Talk:Death and state funeral of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani

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Requested move 25 September 2022

• Death and state funeral of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani → Death and funeral of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani
• Death and state funeral of Boris Yeltsin → Death and funeral of Boris Yeltsin
• Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II → Death and funeral of Elizabeth II
• Death and state funeral of Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed → Death and funeral of Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed
• Death and state funeral of Fidel Castro → Death and funeral of Fidel Castro
• Death and state funeral of George H. W. Bush → Death and funeral of George H. W. Bush
• Death and state funeral of George V → Death and funeral of George V
• Death and state funeral of George VI → Death and funeral of George VI
• Death and state funeral of Gerald Ford → Death and funeral of Gerald Ford
• Death and state funeral of Hafez al-Assad → Death and funeral of Hafez al-Assad
• Death and state funeral of Heydar Aliyev → Death and funeral of Heydar Aliyev
• Death and state funeral of Hirohito → Death and funeral of Hirohito
• Death and state funeral of Jack Layton → Death and funeral of Jack Layton
• Death and state funeral of Jawaharlal Nehru → Death and funeral of Jawaharlal Nehru
• Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin → Death and funeral of Joseph Stalin
• Death and state funeral of Josip Broz Tito → Death and funeral of Josip Broz Tito
• Death and state funeral of Kim Il-sung → Death and funeral of Kim Il-sung
• Death and state funeral of Kim Jong-il → Death and funeral of Kim Jong-il
• Death and state funeral of King Hussein → Death and funeral of King Hussein
• Death and state funeral of Lech and Maria Kaczyński → Death and funeral of Lech and Maria Kaczyński
• Death and state funeral of Lee Kuan Yew → Death and funeral of Lee Kuan Yew
• Death and state funeral of Leonid Brezhnev → Death and funeral of Leonid Brezhnev
• Death and state funeral of Liliʻuokalani → Death and funeral of Liliʻuokalani
• Death and state funeral of Mao Zedong → Death and funeral of Mao Zedong
• Death and state funeral of Michael Sata → Death and funeral of Michael Sata
• Death and state funeral of Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq → Death and funeral of Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq
• Death and state funeral of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk → Death and funeral of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
• Death and state funeral of Nelson Mandela → Death and funeral of Nelson Mandela
• Death and state funeral of Norodom Sihanouk → Death and funeral of Norodom Sihanouk
• Death and state funeral of Néstor Kirchner → Death and funeral of Néstor Kirchner
• Death and state funeral of Omar Bongo → Death and funeral of Omar Bongo
• Death and state funeral of Pierre Trudeau → Death and funeral of Pierre Trudeau
• Death and state funeral of Raúl Alfonsín → Death and funeral of Raúl Alfonsín
• Death and state funeral of Richard Nixon → Death and funeral of Richard Nixon
• Death and state funeral of Ronald Reagan → Death and funeral of Ronald Reagan
• Death and state funeral of Ruhollah Khomeini → Death and funeral of Ruhollah Khomeini
• Death and state funeral of Ruth Bader Ginsburg → Death and funeral of Ruth Bader Ginsburg
• Death and state funeral of Vladimir Lenin → Death and funeral of Vladimir Lenin
• Death and state funeral of Võ Nguyên Giáp → Death and funeral of Võ Nguyên Giáp
• Death and state funeral of Winston Churchill → Death and funeral of Winston Churchill

– the word "state" is redundant detail, because it is not needed for disambiguation.
Per WP:PRECISE: "titles should unambiguously define the topical scope of the article, but should be no more precise than that" ... and in all of these cases "Death and funeral of Foo" is sufficiently precise. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:10, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Note to closer: if there is a consensus to make these moves, then a lot of navboxes will need to be updated, and a lot of eponymous categories will need speedy renaming per WP:C2D. I would be happy to assist in those tasks, if asked. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:15, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose - State funerals are only for heads of state, and should be so named. And they are officially referred to as state funerals when covered by the media. Who is Wikipedia to decide that they know better that the world media, and government protocols, about how they name their funerals? — Maile (talk) 01:09, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

Also note State funerals in the United States and Category:State funerals by country (etc.) there would have to be a whole lot of renaming of related categories and articles, just for consistency. — Maile (talk) 01:49, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

@Maile66: I see no need to rename such set categories just because the attribute is no longer in the title. Most article are categorised by multiple attributes which are not included in the title. For example, Queen Elizabeth II died in September 2022 and her funeral was in London, but "September 2022 in London" is nor part of the title.

