Talk:it's the something, stupid

Deletion debate

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it's the something, stupid

Where "something" is a placeholder for specific nouns. This is like those "X" entries that got deleted in the past ("I'll see your X and raise you Y"). Equinox ◑ 16:42, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

But it is also like many of our idiom entries which require a placeholder for one of the objects. We also have it's the economy, stupid, which is the form which has gained the widest popularity. (The contributor asked in advance about this and I directed him to snowclone and offered both of these are possibilities which might meet CFI.) Contributors want to add this kind of thing and they have some lexical value, as ugly as they may be. DCDuring TALK 17:46, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

"Contributors want to add it" is not much of an argument for inclusion (spam, self-promotion, homework help)! To support these "snowclone"-type phrases it seems that we need to introduce some new sort of notation that indicates a placeholder; otherwise entries like this are bound to fail on other grounds (headword not attestable). Having "X" here and "something" there is just a mess. Equinox ◑ 18:06, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

The something/someone/one notation is the only notation that is already in common use here for various multi-word terms. No one has forcefully objected to it there. I wonder whether objections in this application area attributable to the application rather than the notation itself. As an open wiki we do give weight to what contributors add if we do not have specific rules against it. DCDuring TALK 11:38, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Delete as absolute tosh. It's not an idiom either, it's more of a full sentence like stupid fucking computer (something I say to mine quite often). Mglovesfun (talk) 00:14, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

It does seem SoP, doesn't it? DCDuring TALK 11:38, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Delete, on the grounds that anyone looking up a phrase that is not specifically mentioned won't find it this way. For example: it's the environment, stupid will not get you near this entry. it's the voters, stupid will get you a search result hit for it's the something, stupid, but only because it's the voters, stupid is listed as an example there. Also delete on the grounds that this phrase appears more like prose than an idiomatic phrase. Facts707 08:15, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

An entry like this would be useful to contain generalizations about the productive structure if there were multiple includable instances of the snowclone. It might also be useful once users were trained to recognize how we include snowclones.

• Would it be better to have only includable instances of snowclones in principal namespace and place them in Category:English snowclones or link the entry to Appendix:Snowclones (for a discussion of their nature and use) and Appendix:English snowclones (for their form in a notation explained there? DCDuring TALK 11:38, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

As an aside, snowclone is quite a neologism. It's only in two or three books on Google Books so far. Although there probably isn't another single-word name for them, I don't much like the idea of using a term like in an appendix title. Equinox ◑ 11:41, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I dislike the term, but I'd rather have an appendix with an ugly title than not have the appendix. We can move it to a better title (with redirects) when as and if we find a better name. DCDuring TALK 17:06, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Keep, this does seem to be an idiom, and there doesn't seem to be a better place to put it. --Yair rand 06:42, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Delete. It fits nicely on Wikipedia, but I think it's not a phrase but a quote. Once people using it don't think of Clinton it should come back, but it's also possible that without the living memory of the quote it won't be used anymore. Joepnl 22:21, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Deleted.​—msh210℠ 16:39, 2 June 2010 (UTC)