Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Romani ite domum

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 consensus non habemus. There are reasonable arguments to be made for redirecting or merging (minor aspect of a notable film), as well as for keeping (the scene has coverage in reliable sources), and whether these really suffice as the basis of an article is a matter of editorial judgment not to be second-guessed by your closer. Sandstein 19:28, 9 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Romani ite domum

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Originally created on 1 March 2005 as a redirect to the article Life of Brian, it only took 103 days to be turned into essentially the same page it is now: failing WP:PLOT and WP:N for 17.76 years, it now manages to bear a single salient source (cited to "montypython.50webs.com").

It may be worth noting that steps have been taken repeatedly to return this page to a redirect. Samuel Blanning (talk · contribs) redirected it again in January 2007, and was reverted by Michael Bednarek (talk · contribs) in March 2013. MRN2electricboogaloo (talk · contribs) redirected it a third time in December 2022 saying in part, the scene isn’t notable and neither is the phrase it seems; they were undone by Michael Bednarek again, who referred to deletion instead, saying there's a process to nominate articles for deletion. Today, I used one of those processes as instructed by Michael Bednarek, proposing deletion because Handily fails WP:PLOT & WP:N (nominated at the request of User:Michael Bednarek; that same editor reverted the {{prod}} tagging, saying this time, I made no such request; if you want it deleted, take it to AfD.. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 14:58, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. If a scene from a film is notable (and I doubt it is), then it should be a section in that film's article. Gonnym (talk) 15:03, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I suspect this scene is notable enough for a mention somewhere. It is discussed in many Latin books unaffiliated with Monty Python, take a look on google books:[1] – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 15:17, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It's not even mentioned in the film's article (that I could find). Gonnym (talk) 15:19, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This is how it's described in the plot section: To prove himself, Brian is tasked by the PFJ to paint slogans on Roman governor Pilate's palace, but is interrupted by a Roman officer. The officer, however, is more concerned with Brian's appalling grammar and, after correcting the slogan, orders him to write it one hundred times. – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 15:21, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Language and Film. – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 15:20, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The article subject is discussed in some depth here: Cognitive Linguistics and Humor Research Barnards.tar.gz (talk) 16:36, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot access your linked source. Could you incorporate it into the article so we can see whether it affects concerns about notability and lack of non-plot context (and won't make the page a coatrack of mentions/references)? — Fourthords | =Λ= | 15:28, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
A coat rack of references? That's what every Wikipedia article aims for. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 00:43, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry! That's not what I meant. What I meant in my reply to Barnards.tar.gz was whether their source helped satisfy N and PLOT, and wasn't just a mention (or a reference) to the topic at hand; i.e. does the source just name-drop or call-out to this particular TV scene. Does that make sense? We don't want to just list a bunch of sources that mention the topic in passing: a coatrack of [mentions, name-drops, call-outs, references]. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 00:54, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Individual scenes from some films take on a life of their own, and this appears to be an example. Wikipedia has at least two from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, concerning the Knights who say 'Ni!' and the Rabbit of Caerbannog. Evidently there are sources unaffiliated with the movie that discuss this scene, whether in discussions of Latin grammar or for the sheer silliness of it. Perhaps more such sources could be cited. As for the argument that it should be redirected to a list of Latin phrases, there is simply too much content necessary to explain it; and in fact this is much the same reason for not merging it with the article about the film: as a section of that article it would be too lengthy, and would probably need to be split off to produce—this article. Finally, it's harmless and people might just be looking for it, so there are good reasons to have an article, and nothing is really improved by deleting it. There may be other articles about scenes in films that can't really be justified, but this one seems good enough to stay. P Aculeius (talk) 17:51, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Do those sources provide the article requisite notability and real-world context? — Fourthords | =Λ= | 15:28, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect or merge to the film. I'm not sure it's notable without the film, all discussions seem to be in context of the film itself. Oaktree b (talk) 20:22, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep – P Aculeius gave the reasons against redirecting and merging. As for the phrase's notability on its own, the first three provided search links above (books, news, scholar) provide plenty of significant coverage. