Template talk:Virginia Tech shooting

message: Why do some victims get more attention than the others? I see the three notable victims are professors, but what about the students? The fair thing would be either to list all of the victims or none. That's just my two cents of course.
I agree. I think this very 'notoriety' is probably what set Cho off in the first place. contribs).
:If you look at the AfD entries for the student articles, they will likely all be deleted very soon.  It is only the notable entries, such as those who meet WP:PROF, which are likely to last. --StuffOfInterest 14:27, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I like the box and think it is fine as is, but could somebody link to similar tragedy boxes to better illustrate that this a more standard sort of thing? MCalamari 14:31, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't think this box will be ultimately be necessary, once the main page matures and gets better laid out, but we'll see Epson291 15:09, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

text: The victims part needs to go. There were 32 victims. Listing only those deemed notable by Wikipedia is inherently POV and misleading. --Elliskev 12:54, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: 'Notable' victims?

message: I'd like to propose dropping the map image out of this template.  It just takes up more space than justified. --StuffOfInterest 16:15, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Il' support that, if more articles are added. For now, removing it will make the temp rather tiny --TheFEARgod (Ч) 16:35, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

text: see also: Template:Katrina, Template:2004 tsunami--TheFEARgod (Ч) 16:38, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I can see it either way.  My concern right now is that the image takes up almost as much vertical space as all the text content.  Also, that particular graphic was one of the complaint items at TfD.  Guess we'll see what develops. --StuffOfInterest 16:41, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Map image

message: I will try not to turn this into a revert war, but i don't think her link she but kept. Given that the template itself is already under question... adding links to articles who are probable for deletion seems foolish. -- Jimmi Hugh 19:49, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That was my reasoning for not putting her in in the first place, but someone else chose to.  When the link goes red, it will only take a second to drop back out so I'm not concerned either way. --StuffOfInterest 19:55, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But the link won't go red. It will be redirected and stay blue... The correct action, which has already been done, is to take out the victim names altogether. With redirects, you could have them all there, but that would be misleading as some would redirect to anchors back in the parent article, rather than separate articles. Just the main articles should appear on the template, as in this version. Carcharoth 16:31, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jocelyne 

message: In my opinion, that link should be changed from "Media Inaccuracy" to "Inaccurate Reports".  At first glance, the term "Media Inaccuracy" suggests that the media as a whole has been inaccurate, whereas the article itself is more of a review of inaccurate reports. --Bletch 12:26, 21 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Slight tweak should have dealt with that - it now reads "Media inacuracies". Carcharoth 14:07, 21 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Media Inaccuracy" 

message: I'm not sure why this irks so many people, but I do think that it needs to be reformatted.
Instead of the extant design, I think it needs to be a non-intrustive navbox at the bottom, such as:
The sidebar style is usually reserved for huge topics, like Quantum mechanics or Esperanto. I think a navbox that lies low, like the Beethoven one above, would attract fewer deletionist agendas. ALTON .ıl 03:06, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I tend to like this design.  I've never been overly sure the template needs a map included.  Something like this would take up about the least amount of vertical scroll space. --StuffOfInterest 11:17, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redesign 