It seems that you may have misunderstood this proposal. It is not a plan to somehow pretend that these state funerals are not state funerals; it just a proposal to follow the conciseness principle of the naming policy WP:AT by removing a word which is not needed to identify the article.

As to your comment about government protocols, following them is contrary to policy. The actual policy is to use WP:COMMONNAME, which may or may not be the official name.

As to usage, I see no evidence to support your assumption that reliable sources predominantly use the term "state funeral" rather than "funeral".

I just checked JSTOR, which concentrates reliable sources:

• "funeral of Winston Churchill": 21 hits
  • "state funeral of Winston Churchill": 2 hits
• "funeral of Ronald Reagan": 9 hits
  • "state funeral of Ronald Reagan": 1 hits

BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:09, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose State funerals are state funerals. For some leaders, a state funeral is followed by a private burial. The difference between the two must be noted so there is no confusion. Thriley (talk) 01:26, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Thriley: I am not aware of any case where a Wikipedia article on the "Death and state funeral of Foo" is accompanied by another article on the same person with the title e.g. ""Private funeral of Foo". If I have missed some, please can you post some examples. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:48, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  BrownHairedGirl QE2 had a public funeral service followed by a private burial service.1. This is not uncommon for heads of state of any nation to have a public service followed by a private service. I don't know if there are separate Wikipedia articles on the private services, but for heads of state it's normal to have both. — Maile (talk) 02:15, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Maile66 the article Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II includes the state funeral, the Committal service and the interment.

  Using the term "state funeral" in the title is not just un-needed precision; it is worse than that, because it misleadingly implies that the article does not go beyond the state funeral. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:07, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  Assuming this is a valid argument, I fail to see how removing 'state' improves anything. By your argument, it would still 'misleadingly [imply] that the article does not go beyond the funeral.' H. Carver (talk) 03:10, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @H. Carver: removing redundant verbiage from article titles is policy: see WP:PRECISE. If you don't see how that is an improvement, then go start an RFC to change the policy.

  And you miss my point, which is that the greater specificity does not help. It does not help identify the topic, it does not resolve ambiguity, and it does not reflect common usage in scholarly sources. So no positives; and the downside is that it may mislead about the scope, because while the word "funeral" may or may not be read to exclude the burial service, @Thriley insists that "state funeral" does not include the burial service. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:19, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  I think Maile66's citation of the QE2 example demonstrates exactly why the proposed move is appropriate. The article title Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II is misdescriptive due to the inclusion of the "state" qualifier: the article covers not only the death and the "state" funeral (as indicated by the title), but the semi-private (limited to 800 guests) committal service and the private interment service. Both of these would be expected to have coverage in the death-and-funeral article -- and neither of them are part of the state funeral as the title misleadingly suggests. TJRC (talk) 19:55, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Neutral leaning Oppose - While it is true that "death and funeral" is easier to absorb for an everyday person, I feel we should not compromise the true meaning of separating the difference between "state funeral" and a conventional funeral. Per some other points provided above for the opposes, I feel that we should keep "state funeral" in the names of these heads of state. Qwertyxp2000 (talk | contribs) 01:30, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Qwertyxp2000: that difference should be conveyed in the text of article. What part of policy do you believe supports keeping the word in the title? BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:13, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose - Per WP:PRECISE: "titles should unambiguously define the topical scope of the article, but should be no more precise than that", 'state funeral' unambiguously defines the topic scope. Removing the word 'state' no longer precisely defines the article by these standards. It is misleading to suggest that, to take a fatuous example, 'Death and funeral of my gran' is be functionally equivalent to 'Death and [state] funeral of ...'. There is a level to state funerals that goes far above a simple funeral, and it would be wrong - and imprecise - to conflate these in article names. This is why the addition of the word 'state' where appropriate unambiguously defines the article. H. Carver (talk) 02:31, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @H. Carver: please can you identify the article(s) nominated where removal of the word "state" would cause ambiguity with some other article. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:47, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @BrownHairedGirl I have said all I have to say in the comment above. H. Carver (talk) 03:00, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  OK, that's up to you.