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:13, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Without my own access to those sources, would you instead be able to incorporate them into the article, so we can all see how well and if they address the concerns about notability and lack of non-plot context (and won't make the page a coatrack of mentions/references)? — Fourthords | =Λ= | 15:28, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Surely the Google searches provided at the top of this page yield results when you click them. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 00:43, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot access those sources, as I said. That's why I asked whether you could use your access to improve the article, so we could evaluate their qualitative effect on the concerns here. Also, if they're libre-licensed or public-domain sources, you could copy them here (or onto this discussion's talk page) for us to pick through. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 00:54, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete (or at the very least a smerge). The discussion on the grammar is a blatant violation of WP:NOTTEXTBOOK and shouldn't be in the article regardless, and this is otherwise just a description of one scene in a movie. While it may be a well known scene, it doesn't rise anywhere near to the level of notability for a standalone article. WP:NOPAGE applies here. One single source which uses this as an example of linguistic humor is nice, but it's not enough for GNG. A couple sentences at the main article would be more than sufficient..."so-and-so has used this scene as an instructive example of linguistic humor in movies..." or something to that effect. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 03:38, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion of the grammar is exactly the point of the scene's notability and its coverage. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 05:06, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Even more reason that this shouldn't be an article then. Is the topic of the article the scene or is it the phrase? If it's the scene, WP doesn't include articles about individual movie scenes except maybe in very exceptional circumstances. The closest I could find is in all of WP was Poole versus HAL 9000, and that's really about the game depicted in the scene rather than the scene itself. Any well loved movie (and a lot of not-so-well loved ones too) are going to have their well known scenes dissected by critics, by cinephiles, by people writing in reliable sources. But again, WP:NOPAGE is key here. If it's particularly noteworthy, it can be mentioned in the main article on the film. Is the topic then the phrase? If so, it isn't notable except in the context of the film. Again then, at best, mention it on the film's article. Edit: oh wait, I finally did manage to find one: Han shot first. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 06:01, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
In my reading, WP:NOPAGE (which is also called WP:PAGEDECIDE), supports the existence of this article. Ignoring sources "by critics, by cinephiles, by people writing in reliable sources" is ignoring WP:RS, which works both ways. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:50, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Michael Bednarek: a cinematic debate or discussion of grammar is not what WP:NOTTEXTBOOK is about; this article is not a "how-to", but a discussion of a movie scene that has taken on a life of its own—the possibility that a reader might actually learn something about Latin grammar is incidental. I see nothing in WP:NOPAGE that suggests this article shouldn't exist; it's just general advice about how to determine whether a topic is better as a stand-alone article or as part of another article. In this case the discussion and explanation of the scene seems to be of an appropriate length and detail for the subject, and that discussion is too long and detailed to be folded into the main article about the film; hence, a stand-alone article seems justified. Often, notable scenes can be fully discussed within other pages, but this one simply requires more context and explanation than that treatment would allow. P Aculeius (talk) 14:13, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This scene has not "taken on a life of its own". It's one reasonably well known scene in a reasonably well known movie. You can find more written about countless others, but given the fact there's a total of one (1) other article in all of Wikipedia about a movie scene (that I could find), established precedent about how to handle this situation appears clear: individual scenes from movies do not get separate articles (at least not without some very extraordinary circumstance, like the SW one...this is where NOPAGE comes in). If you want to change this, you should write a new notability guideline on individual scenes and propose it for wider adoption. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 16:28, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That's your opinion—if various reliable sources talk about a specific scene, then one can certainly say it's taken on a life of its own. But as this is a metaphor, I'm not going to waste time trying to "prove" it to someone whose opinion is clearly different. I pointed out two other movie scenes that have their own articles, and I might have come up with others had I bothered searching for them; they were simply the ones that I was already aware of. And your lack of awareness of others does not constitute any kind of precedent or policy concerning their general notability. If anything, the fact that such articles have been created and curated for a number of years would seem to argue that there is a general consensus in favour of such articles existing, for the very reasons stated at NOPAGE. That doesn't mean that every memorable scene in every famous film should have its own article, but it's a long way from extracting a rule, stated nowhere in the encyclopedia, that no scene in any movie should be split off into a separate article. If you want to create such a rule, it's up to you to rewrite the notability guidelines. P Aculeius (talk) 16:56, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The two articles you pointed out were about characters, not scenes. