Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Carnism (4th nomination)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
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 No consensus. I appreciate the strength of feeling on both sides but for better or for worse this does not seem unambiguously to meet our community's criteria for deletion. Concerns with article quality can be addressed in the usual ways. I was swayed especially by SlimVirgin's argument about the relatively high number of sources which use the term. John (talk) 22:58, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Carnism

Carnism (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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This article has already been deleted twice, but was recreated without any evidence of an undeletion discussion.

The term does not have any significant usage outside of the book

POV fork
of the main article, advocating for the use of the term (and also for the truth of the term).

The thing is, this article is one of the most actively, intentionally misleading articles on Wikipedia as to the prominence of the term, an effective

WP:HOAX
that adds swathes of material not related to carnism into it in order to give the illusion of notability separate from the book's. Not every source is viewable, but let's consider every single source that is:

  • Source 1 [1] A brief definition that makes it clear the term is used to define - and gives as an explicit synonym: "Melanie Joy’s view on food ethics". This doesn't justify an independent article on "carnism". (the longer, pre-publication version goes into more detail, but is still explicitly a summary of Joy's work.)
  • Source 2: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=92Ct9iD1QTYC&pg=PA138&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false] A one paragraph mention beginning Sociologist Melanie Joy (2009) coined the term carnism..." A search of the book shows this is the only use of the term in the entire book (ignoring the title of Joy's book in the references, and a link to that page in the index)
  • Source 3: [2] While almost certainly not notable (published in a low-tier journal; on a very specific subject (right-wing authoritarianism and meat-eating), this paper does, at least use the term.
  • Source 4: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=TzDZYc8SGigC&pg=PA353&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=carnism&f=false Term is used in the book five times, all within a couple pages as part of a summary of Joy's ideas. Does not show independence.
  • Source 5:Why We Love Dogs... - This is the source of the term, as stated above.
  • Source 6: Interview with Melanie Joy about "Why we Love Dogs..." - The author of the book using the term in an interview on the book shows nothing.
  • Source 7: [3] Content entirely based off of a press release advertising Why we Love Dogs...
  • Source 8: Why we Love Dogs... again.
  • Source 9a: Partially inaccessible. [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195666315001518 "Carnism" does not appear in the abstract; may or may not in article
  • Source 9b: [4] The term "carnism" does not appear in the article.
  • Source 10: [5] Term only appears in the title of Joy's book.
  • Source 11: [6] Term only appears in title of Joy's book.
  • Source 12: [7] Term only appears in title of Joy's book.
  • Source 13: [8] Term does not appear at all.
  • Source 14: [9] Term does not appear at all.
  • Source 15: Partially inaccessible [10] Term does not appear in abstract.
  • Source 16: [11] Term does not appear at all.
  • Source 17: Partially inaccessible [12] Term does not appear in abstract.
  • Source 18: [13] Term does not appear at all.
  • Source 19: Inaccessible, but predates term.
  • Source 20: [14] Term does not appear
  • Source 21: [15] Term does not appear.
  • Source 22: [16] Term does not appear.
  • Source 23: Inaccessible
  • Source 24: [17] Term still does not appear (Same as source 20)
  • Source 25: Partially inaccessible [18] Term does not appear in abstract
  • Source 26: [19] Predates term
  • Source 27: Partially inaccessible [20] Predates term
  • Source 28: Inaccessible
  • Source 29: It's Plutarch, and thus predates the term by millenia. Term does not appear.
  • Source 30: [21] Term does not appear
  • Source 31: [22] Term does not appear
  • Source 32: [23] Term does not appear
  • Source 33: Inaccessible.
  • Source 34: Inaccessible, but predates term.
  • Source 35: [24] Article is in French. French cognates appear, but I don't really see that helping much in a neologism article on the English term.
  • Source 36: Inaccessible, but all three sources predate term.
  • Source 37: [25] Article by Melanie Joy, who, again, created the term.
  • Source 38: [26] Summary of Melanie Joy's work (does claim that the term will in future catch on, though)
  • Source 39: [27] Term used in discussion of Melanie Joy and her book.
  • Source 40: [28] Speech by Melanie Joy.
  • Source 41: [29] Summary of Joy's work.
  • Source 42: [30] Summary of Joy's work.
  • Source 43: Why We Love Dogs... again.
  • Source 44: [31] Does not use term.
  • Source 45: [32] Does not use term.
  • Source 46: Why We Love Dogs... again.
  • Source 47: [33] Does not use term
  • Source 48: Inaccessible (Same as Source 23)
  • Source 49: Inaccessible,
  • Source 50: Why We Love Dogs... again.
  • Source 51: [34] Term does not appear
  • Source 52: Partially inaccessible [35] Term not in abstract.
  • Source 53: [36] Tern does not appear.
  • Source 54: [37] Term appears only in title of Joy's book.
  • Source 55: Inaccessible
  • Source 56: Inaccessible

To summarise, of the 59 sources (there's a 9a and 9b, and Reference 36 is three sources):

  • 10 are by Melanie Joy, the creator of the term (including the press release about the book)
  • 5 have summaries of Joy's work, and mention the term in that context.
  • 30 do not use the term (with the possible exception of including the title of Joy's book). This count includes those sources that predate the term that I couldn't check. (the three sources in Ref 36 are counted individually in this total)
  • 5 are only partially accessible, but do not use the term in the text available (usually an abstract) and do not predate the term.
  • 7 are inaccessible (and do not predate the term)
  • 1 is in French, but includes some French cognates
  • 1 uses the term, but is of no notability.

