that it is a list of loosely associated fictional people, who are clearly not famous primarily because they are Scots. If they are notable, they are because of their inclusion in a popular fictional book. This article also clearly fits item 6, because the intersection of fictional people and Scottish people cannot be shown to be a culturally significant phenomenon. SnottyWong 19:24, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

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