Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2008 October 23

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23 October 2008

Criticism of Barack Obama

I wish to protest the speedy deletion of this article. I believe McWomble did it, since he was the only one expressing an interest. There have been two similar articles here that I know about, Criticism of George W. Bush and Criticism of Tony Blair, and both are healthy survivors of any previous attempts to delete them. Please, let's establish a community standard here. All three are about prominent politicians who have endured controversies that have produced notable criticisms on a number of subjects. Either all of them should stay, or all of them should go. 300wackerdrive (talk) 15:45, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Endorse deletion I've just reviewed the deleted article and it is a blistering POV-fork that largely focuses on people and events that do not relate to Obama, but which relate to people and organizations that the public associates with him. Its a straight up POV-fork, not a split from a main article and was a valid G10 deletion. We don't take second chances with BLP material. MBisanz ^talk 15:49, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse deletion as a POV fork and attack page. I am not an admin and cannot delete articles. This was the article's second speedy deletion, once under A3 and once under G10. McWomble (talk) 15:51, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Urban Ministries, Inc. (UMI)

Not clear why page was deleted. It says corporate spam, but need to know process for a company to start a Wikipedia page about its history without having it deleted; other Christian publishing companies have Wikipedia pages just like ours that have not been deleted, please explain criteria; UMI is a very significant publisher in the African American community, it makes sense to have an entry on Wikipedia, but need to know how to post one in a way that will be acceptable to Wikipedia's editors; please advise Urbanministries (talk · contribs) 14:30, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article was deleted following a proposed deletion, without explicit discussion, so it will probably be restored shortly (I haven't checked the article though). The information you've asked for can be found at Wikipedia:FAQ/Business. Cheers, Amalthea^Talk 14:40, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Aspidistra (transmitter) (closed)

Ginger Jolie

Contentious deletion of article as the decision by closing admin was "no consensus, default to delete". There has already been an effort to send this to RfA - see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Wizardman's closure of the Ginger Jolie deletion debate. That RfA was speedily rejected as it had not been listed here first. I've taken no sides in this debate yet, despite it occurring in the WP:P* area of which I am a member (declaring my conflicts of interest here folks). I'm merely listing this deletion here for debate to see if the decision is proper, since the most common action after a "no consensus" decision is "keep". Tabercil (talk) 03:04, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Endorse I disagree with the outcome of the close and had I closed the debate I would have closed it as keep. However, this is within the realm of his (?) discretion as an administrator. He (just going with it) could have given the exact same rationale and ended with the bolded phrase "delete". Instead, he noted that consensus had not been reached but argued that other factors in the debate pushed us away from the traditional "default to keep for no consensus", namely BLP and the request for deletion by the subject. I don't want to talk about this setting a precedent or not, because technically nothing we do sets a precedent--this may cause people to close more contentious AfD's as delete even in the absence of consensus, but it probably won't. My suspicion is that regardless of the outcome of the DRV, "no consensus/delete" closes will still be as rare as hens teeth. Protonk (talk) 03:24, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As mentioned in my posts on the closing admins talk page (and his reply to me on mine) I think he characterises the "four camps" in the !vote as:

1. Not notable - delete

2. Delete per subject's request and BLP (no opinion on notable)

3. Keep despite subject request (no opinion on notable)

4. Keep per notability overturning subject request.

And he then stated that 1 and 3 were minor elements and the two large (and balanced) camps were 2 and 4. Since the bulk of the thrust of the #2 position was, I believe, based on the BLP issue, I don't think we had "no consensus" on notability; I think we had no consensus on "delete". I think the actual position on notability was more weighted to her being notable, but that many of the people in cam #2 considered the notability to be low such that the BLP concerns overruled.

As such i think this decision sets a precedent that a person who would be notable enough that their article would survive a third party AfD nomination can, if the subject of the article finds it unhelpful in their life while not stating that the article as a whole is defamatory etc - I don't believe that the key elements of the article, that she modelled for Penthouse and performed in some porn films has been challenged at all - then on the subject's request the article is going to be deleted. This seems to create three classes of people:

1. plainly non notable - delete

2. Very notable - keep no matter what

3. middling notable - keep an article unless the subject doesn't like it

is this really what we want the policy to be?

It opens all kinds of issues: what if someone objects to part of their bio, perhaps from an earlier career. What if "Ms Jolie" does make it big as a model under her new 9own)name and gets an article; must we tyhen ignore her past, even if it's a matter of public record? What about people who don't change their name; former UK glamour model Samantha fox has taken massive exception to being questioned about her topless modelling in recent years (she has stormed out of interviews). Must her bio only start after she started keeping her top on? What youthful indiscretions are "forgiven" and what remain? Criminal records? or just being a member of some silly student political grouping that's now embarrassing?