In short, this article is a massive

coatrack. At best, including the articles summarising Joy's work, and the one in French, only 7 sources that aren't by Joy herself even mention the term. If we're not generous... maybe four, as you might be able to count a couple of the lengthier summaries of Joy's work. From what I can tell, however, none provide any material not better placed in the article Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows
. It simply hasn't grown beyond the book's content (attempts at a coatrack of original research aside).

Now, no-one is saying Joy's ideas shouldn't be on Wikipedia:

WP:COATRACKing in other information, this article does that information a disservice. For example, the section "Meat paradox" is ironically better evidence of the term "meat parodox" being a notable term than this entire article is for Carnism
being a notable term, as it's pulling in sources that do use the term "meat paradox" but not carnism.

With an article on a neologism, we first need evidence the term is in reasonably widespread use. This article, instead, just throws in anything that discusses the ethical issues around meat eating to support the new term. That's

synthesis, and neither of those belong on Wikipedia. Adam Cuerden (talk
) 11:05, 31 December 2015 (UTC) }}[reply]

  • Delete per nominator. WegianWarrior (talk) 12:19, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Equity and gender feminism is a possible precedent. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 13:59, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nom, and can we include some kind of moratorium on this damn thing being recreated yet again in a week? Capeo (talk) 14:09, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep -- looks and feels like a good article to me. The rationale proposed by Adam Cuerden above looks copious and looks well-researched, but i took just a single randomly-selected part of it to look it, the comment on source 9b in the article, which was stated as Source 9b: [38] The term "carnism" does not appear in the article. I looked at the text in the article, and the source, and i find that there is nothing negative about the fact that the source doesn't contain the term carnism for it certainly does support the claim in the article, and there is no claim based on the term carnism sourced to that source. Therefore, based on a random sampling of one of this editor's copious objections, i would urge caution in accepting that large screed as evidence of the damnability of this article. I think it's very well-written and describes a notable concept with a good NPOV tone. SageRad (talk) 15:34, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The text may support the claim in the article, but does not support' the claim being part of carnism. If this were one or two cites, it'd be harmless, but there are whole sections of the article with absolutely no cites that can be linked to carnism in any way. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:17, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I understand that the text of that source didn't support the claim being part of carnism but that was not the requirement of that source from the claim and that does not look like an argument to delete the article, to me. So i sampled one of your points and found it lacking in merit. I don't have time to look at all of them, it's clear to me that carnism is notable enough to warrant inclusion in the encyclopedia, and that the article is well-written and the notability is sourced well enough to merit inclusion. SageRad (talk) 16:26, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The sources do not support your argument, given that only seven, at the most generous, mention carnism while being even the slightest bit independent of Joy - and most of those are just summarising her work. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:28, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - article could do with a bit of a trim back but I am not convinced by the deletion rationale, which is basically a IDINTLIKEIT propped up by a wall of text and some canvassing. It's possible that the article could benefit from a merge but I believe that discussion should happen outside of an AFD context. Artw (talk) 17:23, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Propped up by evidence that this non-notable term was coined by a barely notable activist. That's what that wall of text shows if you bothered to read it. Capeo (talk) 17:47, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. For the sake of expedience I am mostly copying a response I wrote to the nominator and others here. The below is nowhere near an exhaustive list of sources.
  • This German academic book by Sandra Mahlke uses the term at least 90 times, including in the title, and is clearly not about Joy's book.
  • This German academic book uses the term nine times, again going beyond Joy's work.
  • I have not been able to get a copy of Le végétarisme et ses ennemis, but FourViolas assures me that it uses the term throughout and that "there's actually a lot of the more useful second kind of information: carnist philosophy in Ancient Greece, Abrahamic religions, and modern society, all in lots of detail and presented in very fair-sounding ways."
  • This book uses the term at least 41 times.
  • This academic book by Frye contains an analysis that is clearly independent what Joy wrote.
  • This essay collection uses the term at least 11 times.
  • ...Mostly in the title of Joy's book. I'm not going to review all of these. Give me three citations you think - unlike this spot check - won't fall down at the slightest glance, and I'll check those. Adam Cuerden (talk) 02:50, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • You're right, technically six out of eleven times is "mostly". I think you're ignoring the big picture. --Sammy1339 (talk) 06:15, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • This academic book chapter is about carnism and independent of Joy.
  • This new paper uses the term 20 times and goes beyond Joy's book.
  • [www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?paperID=58725[predatory publisher] This] new paper is about "The presence of carnism on Portuguese television."
  • This academic book uses the term at least 14 times, and again has not much to do with Joy's book.
  • This paper by Gutjahr uses the term and is not about Joy's book.
  • This paper "frames contrasts between vegetarianism and carnism through the phenomena of the presence of an absence and the absent referent, respectively" and whatever that means, I think it's nothing Joy wrote about.
  • This paper by Greenebaum uses the term and goes beyond Joy's work.
  • This definitely provocative psychological study tells us that "Animal exploitation and meat consumption are arguably part of the dominant ideological system ‘carnism’, prescribing norms and beliefs about animal treatment" and goes on to discuss this at length. --Sammy1339 (talk) 18:20, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
You are being quite generous with the term academic there. Google scholar brings up nothing but Joy or papers that reference Joy, including many of the papers above. All primary sources. All low impact or no impact journals and all the cites are minimal, if any, and circular in that they cite each other. In other words, I see no notability here. Anything here that isn't already in the Joy article should be tossed in there really. I don't see nearly enough notability for a stand-alone article. Capeo (talk) 18:43, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that they cite Joy does not make them primary. Of course they cite her - they have to note that she coined the term and originated the concept. Also, these sources are all very recent, and are in humanities fields that do not publish huge numbers of papers. This may account for why some of them have not got many citations. I also could have included lots of other sources, including other papers and newspaper articles, but I never cease to be amazed by this Wikipedia culture that regards "low impact" peer-reviewed journals and academic presses as less valuable than The New York Times. --Sammy1339 (talk) 20:32, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
There's thousands of papers written every year and, over the last couple decades, a huge uptick in non-impact journals. It seems like everyone and their brother has a journal now and their "peer-review" is suspect at best. We don't write articles for every new hypothesis or theory represented in a journal because simple publication does not equate to notability or overarching acceptance in academic circles. We'd have thousands of articles on every fly by night fringe concept there is. Actually we do but that's not argument for more. I also don't know that anyone would argue that we value the NYT over academic sources but significant coverage in the press can be an argument for inclusion for even the fringiest of theories. I don't think notability here is established on either the academic nor mainstream fronts. Capeo (talk) 20:52, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep but merge or remove material as necessary to address SYNTH. Even the most uncontroversial of Sammy1339's sources above would require unacceptable mental acrobatics to be included in Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows.
