Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Great Equalizer

The Great Equalizer

The Great Equalizer (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

The NewsMax reference forming the foundation of this article, and the phrase _The Great Equalizer_, appears to fail the attribution test of WP:ATT, and fails the reliable sources test of WP:RS, and appears to be in violation of WP:NOT#SOAP, being based upon a personal blog of Miguel A. Faria. I suggest that this article be deleted. The citation of the Joel Miller commentary also fails a WP:NOT#SOAP test and the WP:ATT test. Additionally, the term _The Great Equalizer_ is severely ambiguated. SaltyBoatr 00:03, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

A Google web search finds The Great Equalizer used to describe a very broad range of topics, including: cancer, home ownership, the atom bomb, education, a Rick Borsten fiction novel, a Television series, computing power, the Internet, the search engine, assistive technology for disable people, mathematics, marriage, shopbots, In-stent restenosis, Romantic Love, automation and more. SaltyBoatr 15:22, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

A Google book search returns plenty of references, the top nineteen refer to a different usage than 'firearms', with the twentieth being the first containing the 'firearm' reference. Per WP:ATT, I argue, a Wikipedia article about how firearms are The Great Equalizer fails a credible attribution test. Similar for a Google scholar search, and I argue that for an article in Wikipedia to state that _The Great Equaliser_ means firearms, that such an association should be confirmed through a check of scholarly work, and it is not confirmed. SaltyBoatr 15:22, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Further evidence of this article failing the WP:NOT#SOAP test is this entry on the talk page, which frames this AfD as 'doing the bidding the the gun prohibitionists'. I argue that this article plays a part in an attempt to use Wikipedia as a soapbox in the gun politics debate. SaltyBoatr 18:25, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

• 'Keep Seems to be sourced although the article clearly needs some work. Dman727 21:11, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

User Dman727; Please clarify, do you mean: 'Seems to be sourced.', Or: Is sourced, per WP:ATT? SaltyBoatr 23:20, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Im not to sure what you mean. The article is sourced with sources. It could use more and the article is not in great shape. I did just notice that the article is only a couple days old, so I would suggest giving this more time to develop into a better written article. Nonethless the phrase has been around for awhile. Dman727 23:28, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

What I mean, what I am asking, is whether the sources meet WP:ATT. The sources appear to me to not meet WP:V and to be based on blogs, which WP:ATT disallows. I agree the phrase has been around for a while and is used with at least twenty different meanings, with the disease cancer being the first, and guns being the twentieth. Check Google books, or Google scholar to confirm this. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and I don't see how this phrase merits an article with twenty meanings, it just isn't scholarly. What it really is, is a soapbox in the gun politics debate, and Wikipedia is not a soapbox. SaltyBoatr 06:01, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree wiki is not a soapbox and that one of the reason why the article should be cleaned up. But its clearly a noteable term and is sourced. Dman727 14:28, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

A notable term with twenty+ definitions, I argue the term should be defined in a dictionary instead of an encyclopedia. Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a dictionary SaltyBoatr 16:56, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

The term, "The Great Equalizer" seems to be a textbook colloquialism. It can mean various things because it has no defined meaning. As a matter of fact, the meaning that this article attempts to give it would make it a misnomer, because giving a weak person a firearm to defend himself or herself from a stronger but unarmed attacker doesn't "equalise" anything. Regardless, this article asserts that the term specifically pertains to firearms, and its only source to back this claim up shows the term being used just like a colloquialism is typically used; it doesn't demonstrate the term being defined for any purpose outside of that article. Its very foundation, then, is unsourced. If a source can't be found that actually defines this phrase as referring specifically to a weapon in the context that the article defines it, then the article should not exist as it does now. If such a source can not be found, then the only way this article could remain relatively unchanged is by acknowledging that the term's article-designated definition applies only to that author's article, and any others that it sources using that way. MVMosin 04:44, 8 April 2007 (UTC)