Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Apartheid in Bahrain

This discussion was subject to a deletion review on 2011 April 27.
For an explanation of the process, see Wikipedia:Deletion review.

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

The result was DELETE. postdlf (talk) 23:45, 10 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Apartheid in Bahrain

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

If you came here because someone asked you to, or you read a message on another website, please note that this is not a majority vote, but instead a discussion among Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia has policies and guidelines regarding the encyclopedia's content, and consensus (agreement) is gauged based on the merits of the arguments, not by counting votes.

However, you are invited to participate and your opinion is welcome. Remember to assume good faith on the part of others and to sign your posts on this page by adding ~~~~ at the end.

Note: Comments may be tagged as follows: suspected single-purpose accounts: {{subst:spa|username}}; suspected canvassed users: {{subst:canvassed|username}}; accounts blocked for sockpuppetry: {{subst:csm|username}} or {{subst:csp|username}}.

Delete. Please see my comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palestinian Authority and the apartheid analogy; everything I wrote there is applicable here as well. If anything, this page is even more dubious than the "Palestinian Authority" one, particularly in that all but one of the sources are taken from recent journalistic articles. CJCurrie (talk) 03:52, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Currie, I hope that you will take another look at the article and consider revising your comment. I believe that this article is well-sourced and notable. Sources include the Christian Science Monitor the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights.I.Casaubon (talk) 01:47, 10 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - Pointy POV fiesta. I'd call it an original essay, but that would be giving this drive-by gotcha extravaganza too much credit. Carrite (talk) 04:37, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. A stub article about discrimination against Shiites could possibly be created, but this title needs to be got rid of. Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:57, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I created this article because the democracy demonstrations in Bahrain have caused a great many human rights activists, such as Nicholas Kristof to look at Bahrain and call it apartheid. This is a system where Shia are forbidden by law to live in certain Sunni neighborhoods, where only Sunnni can join the police and the army, and where the government recruits Sunnis from abroad to help it maintain control over an oppressed minority. The more important point is that Wikipedia articles reflect reality as it is written in reliable sources. This article is well sourced and simply reflects the reality that scholars and commentators around the world look at Bahrain and say apartheid.I.Casaubon (talk) 13:01, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Why is it necessary to have an article on this topic that's separate from Human rights in Bahrain? GabrielF (talk) 02:52, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Please read Wikipedia:Deletion policy and make a valid argument.I.Casaubon (talk) 14:30, 8 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Pointy article creation in the vein as the recently shitcanned Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Accusations of Arab Apartheid. Thin, cobbled together sourcing to advance an agenda. I will note that this sort of thing was once brought to ArbCom, which thankfully didn't need to act as every single one of those old, equally pointy articles was either deleted renamed, or redirected. We seem to be going down the same road. Tarc (talk) 13:41, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. While there may well be discrimination in Bahrain, this article is pretty much entirely synthesis. To justify its inclusion, we'd need to have some reliable sources attesting to the topic being one of general notability, rather than just some people apparently using the word "apartheid". -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:10, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Yes, the NYTimes' Nicholas Kristof referred[1] to the discrimination in Bahrain as similar to apartheid, but that is the type of analysis and analogizing that you expect from a good editorial, the analogy doesn't then justify a separate wikipedia article. E.g., Racial segregation in the United States cites comparisons to apartheid (as were made since at least the 1960s), but there is no article on Apartheid in the United States.--Milowent • ^talkblp-r 18:51, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy Keep "Please see my comments..." No, I won't. If you can't even be bothered to copy-paste, don't nominate articles for deletion. Anarchangel (talk) 14:08, 5 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
And if he did that, you would likely complain that "it was just a cut n pasted rationale, come up with something original!". There are 5 criteria listed at Speedy Keep, and I fail to see how this meets any of those. Tarc (talk) 14:27, 5 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I might do that. But probably not. The other flaw was a more pressing issue at the time. And still is, as it has not been addressed. The nomination currently lacks any of the reasons to delete in WP:DEL#REASON. The rule in question is SPEEDYKEEP #1, in fact: "The nominator withdraws the nomination or fails to advance an argument for deletion" And I see that WP:BEFORE lacks any requirement for nominators to provide one, which is quite absurd and incompatible with SPEEDY. Anarchangel (talk) 02:22, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedians have an obligation to apply the rules objectively' I am concerned that the standards, WP:N and WP:RS are being applied differently here than they are to Social apartheid in Brazil or to Israel and the apartheid analogy For example, Roscelese removed a paragraph from this article, but not from very similar articles on Brazil and Israel. To me, the five articles , Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Israel and Palestinian Authority share many similarities. I would like some of the editors voting to delete to explain why an article about Apartheid in Bahrain, where Shia suffer formal, legal restrictions, is to be deleted, while the article about Brazil, where there is no legal inequality, was kept Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Allegations of Brazilian apartheid.I.Casaubon (talk) 16:13, 5 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Closing admin note - The above comment has been pasted to 3 AfDs, I have replied once here, to address this concern. Tarc (talk) 21:31, 5 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

WP:WEIGHT is only relevant to article content; the linked explication of how it relates to other rules is a serviceable argument for keeping the article. There is no rule at all about what balance there should be between articles. Anarchangel (talk) 02:22, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Middle East-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 00:42, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also in # Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Saudi Arabia (links)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Palestine
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam/Shi'a Islam task force/Afd.I.Casaubon (talk) 21:02, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I took the liberty of adding missing information to the list of previous AfD results. I assert that is overall a record of retaining articles about the apartheid-like characteristics of modern states, with one result anomalous enough that consensus could very well change to overturn it: Accusations of Arab Apartheid. Anarchangel (talk) 02:22, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per the rationale I provided at the other "apartheid" pages.--Babank (talk) 06:38, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bahrain Centre for Human Rights is a leading center for opposition to the "apartheid regime" - their words, not mine, in Bahrain and is a leading source for the information in this article, along with Irshad Manji, Princeton University Press and other reputable sources.I.Casaubon (talk) 19:57, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete and salt as yet another obvious POVFORK and violation of WP:SYNTH. I.Casaubon, the article's creator, really ought to be sanctioned for persisting with this pointless waste of everyone's time. He knows perfectly well what the problem with these misconceived articles is, so there is no excuse for creating more of them. Prioryman (talk) 22:19, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delete and salt It seems like we're getting a new one every few days. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 04:21, 9 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note There is an off-wiki effort to canvass editors here. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 04:23, 9 April 2011 (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 article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.