On Jan 25, 2007, at 11:53 AM, Francis Tyers wrote:
While all policies can be abused, some are easier to abuse than others. Some are even attractive nuisances.
The only people who think that having to cite and verify articles with reliable sources is "abuse" are the kind of people who think "oh no my pokemans character studies are at risk again!"
This comment (which I will note is offensive, wrongheaded, and appalling) is emblematic of the exact problem with [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:CITE]]. Nobody sane ever thought that the problem with Pokecruft was that it wasn't verifiable. We only started using [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:CITE]] to deal with that problem because we were desperate to come up with something that seemed sturdy that we could use to tell people to go away.
But this was fundamentally an act of desperation, and it shows, because the justifications for using [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:CITE]] in this way are so obviously flimsy. The deletions still go through because we have a well-sized cult of people who will faithfully vote delete, but anybody with an ounce of sense and knowledge about the subject knows full well that this is a flimsy justification and that the sources are reliable.
Deleting cruft articles with [[WP:RS]] and [[WP:CITE]] is an ugly kludge. If it's so vitally important that we do it, we need to come up with a justification that isn't a joke.
-Phil