Wikiquote:Votes for deletion/Rodney King

~ Jeff Q (talk) 19:18, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Rodney King
Probably notable (though for what happened to him, not what he did), but there is only one trite and unsourced quote. — Poetlister 11:09, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Vote closes: 12:00, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks like it's headed for a keep, but shall we extend 48 hours to 12:00, 1 December 2007.--Cato 21:11, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Vote extended until 12:00, 3 December 2007 (UTC) for three reasons: Cato's request, because nobody seemed to want to close it yet, and because it covers a lot of ground. This adds a weekend for additional commentary and deliberation. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 01:13, 30 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment: In my mind, this is one of those frustrating grey areas. Even though the quote is hardly original, it's iconic in the area of racial tensions. It doesn't seem like we'll get much more (if anything) from King, but how much would we need to make this a viable article? Since we don't tend to favor inclusion in theme articles without an inarguable connection to the theme (usually the exact phrase or a very close version), where would we place this famous quote if we decided to merge it into a theme? At the very least, we should be able to source the quote. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 12:23, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. I agree with Jeff Q that it's valuable. But we should find a source, and make sure the quote is correct. --Ubiquity 14:20, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete, the principle in a long overplayed, tragic chapter in Los Angeles history, ancient history and the quote is empty and hollow in this context, why is it even here? Doesn't merit an article unless you include quotes from the police, the press, the judge, the videotaper, the rioters etc. Modernist 20:57, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * In that case, we might make a reasonable theme article from that material, probably with the title Los Angeles riots of 1992 to parallel the Wikipedia article. I'm not usually a fan of such narrow themes, but if there were quotes memorable not just for the incident but that would resonate on a larger scale, I suppose one could argue for such an article. (BTW, these are just my thoughts. I have no position yet on any of this.) ~ Jeff Q (talk) 04:26, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment Was King really the first to say this?--Yehudi 15:22, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Surely not. We always want to identify the earliest published origins of any memorable quote, although I'd suggest that it's not particularly important in this case because, as Poetlister says, the phrase itself is rather banal. But there are rare quotes that are more famous for who, how, and when they were said than what they actually say, and I think this is one of them. (Time will tell if it remains significant.) ~ Jeff Q (talk) 16:55, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep As strange as it may seem, it's triteness is large part of what made the quote notable. It needs to be sourced to find the exact wording. FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 16:35, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete unless sourced (or of course if other quotes can be found).--Cato 22:27, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep or move to Race relations (and then create a page on that topic). BD2412 T 23:02, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, as it is certainly an iconic quote, but I would agree that it should be properly sourced (surely that can't be too hard as it was continually repeated on TV and in print at the time) and probably moved to a theme page, as it has been suggested above. ~ UDScott 18:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: You'd think that sourcing this famous quote wouldn't be that hard, but a few minutes with Google Book Search, looking specifically in 1992 (and even 1993) provided contradictory quotations, usually disagreeing on "can/can't we all get along". Although it's not a very satisifying source, I checked YouTube for a video of his actual statement to try to find it verbatim, with which we could more easily locate a proper quotation. I found this CNN video that suggests the problem. Hardly a professional speaker, King is clearly emotionally overcome by the spiralling violence (and probably the privacy-destroying press attention), stumbling through his statement, making it hard to quote properly. Here's my attempt at an exact transcription:
 * "I just want to say, you know, can we, can we all get along? Can we, can we get along? Um… Can we stop making it… making it horrible for… for the, for the older people and the… and the… and the, and the kids…" ~ CNN videotape, timecode 0:53–1:10, 1 May 1992
 * (I deliberately don't provide a proper citation because this clip is probably a copyvio, and I'm using it solely for research.) I still haven't made up my own mind on this discussion, but I thought I'd help the effort to track down a quote source. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 21:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep --McNoddy 15:21, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. - author of a very famous statement, and we can include many of the misquoted variants as well. There is also much material available from which can be gathered at least a few other significant remarks by him or about him. ~ Kalki 15:57, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep--Lookatthis 18:49, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. - InvisibleSun 20:07, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete King had his brief period of fame but surely is not of long-term significance, and none of the quotes strikes me as memorable.--Yehudi 12:36, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep--Jusjih 21:35, 2 December 2007 (UTC)