There's much less OR in
Draft:Psychology of eating meat
, and republished once that article meets policy requirements.
What would remain would be a collection of sociological works like Freeman 2012, Gutjahr 2013, and Braunsberger 2015 which unambiguously discuss carnism and go well beyond Joy's work. The fact that these academic sources tend to have a POV different from that of the median Wikipedian is none of our legitimate business; we're not scholars or peer reviewers, we're just editors (
WP:MAINSTREAM). FourViolas (talk) 19:55, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply
]
A few more in-depth independent reliable sources: a book chapter subtitled "Vegan sexuality and the intimate rejection of carnism" [39] and a paper on the normalization of carnism on American television (using the term) [40]. Trivial mentions in a literary-theory paper [41] and book [42] show that the idea is used in several areas of academia independently of Joy. FourViolas (talk) 13:44, 3 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
WP:MAINSTREAM actually refutes your argument. None of the sources you cite above come anywhere close to mainstream academic sociology. So when we're deciding whether a fringe theory deserves inclusion the criteria would be notability which is sorely lacking here. Capeo (talk) 20:12, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I think it has been written about enough, in academic and non-academic outlets, that if it were "fringe" there would be someone refuting it. Per the text of
WP:JUSTDONTLIKEIT
.
In response to 4V's assertion that the meat paradox papers don't belong, they are discussed in the entry on carnism in The Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics and we followed standard practice by directly citing the secondary sources instead of the tertiary source. They really do go to the heart of the concept, and if this article is about ideas and not words, I don't think it can be argued that they are out of place. --Sammy1339 (talk) 20:42, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
That's a bad understanding of fringe. 99% of the fringe ideas out there don't get refuted in academia because academics don't waste valuable time and effort to refute things that have no traction in the first place. Capeo (talk) 20:58, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
But you still have to have sources, which may precede the allegedly "fringe" theory, contradicting the ideas. And it is furthermore my contention that the twenty or so academic sources you choose to ignore do constitute "traction." --Sammy1339 (talk) 21:06, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
No, you don't have to have preceding sources that contradict the idea because, as I said, most academics don't bother to deal with fringe ideas. That puts us into OR territory. For instance, if any theory is bandied about that contradicts mainstream thought on a subject but hasn't garnered enough traction to warrant a response we, as editors, can't say this contradicts mainstream thought if no RS has. That would be OR. That's where notability comes in as the deciding factor. To me, as I see the sources, Carnism belongs in the Joy article and not as a standalone article. Capeo (talk) 00:26, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Draft:Psychology of eating meat, which I had nothing to do with (and in fact opposed) and which is now being attacked as "fringe" for exactly the same reason: people simply don't want to hear what it says. --Sammy1339 (talk) 00:41, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
I don't know what to say anymore. We don't decide what anything contradicts. That's basic. You keep ignoring notability. If Carnism suddenly takes off as a concept and integrates itself into ethics to a huge a degree then it deserves an article. Right now it's a concept that has made no significant inroads into the conversation. Capeo (talk) 01:27, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Sammy, that's true about some of the meat paradox papers (Bastian 2012, Bratanova 2011, Ruby and Heine 2012). My apologies. But even so, I think it would ultimately be fairer to cut those sections of
WP:SUMMARYSTYLE, keeping the main text at Psychology of eating meat, where they directly belong according to many more sources. Capeo, I don't see how an idea could be on the "fringe" of food studies while having a 7-page entry in the Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics. FourViolas (talk) 21:54, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply
]
The EFAE is over 1,800 pages of literally just about anything that's ever been written about any subject tangential to food ethics. It's currently asking for suggestions from anyone graduate student and above to include in its next printing including extremely new ideas. Its inclusion criteria is more lax than WP. Capeo (talk) 22:23, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Undecided There is certainly a set of justifications for using animals for food, etc. WP should have an article on the topic or it should be a major part of whatever article we have on "Human carnivorism" or "Exploitation of animals." However a WP article can not start out "Carnism is a term coined by psychologist Melanie Joy..." I would have more sympathy for an article that started out: "Carnism is the justification of exploitation of other animals by humans." And later in the article: "The term was coined by psychologist Melanie Joy..." Borock (talk) 21:58, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Literally the only references to the term in that book is in a brief summary of Joy's work, the title of her book in the references, and the index. This is yet anotherr evidence that the people voting keep cannot rationally evaluate the evidence they're presenting. 15:37, 1 January 2016 (UTC) Adam Cuerden (talk) 15:36, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
That sounds kind of insulting the Andrew Davidson, like anyone who has other opinions than you is not thinking clearly. How about sticking to the content. I think that the mention is one more tick mark for notability. It's not necessary for a source to do more than to describe the existence of this concept by this name to add to the overall notability of the concept. It's also not necessary for a concept to be "true" or "real" for it to be a real concept. A concept can be a notable thing in society even if it's not an actual thing. This is the nature of human culture. I find enough discourse to mention carnism as a concept to call this one a keeper. I repeat that it's not cool behavior to call those who disagree with you stupid or irrational. You seem frustrated but that doesn't mean that everyone who disagrees with you is stupid. SageRad (talk) 15:44, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
It does not justify a seperate entry from the book setting it out if the only references are summaries of the book. Period. There is no argument there. The argument is not whether the concept should be discussed on Wikipedia, it's whether we should have two articles on it. Adam Cuerden (talk) 17:20, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • That book was just an example. My position is based upon the more general finding that the term is used in many books. For an example of an entry in another encyclopedia, see Gibert, Desaulniers (21 November 2014), "Carnism", Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics, Springer, pp. 292–298,
    ISBN 978-94-007-0928-7. My !vote stands. Andrew D. (talk) 16:33, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
    ]
TWO articles. TWO. The book setting it out, that deserves an article, and the neologism foro which every reference is a summary of the book, which does not. Perhaps it wasn't clear that that was the problem, because you seriously are not providing any evidence that this deserves a second article, only that the book deserves one. Worse, the article as it stands is a
WP:HOAX: throwing in at least 30 sources not about carnism in any way in order to create the illusion of a more widespread, accepted term. Adam Cuerden (talk) 17:21, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
It also literally defines the subject as "Melanie Joy's views on food ethics. [43]. You're using sources already analysed, and ignoring the analysis. I will grant that's one of the few decent sources, but it doesn't show notability, as, as I said in the nomination itself, for sources independent of Joy, there are "maybe four, as you might be able to count a couple of the lengthier summaries of Joy's work", but that doesn't stop the article being a massive
WP:HOAX. Adam Cuerden (talk) 22:25, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
Comment about canvassing