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 17:05, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Splitting hairs doesn't change the basic reality of the situation. They're really about individual scenes, even if they allude to things that happened in other scenes, and there's never been anything wrong with splitting off articles that are too detailed for a proper discussion as part of larger topics. The only argument against it seems to be, "I don't think this is important, so it shouldn't have an article." P Aculeius (talk) 21:38, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Draftify while it may be notable, it’s current state is not good and needs some work to incorporate actual sources and make the text more encyclopedic (precedent might actually lean towards deletion for this scenario, judging by another AFD I was in, for GONN but I don’t really agree with that) MRN2electricboogaloo (talk) 14:43, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This article does not appear to meet the criteria for WP:DRAFTIFY. Whether the article "has some merit" seems to be the main subject of discussion, although currently a majority of commenters including yourself seem either convinced or willing to entertain the possibility. However, it clearly "meets the required standard", as it is 1) already more substantial than a stub, 2) has a reasonable chance of surviving AfD, 3) is not a candidate for speedy deletion, and 4) is not a recent creation (it was created in 2005, and has over 200 edits, as well as an average of over 150 daily page views over the 90 days preceding its nomination for deletion, which is far more than many perfectly good articles). To this I would add 5) several editors participating in this discussion are satisfied that it belongs in mainspace, even if it could stand to be improved (as nearly all articles can—and many articles in mainspace are in poorer shape than this one), and 6) there do not appear to be any issues regarding copyright violations, as everything is properly attributed, or conflicts of interest involving the editors (not that we would expect any, given the age of the film). The defects in this article can be met by the normal process of editing it in mainspace—and Wikipedia policy explicitly states that there is no time limit for improving articles. P Aculeius (talk) 15:07, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I think those parameters are only pertinent when an article is simply draftified, without discussion. DRAFTIFY clearly states, "Articles may be moved to become a draft as a result of a deletion discussion." Onel5969 ^{TT me} 01:39, 21 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That doesn't appear to be the case. Otherwise the very clear guideline, "2d. The page is a recent creation by an inexperienced editor. Older articles should not be draftified. As a rule of thumb, articles older than 90 days should not be draftified without prior consensus at AfD." (emphasis in original) would not make sense. And we clearly do not have consensus for that, nor do the other criteria suggest that this article would be suitable for draftification. Or to restate: this article is not a draft, nor does it resemble a draft. If every article that could stand to have more citations were draftified, half the encyclopedia would vanish overnight. This is a simple case of a short article that could be improved by adding more sources, like countless others. It is already in better shape than many other articles that would never be draftified. The only reason for doing so would be as a backdoor to deletion—which AfD clearly states is not an appropriate reason for draftifying an article. P Aculeius (talk) 04:37, 21 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep or merge and redirect. Either would suffice for me. I have added a reference. BD2412 T 16:02, 22 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 14:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect per nom. The various WP:ILIKEIT votes are not convincing. Walt Yoder (talk) 20:27, 23 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
… whereas the WP:IDONTLIKEIT voices are so much more convincing. BTW, those 2 shortcuts refer to the essay Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions, here doubly irrelevant. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:02, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The nom's argument was that this isn't an encyclopedia article, it is a coat-rack to quote a Monty Python sketch excessively. I agree. Walt Yoder (talk) 01:18, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds an awful lot like IDONTLIKEIT to me. IMO that's the premise behind all of the delete votes: "I don't like it, therefore it's not sufficiently notable." P Aculeius (talk) 03:03, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Something about this particular claim has been bothering me: "a coat-rack to quote a Monty Python sketch excessively." Looking at the script (the very first source cited), the scene contains forty-four lines of dialogue, excluding stage directions. The quoted section contains seven consecutive lines focusing on the incorrect identification of domum as the locative of domus, when in fact the construction is accusative. These lines contain a total of forty-two words, less than half the length for which the Chicago Manual of Style would recommend a block quotation, if they came from a single paragraph (before I checked, I was thinking of a similar standard that requires just fifty words). There must be thousands of articles on Wikipedia that contain more and longer quotations of material still under copyright than this; the length and proportion of the original dialogue quoted is clearly not "excessive".

