Talk:Grey River (New Zealand)

Requested move 14 May 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Moved to Grey River (New Zealand). This is a classic WP:NOGOODOPTIONS close. There is no consensus between participants on whether the dual name or parenthetical disambiguation is the best, rooted in whether the dual name is common enough in general parlance. This failure to find consensus on this matter is sadly the usual outcome in New Zealand RMs, as they tend to devolve into an endless struggle between dual name supporters and dual name opponents. However, it is uncontested that the article cannot stay at the base name and must be disambiguated because there is no evidence that it is the primary topic. The parenthetical disambiguation will be used provisionally, as it is the current default recommended at WP:NZNC. Another RM to debate the use of parentheses vs. the dual name can be started up at any time. (non-admin closure) — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 16:51, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

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• Grey River → Grey River / Māwheranui
• Grey River (disambiguation) → Grey River

– Page views indicate no clear primary topic for Grey River, while recent books under the term "Grey River" show very few, if any, results for the NZ river. Per WP:NATURAL, the dual name for the river is a suitable alternative. Turnagra (talk) 03:40, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

• Support to Grey River (New Zealand), per WP:NZNC #3 which requires parenthetical disambiguation, and WP:TITLEDAB, which requires that natural disambiguation use an alternative name that the subject is also commonly called in English reliable sources, and forbids the use of obscure names - and the dual name is obscure, per Google News, which shows only one use of the dual name. BilledMammal (talk) 04:28, 14 May 2022 (UTC)
  • Comment I would also support moving Grey River, Newfoundland and Labrador to Grey River, as looking at the pageviews it appears to be the primary topic. BilledMammal (talk) 04:32, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

    Usage requirements state that a primary needs to be more likely than all the other topics combined, which is not the case here for the Newfoundland article Turnagra (talk) 04:36, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

  The dual name is used by Google maps, environmental organisations, both local and overseas catalogues, business listings on the NZX and the US Government. That seems more than enough to indicate it has sufficient usage per WP:NATURAL.

  As for your NZNC comment, thankfully when we use the dual name we've got a nice distinct and unique name, so NZNC #1 would apply. Turnagra (talk) 04:43, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

  I believe NZNC #1 refers to the place number per WP:PAG. If it was advocating the use of the dual name for disambiguation, it would say so.

  As for your sources, if the name was not obscure and commonly used as required by WP:TITLEDAB, it would be commonly used by news organizations. I also note that most of the sources you have provided are either not reliable, or not independent of the NZ Government (Google Maps and GeoNames pull their data from NZ government databases). BilledMammal (talk) 05:44, 14 May 2022 (UTC)

• Support originally proposed move as natural disambiguation. Given the fact that foreign governments, as well as general-audience sources like Google Maps, are using the dual name in this case, I think it's widely enough used to not be considered "obscure". ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 22:13, 16 May 2022 (UTC)
• Support Grey River should be the disambiguation page. ANd the dual name here seems like a tidy way to disambiguate this page.ShakyIsles (talk) 21:16, 27 May 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose. This isn’t a good faith effort to find primary topics; this is another attempt by Turnagra to move more articles to their official names by any means necessary. It may well be that there is no primary, but the dual name is entirely unused by the local population as well as ordinary reliable sources (RNZ [1], Stuff [2] and 1 News [3] all use the single name; searches for news show no use of the dual name), so we should disambiguate according to guidelines (per Billedmammal above) and if it is to be moved, move the page to Grey River (New Zealand). I note that, as in most cases, the parenthetical disambiguation is far more NATURAL (per WP:CRITERIA) than code-switching between English and Māori through the middle of a name. — HTGS (talk) 00:54, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Format of lede

@Turnagra: What established consensus are you referring to? BilledMammal (talk) 05:03, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm referring to the discussion which was had over at WP:NZNC that everyone but you seems to remember. Turnagra (talk) 05:17, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Which did not establish a consensus. BilledMammal (talk) 05:28, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Everyone but you was able to live with the proposal and you WP:STONEWALLED and WP:FORUMSHOPPED to prevent it from moving forward. That closure request was in response to these actions but didn't proceed based on the time it had been and the context, there was no ruling one way or the other on whether there was consensus from the link you provided. Turnagra (talk) 05:35, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Then lets open an actual RfC; the two of us can agree on the question and the format, open it at WT:NZNC, and as advised at Wikipedia:Article titles#Proposed naming conventions and guidelines post neutral notifications at WP:AT, WP:VPP, and WP:NZ. If there is a consensus for either of our positions we can resolve this without further difficulty. (For the record, I also disagree with that assessment of my behavior). BilledMammal (talk) 05:40, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

With respect, none of my interactions with you on this subject make me inclined to believe that you would act in good faith on this. Your actions in this space almost always involve badgering anyone who disagrees with you into submission and outlasting them, then launching several move requests at once (as you have just done) in a drive to remove any prominence of dual names from Wikipedia. Your behaviour gives me no faith that you would simply give up this crusade even if the RfC went against you, and I don't see why I should spend my time engaging with a WP:SEALION. Turnagra (talk) 07:43, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

The reason you should have faith is that prior to the RfC that removed the preference for official titles I usually took a neutral stance on RM's proposing to move articles to their dual names. For example, Talk:Fox Glacier/Archive 1#Requested move 15 September 2021. I note that this isn't the approach you have taken; you never follow the guideline on how to disambiguate New Zealand places.

I am also not attempting to remove any prominence of dual names from Wikipedia; I am attempting to move articles to their WP:COMMONNAME, in accordance with policy. This does mean that many dual place names need to be moved, but that is because under the previous policy we moved articles to their dual names regardless of whether the dual name was the common name.

And for the record, I again disagree with that assessment of my behavior, and note that you provide no evidence to support it. BilledMammal (talk) 07:53, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Your comment in that move states I decline to present my own opinion on this, which doesn't scream actually neutral so much as hiding motives - if you were neutral, you wouldn't have spearheaded the attempt to remove dual names from the naming conventions, or be launching several move requests even after literally everyone else has long put this to bed from burnout.

As for the disambiguation comment, I've explained that the naming conventions already provide for natural disambiguation. But regardless, you've been clear in the past that you don't see naming conventions as trumping other guidelines, so why the sudden desire for them to do so when it suits you?

My comments are based on my entire interaction history with you. In keeping with WP:SEALION it is difficult to point to specific instances, but the trajectory leaves a lot to be desired. Turnagra (talk) 08:19, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

I wasn't neutral - I disagreed with the guideline, and I wasn't convinced that it reflected consensus - but I took a neutral position because the guideline currently supported the move, and it was possible that it did reflect consensus. If the consensus had been to keep the preference for dual names I would not have commented on most of the subsequent RM's.

As for the accusations, it is a violation of the policy on personal attacks to make them without evidence. I've probably asked you a dozen times to stop, but I'll ask again: Please stop making personal attacks. BilledMammal (talk) 08:38, 4 March 2023 (UTC)