When anybody evaluates this AfD, they should note carefully that there is canvassing here advocating for editors to come and vote for deletion, with the following text by the poster of that call to arms so to speak: Fringe neologism. One of the worst examples of a WP:COATRACK I've seen ever. Adam Cuerden (talk) 11:07, 31 December 2015 (UTC) Therefore, the numbers of votes should be taken with a grain of salt in light of this canvassing. SageRad (talk) 15:34, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

That is the Fringe Theories Noticeboard. It's a normal place to discuss fringe theories. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:16, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
That very comment in itself is prejudging it to be a "fringe theory" which is a term that has come to be used in a McCarthyist way on Wikipedia, and posting it there has a clear intent to present it to a certain subset of editors who would be ideologically predisposed to a certain outlook on the article (not in terms of expertise as with a medicine or engineering board but because it's an ideological group), and lastly if that weren't enough, the phrasing itself of the call to comment on the AfD was very very very very clearly biased against the article (yes, four very's worth).... SageRad (talk) 16:26, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Vegan ethics isn't necessarily fringe, but a specific term, with no evidence of widespread use? It is fringe, by definition. Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:44, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
A search on Google News for the word gives 215 results. Many of those are fluffy but many are good for establishing notability. It's not a term with very widespread usage in my brief survey but it's a real term with enough notability to remain an article in my opinion. There may be some case to fold it into speciesism as a specific variant, but i think the article is a great standalone article. SageRad (talk) 18:15, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Wait, I'm part of an ideological group because I have FTN on my watchlist? Didn't know that. And McCarthyist? Seriously? What next? Godwin's Law? Carnism is completely non-notable. Capeo (talk) 16:49, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree that Adam Cuerden has crossed the line is using the FTN for canvassing here. Admittedly FTN gets abused like this a lot, sonething that is unfortunately very commonplace with that noticeboard. Artw (talk) 17:18, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Comment about
WP:NEOLOGISM