  But that leaves with no editor having identified any of article(s) nominated where removal of the word "state" would cause ambiguity, or otherwise make the articles hard to find or identify. I fact, I don't see any policy-based arguments for retaining the word "state". BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:11, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  You are, I think, being needlessly pedantic. You appear to be arguing that because there isn't a Dave Jones (to use a stand-in name for any and all actual examples) who has had a funeral, his article doesn't need to say he had a state funeral. You are therefore arguing on a per-person record.

  I, on the other hand, am arguing on a per-category record; that the distinction between 'funeral' and 'state funeral' is important enough that it should be noted. This argument is on a level removed from an individual person; it doesn't matter to me if there is another Dave Jones who has had a funeral. This is why I won't - indeed, can't - respond to your request to identify specific articles. Your framing is overly specific and I refute it. H. Carver (talk) 03:22, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @H. Carver: on the contrary, this is very simple: I am arguing per policy, and you are not.

  No part of article policy supports your desire to use article titles to convey a "category distinction".

  It would be very helpful if before contributing further, you would take time to actually study the policy WP:AT, especially WP:CRITERIA. The closer is obliged to discount arguments which are not founded in policy, so all your non-policy ideas are simply a waste of your time and everyone else's time. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:36, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  I was under the impression that we were both arguing over a policy, and our difference was in the interpretation of said policy.

  However, I will post a response to my original comment later with references to specific policy documents. I wouldn't want to risk my vote being discounted.

  I feel I must also note that - and I accept you may not realise or intend it - some of your responses here come across as unnecessarily antagonistic. You have replied to a lot of 'oppose' votes to essentially tell people they're wrong. If your argument is so strong and the oppose arguments so weak - why? You could simply keep quiet and trust the eventual closer. I don't think it was appropriate for you to say my comment was 'a waste of time' and effectively address the eventual closer to ignore it. Nor do I think you needed to state "I'm arguing [properly] and you're not". There are kinder ways to say "Can you please support your arguments by referring to specific policies" H. Carver (talk) 16:00, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  H. Carver, you made a series of post which had absolutely no foundation in Wikipedia policy. You accused me of being needlessly pedantic and of arguing on a per-person record

  Both those claims are false and hostile. When you choose to conduct yourself like that, don't complain that the response you get is blunt. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 16:21, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  I don't want speak where I'm not wanted, but since both you and @H. Carver have established that you want a friendly discussion why not set any insults in previous comments aside and be cordial going forward? It's only Wikipedia, after all A.D.Hope (talk) 16:51, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @A.D.Hope: if H. Carver chooses to conduct themselves with proper civility, by basing their comments on policy and refraining from their ad hominems, then I will be very happy to have a friendly discussion.

  However, ignoring policy is uncivil and disruptive. Attacking other editors as pedantic for upholding policy is very nasty; in my view it is WP:NOTHERE conduct. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:11, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  All I'm saying is that, if each of you thinks the other has been insulting, but you both want a friendly discussion, the easiest thing might be to just forget the previous comments move on civilly. Anyway, this isn't my discussion so I'm going to keep quiet now! A.D.Hope (talk) 17:14, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  I apologise for the first comment, I didn't intend that to be hostile but I accept it was poorly worded. I'm baffled as to the issue with the second comment, however, and don't understand how that caused offence. H. Carver (talk) 17:07, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose, on the basis that state funerals are (generally) considered to be a special, quite small subset of funerals (such as described in the article State funeral), so only a small subset would apply to articles pertaining to particular individuals, such as the list of people that are the subject of this requested move. Having made myself familiar with the policy under WP:PRECISE, and noting that this discussion appears to be currently @BrownHairedGirl vs. the world over following the policy to the letter, there should be consideration of the first word of the section on Precision, which is "Usually". This discussion could be a case of applying the WP:NAMINGCRITERIA more aligned with WP:COMMONNAME. The example given of using Bothell, Washington instead of Bothell, where adding the state name is in deference to common name not disambiguation, appears to be pertinent in this case. Matilda Maniac (talk) 06:01, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Matilda Maniac: I agree that we should use the COMMONNAME. However, neither you nor anyone else in this discussion has even attempted to provide any evidence that the COMMONNAME includes "state".