Nor can the article properly be described as a coat-rack to get the quoted lines into Wikipedia. The quoted lines are directly relevant to the section in which they occur, and illustrate what it is that is wrong about the dialogue; it is difficult to imagine a better way to do so. The quoted material does not contain any jokes, unless you count the description of the centurion holding his sword to Brian's throat—which while accurate and helpful, is not actually quoted from the script, and therefore occurs in square brackets. The scene is funny because of the context in which it occurs, as described by the non-quoted text and the sources cited, not because of the mistake made concerning the distinction between the accusative and the locative. There is no reason to quote these lines other than to explain the mistake.

Because there is a legitimate purpose for quoting these specific lines where they occur, which purpose is borne out by the sources cited in that section, and because the amount of material quoted constitutes only a small portion (a bit less than 1/7) of the dialogue in the scene, with a total of less than fifty words, the claim that the entire article is merely "a coat-rack to quote a Monty Python sketch excessively" is clearly wrong. P Aculeius (talk) 13:47, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect to Monty Python's Life of Brian#Plot. The sourcing to establish notability for this scene as a topic of its own is weak. Of the four cited sources, one is just a transcription of the scene from the film, and another is just a definition of the Latin word domus. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 05:42, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There are now seven sources, with the addition of three scholarly discussions of the scene in historical, linguistic, and social context. The subject was already too detailed to be covered adequately in the article about the film, which is why it was split off in the first place. Now it is even more so. P Aculeius (talk) 14:22, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, per Michael Bednarek and P Aculeius. —Cote d'Azur (talk) 08:24, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: I have cited three scholarly discussions of the article. One discusses the use of the classroom discourse model to produce humor from linguistics, subverting the viewer's expectations from historical context; a second discusses how the scene depicts resistance to the Roman occupation of Judaea, compared with the historical reality; a third compares the use of satirical classroom discourse as a distraction from the primary issue of the Roman occupation to modern political debate over social matters, as the author suggests a misleading focus on details such as non-binary pronouns. I've also added a source further explaining the grammatical error involving the use of the locative, and rewritten the paragraph in which it occurs.
All of these sources were easily obtainable just by clicking the links above—but once again, AfD has been used as a substitute for the appropriate editorial process. Please consult WP:BEFORE; for an article to be deleted due to lack of sources, the nominator should attempt to determine whether such sources exist, not whether they have been cited. If they exist, then the nomination should fail. But here the burden was inappropriately shifted to those voting "keep", thereby inverting Wikipedia policy to say the opposite of what it actually does. AfD is intended to deal with articles that cannot be improved through reasonable effort. It is not a tool for editors who can't be bothered to improve articles themselves to force others to do it for them. P Aculeius (talk) 14:39, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Your clairvoyance of my actions and intents notwithstanding, I did not find before, and am still yet to see, sufficient and focused analytical discussion of this television moment such as warrants its own standalone article separate from the episode in which it appeared. However, I've nonetheless been keen to follow-up with the several participants here who mentioned sources that were available to improve the article. One, linked to by Barnards.tar.gz, I can not access and asked impotently if they could share with us for evaluation. Second was your non-specific mention of apparent sources available, but when I asked about them above, you didn't reply. Third was Michael Bednarek, who claimed sufficient sources were surely available at Google resources to which I had no access; I asked for them to be shared with those participating here, but they didn't reply. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 18:11, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That reliable sources exist is not dependent on whether every editor is able to view them over the internet. I cited only those sources I was able to review, or ascertain the purpose of sufficiently to determine that they consisted of more than a passing mention or "shout-out". Some were not available for me to view in any form, and I was therefore unable to cite them. I have however added citations to multiple sources indicating what it is that they say. Have you tried to access any of them from the links in the article, or by searching for them by author or title? Did you undertake a search, or merely rely on the fact that the other editors did not provide you with alternative links to the sources that they found? I cited to the work that Barnards.tar.gz linked, having reviewed it and determined that it was a detailed analysis of—not a passing mention of—the scene in question. So were the other sources that I cited, as I tried to make clear in the body text when citing to them.
I find it difficult to believe that no sources indicating notability beyond passing mentions or trivia would be viewable by someone doing a general search. But I also note that sources do not need to be available on-line in the first place: it is perfectly acceptable to cite things to books or other media that have not been digitized or made generally available on the internet. I don't know whether your complaint is that you were not able to find any relevant sources online, or merely that you were not able to view the ones that other editors linked to—but in either case, being unable to form your own opinion regarding those sources does not invalidate their use, or demonstrate that reliable sources indicating the notability of the subject do not exist. Nor are other editors required to find or provide you with copies of those sources or their contents—their failure to do so does not determine whether such sources exist, and should not determine the outcome of the discussion.
