Wikipedia:Drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass

An early Wikipedian coming to the realisation that dead horses can't be made to go anywhere.

There comes a point in every debate where the debate itself has come to a natural end. You may have won the debate, you may have lost the debate, or you may have found yourself in a draw. At this point you should drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass.

If a debate, discussion, or general exchange of views has come to a natural end through one party having "won" or (more likely) the community having lost interest in the entire thing, then no matter which side you were on, you should walk away.

If you don't, if you continue to flog the poor old debate, if you try to reopen it, if you continually refer to old news, if you parade your triumph in the faces of others... you're not really winning friends and influencing people. Instead, you are annoying the hell out of everyone nearby.

• If you have "won" – good for you. Now go about your business; don't keep reminding us of the fact that your "opponent" didn't "win".
• If you have "lost" – sorry, hard luck. Now go about your business; don't keep reminding us of the fact that your "opponent" didn't actually "win" because of... whatever.
• If the debate died a natural death – let it remain dead. It is over, let it go. Nobody cared except you. Hard to stomach, but you're going to have to live with it.

So, the next time you find yourself standing over the body of a clearly-deceased horse: please don't beat it. It won't help. Let the poor animal rest in peace.

See also

Column-generating template families

The templates listed here are not interchangeable. For example, using {{col-float}} with {{col-end}} instead of {{col-float-end}} would leave a <div>...</div> open, potentially harming any subsequent formatting.

Column templates

Type	Family	Handles wiki  table code?†	Responsive/ Mobile suited	Start template	Column divider	End template
Float	"col-float"	Yes	Yes	{{col-float}}	{{col-float-break}}	{{col-float-end}}
	"columns-start"	Yes	Yes	{{columns-start}}	{{column}}	{{columns-end}}
Columns	"div col"	Yes	Yes	{{div col}}	–	{{div col end}}
	"columns-list"	No	Yes	{{columns-list}} (wraps div col)	–	–
Flexbox	"flex columns"	No	Yes	{{flex columns}}	–	–
Table	"col"	Yes	No	{{col-begin}}, {{col-begin-fixed}} or {{col-begin-small}}	{{col-break}} or {{col-2}} .. {{col-5}}	{{col-end}}

^† Can template handle the basic wiki markup {| | || |- |} used to create tables? If not, special templates that produce these elements (such as {{(!}}, {{!}}, {{!!}}, {{!-}}, {{!)}})—or HTML tags (<table>...</table>, <tr>...</tr>, etc.)—need to be used instead.