message: :As one with both a deletionist agenda and a horrifying, secret love for crufty navboxes, I can tell you exactly why the Virginia Tech massacre navbox irks people.  There is a feeling that, once the excitement of the chase wears thin and Wikipedians start treating this subject like encyclopediasts rather than scoop-hungry journalists, the "story" will collapse into two articles: one on the perpetrator, one on the act perpetrated (see Marc Lépine and the École Polytechnique massacre for a foreshadowing of the eventual intellectual fate of Seung-Hui Cho and the last, desperate act of his terminal frustration with his fellow human beings).
:Two articles, plus a link to the institution where the dastardly act occurred (Lépine merits one whole sentence at the end of the article for the École Polytechnique de Montréal) would hardly justify a navigational template.  It would simply be seen as a self-indulgent and unjustifiable waste of space whose function could have been easily handled by in-article links, and that assessment would probably be right.
:The present form of the navbox is not really the problem.  A map plus categories of links is not necessarily inappropriate in all contexts if it's done right.  Here is a navbox I put together for University of California-related articles a week or two ago: 
:Note the use of a map and several categories of links.  However, all of the links have some sort of permanence as to their Wikipedian notability that one honestly can't say is possessed by a lot of the satellite articles that spin wildly about the Virginia Tech massacre.  Also, the map in the UC navbox is actually useful in figuring out where a lot of the links' widely-distributed subjects are physically located.  The VT-massacre template's map, on the other hand, points out one precise location (if you can really call a big, red dot covering 150 square miles or so of Virginian countryside "precise") that most news junkies already know by heart and which, if a reader is unfamiliar with Virginian geography, is just one click away in the Blacksburg, Virginia, article.
:If you truly want to put together a navbox with lasting significance and which won't be continually rubbished by self-righteous deletionists, I would not bother with one specifically dedicated to the VT massacre.  Instead, I would put together a box on school shootings, shooting sprees, or some other categorized topic that really does have enough stable articles to justify creating a navbox and can sustain demand for one.  My 2¢, plus a quarter or two. --Dynaflow 04:18, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No sarcasm was meant; I am entirely serious on why I dislike the very idea of a VT-massacre template.  See my comment towards the bottom of  UCLA's Talk page for why I haven't redone that one yet.  --Dynaflow 04:50, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Why I dislike the navbox - a parable

message: Now that the TfD has ended, how about readressing the inclusion of victim articles?  It seems pretty much a conclusion that any student articles will go, but several of the professor articles have already survived AfD.  The biggeset debate ongoing right now seems to be over non-professor teachers.  If we can find an appropriate title to use, such as "Victims (with articles)", should these article links be included in the template?  --StuffOfInterest 11:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Victim article redux 

message: I'm very confused as to the implication of these individuals' involvement in the massacre.  Both Giovanni and Roy taught Cho, the perpetrator, and Giovanni spoke at the ceremony.  Both are highly regarded English faculty members at VT.  However, they are neither victims nor perpetrators.  Categorizing them under "people" amongst victims and the individual who committed the crime seems highly out of place; it implies that they had a larger part to play other than doing their jobs, speaking to the media after the incident, and giving a speech.  I suggest they be removed from the template, or be classified under a different section.  "People" is far too broad.  María (habla conmigo) 01:29, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi, your comment was left in the wrong place.  The template you are commenting on is actually Template talk:Virginia Tech massacre 1.  Unfortunately, that template was pointing to this talk page for a while. --StuffOfInterest 12:29, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, I see.  Thanks for informing me. :) María (habla conmigo) 13:55, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Nikki Giovanni]] and [[Lucinda Roy]]

message: I state this not as a member of the VT community, as I am not, nor did I personally know any of the victims, though I do know people who did know victims.
I don't have any issue with the box linking to victims who have Wiki pages. Nor do I think every victim meets the requirements of having his/her own article. However, I strongly believe that using the term 'Notable Victims' is wrong. To those of us who frequent Wikipedia, it makes perfect sense. 'Notable' is a term commonly used within the community to describe something as being article-worthy. However, take a step outside of the Wikipedia community, and read it as an individual without any familiarity to the project's policies & terms may read it. To only state that "These 5 people are the notable victims" comes off as saying "These 5 people who died meant something, these others were not really noteworthy". Yes, if you read the entire article, you know that no one of the lives lost was any less tragic than another. 
Is Emily Hilsher not notable?
Did Ryan Clark not ever make a difference in someones life?
How about Matt La Porte?
Or Erin Peterson?
What did Leslie Sherman not do to make her loss of less note than anyone else?
What makes those 5 randomly selected names "Not Notable"? No, they don't have the notability for their own Wikipedia Article. But in this template, 5 individuals are prominently elevated as being "Notable".
The box is useful, and the 5 links should remain. However, I simply urge for a simple change in title to something that would not be found offensive to someone who isn't familiar with Wikipedia's terminology, because I guarantee you there's plenty of people connected to these "Non-notable" victims that feel they are every bit as notable as any of the others.Coastalsteve984 (talk) 22:47, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you have an alternative proposal besides just "Victims", which makes it sound like every single victim should be listed? --Cybercobra (talk) 23:08, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I made one suggestion which was reverted, "Victims with Wikipedia Articles" - I recognize this is a bit long, but it didn't widen the box too much. Perhaps do a "Victims with [br] Wikipedia Articles"... I'm open to suggestions as well. Coastalsteve984 (talk) 17:14, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Suggestion: User:Coastalsteve984/VTTest Possible solution? Coastalsteve984 (talk) 17:23, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

