To-do list:

• Move all wicks for Vengeful Widow to Crusading Widow, and move wicks for Crusading Widower that aren't on Character pages to the new name; gendered redirects are allowed on Character pages but not other pages, so Crusading Widower wicks on Character pages probably will not need to be changed while others will.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Oct 24th 2022 at 10:37:28 AM

Paging ~amathieu13 to the thread.

Anyway, I agree with merging. This and Crusading Widow (which is already a redirect to this trope, further pointing toward this being an unnecessary split between gendered variants of a single trope) can be redirects.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Oct 18th 2022 at 4:41:46 AM

Merge. Is there a gender-neutral way to call "widower"?

I prefer Vengeful over Crusading though.

Edited by Amonimus on Oct 18th 2022 at 1:03:21 PM

Seconding the merge

wow we are really zooming through the queue. didn't expect this to be up so soon

on a gender neutral term. it seems like widow is sometimes also applied to men, but this just might be one of those ones where, if we merge, we keep the gendered trope name.

conveniently Crusading Widow is already a redirect for Vengeful Widow so we won't have to make a new one/any examples under that one can stay

Edited by amathieu13 on Oct 18th 2022 at 6:28:01 AM

I'm good with a merge.

Merge

I suppose Crusading Widow would be usable as a gendered redirect for Crusading Widower when examples are merged, per what was already said about gendered redirects being allowed in example lists.

That said, I'd say we could decide which direction to merge the tropes in, and which name to use (whether to merge Vengeful Widow into Crusading Widower or vice versa, and whether to use "Vengeful" or "Crusading" as the first word, and whether to use "Widow" or "Widower" as the second word).

Edited by GastonRabbit on Oct 18th 2022 at 8:07:38 AM

Vengeful Widow has 254 wicks and Crusading Widower 781. Both are manageable should we merge in either direction, though merging to CW would take less time.

If one really needs a gender-neutral term, How about Vengeful Bereaved Spouse?

Whatever is done on the gender front, I'd prefer the inclusion of "Vengeful", because "Crusade" is much broader in current use:

• 2: a remedial enterprise undertaken with zeal and enthusiasm “crusade,” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/crusade. Accessed 10/18/2022.
• Crusading: vigorously campaigning on a social or political issue. (Google definition via Oxford Languages)

Which would seriously detract from the Anit Hero/Semi-Villainous aspect.

EDIT: Now that I've thought for a hot second, a Justice Seeker might be a separate tropable concept?

Edited by underCoverSailsman on Oct 18th 2022 at 11:58:53 AM

I like the idea of merging both pages under Vengeful Bereaved Spouse. We had a similar proposal for Scamming the Bereaved.

Just noting here that gender redirects are limits to character pages in trope listing now because of a ruling from a wiki talk thread on gendered redirects (I'll edit this to link the thread later). So, we would still have to fix the wicks on work pages.

Anyways, Vengeful Bereaved Spouse sounds good to me if we are renaming + merging

Edited by MacronNotes on Oct 18th 2022 at 2:40:37 PM

I like Vengeful Bereaved Spouse, too.

A new name is 4 times the work (~1000 wicks) of just merging Vengeful Widow into Crusading Widower, so I vote to do that and note that CW is gender-neutral.

yeah, as the one most likely going to have to do all of the clean up virtually single handedly (from my experience in TRS this is how it typically goes), I would rather we merge into one of the existing names

Oh, true, true... Merging also works.

Yeah, didn't think a rename would be necessary, since we do have gendered titles for gender-neutral tropes.

I mean, I might be able to pitch in with wick cleaning if needed. It may take me a while to be ready because I've got midterms next week but once I'm free, I'll see what I can do.

I'm against going with a completely new name (though I won't stop anyone from voting in favor of a rename if merging under one of the current names is outvoted). It would be less work to just merge one into the other. In particular, amathieu already covered what would probably be the easiest way to do it:

Thus, I'm in favor of merging Vengeful Widow into Crusading Widower and using the latter as the name of the merged trope, with Crusading Widow as a gendered redirect we could move the former's examples to.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Oct 19th 2022 at 9:00:38 AM

It is easier to merge into an existing name, and if we weren't already discussing a merge between two "gendered" articles (widow and widower), then I wouldn't raise the issue of ensuring that the name was gender-neutral.

However, we are in that situation, so I am podium-thumping to make use of the opportunity to make the article name gender-neutral. It makes sense to have gendered names when a trope is Always Male or Always Female, but this concept isn't. The gendered name seems to have caused the original division and since we are already discussing the merge, I think merging the two under a gender-neutral name should be a crowner option along with merging into one or the other.

I don't think "less work to do" for me was ever a reasonable argument, there may be 500 wicks to move there can be 5000, I believe the point is finding long-term solutions. And if there are 1035 wicks to rename (and alphabetize) without moving elsewhere, it can likely be done in a week or less.

Edited by Amonimus on Oct 19th 2022 at 6:26:22 PM

^Unless we're all deciding that Unisex Tropes shouldn't exist, having a gendered name for a non-gender specific trope is a viable long term solution, on top of being expedient. It's not an either/or thing.

Look, I'm not going to oppose having it as an option on the crowner, but I do hope we all keep this energy come wick cleaning should the rename go through. Wick cleanings stalling or not are rarely about what can be accomplished and more about the lack of effort/manpower behind them. Call me jaded, I guess

If the usage already encompasses the broader scope, not renaming is a viable argument. For a non-gender example, I argued against renaming Magical Native American to Magical Native when the scope was broadened to include all indigenous peoples. The usage already covered them despite the name being narrower, so the effort to remove a single word from 1000 wicks wasn't worth it. I think we can also add Vengeful Bereaved Spouse and Crusading Bereaved Spouse as redirects for examples outside the gender binary.

Edited by Synchronicity on Oct 19th 2022 at 11:31:23 AM

I think I also argued against renaming Magical Native American.

to merging, and putting Vengeful/Crusading Widow(er) (all four) and Vengeful/Crusading Bereaved Spouse (both) on a crowner if it comes to that. I'd rather use Widow(er) as the term 'cuz it does save wick cleaning work, and there are tons of cases where an article name doesn't exactly describe the trope yet it's flexible, and here's one that I think won't confuse people about which gender the surviving spouse is allowed to be.