For my part, I merely alluded to whatever sources were referred to by the editors who commented before me, assuming that if they found good sources, then I did not need to verify that they were correct in their analysis. By joining this discussion, I only took on the responsibility to determine whether deletion was consistent with Wikipedia policy, not to hunt down sources myself or prove that they were sufficient to support the article; WP:BEFORE makes clear that that is the responsibility of the editor nominating an article for deletion. The fact that I subsequently found, reviewed, and incorporated good sources in order to settle this debate does not mean that the nomination was a good one before I did so; it was not, since the sources existed and were easily findable whether or not they were cited or incorporated into the article at that point. Now they have been, so the nomination that should have failed even without any further edits to the article cannot be sustained. P Aculeius (talk) 19:13, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I concede defeat at the mass of your accusatory words, and apologetically withdraw from engagement therewith. Mayhap somebody else will take up the mantle of MOS:ACCESS. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 19:33, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
WP:ACCESS has nothing to do with anything discussed here. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 23:43, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:13, 1 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: In addition to various articles relating to the general topic of film scenes, Category:Film scenes presently contains five articles about specific movie scenes. In addition to Romani ite domum, which I just added to the category after seeing this discussion, these are Han shot first, Poole versus HAL 9000, Red pill and blue pill and Tears in rain monologue. WP also has at least one article on an individual scene from a TV episode: Kirk and Uhura's kiss. (That all of these scenes except Romani ite domum are from sci-fi productions may say something about WP's content biases.) Gildir (talk) 10:42, 2 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm not convinced this warrants a stand-alone article (as opposed to being covered at Monty Python's Life of Brian), and to me Romanes eunt domus seems like a more appropriate title. TompaDompa (talk) 16:30, 2 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As a number of people have pointed out, this article is too big—and the topic requires too much discussion—to be folded into the main article about the film, which is already just shy of 90 Kb—well over the size at which splitting is suggested, and nearing the point where it is strongly recommended. Since the issues concerning this scene require more discussion than can be conveniently had in the article about the film, there is a good reason for splitting it off; the only argument against it seems to be an assertion of a hithertofore unwritten rule that individual scenes in a movie are never notable and therefore cannot be split off, even though in any other topic doing so would be justified by the size and detail of the subtopic alone.

Whether the article is at the best title is a completely separate issue from deletion, and does not really belong here, particularly given that this discussion has gone on at considerable length with little or no significant discussion of the title. However, I will note a few things: first, a Google ngram and overall Google hits for each wording show very similar numbers either way; part of this is likely because most books, articles, or other references to one wording will also contain the other. "Romanes eunt domus" is nonsensical, while "Romani ite domum" makes sense, and all other things being equal, the correct wording would seem to be the better title. Lastly, over the last ninety days the article has received an average of 200 daily page views—not an inconsiderable number, as many notable topics receive far fewer views—while the redirect "Romanes eunt domus" has received an average of 1. I can't say for certain how many people arrive at the article by typing "Romani ite domum", but clearly very few people are searching for "Romanes eunt domus". P Aculeius (talk) 04:22, 3 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
WP:SIZESPLIT refers to readable prose size, which is nowhere near 90 kB at present. It's more like 50 kB, if this is anything to go by. The film article could also do with a fair amount of trimming (somewhat amusingly, one of the things that should be trimmed is two paragraphs in the "Legacy" section that deal with "Romanes eunt domus" appearing in Fallout: New Vegas). I'm also not sure how much discussion you think this particular scene requires, but the current version is rather uneconomically written and thus way longer than it needs to be to convey the information it is meant to. For instance: Once Brian has arrived at the correct answer, the centurion imposes a grammar-school punishment—writing lines—instead of a period-appropriate sanction for vandals or rebels. Rather than punishing Brian for writing the graffito, the centurion instructs him to repeat the act one hundred times using good grammar. is just plain repetition of the same information twice. For these reasons, I find the argument that this needs to be covered separately unpersuasive. TompaDompa (talk) 04:54, 3 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The article about the film may indeed be in need of trimming, but that is not the primary issue here. If you're going by number of characters, instead of the article size—possibly a reasonable interpretation, although this is not clearly what the guideline says—folding this article back into it would not only make for an unduly lengthy section within it, but would push it back to about 60,000 characters, and into the size range where a split is suggested. Granted, it might be slightly less if trimmed, but I don't see any point in merging them merely because the combined article could be trimmed to be just under the size of a long article for which splitting is suggested. Just as the guideline does not make splitting mandatory at any size, it does not state that there is a minimum size for splitting; the choice is supposed to be based on convenience, and in this case the length of this article suggests that it is too detailed to form a section of the film's article.

