Wikipedia:Closure of Leo XIV DRN

{{nutshell|The RFC on dates in Pope Leo XIV should continue.}}

I am closing the request by User:JacobTheRox for discussion at DRN as pending in another forum, and am making this detailed statement here for better visibility than in the closing banner of DRN. A Request for Comments that was started by the filing party is currently running. A Request for Comments establishes consensus, and takes precedence over other modes of dispute resolution. The filing party has requested that the RFC be discarded, and that DRN be used instead.

I am disagreeing with that idea for at least two reasons. First, the filing party has not made the case that the RFC should be discarded. Second, even if the RFC should be discarded (which it should not), DRN would not be the right process. First, it is not clear to me why the filing party thinks that the RFC should be discarded, but I have two thoughts as to possible reasoning, one of which I think is plausible but mistaken, and one of which is completely wrong. The completely wrong idea may be that the RFC is out of hand because it has had 287 comments. That is how an RFC is supposed to work. A large number of responses to an RFC is good. That probably isn't what the filing editor is saying. The other possible reason is that the arguments being raised in the responses to the RFC are not what the filing editor expected, and more specifically that the arguments largely focus on the MOS, and that some editors disagree with the MOS and think that the MOS should be changed. Sometimes a properly asked question identifies other questions that need to be asked. The filing editor may be saying that, now that they are seeing the answers, they think that they asked the wrong question. Well, they asked a question that a large number of editors are trying to answer, and it really is a valid question. Why should the good-faith answers and comments of a large number of good-standing editors be discarded because the questioner thinks that a different question is in order? The RFC should not be discarded.

Also, even if the RFC should be discarded (which it should not), DRN would not be an appropriate next step. The filing editor has listed 11 other editors. DRN as usually conducted is not effective with that many editors, but why were those particular editors selected? There would be no right way to select a limited audience for moderated discussion.

It may be that, either while the RFC is running, or after the RFC is closed, it may become clear that there is an issue about the MOS. If so, there should be discussion on the MOS talk page, possibly followed by another RFC to change the MOS. If an issue with the MOS is identified and the MOS is then changed, a new RFC on date formats may be in order to replace the previous one to reflect the change to the MOS.

There isn't a reason to stop or discard the RFC. If the filing editor thinks that the RFC should be discarded, the proper forum to make that request is probably WP:AN, but the request will probably be declined. The RFC is running, and is asking a question that should be asked. There are probably other questions that also need to be asked. If so, another RFC is likely to be in order. The case has not been made that DRN is in order, nor that the RFC should be stopped.