I see many in this AfD citing

WP:WORDISSUBJECT
which makes it clear that some neologisms are suitable:

When a word or phrase itself may be an encyclopedic subject

In some cases, a word or phrase itself may be an encyclopedic subject. In these cases, the word or phrase in and of itself passes Wikipedia's notability criteria as the subject of verifiable coverage by reliable sources. As with any subject, articles on words must contain encyclopedic information. That is, such articles must go beyond what would be found in a dictionary entry (definition, pronunciation, etymology, use information, etc.), and include information on the social or historical significance of the term. While published dictionaries may be useful sources for lexical information on a term, the presence of a term in a dictionary does not by itself establish notability. Examples of Wikipedia articles on words and phrases include Macedonia (terminology), thou, orange (word), and no worries.

In other cases, a word or phrase is still prima facie (at first blush) about a topic other than the word or phrase itself. Often the word or phrase is a "lens" or concept through which the topic or closely related set of topics are grouped or seen. When this occurs, the article often focuses on the "lens" and may not be the main coverage of the topics which are viewed through it. World music, Political correctness, Homosexual agenda, Lake Michigan-Huron and Truthiness illustrate this.

I think this is one such case where a neologism has gained a notability and the article goes into depth far beyond a dictionary definition. SageRad (talk) 23:00, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment. (edit conflict) I would like to clarify what is going on above.
  • (1) This is not a deletion discussion at all - it is a merge discussion, as stated by the nominator here. The nominator previously started a merge discussion, and then
    WP:FTN
    .
  • (2) The nominator's allegation that all of the sources are summaries of the book, as opposed to discussing the concept, is disingenuous. For example, the beef industry source Drovers Cattle Network[44] was labeled by the nominator as "summary of Joy's work." It begins with

    "There’s a new buzzword gaining traction among the vegetarian activist community: carnism. Actually, it’s a term that’s been around awhile, since it was first coined by psychologist Melanie Joy several years ago and garnered visibility in her 2010 book “Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs and Wear Cows.” But it’s now become a topic du jour at conference sessions and discussion groups when animal activists get together at their annual “hate-the-meat-industry” meetings.