I am unpersuaded by your example of unnecessary repetition, in part because the two sentences are making separate points: the first one describes the incongruity of the centurion imposing a grammar-school punishment, which is consistent with the grammar-school grammar analysis that preceded it, but inconsistent with the roles that Brian and the centurion are playing. The second sentence points out that the centurion's punishment is also counter-productive, because instead of discouraging vandalism, he is ordering Brian to vandalize the wall one hundred more times—provided he uses good grammar. I made this distinction myself when writing/rewriting this paragraph based on the discussion in the sources that I cited.

Could it be more succinct? Possibly, but it is difficult to make both points clearly in a single sentence, without making it unduly complex. Could the article be trimmed to remove all verbiage that isn't strictly necessary? Perhaps, but brevity is not a goal in itself, and does not necessarily make articles clearer. And Wikipedia guidelines clearly state that saving space is not a valid reason to delete (or even trim) articles; unlike a traditional print encyclopedia, we have no hard limit on the number or size of articles. Article length—and existence—should be based on utility to readers.

The fact that this article gets an average of 200 daily page views suggests that a lot of people find it useful. It is certainly not as big as it would be if, as one editor suggested above, it were merely a coatrack to quote the article excessively (only a small portion of the scene is quoted, and that portion does not contain any jokes, being focused solely on a grammatical error that is not apparent from the dialogue). Even if the language could be streamlined slightly, it is not unduly long for covering the subject, while it is too long for a convenient merge. That is why it should stay where it is. P Aculeius (talk) 03:40, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The entire article is an exercise in uneconomical writing. The first section describes the scene in question at length. This is done much more succinctly in the Monty Python's Life of Brian article with minimal loss of (pertinent) information. The second section quotes seven lines of dialogue and goes on for another hundred words to note that the centurion made an error. The third section, apart from having a terrible heading ("Cultural significance"), repeats a lot of information both from the first section and within itself. As an example, The centurion is unconcerned with Brian's act of vandalism, but rather with his inept use of Latin grammar. is just repetition of the scene description. For the two sentences I brought up above, you could for instance simply replace the second sentence with , and increasing rather than reducing the amount of vandalism. Really, this entire article could be condensed to a single brief paragraph in the main article about the film. Here, I'll show how (parts copied from the article under discussion, see the article history for attribution):
The scene where Brian writes anti-Roman graffiti and a centurion corrects his grammar has been noted as accurately reflecting the ancientness of the practice of writing graffiti on walls as a form of political protest. The incongruity of the centurion's actions is discussed as a source of humor in Cognitive Linguistics and Humor Research, noting that the expected arrest of a vandal is replaced by a satirical representation of classroom discourse, followed by a counter-productive grammar-school punishment of writing lines that increases rather than decreases the amount of vandalism, and then reverting to the expected roles of soldier and rebel by the threat of physical harm if the punishment is not carried out on time. A number of works on Latin also note that the centurion himself makes a grammatical error, reflecting how even those well-educated in Latin occasionally err regarding grammatical details. Jack Halberstam compares the satirical use of classroom discourse as a technical exercise to distract from the realities of Roman imperialism to the contemporary political phenomenon of diverting attention from serious social issues by focusing attention on less important details.