  OTOH, see evidence I posted above from JSTOR that in the case of Ronald Reagan and Winston Churchill, the COMMONAME does not include "state". BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 10:40, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per the above arguments that have been made about the conventions of state funerals. Originoa (talk) 07:25, 25 September 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose, it is more often than not the "state" character of the funeral that makes the funeral notable. Removingfrom the article article the word that is most clearly linked to its relevance can not be a clever move. Dentren | ^Talk 09:48, 25 September 2022 (UTC)
• Support, the extra word is largely redundant and AFAIK the final 'private' ceremonies and/or burial are ordinarily covered briefly by us as well - though by their very nature - the final ceremonies are private, largely unreported, wholly un-broadcast and adequately covered by a sentence or two to outline how the person's body was finally dealt with and final farewells said by those closest to the individual in their private life. It is obvious that the title primarily refers to the public (State) event iro figures such as QEII, Churchill, Mandela etc. so no useful purpose is served by the - at best, marginally - more precise title. Yes it is true that a state funeral is - in most countries - a rare honour, but there is no necessity for the title to record that. Pincrete (talk) 11:01, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

Support. The guidance at WP:PRECISE is clear and there's virtually no risk of ambiguity. Elizabeth II, for example, did not have a state and a none-state funeral, and I imagine this is true of everyone in the list above. A.D.Hope (talk) 11:15, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Support as the proposed titles appear sufficiently clear and precise in the absence of separate articles dedicated to the private funerals. If anything, the current titles are overly precise for cases where the private funeral activites are also covered by the articles. -Ljleppan (talk) 11:20, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• Strong oppose and speedy close Seriously?????? I’ve seen some ridiculous move, delete and merge requests since the Queen sadly passed but this one takes the biscuit. Others have put the reasons why across better than I will but it’s as simple as this. This was a state funeral fact and that should clearly be reflected in the article title

Davethorp (talk) 12:40, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

Another passionate oppose without even a hint of an attempt to find any basis in the policy WP:AT. Similarly, the "speedy close" request has no basis in WP:CSK.

What is it about state funerals that generates such policy-free passion? BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:50, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

The fact that you are even asking this questions shows that Usually, such a policy should apply, but in some cases arguments in addition to policy are relevant considerations. Matilda Maniac (talk) 22:44, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

@Matilda Maniac: arguments in addition to policy can by definition by made only if the presenter is aware that they are outside policy, and can make a case as to why policy is inadequate to an exceptional situation.

That has not been the case here, where a flurry of editors have made !votes whilst demonstrating complete ignorance of the principles by which articles are named. These are in fact "arguments in place of policy", and in practice most of them are "arguments in flagrant defiance of policy". BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:22, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

The process here, where the move requester rapidly replies to posts that Oppose with statements implying ignorance, or now flagrant defiance, or to only address policy, rather than at least waiting 48 hours to see what views are out there, in my opinion is a process that is far from helpful, as it will discourage debate. You are passionate about policy, whereas others appear to be passionate about content, and thats fine; but you are coming across as wielding a large weapon to immediately shoot down views contrarian to you own, instead of perhaps reading and absorbing. I wonder if the note to Closer that you generated before any of the debate was started - implying the implications after a particular outcome - has also unconsciously biased the debate. A cycle of Oppose / Shoot / Oppose / Shoot / Support / Support / Oppose / Shoot, with comments such as . . . all your non-policy ideas are simply a waste of your time and everyone else's time is far from constructive debate from such a senior editor. Matilda Maniac (talk) 00:13, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

@Matilda Maniac: ideally, all editors would uphold decent standards, and there would be no need to remind them that arguments not based in policy carry no weight. Sadly, that is not the case here, which is why I have been trying to point editors towards constructive debate, i.e. debate founded in policy.

I find it bizarre and Kafka-esque that you claim that is somehow not constructive to ask editors to avoid cluttering the page with argument which ignore policy, and even more bizarre that you did so while making no reproach to those who ignore policy. Whatever your intent, the effect of your partisan criticism is encourage editors to ignore policy, which is very undesirable.

Attacking any editor for demanding attention to policy is disruptive conduct, which I find deeply insulting. Please desist. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:30, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

I will desist immediately; my comments on the Requested Move are as above. I am not attacking any editor. I am pointing out that it is the behaviour or conduct of the debate, not the quality of arguments on policy, that i find disappointing. Matilda Maniac (talk) 00:42, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Not so.

You made it very clear that you have absolutely no objection at all to the misconduct of editors who disrupt debate by ignore policy.