Likewise, the Piazza paper is entirely about the concept of carnism (not the book) as explained in this CNN story. Yet it was dismissed by the nominator because ""Carnism" does not appear in the abstract; may or may not in article."
  • (3) In a post above, I listed 14 sources (not including the previous three) which substantively discuss the concept. All are secondary - independent of Joy. I specifically identified most of them as going beyond Joy's work. The nominator chose to criticize one which I did not make this claim about as being too closely connected to Joy's work, and use this as an excuse for ignoring the rest. All of the sources in that list are legitimate. In the words of FourViolas, who has been my most vocal adversary in the previous disputes over this topic, "it would be really artificial to shoehorn Sammy's sources into this article" (on Joy's book.)[45]. Consider for example the German book by Mahlke, which is the first in my list of 14 sources. It has "carnism" in the title, and a large part of it is devoted to the subject. It would be completely silly to try to work this into the article on Joy's book. Likewise, the entry in the Encyclopedia of Agricultural and Food Ethics is not about Joy's book, it is about carnism. This is the case with many other sources that have been bluntly dismissed by the nominator.
  • (4) The opponents of this article want to treat this as a fringe theory, and use this as a reason for discounting all the sources in my previous list. However, they have not been willing to provide any evidence that Joy's ideas depart significantly from mainstream scholarship. They don't. In fact, the people claiming this have either not defended their position at all, or have brought up their own citation-free fringe theories about evolutionary psychology and Anthony Bourdain's opinions. This is a case of
    WP:JUSTDONTLIKEIT
    .
  • (5) The perception that this article is full of original research is based on a decision by certain editors to include material which is clearly about the same subject matter but predates the term. When I first came across this article, it was a partisan screed. My rewrite did not include sources that were not clearly connected to the subject, but I understand why other editors wanted to include these sources on the grounds that the subject of the article is the idea, not the word. Furthermore it was reasonable to place the term in the context of the previous scholarship on the subject matter, such as the works of Rozin.
I hope that people will conduct searches on the term and actually read the sources they turn up, instead of buying into the idea that this is a pseudoscience "hoax".
If anyone wants to respond, please do so outside this comment rather than breaking it up. --Sammy1339 (talk) 23:26, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
This is a deletion discussion. Kindly do not put words in my mouth, which I have not said. I could see
WP:HISTMERGE might mean that we should look at alternatives to deletion, but, honestly, a bad depiction of Joy's views constantly going off-topic is probably unsuitable merge topic, as I learned after fully researching this and realising how bad it was. I also think your view - that going to people who, for example, explicitly talk about their conversations with Melanie Joy as reasons not to merge - means that the wider Wikipedia community should be actively excluded from a deletion discussion, keeping it to the people who are obviously non-neutral. Adam Cuerden (talk) 23:36, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
That's not the person I quoted. --Sammy1339 (talk) 23:53, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete The nomination does a good job of explaining the issue. The article is about a made-up-term which the author is trying to push as part of a campaign. Wikipedia should not be part of that—not until multiple independent reliable sources use the term as if it were an accepted concept not in relation to the author. The advocacy images can be put in some other article. Johnuniq (talk) 00:11, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Johnuniq: If you want in-depth academic analysis of the concept that doesn't even cite the person who originated it, that's obviously too much to ask. But if you want mainstream media outlets that use the word without reference to her, there are some, for example [46], [47], [48]. Please read my comment above, if you haven't already. --Sammy1339 (talk) 00:47, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Those are A. references to "carnist", B. very weak usages (used to simply mean "meat-eater", without any additional philosophy behind it) and C. in the middle case, quoting a vegan website in the only point it mentions the word. While a cognate, I'd say "carnist" is a far more narrow term than "carnism". Adam Cuerden (talk) 01:04, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
To refute NEO, one needs to show that the term is used independently of its creator, and, much more importantly, that it has been discussed in enough depth to allow an article to be written. The three weak mentions above, like these [49][50][51][52]; , show the former; in-depth sources (mentioning Joy, as they should) show the latter. FourViolas (talk) 02:54, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - My opinion hasn't changed since the previous AfD. Regarding
    Equity and gender feminism (seems like as good a place as any to start), in that case the subject was a set of terms Christina Hoff Sommers used to talk about concepts we already cover under other (much more popular) names. There was no novel concept. The terms' significance was therefore limited to the context of the book. Discussion of the terms was limited almost entirely to discussion of the book. In this case there is a prominent publication which brought the term to the mainstream, but (a) there is a novel concept we don't cover elsewhere, (b) secondary source coverage of the concept via Joy is not limited to a particular work (she coined it 9 years before Why We Love Dogs...), and (c) there are many secondary sources about carnism that mention the book in addition to sources about the book which mention carnism (we need both, but both "count" -- i.e. a review of one of her works which focuses on the concept still contributes to notability). That's an important distinction. Many notable concepts are named by and/or developed by and thus associated with a particular person. What's important is that it has significance outside of her own primary sources. And in this case there are many reliable secondary sources which talk about carnism. That many of them also talk about Joy just means she wrote the best known text about it. So if anything, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows should be merged into this article, not the other way around. Last time around I collected sources at User:Rhododendrites/Carnism. It's very possible more have been discovered since then, and as a disclaimer, I did not go back through them since then. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 01:12, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
    ]
    • @Rhododendrites: Speciesism. Ethics of eating meat. What, exactly, doesn't fit into one or the other of those? Adam Cuerden (talk) 01:22, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
      • @Adam Cuerden: Speciesism is the much too broad umbrella term, so the real question, to me anyway, is about ethics of eating meat. That article runs through the various arguments/criticisms/justifications but while it covers perspectives it's not about the underlying psycho-sociological context/apparatus/paradigm. That's a smaller subject, but it's also sufficiently distinct to justify a separate article. We could also fold critical race theory, sociology of race and ethnic relations, institutional racism, and symbolic racism into racism -- and I realize as I'm typing that this analogy is so fraught as to potentially do my argument more harm than good... and yet here I am still typing... :) -- but they're sufficiently distinct and sufficiently written about to justify and sustain a stand-alone article. If we were talking about a stub, without any indication that it could sustain a stand-alone article (and/or without worrying that it could grow disproportionately long in a broader article), that would be one thing, but that doesn't look to be the case. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 02:12, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        • Those terms are used by independent sources. Come back in a few years and recreate this article when it is past the neologism and retweet stage. Johnuniq (talk) 02:38, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
For what it's worth, I just finished a college course on animal ethics (the generalized topic of ethics of eating meat), and it's not the same topic. Ethics is about formal logic: "if I'm committed to believing that the fulfillment of my desires is subjectively good, am I committed to valuing animals as ends-in-themselves in the Kantian sense?" "Carnism" refers to cultural practices and social structures which have nothing to do with, and may actually be hostile to,[53] this kind of formal debate. FourViolas (talk) 02:34, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and redirect to book. NE Ent 02:19, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