I only took a few minutes to write this shorter version and it is obviously not perfect (still a bit of repetition with "satirical representation of classroom discourse" and "satirical use of classroom discourse", for instance), but it is a lot more succinct while still conveying all the crucial information. This is a question of WP:Writing better articles. TompaDompa (talk) 04:38, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
No, it's not. The above is an exercise in crushing an article into a dense wall-of-text paragraph for the sole purpose of justifying its deletion or merger. It removes the context and illustrative quotations (and perhaps the actual illustration). Your example of combining sentences is faulty; the clauses are not parallel, and in your version the centurion is "[concerned with] and increasing rather than decreasing". You would have to reword the sentences considerably to have them make sense. But that is a minor point—condensing all of an article into what you regard as the only essential parts, in order to make the case for deletion or merger, is not "writing a better article"; it is the opposite. P Aculeius (talk) 11:20, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Right, that should have been , thus increasing rather than reducing the amount of vandalism. (which would make the full sentence Once Brian has arrived at the correct answer, the centurion imposes a grammar-school punishment—writing lines—instead of a period-appropriate sanction for vandals or rebels, thus increasing rather than reducing the amount of vandalism.) or something along those lines. Mea culpa. The current article is poorly written, and reducing those roughly 700 words of sprawling text into roughly 200 words by summarizing (i.e. omitting extraneous details and needless redundancy) would be an improvement. The article only has the appearance of needing to be a stand-alone article because it badly needs copyediting. TompaDompa (talk) 11:44, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think you will find that most editors would regard the kind of editing you propose to be non-constructive. It seems that we are back in "IDONTLIKEIT" territory, where whatever content you don't like is unnecessary, thus clearing the way for deletion of an article you don't like. Further discussion would appear to be pointless. P Aculeius (talk) 12:12, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You say that this needs to be a stand-alone article due to length. I say that neither this article nor the parent article need to be as long as they are. If this had been done the way it usually is, with the scene covered in the article on the film in WP:PROPORTION to its coverage in reliable sources, the way it is treated here would be seen as obviously WP:UNDUE in the main article. We wouldn't split it off into a separate article due to length, we would edit it down to the appropriate length. From that perspective, why not fold it into the main article (in proportion to its coverage in the sources) as would usually have been done from the start? TompaDompa (talk) 12:45, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You're entitled to your opinion, but other people are also entitled to theirs. At this point we only have contradiction repeating the same arguments that have already been made. P Aculeius (talk) 16:49, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
We can definitely get somewhere useful with this conversation if there exists some good reason to have this as a separate article that would apply even if (1) this article did not already exist and (2) the Life of Brian article were already high-quality. That is, if there would be a strong reason to create this article in addition to the Life of Brian article assuming we had to start over from scratch. One such good reason might for example be if there is a significant body of reliable sources with discussion of this scene both in particular (i.e. not discussing the rest of the film) and in general (i.e. not just one aspect of the scene but the scene as a whole). Do such sources exist? Do sources that discuss the film as a whole devote significantly more time to this particular scene than to the other scenes in the film? Do sources that discuss certain aspects of this scene in depth tend to additionally discuss other aspects of the same scene or do they tend to discuss related aspects that appear elsewhere? In other words, is there a strong reason to discuss the film scene by scene, rather than topic by topic? If the sources predominantly do so, then yes, absolutely! Is that the case? If not, it would make more sense to discuss the different aspects of this scene alongside related aspects of different scenes in the main Life of Brian article. Whether this should exist as a stand-alone article is a WP:PAGEDECIDE issue. We have various different possibilities to consider—is forking off this scene the best way to reduce the overall length of the Monty Python's Life of Brian article, assuming we should even do the latter in the first place? It seems to me we might have stronger reasons to create sub-articles along the lines of Religion in Monty Python's Life of Brian and Politics in Monty Python's Life of Brian than to create sub-articles like this. TompaDompa (talk) 17:29, 4 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, this has been referenced in other pieces of popular culture like Fallout: New Vegas, and thus, is culturally significant. ImYourTurboLover (talk) 02:17, 7 April 2023 (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.

Post-close: I think it ought to be consensum non habemus – Not the nominative! Accusative fourth declension! Write it 200 times! (unless the closer meant plural, which for an uncountable noun would be weird.) -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 00:34, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That seems to be correct—it should be accusative consensum, since the subject of the sentence is a group including the speaker. You can of course have more than one consensus, although in this instance it wouldn't make any sense. As an alternative formulation, perhaps the nominative consensus non est (there is no consensus) would work, although I can see no objection to consensum non habemus. P Aculeius (talk) 14:11, 10 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]