Instead you attacked me for asking editors to focus on policy, and for reminding them that the closer is obliged to disregard arguments not based on policy. A retraction would have been nice, but thank you for agreeing to desist. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:48, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

• Support  Is the word “state” needed in any of these to disambiguate it from a separate non-state funeral article, e.g., Death and funeral of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani? I don’t think so. Remove the term to improve conciseness without compromising any of the other WP:criteria. —Michael Z. 14:35, 25 September 2022 (UTC)
• Support per WP:CONCISE. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:04, 25 September 2022 (UTC)
• Support. The proposed titles are perfectly WP:CONCISE without the unnecessary disambiguation of "state". No one can point to any articles where there are both state and non-state funerals for the same individual and they need to be distinguished; and let's face it, if there was such a case with multiple funerals, any coverage of the non-state funeral would logically be in the same article. Finally, it avoids the pointless sidebar arguments we frequently see about whether a particular government-sponsored event is a funeral or something else; or whether it is a funeral but maybe not a state funeral (e.g. this one). TJRC (talk) 19:35, 25 September 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose. As pointed out, there is a major distinction between state funerals and regular funerals in regards to the recipients and the organization and traditions involved.2601:241:300:B610:C479:CF14:9F1:F4F2 (talk) 22:35, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  That distinction is debatable, because the gap is not as big as claimed. Some funerals are not formally labelled as "state funerals" yet share many similar characteristics. See e.g. para 3 of the lead of State funerals in the United Kingdom.

  In any case, regardless of the merits of that distinction, the question of the recipients and the organization and traditions involved has absolutely nothing to do with any of the WP:Criteria which policy applies to the naming of articles.

  Why is this discussion getting so many posts from editors who know absolutely nothing about the relevant policies? Is there some on- or off-wiki canvassing? BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 23:06, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

  I believe you're mistaking different interpretations of the policies for a lack of understanding. Although you disagree, there is an argument for including 'state' even under Wikipedia:Precise. A.D.Hope (talk) 07:26, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  @A.D.Hope: if there is such an argument, I have yet to see it. Would you like to present it? BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 08:58, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  Though I agree with the moves, I can understand why other Wikipedians want to differentiate state funerals from regular funerals and therefore consider the word 'state' necessary to these titles. The question is more one of interpretation and article scope than policy. A.D.Hope (talk) 16:25, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  That's not a policy-based argument. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:04, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  It is. Your argument is mostly based on Wikipedia:Precise, which states that 'titles should unambiguously define the topical scope of the article, but should be no more precise than that.' In this case your interpretation of what 'no more precise' means differs from that of others. A.D.Hope (talk) 17:29, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  That is not a matter of interpretation. Adding the word "state" does not in any way make the title more precise or less ambiguous. Despite numerous requests, nobody in this discussion has identified even one example where omitting "state" would make the topic harder to identify.

  Adding "state" is merely a signifier of status, which is usually omitted from article titles. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:58, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  Well, it's not up to me to tell you whether to consider other interpretations or not. A.D.Hope (talk) 18:11, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  It is up to all good-faith editors to dismiss an "interpretation" which has zero basis in policy. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:28, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  If we continue this will become an argument. I've said I support the moves, I don't want to engage any further. A.D.Hope (talk) 18:34, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

• Comment. Regardless of the decision made for these pages, what should be done with these articles that are currently at "State funeral of X". Two of them have a separate requested moves discussion going on, but the others don't.2601:241:300:B610:C479:CF14:9F1:F4F2 (talk) 00:39, 26 September 2022 (UTC)
• Support: per WP:PRECISE because "state" is unnecessary for a clear and unambiguous title in each case, and because, as stated above, the articles may in some cases (eq QE2) go beyond the "state funeral" to describe any private commemorations so that including "state" in the title misleadingly suggests a narrowing of the content. PamD 04:05, 26 September 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose - as state funerals are rare (usually held for heads of state), particularly where monarchies are concerned. GoodDay (talk) 21:02, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  @GoodDay: please can you explain how that relates to the policy WP:AT. I can't see any connection, but maybe you can. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:41, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  Best in this situation to WP:IAR. Particularly where presidents & monarchs are concerned. GoodDay (talk) 21:44, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

  Heads of state are often controversial topics, and for many people their deaths are emotionally charged.