NE Ent:Based on what POLICY!? --Elvey(tc) 20:49, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge I think we should cover this, but as it's written now it pretty clearly belongs with the book. If the term starts seeing wider use (outside of a narrow part of academia) then recreation might make sense. Opposed to deletion as I think A) this may be useful later if the term does see more use and B) there may be things here to merge back into the book. Hobit (talk) 03:05, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. North America1000 13:06, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the
list of Behavioral science-related deletion discussions. North America1000 13:06, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organisms-related deletion discussions. North America1000 13:06, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Food and drink-related deletion discussions. North America1000 13:06, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Social science-related deletion discussions. North America1000 13:07, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I agree totally with the comment of SageRad regarding canvassing here. This is so blatant that I believe it invalidates this AfD and I urge any admin or user intending to close this AfD to bear that in mind.DrChrissy (talk) 16:02, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Aside from the fact that somebody coined a term to propagate their belief, this article does not cover ideas that are not already included in such articles as Speciesism. Pete unseth (talk) 16:15, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • Delete and redirect in its current form, the article is largely based on sources which either don't use the term "carnism" or which only discuss it in terms of quotations or explicit summary of Joy's work. To the extent that the article uses sources which summarise Joy's work the content should be placed in articles about Joy's work, and the remaining content is largely a
    WP:COATRACK of other content about the historical and cultural aspects of eating meat (and some more tangential areas such as meat production). Looking through the discussion above I suspect it might be possible to write an article about this topic which addresses these concerns, but I don't think it would look much like this one and I am conscious of the fact that this is the fourth deletion discussion about these issues. Hut 8.5 17:39, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
    ]
  • Keep. What do our policies say?
    WP:COATRACK aren't policy for a reason. --Elvey(tc) 20:49, 2 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
    ]
No,
WP:N
is not the relevant policy. It is "an article notability guideline".
  • As others have noted, sources include:
  • Martin Gibert, Élise Desaulniers (2014), "Carnism," Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics, Springer Netherlands, pp. 292–298.
  • Rui Pedro Fonseca (2015). [www.scirp.org/journal/PaperDownload.aspx?paperID=58725[predatory publisher] "The Presence of Carnism on Portuguese Television,"] Open Journal of Social Sciences, 3, pp. 48–55.
  • Carrie Packwood-Freeman, Oana Leventi Perez (2012). "Pardon Your Turkey and Eat Him Too," in Joshua J. Frye, Michael S. Bruner (eds.), The Rhetoric of Food: Discourse, Materiality, and Power, Routledge, p. 103ff.
  • Kristof Dhont, Gordon Hodson (2014). "Why do right-wing adherents engage in more animal exploitation and meat consumption?" Personality and Individual Differences, 64, pp. 12–17.
  • J. Gutjahr (2013). "The reintroduction of animals and slaughter into discourses of meat eating," in Helena Röcklinsberg, Per Sandin (eds.), The ethics of consumption: The citizen, the market, and the law, Springer, pp. 380–383.
Together with the news sources, these would normally be enough to show that a topic is notable. SarahSV (talk) 20:49, 3 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong keep per SV up above. The article meets and exceeds all the basic requirements for a standalone subject. My only quibble regards the deflection of blame for the current problem. There is nothing stopping Sammy1339 or SV from creating a polished version in a sandbox. Viriditas (talk) 00:13, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • @
    WP:NOTCOMPULSORY on that. The fight over this went on pretty much all day every day for six weeks, and included endless quibbles about things as minor as whether something is "orthodox" or "conventional", interspersed with an ever-shifting series of new, creative ideas for getting rid of the whole article. It's the reason I didn't edit WP at all for almost 3 months, and I only came back because I noticed the merge discussion, and the discussion about the psych article, and this discussion, representing three simultaneous ways it could be eliminated. Why should I play in my sandbox? --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:04, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
    ]
I think this is getting a little off topic. IMHO development was stalled by over-application of
WP:AGF, but that's a conversation for later. FourViolas (talk) 03:05, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
Are a few papers in obscure journals really significant? A bunch of non-notable sources don't really equal a notable one. Adam Cuerden (talk) 04:32, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
To satisfy
reliable, not necessarily "notable". Books and papers vetted by the scholarly community, such as those published by well-regarded academic presses like Springer and Routledge, are reliable even if they haven't themselves been discussed in depth by two independent published RS. FourViolas (talk) 05:05, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
...Um... how's that, logically, meant to work? You're trying to claim a
WP:WIKILAWYERING, using the letter of a general statement to force it to work somewhere it clearly doesn't apply. We're trying to establish this as independent of the book. Adam Cuerden (talk) 05:59, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
Adam, to put it mildly, you're pretty confused here. Reliable (not notable) sources are used to establish notability, as per the
Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources#Some types of sources). There's no wikilawyering here, you're simply misinterpreting notability requirements. You're displaying a gross misunderstanding of the relevant guidelines. Josh Milburn (talk) 11:24, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
But simply cannot be used to justify a forking off from the book that created the neologism. Notable sources besides the book are required to show that, to sufficient extent that it wouldn't be merely a legacy section for the book. It's nonsense to suggest anything else, otherwise, you could fork infinitely. And it's not like the article as it stands is worthwhile: I think everyone knows it's getting more-or-less stubbified if it's kept, as noone is arguing for it not being a massive
WP:COATRACK. Adam Cuerden (talk) 23:48, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
"Notable sources besides the book are required to show that". So you keep claiming, but this is not required by any Wikipedia policy or guideline. There are editorial questions to be asked about the article (including, perhaps, whether it would be better off merged into the article on the book- something I don't support) but none of them (beyond, perhaps, questions related to the inclusion of wikilinks...) involves the "notability of the sources". I am not sure where you have gotten this idea from, but it's really one you need to be rid of. Josh Milburn (talk) 00:02, 5 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
In case it's helpful, there's also a passing mention of carnism in Marguerite M. Regan (2014). "Feminism, Vegetarianism, and Colonial Resistence in Eighteenth-Century British Novels," Studies in the Novel (pp. 275–292) p. 283.
JSTOR 23882895: "An early critic of carnism, she [Catharine Macaulay
] asserts that 'the taste of flesh is not natural to the human palate, when not vitiated by carnivorous habits.'"
I found that significant because Regan doesn't explain what carnism is. She's assumes that a well-informed reader will know what it means. SarahSV (talk) 00:21, 5 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Regrettably, that's not quite true. Regan writes a few pages earlier,

Vegetarianism....serves as a protest against what one recent writer has dubbed “carnism,” the entrenched belief system that is “resistant to scrutiny” and that considers the “eating [of] certain animals…ethical and appropriate” (Joy 30).

