Talk:Weep Not, Child

Controversial?

The intro previously called the book Thiong'o's "controversial" first book. It's not appropriate to use subjective words like that, especially in the first sentence. If the book really caused controversy, the appropriate way to handle this would be by describing the controversy (who thought it was controversial? And why?). I'd do it myself, but the link is broken. I'll try to construct a sentence or two based on what I can judge from context, but the original editor will have to double check it or rewrite it.--Cúchullain ^t/c 00:18, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

User: Faithlessthewonderboy Reverts

Please note that after 3 reverts, you get reported for reverting valid edits. It is common to add sections that are standard for novel articles. Each novel article has to have a Summary section, a Themes Section, etc. Without these headings, it can be said that the process is hindered for editors who don't know where to start. This is also not about having a athetically appealing page. It's about encouraging people to edit and add things. An article that is hardly begun with no indication of what is missing is hardly welcoming for new editors, which, in good faith, I'll assume is not your goal. Look at some other major novels. Each has these standard sections and it's a good starting point. If your sole reasoning for deleting them is that they don't look good, that's your perrogative, but that's not really a good reason and I'll keep editing them back. That is until I take it up with administration or just wait until someone else gives their opinion. Plus you keep deleting the Themes section that already has some themes including, which is puzzling if your goal is to start someone on their way to edit an article. --RossF18 (talk) 03:02, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Please do not deign to explain policies to others when it is clear that you do not understand them. I suggest that you familiarize yourself with WP:3RR before tossing around threats. Saying that an article has to have certain sections shows how unfamiliar you are with Wikipedia. If you plan to expand the article, by all means do so! But creating an empty section and placing an 'expand' tag in it does not do anyone any good whatsoever. There is absolutely no point in doing this. The poor aesthetics isn't the reason I've removed the offending sections - I've removed them, again, because they are completely useless. If you create an article without any content and just an 'expand' tag, it will be deleted, even if it is a perfectly worthy subject. Why? Because an empty article is of no use! You would never open an Encyclopædia Britannica and see an empty article or section, so why should Wikipedia contain them?

"That is until I take it up with administration or just wait until someone else gives their opinion." Well, I'm an administrator - what's your point? And if you want to get a third opinion, please do so. But please stop this edit war. faithless (^speak) 03:47, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think there were any threats anywhere in my post. Stating Wikipedia policy is not a threat. Plus, I wasn't in an edit war, considering you've started the deletions. Perhaps "has" was too strong of a word, but the fact remains that most articles dealing with novels have these sections and the benefits of pointing out these sections outweigh what you call an empty article. As far as an empty article claim, it's not really empty given the long into paragraph and the entry in the Themes section that you keep deleting. This is not Encyclopedia Britannica so let us not judge a work in progress article by articles that a written up by experts for a printed book. Although you say it's not for authentic purposes, that was your reason after your first deletion and by claiming that there is absolutely "no point" you completely ignore the valid point I made in my post above. These sections, even if empty, help new editors especially know what sections are needed, and without these sections, it's easy to assume that the article doesn't need them, which is not true. Being an Administrator should prompt a desire for increasing ease of use for new editors as opposed to using the status to bully and for baseless accusations. I have a valid reason for the edit, and you accuse me of an edit war. That's just strange. You're free to keep reverting, but if an edit is valid and has a valid reasoning behind it, the fact that you see no reason or no point behind it really shouldn't give your opinion any more validity than mine. If you delete again, fine, but keep in mind that the themes section actually has information beyond the expand tag - the information that wasn't added by me, by the way. --RossF18 (talk) 04:41, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Besides, it seems kind of strange that even if there is one sentence in the plot summary, the section can stay, but with no sentence, the section gets arbitrarily deleted.--RossF18 (talk) 05:03, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

That was a pretty long post, so I'll respond to it point-by-point. 1.) You don't think threatening to have a user blocked by misquoting policy is a threat? I disagree. 2.) Two editors reverting each other repeatedly is the definition of an edit war. I'm not picking on you; it takes two to tango, and I'm as guilty as you are. But to suggest that only one of us was edit-warring is absurd. 3.) Yes, longer articles certainly have many sections. But as long as an article is only one paragraph long, it is pointless to put in sections which will never be created. It would be great if the 2,000,000+ articles on Wikipedia were all FA-quality, but the fact is most are stubs or start-level. And I'd argue that a decent stub is desirable over a poor start- or B-quality article any day. Also, a couple of odd, unsourced bulleted bits are hardly deserving of an entire section, in my opinion. 4.) We are striving to create a serious, reliable, high-quality encyclopedia here, and we would do well to emulate EB. 5.) (I'm assuming that's a typo, and you meant aesthetic instead of authentic.) That's not entirely correct - in my original edit summary I explained how I felt the empty sections added nothing to the article; this was my primary concern. Yes, I noted how they hurt the aesthetics, but only as a secondary complaint. 6.) I can understand where you're coming from with your "these sections will encourage editors to expand the article" argument, but I don't think it stands up to scrutiny. Wikipedia is closing in on three million articles, and this one is on for a relatively obscure African novel. Unfortunately, the article doesn't get many many views in the first place, let alone many edits. The idea that some benevolent expert on East African literature is going to pop in and create an FA out of it is foolishly optimistic (yes, I'm being hyperbolic here, but to make my point). We're here to provide information to our readers (and Wikipedia has far more readers than editors), not to encourage them to join us. If someone wants to become a Wikipedian, great! I'll welcome them with open arms! But our goal should be to inform, not recruit. 7.) How have I bullied you, and what baseless accusations have I made? You apparently didn't even know I was an administrator until I mentioned it, and the only reason I did that was to point out how irrelevant it is. Administrators are janitors, we don't settle content disputes. 8.) If there is a sentence, at least that's something! Even then it may not be deserving of an entire section, but at least an argument could be made for it. But there's no logical reason for a section to exist if there's nothing to put in it. It would be like a bookshelf without any books, or a gun rack without a gun. faithless (^speak) 13:48, 16 November 2008 (UTC)