text: I find that unacceptable per Wikipedia:Avoid self-references. --Cybercobra (talk) 19:45, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, fair enough. Can't say I agree with the rule in this case but there's alot of rules I don't agree with, hah! How about a suggestion? Do you disagree with my reasoning or just don't care enough to offer something up? I'm thinking something maybe involving the word "Selected" ... or maybe trying to find a way to put all 32 names in, with these ones with articles being larger with links and the rest being smaller and not linked. Or how about just "Individual Victim Articles" ... I'm trying to think of something but suggestions would be welcome and appreciated. Coastalsteve984 (talk) 02:23, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I just don't care enough. "Selected" would work IMO. --Cybercobra (talk) 02:43, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: "Selected" will make the reader wonder what selection criteria were applied.  --Lambiam 01:45, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

text: And I will revert you again. The template's usefulness is lessened by your removals; its primary purpose is to provide links to other, related articles. WP:NOTAMEMORIAL specifically prohibits creating memorials that don't have related articles; these are links to related articles, not a list of victims. Removing the links to the articles about the victims that have them is counterproductive, at best. You've reduced the template to three links, hardly useful. The discussion above isn't ambiguous about having the links, only what to name them. You are proposing a controversial edit; the onus is on you to get consensus to make it. The template has already survived one deletion attempt, by the way.—D'Ranged 1 VTalk 17:11, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
replies: text:  Update: I've changed the template to emphasize its function as a link to related articles. Only articles containing the template are listed, just as in other navboxes. No "identifiers"—such as "Victims", or "Perpetrator"—are included. I kept the piped versions of the article names for the Media Coverage and Timeline, as the actual article names are so long they would require two lines or widen the box unnecessarily. As an aside, I went through the articles yesterday that were using the box and removed it from those where it didn't belong, notably Lucinda Roy and Charles Steger.—D'Ranged 1 VTalk 17:34, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Rekindle of 'Notable' Victims Discussion

message: I have removed the "victims" links citing WP:NOTAMEMORIAL as well as WP:UNDUE. While the shooting is a tragedy in every sense, Wikipedia is not the place to memorialize any one person or group of people. I do not believe that this template should exist, but will not contest it if its used as an informational/academic device to point Readers at other related articles. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (Talk) 16:08, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: And I will revert you again. The template's usefulness is lessened by your removals; its primary purpose is to provide links to other, related articles. WP:NOTAMEMORIAL specifically prohibits creating memorials that don't have related articles; these are links to related articles, not a list of victims. Removing the links to the articles about the victims that have them is counterproductive, at best. You've reduced the template to three links, hardly useful. The discussion above isn't ambiguous about having the links, only what to name them. You are proposing a controversial edit; the onus is on you to get consensus to make it. The template has already survived one deletion attempt, by the way.—D'Ranged 1 VTalk 17:11, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
replies: text:  Update: I've changed the template to emphasize its function as a link to related articles. Only articles containing the template are listed, just as in other navboxes. No "identifiers"—such as "Victims", or "Perpetrator"—are included. I kept the piped versions of the article names for the Media Coverage and Timeline, as the actual article names are so long they would require two lines or widen the box unnecessarily. As an aside, I went through the articles yesterday that were using the box and removed it from those where it didn't belong, notably Lucinda Roy and Charles Steger.—D'Ranged 1 VTalk 17:34, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: continuation

message: :Template:Virginia Tech massacre →  – The article has been renamed; this template, the navbar, and the category should also be renamed 184.244.227.24 (talk) 08:17, 19 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Requested move