I deleted most of unreferenced text per our most basic rules, WP:CITE. WP:RS. Per WP:BURDEN, do not restore without references. --Altenmann >talk 17:55, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- You did not seek any consensus before doing so. As a native speaker of this language, I can attest that 99% of the content you removed is accurate and I could eventually find citations for. I can't do that with you camping the article and trying to blank it out whenever you want. Put down your hubris.
- Try to be productive instead of going to every Wikipedia article and nuking its contents because not every line was cited. More reasonable and collaborative editors attach "citation needed" so the community has a chance to fix it. Deathying (talk) 22:05, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- @Deathying: The whole article is tagged since 2015, so tat the community had the chance for 10 years already. Please read und understand the policies I cited, in particular WP:BURDEN. YOu will be blocked from editing for violating WIkipedia policies, if you continue restoring unreferenced text.
- When you start finding citations, you may add words one by one.--Altenmann >talk 23:29, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- You don't get to command me what to do with impunity. I am going to report you to a notice board first. Then we'll see whether I get to add words one by one. Deathying (talk) 23:43, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- I will suggest for you to take a different approach to this policy disagreement. Augmented Seventh (talk) 00:10, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- Accusing others of being sockpuppets without any evidence is not exactly a good look. Mellk (talk) 23:46, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- Maybe "Sugar Tax" can speak for himself Deathying (talk) 23:54, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- that's not a particularly safe bet around here, as it's generally agreed that if an article has nearly 40k bytes worth of unreferenced content (which would fall within the category of original research). as is, the burden of citing all (or any) of that stuff is still on you if you want it restored per wp:backwards, and your only attempt at doing so was "i know mandarin", which is only really useful for fact-checking. as a source itself, it's about as useful as "trust me bro"
- this is to say. if you can find sources for the text that was originally unreferenced, add the info back with said sources. thinking a request to do this is an attempt at "commanding" you is at best a show of not wanting to collaborate, and accusing altenmann of "power tripping" and sugar tax of being a sock are at best shows that you might not be here to engage with this in good faith consarn (talck) (contirbuton s) 23:57, 8 February 2026 (UTC)
- So I'm allowed to go to any Wikipedia article and start deleting all lines with no inline citation? And we are supposed to uphold Altenmann's version of the article which poorly covers the scope of Mandarin profanity? Like we are leaving the slur about Vietnamese people in as if that is highly representative just because it happened to have a tangential citation.
- Some lines removed were almost so obvious as to not need a citation, such as the definition of the word for fuck. This doesn't show a particularly good faith edit on Altenmann's part, it shows that he didn't actually click on any of the sources at the bottom of the page he was trying to remove as much content as possible. Deathying (talk) 00:05, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- Obviously you have having a HUGE trouble with understanding our policies regarding WP:VERIFIABILITY. It may be hard to believe, but yes, "the definition of the word for fuck" needs a reference. A non-native speaker can't tell whether a Chinese word means "fuck you" or "copulate with you" or "have a sexual intercourse with you" or "eat shit", or "I am ignoring you".--Altenmann >talk 00:19, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- Obviously you do not understand WP:FIXTHEPROBLEM. If you care so much about the accuracy, you should play some part to fix it instead of just blanket deleting 39000 bytes and making it much harder for anybody else to remedy it. You could've tagged areas for lacking citations. You could've said something on the talk page first before removing as much content as you could. Deathying (talk) 00:23, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- yeah, i hate waffles! i mean what
- as was, the article provided an indiscriminate list of profanity, of which barely any was properly referenced, followed by a list of general "further reading" that was actually like 60% of the references, meaning a reader would have to do detective work to find out which content was actually mentioned in references, which is actively anti-educational for anyone willing to look further than what the article itself has to say, and even then, how much of it actually was mentioned in references is subject to more detective work. this would mean that, even if all the "further reading" was reworked into inline citations, it would take a good while and very likely still result in a lot of the article being cut down
- this is to say, whether or not i side with altenmann in the vile evil rampant removal of everything that is immediately obvious (to people who already know mandarin, which keen eyes may notice is less than everyone on earth) and not being willing to do all that aforementioned detective work, i don't think this takes priority over the article being a mess now, having been a mess for over 10 years, not having been cleaned up or reworked in those 10 years, and the one person here who verifiably does speak mandarin seemingly being more in the mood for baseless accusations than actually helping with any of it
- this whole debacle can pretty easily be fixed if you decide to help clean it up
- also, before this happens for what's probably the third time in my life, i'm not a sock either, so don't worry consarn (talck) (contirbuton s) 00:24, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- I would love to clean up the article, and yes it does require more work on my part than it did for Altenmann to nuke everything. I don't mind that.
- However, at least now, there is some discussion on the record about this matter so the goalposts cannot be moved in a week when I do add sources that the sources are in Chinese or unreliable to some extent. Because I do not want to add sourced content and have my efforts reverted by him again as he seems adamant about guarding this article for eternity. Deathying (talk) 00:36, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- if the content added is properly sourced, it won't be removed. the issue here is that, at the state it spent over 10 years in, it really wasn't consarn (talck) (contirbuton s) 00:39, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- Nearly all of the entries in the original unabridged list have Wiktionary entries. @Deathying, I suggest using those as references. ~2026-15729-18 (talk) 06:15, 13 March 2026 (UTC)
- unfortunately, as user-generated sources, they're a no-go around here consarn (talck) (contirbuton s) 21:20, 13 March 2026 (UTC)
- If this content's clearly correct but unreferenced, I'd be inclined to leave it in with [citation needed] tags. Hopefully a Chinese speaker can find references for most of this. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:17, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- It cannot be "cleary correct" for an average English speaking Wikipedian. If some Chinese profanities entered English lexicon, I would love to learn them (with references cited), if only to describe the state of this article for 10 years already. --Altenmann >talk 00:22, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- You misunderstand that the content of the article was never *contentious* to begin with. This article is not subject to BLP (biography of living persons). It was not making any libellous claims towards anyone.
- Therefore blanket deleting all of the content is unwarranted. Numerous editors have come and gone without raising an issue at the article's *accuracy*, just verifiability. Yet, instead of adding a single new citation which you couldve done you just chose to remove everything Deathying (talk) 00:28, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- an article can be contentious or not immediately obvious without being a blp. also, it's almost 40k bytes worth of stuff that's been left to gather dust for 10 years, and no one seems to be in the mood to do anything about it, so removal is indeed the best choice if no one's gonna work on cleaning it up consarn (talck) (contirbuton s) 00:31, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- For the record, since the ANI discussion was closed: @Deathying:, the
specific policy that says after certain time you can just nuke the essence of an article
is WP:V: Facts or claims without an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports them may be removed.
Note this does not specify a "certain time", or require providing a notice - any unreferenced content can be removed by any editor at any time, without notice or discussion. - The Bushranger One ping only 01:39, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
- Exactly. I would add that Altenmann has correctly removed a bunch of WP:OR. Per WP:BURDEN anyone who wants to restore it must add inline sourcing compliant with WP:RS. DeCausa (talk) 07:40, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
