Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ethnic stereotypes in American media

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 of the debate was keep.  Grue  13:53, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Ethnic stereotypes in American media

This article is based on loose impressions of what might be in the mind of the complex American media. Contributers rattle off any of the ethnic characters that pop into their heads, and then proceed to call their traits stereotypical. For every assertion the article makes there are thousands of exceptions, and is therefore unfit for wikipedia. ShadowyCabal 08:16, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

• Afd Suggestion I strongly suggest that List_of_stock_film_roles_based_on_ethnic_stereotypes be added to this afd nomination discussion. It seems to be a list that was branched off the above article and has similar issues Bwithh 01:52, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, as I think it needs a retool, not a deletion (there's a wealth of information in the old versions, but it's not organized). Phenomenon like blackface and blaxploitation appear in Wikipedia despite the American media productions that are not of blackface or blaxploitation. There does need to be a better definition of what constitutes a stereotype, and some of the other things (like minority underrepresentation in media) need to be branched off. --ColourBurst 08:28, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
• Keep - The article is referenced. If it lacks references on some sections, then delete those sections. This is a notable subject and probably, there is work published on it. Afonso Silva 09:28, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per above, but clean up big time. --Coredesat talk 10:34, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Notable subject, even outside America due to influence of such media elsewhere, just needs to be fixed up. SM247^{My Talk} 11:45, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: We all agree to the following :the word "Stereotype" should be clearly defined. The American Media is widespread. Wikipedia should say (even though it's obvious) that the American media reflects social attitudes of the general public, and therefore stereotypes. Life reflects art reflects life. If we all agree on these things, this article is redundant. There should be only a page called Stereotype and each ethnicity should have it's own page filled with facts.- ShadowyCabal
    • Comment I agree with your overall point, but part of the problem is that it's unreasonable to pin down a definition on "Stereotype" to begin with as it would only serve to reflect the bias of the editor. And the idea that art reflects life is unproven, and in my opinion, unprovable, but the article does assert that, "As art is often a reflection of society, these stereotypes can be said to represent American society's dominant view of ethnic groups." Words like "often" and "can be said to represent" seems to invalidate this whole assertion. Basically this sentence reads that "sometimes art reflects society and sometimes it doesn't." And if this assertion were more strongly worded it would undoubtedly be unreasonable as it can certainly be argued that art does not always reflect life. On a personal level, of course, I acknowledge that many of these stereotypes are real and the media does reflect (in many cases) the attitudes of the public. I just don't think these assertions can reasonably be made in an encyclopedia.--Derco 21:09, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
• Delete - I don't think my opinion will surpise anybody, but I have to agree with ShadowyCabal. In my mind this article will never be factual enough for an encyclopedia. There is no definitive test for what is or is not a stereotype, and thus this article will by necessity always be based on the editor's opinion. The contradictory nature of many of the listed stereotypes (for example that black people are either not macho or macho) seems to illustrate this problem. Furthermore, the "references" that this article cites are not reliable (at least not all of them are - the one with in the black stereotype section at least seems to be based on some sort of study). MANAA, for example, simply lists what it deems to be stereotypes. The Andrew Ma article does the same. These articles are based on nothing more than opinion. I for one don't see how these sources are any more reliable than if I made a website and linked to it. Also, individual movies are used often in the article but make poor evidence; for every movie that follows a stereotype, another may disprove it. Even if the sources are all made reliable, I still think that it is a leap on the editor's part to decide what constitutes a stereotype and what does not. In short, I do not see a way in which this article can ever be completely factual or NPOV, and therefore I think it should be deleted. For anyone who suggests keeping it, I would ask they explain how it could possibly be cleaned up into a suitable article as I for one do not see a way.--Derco 01:11, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: Stereotypes are subjective matters, true, and there will always be controversy over what is a stereotype. However, there is no rule that Wikipedia must shy away from controversies and that Wikipedia can only cover objective truths. The rule that applies, however, is that all sides of the controversy be given equal weight (WP:NPOV). There has been plenty analyzed and written about stereotypes, the task WP places upon itself is to represent what is out there. hateless 05:44, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment: I understand that Wikipedia can and does tackle issues that involve controversy. My point is that I feel that the very nature of this subject makes it ill-suited to tackle in an encyclopedia. Even if it were rewritten, I do not personally feel that all sides of this issue can or will be presented. Not to mention that this subject is, in my opinion, far too broad for an encyclopedia entry and, as someone mentions later on the page, is basically an invitation for use as a soap box. As far as I can see, almost every source that can be found on this topic will involve one person's opinion, which is no more valuable really than my opinion. So either the editor will have to decide what is or is not a stereotype, or the article will have to be reduced to "such and such says that the nerdy Asian is a stereotype." The former option (as the article is now, pretty much) seems to be in violation of original research or NPOV, and the latter would seem to involve generally irrelevent assertions that do not belong in an encyclopedia either. Forgive me if that did not make sense as I am having a hard time of communicating exactly what I want to.--Derco 21:09, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. Do Not Rewrite. An embarrassingly poorly authored and badly referenced article given the apparent seriousness of intent. I do not normally vote for delete based on simply an article's poor quality though, and I am not doing so here. In this case, I believe that the article is not recoverable even after a rewrite. Besides Derco's concerns which I share, I would argue that the subject "Ethnic Stereotypes in American Media" is much too large and unwieldy and awkward for a reasonable encyclopedia article. In addition, the subject implies that such ethnic stereotypes are both a special category in themselves and somehow inherent to American media production (perhaps a POV assertion of inherent racism?) , when it is more accurate to say that stereotypes and cliches of all kinds are inherently widespread in media production throughout all cultures and throughout history for just about every kind of situation and character. All these stereotypes are not created by media but are reflections of ideas held socially - negative, positive, more or less accurate or inaccurate etc. but struggling and in flux - that are reproduced and circulated in media. Neither Birth of a Nation or The Clansman are the root cause of racism against blacks in the US. Content about mass media representations of ethnic stereotypes belong in the articles on the the ethnic groups, which can properly approach the subject from the perspective of the social history of the group and identify when and where ethnic stereotypes have been really notable and important in reflecting the history of the group (and properly use media references as part of the evidence for these explanations) rather than the strange, befuddled approach of treating media stereotypes as significant in themselves and detached from social history that the afd article subject encourages. Also delete List_of_stock_film_roles_based_on_ethnic_stereotypes for similar reasons Bwithh 01:46, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