However, this "anarchist geography" paper and this (undergrad-) published body image paper do use the term in passing as you describe, without bothering to define it or cite Joy. FourViolas (talk) 00:44, 5 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
That's odd. I searched for carnism and carnist, and found it only once in the text and once in the references. But regardless, the point stands that it's an example of the kind of academic use we look for (cf. Josh Milburn's point about growing traction), and it's interesting that the author applies it retroactively. SarahSV (talk) 00:54, 5 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep per sv Min al Khadr (talk) 14:04, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep Notable topic, good sourcing, and evidence that this term is widely cited. Dimadick (talk) 14:09, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete as per nominator. This is an unnotable neologism being used as an coatrack. Martin Hogbin (talk) 17:22, 4 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and redirect. Regardless of the state of our current article and its sources, I think the Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics (source 1, accurately summarized by the nominator) is enough by itself to make the situation clear: "carnism" is "Melanie Joy’s view on food ethics". Therefore, it is not independently notable from the book in which she expounds this view, and we should not have an article falsely describing her view as if it were something broader-based than what it is. —David Eppstein (talk) 08:20, 7 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • That's not what "synonym" means in the context of the encyclopedia; as used, they're more like keywords to aid search or to avoid mostly-duplicate listings. So, for example, Carolyn Korsmeyer's entry on "Aesthetic Value, Art, and Food" lists "Aesthetics", "Art", "Cuisines" "Ethical eating", "Gustatory pleasure" and "Taste" as synonyms, while Bernard Rollin's entry on "Beef Production: Ethical Issues" includes "animal welfare in the beef industry", "food safety", "human and animal health", "husbandry and industry" and "sustainability of the beef industry" as synonyms. In this context, listing something of a "synonym" as something else should not be taken to imply that they are the same thing. Josh Milburn (talk) 08:34, 7 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry if I've been a bit too talkative in this discussion, but I think this needs to be responded to. Although I agree with Josh Milburn that this one line in the "Synonyms" section should not be taken too literally, it's true that the entry focuses heavily (not exclusively) on Joy. But I also have to point out this is not the only encyclopedia article on "carnism": there's also one in German here ("Karnismus" on p.191, as you can see in the table of contents[54].) And generally there are many sources which take the concept significantly beyond Joy's work. A couple examples are the foreign language academic books by Mahlke and Larue, which both apply the term retroactively - Mahlke, for example, says in her book that carnism is the "central crux of speciesism" and refers this idea to a 2002 (pre-"carnism") quote of feminist writer Carol Adams. In the sources listed above by North America, SV, and myself there are many which go into much more depth than Joy about the concept and I don't understand why this is being ignored. There are also all the news sources. Many of these sources cannot be artificially jammed into Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows. --Sammy1339 (talk) 16:13, 7 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep:"News- 239 results, Books - 1890 results, Scholar - 219 results, Highbeam - 10 results". 169000 ghits on regular google. If anyone has issues with the content in the article or its sources, that isn't reason to delete the article. The subject is notable. Yogesh Khandke (talk) 02:03, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The nominator
like the term but that is no reason for deleting the article. Yogesh Khandke (talk) 03:56, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply
]
@Yogesh Khandke: I'm sorry, but when the name of the concept is in the book's title - and we all agree the book's notable - simply showing the termm appears in documents shows nothing. Every presence of the notable book's title will, in and of itself, provide a usage of the term, without showing any actual usage. If anything, given the notability of the book, those values seem very low, and tend to show lack of significant usage. Adam Cuerden (talk) 04:02, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Over one hundred thousand ghits minus Melanie minus Joy and over 1000 in google books.[55]Yogesh Khandke (talk) 04:15, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, my google search only shows 99,900 ghits for the topic minus Melanie minus Joy. What gives? . North America1000 12:02, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as per the reasons of many others why this is notable, even if I personally disagree that the term should be notable. Also as per my comments in multiple previous discussions on this topic. This nomination represents exactly what's wrong with Wikipedia's consensus-building structure. If you nominate something dozens of times, you'll eventually get the answer you want. The fact that this has gone through the nomination process three times (two recently) and been kept each time should have indicated to a potential nominator acting in good faith that the article should not be nominated unless new concerns are brought up. Consensus can change, yada, yada, but there's a fine line between gauging whether consensus has changed and hoping that you catch the right people at busy times in their lives so you can get a different pool to turn out for the vote. If this is deleted, I assume several people would cry foul if editors filed repetitious deletion reviews. That's not how Wikipedia's process is meant to work. It's a clear abuse of consensus-building. ~ RobTalk 11:31, 9 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • @BU Rob13: Actually, the results were delete, delete, no consensus. It does help not to bash nomination based on inaccuracies. Adam Cuerden (talk) 11:53, 9 January 2016 (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.