  That seems to me to make these topics a very poor area to apply some special treatment and abandon our broad policies. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:31, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  We shall have to disagree. These events were called state funerals & so state funerals they are. GoodDay (talk) 01:22, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Au contraire, you are confusing the status with the name. This discussion is about the name.

  The checks I have done on JSTOR show that in reliable sources they are overwhelmingly just called "funeral", not "state funeral". The data is posted above, timestamped 02:09, 25 September 2022.

  It seems that in your enthusiasm to IAR, you have jettisoned both WP:COMMONNAME and the need for evidence. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 03:14, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  You've not convinced me with your arguments. I still oppose re-naming those pages & nothing will change my position on that. Best that you try to convince others. GoodDay (talk) 04:55, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  I didn't have any expectation of persuading you.

  The purpose of my replies is to demonstrate to other editors that your position defies both fact and policy. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 05:00, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Attempts to persuade others to agree with you, will nearly always get you the opposite result. Best to let others have a chance to chime in. GoodDay (talk) 05:03, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  GoodDay, 04:55: Best that you try to convince others

  GoodDay, 05:03: Attempts to persuade others to agree with you, will nearly always get you the opposite result.

  Maybe the two GoodDays can have a wee chat somewhere else, and come back when they have reached agreement. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 05:10, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  You're starting to annoy me, now. For your sake, I'm going to stop responding. GoodDay (talk) 05:16, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

• Support. Pretty straightforward win with respect to WP:CRITERIA of conciseness and precision, which ultimately translates to a better experience for readers. Colin M (talk) 00:47, 27 September 2022 (UTC)
• Support more concise title and per WP:COMMONNAME. I also make the similar move request about it at State funeral of John F. Kennedy page. 182.3.72.35 (talk) 09:27, 27 September 2022 (UTC)
• Comment further to my opposition above a lot of editors are citing WP:COMMONNAME as an argument in support of this move, as is the opener in their badgering and almost borderline harassment of editors with opposing viewpoints. BBC, Sky News and Time all refer to the funeral of the queen as being a state funeral in a quick search so if WP:COMMONNAME applies it clearly supports the name as it currently stands. I cannot comment on the rest of the, frankly ridiculous sized, mountain of articles being considered but suspect the same applies there Davethorp (talk) 10:09, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  The OP should also take a look at WP:BLUDGEON since they like discussing policy so much Davethorp (talk) 10:20, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Yes of course, the phrase "state funeral" was used by news outlets, because the status of the ceremony was "state funeral". However, that is not in dispute: nobody in this discussion is suggesting that it was not a "state funeral". The issue is whether that phrase needs to be included in the article title.

  It's easy to find evidence that the term "state funeral" has been used. But that's not the issue here. The test of WP:COMMONNAME is that the term is the most common determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources. So a claim based on WP:COMMONNAME requires some evidence of usage of the various alternative terms, which is wholly absent from @Davethorp's comment, and indeed from every other opponent of renaming.

  To make a comparison, I followed WP:GOOGLETEST, by searching Google News (to concentrate reliable sources) and checked to the end of the results per WP:GOOGLETEST#Google_distinct_page_count_issues.

  I searched for two phrases, "state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II" and "funeral of Queen Elizabeth II":

  • 164 hits for "state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II"
  • 172 hits for "funeral of Queen Elizabeth II"

  So there is no way that "state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II" meets the WP:COMMONNAME test of being the most common determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources.

  As to policy: WP:BLUDGEON is an essay, not a guideline, let alone a policy. It has no standing.

  However, WP:AT is policy. And the reason I have replied to so many !votes here is that so many editors have either ignored that policy or failed to apply it properly. I would be delighted to find that editors actually studied WP:AT before posting here, and tried to apply it properly. If that happened, then I would be delighted not to post reminders of the policy. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:26, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  PS I repeated my search without the work "Queen". That gave

  • 150 hits for "state funeral of elizabeth ii"
  • 132 hits for "funeral of elizabeth ii"

  So, in this test a small majority for "state funeral", but not the required significant majority. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:15, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  From WP:BLUDGEON:

  ” Dominating a discussion is a violation of the WP:DE policy and can get you blocked”

