I support the idea of forcing people to actually argue their view, but I see a lot of problems with the current idea.

1. The decision of the closing admin is always going to be questioned.
2. Having only arguments doesn't show how many people actually endorse

these views. 3) Debates on schools and roads will probably have an equal amount of delete and keep arguments of which the validness is impossible to establish as both "sides" think the other side is wrong and end up in endless counter aguments.

And if we were to force actual arguments we should also find a way to make people actually read an article and vote based on its merit and not a view on the general category of articles.

--Mgm

I'm not sure how you can "force" people to argue their view beyond lip-service and gaming the system. If people won't take the trouble to give a good reason, they won't. It's discourteous, and that's a shame, but I don't know how to enforce courtesy.

At one time, the boilerplate text at the top of VfD specifically directed discussants to give a reason for their vote. It doesn't any more. I don't know why not. But it didn't really matter, because people frequently cast votes without making the effort to explain their rationale, then as now.

At one time, someone decided it would be a good idea to review VfD nominations and make judgements as to whether the nominator's rationale for deletion accorded with policy, and to mark those nominations which he judged to be invalid with cheerful little pastel- colored nastygrams. It turned out not to be a good idea.

-- Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith@verizon.net "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print! Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/