Again, as I've mentioned elsewhere i don't think the closing admin acted in bad faith. But I think there are huge implications for this closure decision. As a minimum, I think we must settle whether we deleted a notable bio or a non-notable bio. If the latter, things are in some ways simpler (though not simpler for PORNBIO). But the former .... has consequences. My personal position is that she is notable, and I don't believe that was challenged sufficiently. i also believe that if we are to have a "forgiveness" policy it should apply only where there is a distinct change for the person, not a minor career shift. MadScot (talk) 03:28, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Forgiveness" is not the issue. The closures at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seth Finkelstein (2nd), Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Rand Fishkin, and others concluded in deletion without any expectation that the subject was embarking upon a career change. Wikipedia has precedents for courtesy deletion on the biographies of marginally notable subjects. In close calls administrators have weighed the wishes of the article subject. Endorse deletion. Durova^Charge! 03:41, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment As a reply to Madscot. I don't think we need worry too much about the impact of subject requested deletions. I think that administrators and OTRS volunteers have a good nose for obviously bad requests and most of the "subject requested" articles go to AfD, where the obviously notable (or whatever policy/guideline applies) ones are kept and the borderline/nn ones deleted. Something like Rick Ross's AfD following a deletion request shows that we don't slavishly follow them, and that is good. Protonk (talk) 03:49, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse the deletion - Wikipedia does not reward people who are famous with a Wikipedia article because of their fame. The keep because she is famous arguments are weak. Wikipedia articles are not composed of compasion, love, hate, respect, they are composed of words and those words exclusively are to be sourced to reliable sources. There were no arguments that sufficiently rebutted the deletion reasoning that the topic lacked enought reliable source material to maintain an independent article. While the feel-good close seems to try to make some feel good that we done a good thing here and the "no consensus, default to delete" may be justified under Ignore all rules, the bottom line is that without source material to write an article, there is no article to write. The deletion outcome was correct based on the weight of arguments and I endorse the outcome. -- Suntag ☼ 05:18, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. Wizardman put significant thought and thoughtfulness into the close and clearly weighed all opinions. Wizardman's close met the four core requirements of the Rough consensus portion of the Deletion guidelines for administrators: Wizardman use his best judgment, Wizardman attempted to be impartial, Wizardman sought to determine rough consensus, and Wizardman looked at strength of argument. In no way should Wizardman and/or Wizardman's close of Ginger Jolie be subject to any process other than this DRV and the closer of this DRV should list that in clear language. Hats off to the arbitrators for seeking to shut down the above noted arbitration process 21 minutes after it was listed. -- Suntag ☼ 05:43, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Endorse as within reasonable admin discretion. Stifle (talk) 08:14, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse Wizardman's closure was a welcome deviation of the usual !vote counting, with admins sometimes making decisions while saying they think are wrong. Wizardman put a lot of careful thought in the decision and as noted above, could also simply decided "Delete". The decison of "no consensus default to delete" is more honest and, may I use the word, wise. --Crusio (talk) 08:42, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
strongly endorse excellent close, with precedent. Sticky Parkin 13:45, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Overturn Per WP:DEL, no consensus defaults to keep. Discussion on defaulting to delete for BLP articles never reached consensus. Deletion is the last resort under WP:BLP, and the only BLP issue in that article was that the subject requested to take it down. The fact that she had an adult modeling career under a specific name is verifiable and considered notable under WP:PORNBIO and that is not a BLP violation. Morbidthoughts (talk) 14:45, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse per Wizardman's excellent close. Really folks it's time we started realising there's a real world out there, and what we do has consequences. We can quote WP:THIS and WP:THAT to say that because of internal rule 3434(ii) we need to keep this - but the bottom line is we don't. And if a subject feels harmed and you can't convince a majority of wikipedians that the article is important, then why not do the decent thing? Keeping low notability biographies leaves the unhappy subject having to check each day for offending material. I'd urge all admins to consider asking for a positive consensus that an article is important before retaining an objectionable biography. See my essay Wikipedia:Borderline biographies for a previous statement of the argument.--Scott MacDonald (talk) 15:34, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse per common sense, doing the right thing, and not allowing Wikipedia to be used to violate peoples' privacy. I don't care what the policy pages might say at this moment in time. Policy on Wikipedia is whatever we decide to do. We should not keep borderline biographies when the subject does not want them. Per the deletion nom, "It has become a detriment to her work environment and her personal life." Jehochman ^Talk 15:39, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]