  Regardless I’ve said my piece. You continue to disrupt this discussion with your constant bludgeoning anyone who disagrees with you and continue to harass other Wikipedians rather than treating them with respect (which is policy). I’m done with you Davethorp (talk) 13:46, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Dave, my replies to you have been thoroughly civil. Consensus-building requires attention to policy and to evidence, and I am sad that your response to an editor who produces evidence is so hostile. That hostility is not respectful. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:56, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  I don't think these numbers are supporting your argument the way you think they do. "funeral of Queen Elizabeth II" is a substring of "state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II", so the search results for the latter will be a subset of the former. Your numbers would suggest that, of the 172 news sources referring to the "funeral of Queen Elizabeth II", only 8 of them fail to use the qualifier "state funeral". (Though the 164 figure will include sources that use a mixture of forms. e.g. this source uses "Funeral of Queen Elizabeth II" in the headline and "state funeral" in the body.)

  But to further complicate matters, I think there's some fuzzing going on behind the Google algorithm. I strongly suspect that, for queries that match a large number of stories, Google News will just peter out after a certain point rather than giving you an exhaustive list. For example, when I search Gnews for the phrase "the weather in", it stops at 309 results. If I filter to only articles within the last year, it still gives me about the same number. All that is to say, I would not rely on GNews hits here. But your earlier Jstor experiments stand on more solid ground. You could also try ngrams. Colin M (talk) 19:14, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Colin, I agree: those Gnews results are messy, and appear to be unreliable. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:39, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Davethorp: I wonder, will the State funeral article, end up being nominated for deletion? GoodDay (talk) 16:41, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  What on earth is the point of that comment? Why would anyone nominate state funeral for deletion? BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:25, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  Many people are asking why on earth someone would nominate the removal of the word state from the title of events that were state funerals and then WP:BLUDGEON anyone who disagrees with them

  Crazy stuff happens on Wikipedia Davethorp (talk) 07:47, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

  I and others have given clear policy-based reasons for removing a redundant word from the title. Davethorp's choice to call that crazy says a lot about Dave and Dave's approach to debate. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:57, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per Dentren. Peter Ormond 💬 11:35, 27 September 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose, respectfully I don't even know why this is a dispute. See State funeral, which is a real term and thing. Randy Kryn (talk) 17:04, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  I don't think anyone's disputing that it's a real term or a real thing. As an analogy, no would would dispute that minidress is a real thing or term. But should Union Jack dress be renamed Union Jack minidress? I would say no, and for the same reasons that I support the moves under discussion here. Titles should generally be no more specific than necessary. Moreover, while some sources do refer to it as a "Union Jack minidress", there are more sources that simply call it the "Union Jack dress". Colin M (talk) 18:58, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

  State funerals, unlike specific minidresses, are often seared into the collective memory of a nation's populace and act as protracted national honors for duty done. They are not just funerals. I have yet to understand why editors here are saying that a shorter name is the proper Wikipedia name when the descriptor 'State' on these pages contains both the officially accurate and the powerful emotionally-shared-by-millions titling included in the important and correct descriptor. See State funeral and Funeral. They are two different articles. Two different things. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:04, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

  No, they are not two different things. Each is a ceremony connected with the final disposition of a corpse.

  One is more public than the other, but the distinction is not rigid. For example, the funeral of Margaret Thatcher was a highly public affair, with massive emotional engagement, but it was not a state funeral. The funeral of Princess Diana was also a hugely public affair with massive emotional engagement, but it was also not a state funeral. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:06, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

  If Wikipedia doesn't consider them two different things then why are there two articles? State funeral and Funeral. Taking your postion in these RMs into account, should those pages now be merged? If not, why not (Socratic method)? Randy Kryn (talk) 04:13, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

  @Randy Kryn: You are creating a false binary: that state funeral and funeral must either be wholly different or be the same. There are other possibilities.

  In this case, state funeral is a type of funeral, just as Funeral of Margaret Thatcher is a sub-topic of Margaret Thatcher.

  So no, of course they should not be merged. It is routine practice on Wikipedia for a sub-topic to be split off into a new article, if it would overwhelm the main article: see WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:34, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose - A state funeral is "a public funeral ceremony, observing the strict rules of protocol, held to honour people of national significance." and a funeral is "a ceremony connected with the final disposition of a corpse, such as a burial or cremation, with the attendant observances." Therefore a state funeral is a very different thing to any old funeral and losing the word "state" would change the very meaning of the article's title. Rodney Baggins (talk) 08:03, 28 September 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose. Solution in search of a problem. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:41, 28 September 2022 (UTC)