• Merge with Stereotype which has slim diversity in its cited resources. Ste4k 02:12, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, but the article needs to be converted into a List instead. hateless 05:44, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment There is already a related list at List of stock film roles based on ethnic stereotypes (branched off from Ethnic stereotypes in popular culture I believe, and then merged with another list), which I think shows the problem with making this into a list. None of it is sourced, and it is completely subjective. In my opinion a simple list would be worse in some ways in that it removes even the element of explanation as to why something has been classified as a stereotype. At the very least it would be rather redundant with that list.--Derco 21:09, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment: I meant the article should be formatted into a list like List of professional wrestling throws, where there is encyclopedic text with each item. Frankly, I'm not impressed with List of stock film roles based on ethnic stereotypes other than the title of the article, perhaps the two articles can be merged in some way. hateless 22:10, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
      • Comment I'm not happy with that article either (evident from my comments on its talk page, I think), which was part of my point. But I don't really see how making it like the List of professional wrestling throws would help either. It seems to me that it would keep all the problems it currently has but in list format.--Derco 00:52, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
        • It's one suggestion of many. I don't mean it will solve all its problems but to me it should be structured like that genre of Lists. hateless 17:30, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as fails WP:NPOV, is a soapbox, and advocacy, filed with sweeping generalizations which appear entirely original research. Making this a list would only make it shorter. Tychocat 15:41, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
• Strong delete per Bwithh and Tychocat. Frankly, I have no idea why I even thought about keeping this. --Coredesat talk. o.o;; 07:39, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep. However poorly constructed the article is, this is a very relevant and necessary topic. The concepts featured, however badly they are explained and related, are very real and it would be an unnecessary shame to have them unincluded in Wikipedia. And on a rather shallow note, this article is very old and relatively old. This may sound rather simple-minded, but if it is to be deleted, it would have been deleted a long time ago. Black-Velvet 12:50, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Valid topic with strong implications for society + references. --JJay 13:44, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep but thoroughly rewrite. If it doesn't look like this is possible, we're probably better off without it. --Lukobe 19:46, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
• Delete per User:Derco reasons. --Dark Tichondrias 21:05, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. I would be willing to help give it a thorough re-write, please post on my talk page if you wish to discuss this. It's a valid subject, I've actually covered similar ground (stereotypes in the British media) in a geography class at GCSE level, this really is a valid topic. Please post on my talk page. --Sunholm(talk) 21:07, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Very important/noteworthy topic. - CNichols 01:13, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• KEEP Definately a valid topic. Why do so many people not want to acknowledge harmful stereotypes?Bethereds 04:28, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment Please do not suggest that those of us who have a problem with this article are implying that stereotypes do not exist.--Derco 23:22, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep Important topic that no encyclopedia should be without. It needs work, not deletion. Hong Qi Gong 04:28, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep This topic needs to be kept. Deletion amounts to a whitewash.wongba 06:13, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep This is an extremely important topic. It's true that stereotypes and racial issues can be subjective. However, they are valid intellectual topics worthy of an encyclopedia entry. If they weren't, why do so many reputable universities have entire departments and majors devoted to such issues? I agree this article in particular could use some reorganization and a lot of work. Perhaps each ethnic stereotype should have its own page (as each ethnic group's stereotypes probably have enough content to warrant separate articles, and the stereotyping isn't always so directly nor exclusively related to media necessarily) in addition to one from a media perspective. From doing research myself, I can assure you that there are many many reputable scholarly articles and books regarding racial stereotypes, and that stereotypes are not all just random qualities that random Wikipedians thought up haphazardly and pasted on this site. As for problems about neutrality, I would like to reiterate Wikipedia's suggestion of presenting all different points of view to achieve balance. I feel that deleting this article and therefore accessable information about this entire subject would be hasty and a loss for Wikipedia; I would instead advocate for putting in extra effort to rework the article to bring it up to Wikipedia's standards.Drenched 05:23, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, but I suggest that anything that can't be cited be removed. Wikibout-Talk to me! 23:05, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. There are some parts that should be addressed and modified, but otherwise this is an important topic. —Sesel 00:50, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep: I think that the page should be kept up, but it definitely needs to be trimmed down a bit and re-worked on to a certain extent (as others have mentioned). Various regions and countries portray different ethnic groups within some or most of their media through stereotypes, but the North American media is way more international than almost any other region or country around the world (this aspect has to be repeated). These representations can and do very much have a crucial impact, on how "the self" sees "the other" and how the "the other" sees themselves. This article can also provide a better understanding of how these depictions shape and have shaped ethnic and race relations, in and between American society and the rest of the world today as well as throughout history. Furthermore, considering that the US (especially) is a world superpower, how much of its media portrays different ethnic groups (both inside and outside of its borders) is of extreme significance. Silver crescent 01:52, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

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.