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 keep. (non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman (talk) 00:09, 20 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

God In Fiction[edit]

God In Fiction (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Aside from being mistitled and listing the Bible and the Koran as fiction, this is a non-notable list which is unsourced and primarily original research. It also contains phrases such as, "God is an idiot." ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 10:06, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. Whether or not the Bible and The Koran are works of fiction, or factual records is open to debate and down to personal interpretation, and if God was depicted as an idiot in one work, then there's nothing wrong with the article stating this, as long as it can be sourced. The article as it stands is pretty poor, but I feel that an article which discusses the depiction of God in films and literature could be written which would have encyclopedic value. The current article barely scratches the surface.--Michig (talk) 10:31, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment. For example, see Thou Shalt Read Our List Of Top 10 Film Portrayals Of God, In Rewind from MTV, this BBC news story, and the book The hidden God by Mary Lea Bandy & Antonio Monda.--Michig (talk) 10:35, 13 April 2009 (UTC) The depiction of God in film has also been the subject of another published book: God in the Movies, by Bergesen & Greeley. As you can see from this listing from IMDB, there are plenty of examples that can be cited of the depiction of God.--Michig (talk) 10:53, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete I am in agreement with the nominator in regard to the list's lack of references, OR aspects, and concept of what constitutes fiction. Pastor Theo (talk) 10:32, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • So am I. But none of those criticisms of the current article are grounds for deletion since none of them indicate that a good article can't be written in its stead. Olaf Davis (talk) 13:07, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am withdrawing my "Delete" input since the current article is a completely different offering at every level. My initial input belonged to something that no longer exists. As for the new article, it is clearly a work in progress and it deserves to grow -- I will gladly add to it. Pastor Theo (talk) 22:16, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep and improve into a properly-sourced well balanced article, per my comments above and the available sources noted.--Michig (talk) 10:55, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment. See Cultural depictions of Jesus for an idea of the possibilities for this article.--Michig (talk) 11:05, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment. I agree with the nominator that the article should be retitled. "Cultural depictions of God" would be a better title, and the Bible and the Koran should be removed - to state here that these are either works of fiction or works of fact would violate WP:NPOV.--Michig (talk) 12:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Surely if we retitle the article as you suggest then it can include both of those without making a judgment on their veracity? Whether the Bible is fiction or not it's surely a cultural depiction of God. Olaf Davis (talk) 13:12, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • I think a retitled article could and should discuss the depiction of God within those works, as they have a clear influence on how God has been depicted in cultural works, e.g. the depiction of God as an old man with white hair and beard can be traced back directly to certain passages in Leviticus. It would be interesting to know where the 'traditional' western image of God originated and how that depiction has altered over the years.--Michig (talk) 13:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. The "God" figure is represented in so many ways by different cultures and religions and is so pervasive in the arts that no single article can possibly address the subject. I42 (talk) 12:58, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is that a reason to have no article at all? Surely having a 'cultural depictions of God' article with links to other more specific pages on specific cultures and religions is better than just removing it entirely. No single article can possibly address the whole of science but we can probably agree that's no reason to delete that! Olaf Davis (talk) 13:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Michig provides several decent sources which demonstrate that either 'God in Fiction' or 'Cultural representations of God' is a notable subject. I have a slight preference for renaming this to the latter and leaving a redirect. All the deletion rationales (except I42's, which I frankly don't understand) address problems with the current version of the article, which is not a reason to delete a notable topic. Olaf Davis (talk) 13:17, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. The nomination seems to suggest that parts of the article was found to be offensive. While I agree that it's inherently non-neutral to claim that the Bible or Koran are "fiction", there's nothing there that can't be fixed by editing. God does in fact appear as a character in many, many works of fiction. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:07, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment. I have made some suggestions for improving the article at Talk:God In Fiction. --Michig (talk) 14:09, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete - unsourced, POV. Also, most novels of a certain type at least mention God or religion in passing, so this is probably unmaintainable. - Biruitorul ^Talk 14:35, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak Keep. A potentially encyclopaedic topic that could certainly be improved along the lines suggested by Michig. Tevildo (talk) 14:50, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Religion-related deletion discussions. -- — LinguistAtLarge • Talk  15:37, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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• It is cargo cult encyclopaedia article writing no more. I predict a replay of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Portrayals of Mormons in popular media, although with fewer delete opinions to turn around this time. Uncle G (talk) 15:41, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - However bad the article is, the subject is encyclopedic. God knows it's going to take a good deal of work to make it any good, but, hey, that's true of a lot of religion articles. John Carter (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. All reasons given for deletion are based on the current state of the article, not what the article could realistically become. WP:DELETION requires us to consider the latter, not the former, before deleting an article, and I see no reason any issue with this article cannot be fixed by editing. JulesH (talk) 18:19, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep per WP:HEY, this can be rescued. Bearian (talk) 18:35, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per, good god. There is a topic lurking here, that would require a lot of tracking down of scholarly sources and quasi-scholarly sources (i bet The Atlantic has had an article on something like this in the past 10 years). But as it stands now, this is an original essay with no guidelines available to us to decide what due weight should be. There's that weird list of bullet points about one minor author's "directives" about writing about god in fiction, but why such weight for that minor personage? The current article is a piece of junk and needs to be at least stubbed. But why keep a stub waiting around for that 1 in a million editor who's going to devote major research to examining this concept appropriately, and then defend the article from the inevitable cruft accretion ("Hey, my favorite Larry Niven sci-fi novel talks about god, let's put in 500 words about that!").Bali ultimate (talk) 20:21, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete this is a shambles - and unfixable POV: "even the humourous portrayals of God are rarely irreverent" says the article - if a few people are killed over cartoons of a prophet, one might imagine what religions which forbid depition of the deity (Islam and Judaism, to name 2) would think of that statement - isn't blasphemy irreverence in overdrive? Carlossuarez46 (talk) 23:37, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment: all POV is fixable. The only issue is "Is this topic encyclopedic?" The content can always be cleaned up. — Reinyday, 03:22, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

• Keep absolutely notable topic, AfD is not for article cleanup. Jclemens (talk) 06:10, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The subject is encyclopedic. Europe22 (talk) 10:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep God saw the article and that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the first day of AFD. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep magnificent rescue by Uncle G, with some help from fellow mortals. He's better at it than the rest of us, but we too can learn. DGG (talk) 06:06, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The topic is demonstrated to be notable through the reliable sources used as references, and it is suprisingly NPOV for a religious article. The article isn't perfect, but its a lot better than it could be and there is valuable sourced information here that belongs under this topic. ThemFromSpace 07:50, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep be demonstrated notability. WP:CLEANUP is not a matter for deletion. Schmidt, ^{MICHAEL Q.} 03:53, 17 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete all in popular media/culture articles as inherently unencyclopedic. Stifle (talk) 08:57, 17 April 2009 (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.